Rust? Or when do you rust up a ship?

GMorrison

I always laughed at the part in the movie "The Aviator", where Hughes visits the factory where the Spruce Goose is being built, and there are big showers of sparks as the workers grind on the airframe.

 

Wood dust just isn’t so cinematically spectacular as sparks...

I always laughed at the part in the movie "The Aviator", where Hughes visits the factory where the Spruce Goose is being built, and there are big showers of sparks as the workers grind on the airframe.

Hi Amphib;

 Yeah , that is what we practiced aboard the Midway .If it don't have wings and don't move , Paint It !

cool pic from one of the nyc pilots from fleet week. thought i would throw it in here as a modern example

- sorry guess the pic didnt take

ejhammer

Ahh yes. Painting. With supevision.

 

EJ

 

 

Forgot to say, this was in 1961 when I was aboard ESSEX.

EJ

im noticing those guys leaning... must be some 10 degree rolls going on there at least!

Ah yes, salt water, the true universal solent

Another factor is the size of the ship compared to crew size.  Military ships generally have a larger number of crew per displacement than civil ships, so, except in time of heavy operations one has the hands to do cleanup work.  So I generally only make rust buckets of civil vessels.  I do weather military ships some, but not like I do civil ones, especially those that do not carry passengers (cruise ships, for example, seem to be kept quite clean, versus fishing boats).

Here is my USS Okinawa in the Med 1987.

Yeah, those are old school sailors alright... The Life captions say Jan 1942, and I was wondering on which cruiser the series of photos was taken, and if those guys survived the Solomons campaign. Well this photo answere the question as to which ship. USS Portland, one of the few USN 8” cruisers to survive Guadalcanal.

Now, those are some black shoes.

I had an old school (read jerk) english teacher in Jr. High who was a former Merchant Mariner.

Why are navy ships gray, according to Mr. Jones?

The navy tried black and the seagulls *** white, the navy tried white and the seagulls *** black, so the navy arrived at a compromise.

Ahh yes. Painting. With supevision.

EJ

Hi,

Here is an image of one of the more interesting projects that I ever worked on.  It is a "wooden steam schooner", whatever that actually means.  It was a fascinating little vessel, which unfortuately was eventually scrapped becasuse she has deteriorated so badly.  Admittantly she had been laid up for decades, but you can see the extent of some of the rust (as well as rot) through out the wooden hull 

Pat

[click to see larger image]

You mention LCVPs as an example. If we extend that to the type of ship that carried LCVPs be it an APA, AKA, APD, or LST and if that ship was on its way to the MED, the deck and boat division personnel had a lot of time on their hands. What better way to use it than to paint. So those boats that were accessible would have a fresh coat of paint. Likewise the portions of the mother ship that were accessible without going over the side would get a fresh coat of paint. That would leave the main ship hull and maybe the outboard side of boats hung over the side to need of freshening up upon arrival.

There's an old Navy saying "If it moves salute it, if it doesn't move paint it"