Tug Power

This new page will show photographs of propellors, Kort nozzles, etc. of Hull tugs. Many were very powerful ships with twin screw drive.
The photographs are copies from company magazines of the Humber Tugs and United Towing(Co.) Ltd.
Permission to copy these has been given by Mr.P.N. Wilbraham, director.

Steam And Deisel

The first tugs were steam powered, usually triple-expansion design.
Coal was used in the earlier tugs, then later, oil fired boilers took over which were much better, giving constant power-levels and not needing endless banking-up with fuel.
Oil was cleaner too, and less labour was involved.
Steam powered tugs were very quiet. Engineers could TALK to each other, which was not possible in a deisel engine room. Deisel engines eventually took over, as boilers and furnesses, not to mention the pipework involved, was hard and expemsive to maintain.
My father started on the coal-fired tugs, and as a boy, I sometimes went to these ships with him, lighting the fires in readiness to depart to sea.
I remember the "coal-holes", with little room, and the dirty furnesses.
Deisel tugs were far better, and cleaner. They were much more powerefull too.
Many tugs were converted to deisel in the mid-1900's, but United Towing(Co.) Ltd. bought the Selby shipyard of Cochranes, and so later on, it was easy to build new and more powerful deisel ships to replace the older tugs, originally of steam power.
The first picture is of a tug in dry-dock.
It is a steam tug, with one open propeller
The year is 1908 and the tug is one of Messrs Odell's,---"The Powerful", in dock at Uxbridge,UK.




The "Powerful"















Another propellor shown below, is that of a trawler.
The prop is that of the "Shemara", and was built for an owner in Peterhead.



Myself, and three other men fitted this propellor to the ship at Paull shipyard after boring out the stern bushes by hand.
Shown is the rudder, which is bolted to the "stock" above.
The assembled unit can be seen in the left hand image.
I myself turned this in a lathe at Jack Hepworth's shipyard at Paull
. It is shown in another photograph before fitting to the ship.

In comparison to the old Steam Tug "Powerful", is the 1967 picture of th Hull Tug "Englishman, as she was on the slipway, after modification,--including the fitting of two "Kort Nozzles", new propellers, and couplings.




Englishman 1967
The Kort nozzles are very large, owing to the massive propellers, which increased "Bollard Pull" to about 45Tons.














The next picture is the business end of the Hull tug Superman, having work done in the dry dock.
Note the "A" frame and port side propellor being worked on.
























Page Updated- 09-October-2007