Published Resources Details Journal Article
- Title
- A new torpedo boat
- In
- The Engineer
- Imprint
- vol. 65, 30 March 1888, p. 263
- Description
Accession No.177
- Abstract
So much attention had been directed towards the larger and faster first-class torpedo boats that the design of more seaworthy second-class boats had been neglected. Messrs. Yarrow and Co., Poplar, had submitted designs for a new type of second-class torpedo boat to the Admiralty. These new boats were radically different from their predecessors; they were 60 feet long by 8 feet 6 inches beam, with a flat floor, and moderate draught. As a result they were extremely stiff, had a greater metacentric height, and were very stable. One of these boats had successfully completed a voyage from the Thames to Portsmouth during very rough weather thereby proving the seaworthiness of these vessels. This boat had a displacement of eleven and a quarter tons (light), and fifteen tons when fully equipped, armed and coaled. During an official trial on the Thames the fully loaded vessel averaged a speed of 17 knots over a period of four hours of continuous steaming. This was the longest full-speed steam trial undertaken by any torpedo boat in the British Navy. The triple-expansion engines indicated 250 horsepower at 500 revolutions per minute, with steam supplied by a locomotive marine boiler. Representatives of the British Government had also investigated a smaller boat, length 56 feet, beam 8 feet 3 inches, weighing 10 tons light and 14 tons loaded.