Swedish Beauty

[Brian Probetts (Site Admin)]

Fifty years ago, in December 1965, workers at the illustrious John Brown shipyard at Clydebank in Scotland were busily adding the finishing touches to the 27,000-ton Kungsholm.
Seen here at Copenhagen with the earlier Gripsholm (1957), the 661-ft long Kungsholm was easily one of the most beautiful ships of her time.
She first entered service in May 1966.

[Doc Vernon]

Hello Brian
Like some of the other Posts you have put on these old Ships were in a class of their own ,as so many others in that Era.
Today all these giants although some really magnificent,i still cannot get to like them!
Give me the good old Liners anyday ,the feel of them,the look of them and the rest!
Where did they all go! So Sad!
Cheers and thanks

[Chris Allman]

I have to agree. These floating blocks of flats of today share no resemblance to the ' liners ' of our days. Elegant lines, each with a distinctive air of grace and beauty the likes of which will not be seen again. They looked good, they sailed well and they were much beloved by their passengers who went out of their way to make repeated voyages on them. Thanks Brian, a reminder of ships, proper ships, not floating boxes full to the gunwales with masses of people, floating holiday camps powering from port after port, just like livestock carriers.

[John Callon]

As I have said before in my opinion the most graceful liner ever built was the Queen Elizabeth. Her lines were perfect and the passenger accommodation luxurious. I would say a close second would have to be the Caronia. Again a liner with the graceful lines of a yacht.
Regards
John C

[happy daze john in oz]

Thanks Brian, a reminder of ships, proper ships, not floating boxes full to the gunwales with masses of people, floating holiday camps powering from port after port, just like livestock carriers.[/QUOTE]


They can be with some of the bigger ones, but it is the fastest growing tourist industry in the world. Here in Oz currently growing at 20% per year.

[John Arton]

On gcaptain it is reported that Carnival have just placed an order for 4 more liners. They (carnival) virtually control the cruise liner market owning Carnival, Cunard, P & O, Holland America plus some others.
In total they either own or control a fleet of 99 ships.
Not bad for a company that started out with one ship, the Empress of Canada and whose originator, Mickey Arison, was backed with money from CPR.
rgds
JA

[Keith Tindell]

I see these horrible looking ships almost every day here in the Solent, i still believe one day they will prove to be of not good design, i have no qualification in saying that, but still think a ship has to look right. I understand that to save weight , the upper decks are built of aluminium , and we all know what happened to HMS Sheffield in the Faulkland war. Just my thoughts from a long ago seaman, kt

[Ivan Cloherty]

I remember many moons ago being on a ship which had an alumium bridge fitted above the captain's deck, I know things have moved on in technology and I am no metallurgist, but that system was trouble from day one, first it had to be special primers and paints, two pack having to be mixed just prior to use and had to be applied within a couple of hours, all very time consuming; then the aluminium was welded to the steel of the housing and deck below and they flexed at different wavelengths when in a seaway, causing welds to break, most repairers didn't carry the special rods for joining two vastly different metals, both requiring different temperatures with a risk of the aluminium melting; so some bright spark decided that riveting was the answer, using steel rivets, for some reason this accelerated corrosion of the rivet holes at certain stress points in the aluminium causing leaking on the bridge deck, short term solution macgregor hatch tape over the rivet heads and then painted white. In a heavy seaway you could see the for'd bridge bulkhead flexing, so I was not in favour of aluminium structures then, and nothing has changed my mind in the interim.

[happy daze john in oz]

In reply to #6 Carnival who you rightly say own most of the companies also changes ownership when suited.
The Oz market is growing with P&O being one of the major players here, but they aim for a certain market. young, 18 to 30, big drinkers who are not too fussed about the food but want a good time. They offer cheaper fares than some of the others but the 'extras' are in a larger number. To meet this demand they have taken two Holland America ships and renamed them to fit the P&O Oz fleet. Next May 2017 one of the Princess line will join them as well.
From what I know and have been told by those who have cruised with P&O both here in Oz and P&O UK the UK arm is a far better organization. But it is a different market in UK with a different approach to what is on offer.

[Peter F Chard]

Hi Ivan, If you have dis-similar metals in contact with each other you have an anode and a cathode, If there is a liquid around as well the you have an electrolyte and you now have a cell with the result that the lesser noble metal will corrode. This is what happened to those early ships, Canberra was a prime example. I am a fan of steel hulled ships with alloy ( aluminium to you ) superstructures. The trick is to separate the steel and the aluminium and you get over this by using structural transition joints - these are blocks of aluminium and steel joined together in such a way that liquid cannot get between the two layers, They are made either by rubbing steel and alloy sheets together at high speed until they bond together by sheer heat ( In the UK and Europe ) or as in the USA, fusing them together with an explosive detonation. As long as the transition joint are kept dry you will not have a problem. Regards Peter in NZ.