After the extensive loosening of the shipbuilding restrictions of the Potsdam Agreement , North German Lloyd rebuilt its cargo ship fleet from 1950. Starting with series such as the Rheinstein class and acquisitions, the NDL fleet grew again continuously. In 1954, North German Lloyd ordered a series from the Brandenstein class for the North Atlantic service from Bremer Vulkan . On July 20, 1955, the shipping company was able to take over the Tannstein , the type ship, from the shipyard. On December 29, 1956, the last ship of the octet, the Bodenstein , was taken over.
Differences in the series
The Tannstein and the following ship, the Torstein , received an unusual propulsion configuration consisting of two engines for cost reasons. In each case, a MAN two-stroke diesel engine built in 1939 from remnants of the Danzig shipyard worked with a 6-cylinder four-stroke diesel engine of the type MAN 45/66 on a common transmission. With 14.5 knots, these ships proved to be too slow, which is why both ships received a 8-cylinder two-stroke engine of the type MAN K8Z 70/120 with 8,480 hp at the Howaldts works in Hamburg. This finally enabled 17 knots. The Birkenstein and all following ships received a two-stroke diesel engine of the type MAN G8Z 78/140 with 9000 HP. From the outside, the other motorization was recognizable by the elongated funnels and a difference on the boat deck of the superstructure, through which the chambers of the master and the first officer were expanded. The last three ships in the series, Blankenstein , Bartenstein and Bodenstein , had an extended forecastle with a larger forward cargo space and were measured as full-deckers with the same dimensions.
Use at the NDL
The first three ships, the Tannstein , Torstein and Birkenstein , were used for the West Coast South America service, while similarly large HAPAG ships operated jointly in parallel . Tannstein and Torstein were registered with the Roland-Linie Schiffahrtsgesellschaft until 1959 and were then incorporated directly into the NDL. The company acted as the developer and buyer of the freighters. Lloyd had revived it in order to avoid confiscation due to any old debts in the post-war years. The same procedure was used under the Orlanda-Reederei GmbH for the following four ships. The last two ships will be taken over directly by the NDL. The last five units were integrated into the joint North Atlantic service with Hapag, which made it possible to offer weekly departures to New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Norfolk and Newport News. The first six ships received lloyd yellow chimneys only in 1959 when they were incorporated into Lloyd. When the NDL merged with HAPAG, the series became the joint property of the new Hapag-Lloyd , but was still used in normal service. Later, the increasing containerization first displaced the ships of the North Atlantic Service to other shipping areas. In 1972 Hapag-Lloyd sold the Tannstein and the Torstein to the Ocean Tramping Company in Mogadishu . The remaining six ships were outsourced to Hapag-Lloyd International SA in Panama in October / November 1974, but continued to be operated with Bremen as their home port. On October 7, 1976, the Breitenstein from the Soc. Armadora Diego Ass. Bought in Panama and continued to operate as Diego , the Bischofsstein went on December 13, 1976 as Pantera to the Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC). The Bodenstein was sold to Chung Chiao Shipping in Singapore in April 1977 . The Pacific International Lines (PIL) from Singapore finally took over the last three ships with the Birkenstein , Blankenstein and Bartenstein in August and September 1977 and put them into service as Kota Berani , Kota Bakti and Kota Benar .
Later career
Although the last ship of the series was built, the former Bodenstein arrived on June 15, 1979 under the name New Panther as the first to be demolished in Hsinkiang. Two and a half years later, on December 30, 1982, the Diego reached the scrapping yards near Gadani in Pakistan for scrapping. In 1983 both the MSC's Pantera and the two PIL ships Kota Bakti and Kota Benar were scrapped. The Tannstein and the Torstein were used from December 1972 as Meiru and Meiki by the Ocean Tramping Company in Mogadishu , brought under the Panama flag in 1976 and 1977 and, like the Kota Berani , although they were the oldest ships, were the last ships until 1986 canceled the series.
