Type Y (ship type)

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The standard ships of the type "Y" belong to the group of Empire ships . They were built in British shipyards during World War II .

details

Against the background of the initially successful German submarine war of World War II, there was a shortage of cargo space on the British side. The British government switched the construction of ships in the UK shipbuilding industry to the construction of standard ships soon after the start of the war . The first general cargo ships built in series were the types "X" and "Y".

The design of the type "Y" was created by the shipyard Joseph L. Thompson and Sons , which also delivered the first ship of the type, the Empire Liberty , in November 1941 . The design was based on the then common British trampoline ships with a load capacity of around 10,000 tons. The superstructures of the ships were arranged amidships and divided in the middle by a hold . The bridge superstructure was in front of the hatch, the engine room behind it. The ships were partly equipped with a three-cylinder steam engine and partly with a diesel engine as a propulsion system.

After the type "Y" had served as the basis for the design of the Ocean type in the course of the British Merchant Shipbuilding Mission in 1940 , plans for the first successor type PF (A) were drawn up that same year , which, unlike at the time, arose from prepared sections.

literature

  • Mitchell, WH; Sawyer, LA: Empire Ships of World War II . Sea Breezes, Liverpool 1965.
  • English war-standard cargo ships in: Die Seekiste 8/1951, p. 266/67