haida: now served with working engines

It's been a while since Haida has stretched her sea legs -- 10+ years. While sea trials may still be in the (very) distant future, the engineers gave a preview this week of what's waiting to roar to life.

M.Y. Haida has been moored in Port Khalid, Sharjah during an extensive overhaul and refit for the last several years.

Haida is powered by two Enterprise medium-speed diesel engines that produce about 1000 hp each. She's been reported to reach almost 19 knots, but sea trial data from 1947 report a speed of 16.7 knots at max engine RPM. Over the last year, the refit support team has been working to locate replacement head gaskets for the Enterprise engines. As you can imagine, it's not easy getting parts for an engine built in the early 1940s. After searching around the United States, the engineering team in Sharjah decided to fabricate the head gaskets. With a little (read: quite a bit) of love and care, the engineers put the Enterprise engines back online.

The three-bladed, 65" propellers await the command of the reinstated air control system.

Port astern, starboard ahead.

This picture was taken while the port engine was going astern. In these early quayside tests, the engines are only going 150-200 RPM. 

This is the engine control station that has been temporarily installed as a bridge wing station. Control air signals from this stand travel down to the engine room.

The Enterprise engines have been modified to accept the control air signal. This eliminates the need for a telegraph; however, the engines can still be controlled from the engine room.

More quayside tests will be necessary before the engines will be ready to go to sea. In the mean time, work continues on restoring the interior and updating the vessel's systems. 

If you squint, you can make out the puffs of smoke coming from the funnel. Haida will celebrate her 64th birthday this year.

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Posted in: Enterprise,haida,haida photos,work photos

let's do this again

Wipe the dust off your luggage! It's time to do this Winter Work thing one last time.

So, while I'm packing my bags to head back to Dubai, I should probably bring you up to speed...

Last January, I flew out to the UAE to intern on a yacht restoration project, henceforth "The Haida Project." Haida was launched in 1947 by Bath Iron Works in Bath, Maine, USA. There's a short background on the project here. Shortly after my arrival, the vessel was towed from her berth in Port Khalid, Sharjah to Al Jadaf Shipyard in Dubai. We waited almost two weeks before the shipyard had room to lift Haida. The lift itself was quite an undertaking. Ten years had elapsed since Haida's last docking, and shipyard and dry dock officials were concerned about the vessel settling onto the keel blocks squarely. There's an account of Haida's dry docking here.

After getting Haida out of the water, the shipyard went to work replacing steel plates that were worn from 63 years of cruising the Northern Pacific, Atlantic, and Mediterranean. The shipyard also fitted new stabilizing fins and installed underwater lights. The entire process lasted more than three months, but when they finished with a fresh coat of paint, Haida looked ready to cruise again.

That ready-to-cruise look was merely on the exterior. When I returned in July, the cabin spaces were in the process of a face lift, nay, a deep cleansing, er... stripping. At her launch, Haida was a cutting edge yacht, outfitted with the latest technologies, many fresh from developments made in World War II. The present owner wants to restore Haida to that glory by outfitting her with advanced systems. In order to do that, it was necessary to cut out most of the joinery work on the interiors. My summer work included sizing air conditioning units, taking freeboard measurements, and an assortment of CAD projects. The summer in Sharjah also meant avoiding the outrageous 120° weather.

Since the summer, the consortium of engineers, designers, and consultants have been working on several important projects including the addition of two watertight bulkheads, a new retractable, azimuthing stern thruster, and revised crew accommodation arrangements.

Phew. A semester's worth of dust sure does cake up. So this January, I'll head back to Haida to keep working on the restoration. I'll be joined by one of my classmates, and together we will tackle planning the piping systems. It's like marine engineering class all over again.

Well, you better dust off your luggage, too. Let's do this again.

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Posted in: announcements,haida,traveling

victory in newport

I pulled out of Newport, Rhode Island on a crisp Thursday morning after spending the last two days working with David Pedrick, a Webb alumnus from the Class of 1970 on the Haida project. One of my tasks this summer is to move the watertight bulkhead arrangement project along so that ABS can approve construction drawings, and Haida can be one step closer to satisfying the most stringent, modern rules and regulations. David and I spent time in February surveying Haida to determine the least obtrusive locations to install additional watertight bulkheads. For the non-naval architects in the readership, watertight bulkheads allow a vessel to be compartmentalized under the main deck to increase the survivability of the vessel in the event of a breach of the hull. Yes, it's the same concept that almost worked for the RMS Titanic. For compartmentalization to work, the entire compartment has to be watertight. In other words, water should not be able to spill over the top of one bulkhead into the next compartment. This past week we laid the proposed bulkheads over a general arrangement of the vessel to see how the bulkheads would affect crew and guest movement and piping and ducting runs. I will use these preliminary drawings in Sharjah to assess whether the proposed locations are the most convenient for ease of construction.

The buzz word this week has been "iterative," as in design is an iterative process. Iteration works well on paper and computer screens. In AutoCAD, mere key strokes and mouse movements can reposition the bulkhead in seconds. When one starts to iterate a design that has already been built, complications arise, particularly in ship design. On a ship, yacht, or even your neighbor's small fishing boat, each system interacts with all of the other systems. A minor change to one component will likely require a change on several other components in other systems. Again, iteration or design changes work well on paper. System changes in the real world can require removing existing systems to gain access to change the design. Do that over and over again for, say, ten years, and you can see why a solid design plan can make the difference between a quick refit and a long overhaul.

Newport offered many new experiences to me beyond working in David's office. On Lynn's recommendation, I had lobster quesadillas at the Red Parrot on South Thames Street. I toured the Newport Shipyard and saw a great collection of 12-m America's Cup boats. David was a principal member of the design team for several of the boats; he had a story for each boat we encountered. (The weather was overcast on the day that we looked at the 12-m boats; I'll take pictures when I return to Newport in early August.)

The Red Parrot

Of course, that same crisp Thursday morning that I was trying to make way for New York to fly home, the BMW Oracle racing team landed in Newport as part of the victory tour. Although the impressive catamaran wasn't in attendance, the fruit of BMW Oracle's hard fight was – the America's Cup trophy. The stately, silver cup stood atop a carbon fiber pedestal -- a true juxtaposition of the old world tradition and modern technology. After meeting a formidable “who’s who” from the sailing community, I loaded up the Jeep and raced back to Glen Cove to catch the train for my flight home.

The America's Cup

I’ll be home for five days before flying over to Dubai. Those five days will be my summer vacation, so I won’t be updating the blog during that time. Rest assured, we’ll have plenty to discuss once I get back to the Middle East. Enjoy the Fourth of July weekend!

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Posted in: america's cup,haida,leisure photos,newport,traveling

January 28, 2009: haida rises

For someone who has only been working with Haida for three weeks, Thursday was surprisingly emotional for me. Docking a vessel, even one that has not moved under its own power for more than 10 years, is like putting a person in a medically induced coma for an operation. The graving dock is the admitting room. As Haida slowly rose out of the water, she painfully parted with the water that held her, gave life to her engines, and let her glide freely around the world. As her weight transferred to the steel railway carriage and chock blocks, the soft plea to stop the lift could faintly be heard. And as the last drops of water ran down the keel and fell to the lift's deck, Haida knew that she wouldn't likely feel the Dubai Creek for many months.

Haida glides into the synchrolift with the assistance of the towing ropes.

The synchrolift gradually brings Haida out of the water.

It was done; she was ready to be transferred to her operating room, a berth just meters away from the synchrolift that admitted her to Al Jadaf. The nurses, men in blue coveralls emblazoned with a Goltens "G," quickly moved in to prep for surgery. They immediately attended to her underwater plating that was in dire need of scraping. In some places the marine growth was almost three inches thick. Tiny microcosms of barnacles, coral, and crabs had taken refuge everywhere on the hull. Scrape by scrape the growth fell to the ground. Scott rescued three tiny crabs from a giant chunk that fell intact. "You three are the chosen ones," he said as he picked up another crab. "Well, you four are the chosen ones. You (might) live to see another day in the Creek."

The men from the Goltens Ship Repair quickly tackle scraping and washing the underwater portion of the hull.

After scraping the bow stem, this chunk of coral fell onto the steel railway carriage. It is larger than my hand.

When the nurses finished a section of scraping, more men would come behind to pressure wash the hull to remove the remaining debris. Everyone worked very quickly to scrape and bathe Haida before the growth dried out.

The sun set on Haida ending her first day out of the water in 10 years. The shipyard noise softened to a dull roar. Over the next 60 days and beyond, Haida will undergo countless procedures: steel renewal, sea chest installations, the addition of underwater lighting, and others. The most involved operation will be the removal of the existing stabilizing fins and the installation of four new fins. Time will tell what other tasks might be added to her schedule.

For now, it seems the work day grows longer as doctors and nurses scurry to put Haida back into her prime condition.

The Cayman ensign flies stiffly in Thursday's strong winds.

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Posted in: al jadaf,haida,haida photos,work photos

January 27, 2010: anglers?

First things first. Go right now and open Microsoft Word. Type "fishermen" without the quotations. You may want to put it in a sentance or type a few other words. Did a green grammar line squiggle its way underneath fishermen? Hmm. Right click on the word and select "About this Sentence." Microsoft has included fishermen, or fisherman, in a slew of gender-specific words that the grammar check should advise you to avoid. The replacement for fishermen: anglers. The replacement for stewardess: flight attendant. ABC's Desperate Housewives is retitled Desperate Homemakers.

In other news, we're (probably) one day away from the Haida being lifted for the first time in 10 years. It seems everyone from the company wants to be there to see what her bottom looks like. I imagine that it will be covered with marine growth and smell horrible. I'll definitelly be taking pictures.

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Posted in: haida

January 23, 2010: you typical american, you

Tonight, I failed. After two weeks, I sunk to being an American on holiday. My offense? At Scott's suggestion, I asked the hotel front desk if there were any additional English channels. Let's face it. There are three (2.5, really) English channels at the hotel: BBC World, CNN World, and some Middle Eastern channel that plays Grade D movies that are too unworthy of Arabic dubs. Sometimes this channel will play a home shopping program; however, I guess in the minds of the locals it is worthy of being dubbed. (Can't you just picture the 50-60 year old women sitting at home watching an Arab version of QVC? Who says that the Middle East is different from the US?)

In other news, work has dulled to a low roar in what is surely the calm before the storm. Haida is (may*) come up for docking this week on Thursday. As I have learned in the last two weeks, a confirmed and contracted lift date means nothing. Scott doesn't expect to see her out until the weekend. In actuality, it may be better for the project if Haida doesn't dock until Saturday. If she does come up on Thursday, it would undoubtedly be late in the day (again, nothing's ever on time.) Friday is the holy day, so she would just sit there instead of being scraped, blasted, and surveyed. In the mean time, I'm spinning between schematics for the heating system (hot water sent through convectors) and the sewage system. Scott has also asked me to look into a ship stores program. I'm dusting off the VBA skills and working up some code.

Scott held a barbeque at his villa on Friday. It was a nice time with great food and music. He's been educating me during the drives to and from work with music (hmm... everyone always wants to educate me about music.) Friday night he put on DVDs of Whitesnake, Steve Vai, and Joe Satriani. We also watched some kitesurfing and paragliding videos. Watch out world! If the Sharjah shores catch any wind, I might try some kitesurfing.

In the mean time, here's a picture of the only kite that would fly in the light, weekend winds.

I want to get back to my Sharjah Museums Department tour later this week. My next adventure will take me to the Sharjah Natural History Museum and Botanical Gardens. I also want to check out the Maritime Museum, a short walk from the aquarium.

One final note. It seems that special guests are a staple in any of my blog series. Some of you may recall Adventures in Salisbury from my freshman winter work in Salisbury, Maryland. My winter work mate Katie and I put together five video blog episodes during our two-month internship at the shipyard. In one episode, Katie and I were sent to Jacksonville to deliver a roll of carpet and some windows for a cruise ship. While we were carpet bagging, I surprised Mother at her school. In February, Making Waves will feature her yet again as she treks out to the UAE for a week-long holiday. I can't wait to blog about that.

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Posted in: haida,leisure photos

January 19, 2010: Chirp goes the cuckoo

Remember those cuckoo birds that chirped relentlessly when I didn't have my itinerary? Yes. It seems that they also chirp if I don't chirp, er... post regularly. Not to fear! I'll update you on the goings-on in Sharjah.

Scheduling conflicts prohibited me from popping over to Al Jadaf on Monday. By scheduling conflicts, I mean the ABS attending surveyor showed up at the office to talk about underwater lighting and the oily water separator. I'm glad that I didn't go to the shipyard because I learned a lot by being in the meeting. At some point, I really would like to intern with ABS on the survey/tonnage side of the business. It's fascinating stuff, and I think it would be a great way to learn the ins and outs of the ABS regulations. After we finished the meeting it was impractical to drive over to Al Jadaf (see: Dubai rush hour traffic; cross reference: parking lot.)

To avoid the Dubai traffic, we settled on leaving the hotel at 6:30am this morning. Those familiar with Sharjah-Dubai traffic are already shaking their heads. We should have left at 5:00am if we were really intent on avoiding the traffic. This morning a simple, 15-minute drive at any other time lasted almost two hours. Oy! I'll take NY traffic any day. Aside from roads being pushed beyond their limits, a real source of the delay is the sheer number of (stupid) drivers that take "shortcuts" off of the shoulder and reenter traffic no more than three cars ahead of where they left. The slowdowns that result from said drivers trying to merge cause a good bit of grief.

This morning was no exception. Most of the shoulder is fenced so that drivers can't "make-their-own-bypass," but just as soon as a break appeared in the fence, there were cars darting off to chase the "shortcut."

Haida is still waiting patiently outboard of a small cargo ship to see her day (see: eternity) on dry land. Unconfirmed speculators have said that Thursday, Jan 21 looks promising, but I'm not holding my breath.

Today I traced some of the piping that I've been plotting from the original plans. Note to self: designs on paper seldom see execution. Supposing that you are fortunate to have a shipyard that builds exactly to spec without some laborer deciding that you, the engineer, really wanted that pipe welded instead of threaded, a half-century of operators will surely muck up your design. I wasn't really surprised to find modifications from the original schematics, particularly on the fuel oil service system. I wasn't expecting the globe valves on the fuel oil lines to have been replaced by ball valves. I also didn't expect the new diesel generator's fuel line to branch off of the day tanks before the fuel strainer. Oh well.

In preparation for the eventual dry docking, the new bow thruster and stabilizing fins were offloaded today. After the crane had neatly placed the assorted crates on the pier, I went up to the yard's office to hire, er... rent, a forklift and driver. Who knew that moving and weighing seven crates could be such an ordeal. So often it is the simple tasks that take too long (see: Haida refit.) After finding a chap, er... guy, to drive the forklift it took another two hours to move everything. The wayward sheep kept doing other odd jobs to help out his coworkers -- moving little bits of scrap or things instead of moving our cargo. My favorite moment was in the middle of the last transport. The driver decided that a smaller forklift would due, so he abandoned the nice, new forklift to go find a smaller, older one. Twenty minutes later, the wayward sheep returned. Just classic. He's lucky he doesn't work for IMI. He'd never make it on one of the supply boats.

On the long rides between Dubai and Sharjah, Scott and I have been talking about UAE politics, construction projects, and environmentalism. Did you know that Abu Dhabi is the home of the International Renewable Energy Agency's world headquarters? (See: travesty.) At some point I will do an entire post about all of the great energy saving (wasting*) construction methods used here in Sharjah and Dubai. I'll follow that post with a lesson on infrastructure planning and why it was not necessary (necessary*) to install a central sewer system in Dubai. After all, why wouldn't you want a cesspool truck to come to your house and business each day to pump out your tank?

Oy! Scott is allowing me to work from the hotel tomorrow while he goes back to Al Jadaf. Thank goodness I don't have to get up at 5:30 again. I have several other posts in the works, so keep reading and commenting!

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Posted in: ABS,al jadaf,dubai,haida,sharjah

January 15, 2010: the office

Friday is the holy day for Muslims. As a result, the Arabic weekend is different from the American weekend. Friday and Saturday are considered the weekend here in Sharjah instead of Saturday and Sunday. My employer and most businesses are closed on Friday and usually open half a day on Saturday.

While the offshore base is closed on Fridays, Captain Scott and the Haida team are hard at work. Friday is a great time to get work accomplished in the Port because it is practically void of other workers. While Haida is in drydock, Fridays will be a time of renewal and cleaning in preparation for the coming week's tasks. (How's that for a holy day?)

Today, Scott and I went into the Sharjah office to do some drawings and reports. While I worked on a misting system arrangement, Scott took George over to Al Jadaf to check on Haida and the watch crew. I took advantage of the quiet office to take some pictures.

The front door to the M/Y Haida project office. This was the offshore company's first office in Sharjah before moving next door.

I acquired the old project manager's office. Copies of Haida's plans from the 1940s are kept in the chart cabinet on the left.

It wouldn't be the Arabian Gulf without oil platforms. These rigs are at Port Khalid for repair. The closest rig was towed all the way from

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Posted in: haida,oil platforms,work photos

January 13, 2010: haida

My work with the Haida (HI-duh) project is both interesting and slightly sad. The yacht was beautiful in its day. Haida was built for Major Max Fleischmann in 1946. At the time, it was the largest pleasure yacht ever built, with an overall length of 168 feet. Major Fleischmann built 22 yachts over his lifetime; Haida was "America's Oustanding Seagoing Diesel Yacht."

The owner of the offshore company acquired Haida in 1999 from Malaysia. The vessel was towed to the Arabian Gulf and Port Khalid in Sharjah. Since her acquisition, a lengthy restoration and retrofitting project has progressed, albeit slowly. The yacht's captain has overseen the work for the last 10 years. He has been instrumental in maintaining the aesthetics and beauty of the vessel. The project team has been open to many questions, but one topic is strictly off-limits: the timeline. The captain said today that two years ago he thought he was beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Today, he doesn't see the light anymore.

That's a pretty big statement considering that Haida left Port Khalid today for a drydock in Dubai. She was beautiful even under tow and in her mothballed state. This will be the first time Haida has been grounded since she was acquired 10 years ago. You can expect her bottom to be in a disgraceful state -- 10 years of warm, Arabian Gulf waters will have cultured marine growth and corrosion like no other. I'll be going on location to photograph the docking.

In the meantime, here are two pictures of Haida leaving Port Khalid this morning. The first picture was right in front of the berth. The second picture (now my desktop wallpaper - I'll be emailing it to a marine engineering professor this evening, too) was taken through the manmade rift-raft (edit: rip rap) that protects the port from erosion.

The tow is set for Haida near her berth in Port Khalid.

Haida through the rip rap as she leaves Port Khalid for Dubai.

I hope to take more pictures tomorrow of the port and the offshore supply vessels. Aside from the opportunity to take these pictures, I've also been working on schematics of the HVAC system's chilled water circuit. It appears that a lot of my job will be redrawing the old prints into AutoCAD for updating and submitting to ABS.

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Posted in: haida,haida photos,work photos