Mc Kechnie Gas Dreadnought

The following bulletin is a translation from Marineblad, 22th year 1907 / 1908, number 4.

J Mc Kechnie, director of the steam sector at Vickers, held a speech at the convention “Institute of Naval Architects”, about combustion engines as primary engines aboard ships.

His primary argument was that the large funnels could be dropped, giving more space amidships for mounting large guns. Furthermore, the weight savings allow for more heavy guns to be placed. The judgement of the feasibility of combustion propelled ships he oughted as probable. He designed a ship of the line of 16000 ton. The layout of the gas engines is in 3 sections. The 4 shafts are each driven by a 10 cylinder vertical gas engine. The gas generators are divided into two compartments. The last section is in the foremost section containing 4 sets of air pressure pumps.

A table is provided with the primary advantages.

	Steam Engine	Gasmotor Engine	Liquid Fueled Motors
I.P.K.	16 000	16 000	16 000
Machinery weight	1585 ton	1105 ton	750 ton
IPK / ton	10,1	14,48	21,33
Occupied space	7250 square feet	5850 square feet	1110 square feet
Fuel per hour per IPK at full power	0,7 kg	0,45 kg	0,3 kg
idem, ¼ power	0,75 kg	0,5 kg	0,35 kg

Further advantages considered are the better protection of munition against heat and the lower temperatures in the machinery rooms.
Another design was provided of a torpedo boat destroyer with liquid fueled combustion engines.

In the discussions, Sir W. White asked how many IHP the largest as of yet built combustion engine could produce. Receiving the answer of 800 IHP, Sir W. White called the design of 16000 IHP a sport design.

Source: Marineblad jrg 22, 1907/1908 [volgno 4]. Geraadpleegd op Delpher, https://resolver.kb.nl/resolve?urn=dts:2305004:mpeg21:0001