OIL FUEL BUNKERING Owing to the many advantages of oil fuel, oil bunkering has become a most important factor. Compared with coal it takes but a tithe of the time to bunker ; dust and smoke are avoided; trimming is no longer necessary ; no ashes have to be disposed of ; moreover, for equal fuel value, oil takes less bunkering space. The loss of heat which, in the case of coal, is occasioned by the cleaning of the fires, is avoided, since oil fuel can be supplied continuously and a constant pressure of steam maintained all the time.
Oil-fuel bunkering is an extremely simple process and may be performed either on the quay or, more frequently, from the waterside, from floating tanks or "hulks." There are three pos sible means of dealing with the problem : The oil may be pumped into the vessel ; or, if the storage receptacles are overhead, it may be delivered by gravity; or air pressure can be applied to closed tanks and the oil thus forced through pipe-lines to the bunkers of the vessel to be served. Owing to the inflammable nature of the oil it is preferable not to supply it from the quay of a general dock, but this is, none the less, frequently the practice. In some cases, the oil mains from the depots are floating, but submerged under water, as in the method employed by the Anglo-Mexican Oil Company. Conveyance through measuring pumps is the prac tice commonly in vogue, through mains ranging from Bin. to Join. and even i 2in. diameter. Pumps of the Worthington-Simp son, and Hall types, etc., have been used for this purpose, having capacities up to 25o tons per hour, employing a loin. pipe-line. As a rule the pumps are located at the depot, but many of the oil-bunkering steamers carry their own pumps for taking in fuel from floating depots.
At the Immingham Dock, where the largest ships are bunkered and where the largest tankers can unload, the oil storage tanks, of a total capacity of 2,280,000 gal., have connecting pipe-lines running from the tank into the dock and also to the eastern and western jetties, which afford excellent advantages for bunkering from the main store. These pipe-lines are of loin. and Jain. diameter and are equipped with a number of oil delivery connec tions.
Such vessels as the "Aquitania" take in the whole of their oil fuel—about 2,000 tons—from a tanker in six hours, through two pipe-lines; one such vessel has been bunkered in the Armstrong yard in four hours. (G. F. Z.)