Rope ship
A rope ship pulled itself forward on a rope in the river with the help of a winch powered by a steam engine. Up to 15 barges were pulled. This method was used on the Rhine , Havel , Spree , Danube and Oder with varying degrees of success.
development
Before the use of prime movers, the rivers were mainly used for graining . With the invention of steam engines, tugs replaced people, oxen and horses as traction. Chain tractors or rope tractors had a lower coal consumption, as there was no slip between the wheel or propeller and water. This technology of rope steam tugs, also known as Tauer, has long been used in river ferries. In Belgium, France and the USA they were used to pull barges upriver with special ships. This technology was tested and promoted around 1866 by Baron de Mesnil and Baron van Havre (Belgian attaches in Washington) in the USA on the Erie Canal with technical support from Max Eyth , a Swabian engineer from the English machine factory Fowler (manufacturer of steam plows). In 1868 this method was implemented on the Meuse and from 1870 onwards it was introduced on the Rhine , as the originally planned chain shipping could not be implemented. This was due to the particularly critical sections of the river with tight turns and torrential currents, in which the chain-towed steamers could not dodge the oncoming rafts and tow trains far enough. The main goal was to reduce the coal consumption of steam engines in comparison to the tugboat and thereby reduce the transport costs, especially for bulk goods such as coal, ore and steel.
Rope tugboat
The first rope ships, or rather rope tugs, for the Rhine were built around 1870 by Ewald Berninghaus and the Ruhrort shipyard of the Guten Hoffnungshütte for the price of around 30,000 thalers. The steam engines for driving the two propellers and the cable apparatus came from Escher Wyss AG and Sulzer Brothers (Switzerland). The heart of these tugs was the rope apparatus , consisting of a "flap drum" and three guide pulleys that were mounted on the side of the ships. Max Eyth played a major role in the development . The key drum had a complicated mechanism, it was driven by a steam engine. The flap drum was supplied by Fowler & Co. , (Leeds, GB), which originally developed it for steam plows.
Implementation on the Rhine
The introduction of this technology on the Rhine was made more difficult by the resistance of the tugboat companies, the authorities that awarded the concessions and the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–1871. It was planned that the Tauer would pull itself upstream on the rope with the barges and go downstream with the two propellers. The ferry traffic caused technical difficulties because there were only a few bridges over the Rhine. Most of the ferries were pulled across the river with hand or steam winches on ropes or chains. These ropes or chains naturally collided with the ropes lying lengthways in the river.
Rope shipping on the Rhine began in March 1873 and from May 1st to June 27th, 15 tug trains with a total of 74 barges (234,370 quintals of cargo) were towed from Emmerich to Duisburg at 4 to 5 km / h. The specific towing costs calculated on the coal consumption amounted to 0.06 pfennigs per mile, for normal steam tugs at the same speed, 0.33 pfennigs per mile were calculated over six times as much. However, the rope costs have to be taken into account, which were considerable as the rope had to be replaced approximately every 5 years. Chain shipping chains were more expensive but lasted twice as long. The wire rope from Ruhrort to Mannheim cost around 350,000 thalers, the ropes were supplied by the Cologne company Felten & Guilleaume .
End of the rope tug on the Rhine
The technology was used in the period from 1870 to 1905, but as the traffic increased, it was found to be a nuisance by the other ships. Up to 20 rope breaks per year, rope or chain-bound cross traffic, current regulation, the switch from wooden to iron and steel barges and, last but not least, falling coal prices meant that rope tug shipping on the Rhine remained a temporary solution for this period. Advances in propulsion technology made new solutions possible for shipping companies, as the efficiency of steam propulsion systems was increased by a factor of 5 to 10 from 2 to 3%. The specific fuel costs were reduced by the same factor. The size and weight of these steam propulsion systems decreased considerably, the efficiency of the propellers was increased and the shape of the ship was also optimized for lower resistance. This enabled the speeds of the steam tugs and barges with their own propulsion to be increased.
Literature and Sources
- When the witches hauled ships, Lars U.Scholl, Ernst Kabel Verlag 1985 ISBN 3-8225-0006-2