SUBMARINEMUSEUMS.ORG Forum
Individual Submarine Boards => USS Batfish (SS-310) => Topic started by: Rick on March 24, 2013, 03:26:28 PM
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Ok I will make it official. For a few weeks now Jim and I have been talking about digging the dive planes out of the ground. The idea is 2 fold. 1 we are hoping to releave the stress on the aft end. I personally know that the shelback has developed a ripple in it that changes with the weather. The boat does have a list and no matter what we do this will have to occur to continue with any plans to corret that list. The second goal is to expose the after stearing gear so we can have another visual on the boat that has not occured for at least 20 years. On this side we will be able to assess some of the potential damage that has been caused by the boat sitting on the ground. I think everyone will be surprised no matter what their opinion is about this situation.
I have some positive feedback from public works. They will help us out once thier schedule clears out in the next couple of weeks. The gentleman that I worked with seemed to be very excited about this project and I look for good things to happen. I need to sit with Jim and discuss further what we can do to keep this from becoming a big water storage tank / mosquito breeding ground, but I feel this is a good project and it looks like it will be moving ahead.
Rick
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Excellent. I can't wait to get started. :coolsmiley:
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I was thinking of loose gravel (white stones) to cover the exposed dirt in the new hole. At least the water that sits in there won't be dirty/muddy looking. If it stays filled with water, then a small aerator pump would keep the mosquitoes and algae at bay. If it's a seasonal puddle, then regularly applying mosquito spray to the area would kill off the mosquito larvae.
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Mark,
Call your local stone quarry and see what the cost of #57 stone is, it is a little larger than gravel but not as large as you see for the rail road beds (ballast)
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Thanks, Darrin. #57. Got it.
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Mark,
when i was a project manager for the government (733d Civil Engineering Division) we used 57 stone as the base when we would pour concrete and we also used it for road beds as needed.. For our drainage basins we did use larger stone i.e. rail road ballast, that was due to the run off issues coming out of drains and I don't believe that you have a deterioration issue due to storm drains, that and cleaning the trash out of ballast isn't too fun and the ballast tends to be somewhat expensive.
You may want to talk to Jim about putting the ballast stone around your stern planes though and then do a 57 stone around the boat, the reason behind the ballast stone at the stern planes is that the stern planes do have a large flat surface area where you will get erosion once unearthed and for the boat setting the way that she does you wont really see a concentrated area like you would for a storm drain. That and with enough of 57 stone you can build up an area so you can bring in equipment for future projects as needed and once compacted it stays in place pretty well.
I may still have the calculations for how much 57 stone is needed for clay/sand/mud based road bed that I used at Ft Eustis, Va.. Sadly my contractors liked to wait until the equipment was stuck in the mud before they would start adding stone to ground and then it was an added expense to drag the stuck equipment out and then slowly try to back fill and then grade with stone until it was firm enough to drive on once more.
If you go to google maps and look at the satelite view of the Batfish you will notice that her starboard side has low depression where water likes to collect (more than the portside) and with the dirt that Jim is removing I would put that on the Starboard side and try to fill in the depression.
Darrin
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Sounds like a plan.
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Mark,
Once you dig out the stern planes you are going to open another can of worms outside of the hull due to Batfish already being inside of a sand bowl, the water like electricity will want to take the path of least resistance and it will all want to go the to stern and set there and collect and stagnate.
With that being said, on a bare bones minimum I mean BARE BONES minimum that I would feel safe to do is length times width of your stern planes (i don't know how much it rains there so you may want to consider the height of the stern planes also) and then times it by 2 just for a small retention pond and then that does NOT include the 100 year flood plan and then put in a liner and fill in part of the area with large stone i.e. ballast or larger if you can afford it.
This new situation does actually help the Batfish because you can dig trenches and put in a "weeping" system down both sides of the boat to remove the water from the rest of the area and bring it back to the stern planes.. What a weeping system is is nothing more than a peferated 3" flexible (if I remember correctly) PVC pipe that is dug at the starts roughly 12" down with 57 stone on the bottom and top and then gradually sloping down (i don't remember the calculations right now and have them in the garage) to your retention pond, although with sand you may have to look into a non traditional weeping system per say.. What that means is while having the heavy equipment onsite have them regrade the areas around the outer hull (pulling the water away from the hull) and add in stone with a plastic barrier underneath down to the weeping system that way most of the water coming off of the hull will not set against the outer hull.
This will help you two fold because you will be removing a good bit of water that lays against the hull and redirecting it to a retention pond and honestly after thinking about it I would build two small ponds one on each side of the boat to remove even more water from the hull of the boat on top of the one for the stern planes.. and you IF you can incorporate all 3 ponds you could have a small display (for the environemtal folks) and if you are froggy enough you may want to look into the RC models that you see at theme parks and have those set up at the stern so that the tourista's have something else to play with that is non destructive, it's that or a nice KOI pond will do the trick.
Just my .02 cents worth
Darrin
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Road work hmmmmm.. this one is a fun discussion that I NEVER thought that would be brought up during a school of the boat :2funny:
for a traditonal railroad bed on a minimally active rail with a dirt base is 18" of ballast stone(will have to check with the FRA book on that one) FRA stands for Federal Railroad Administration and the Army has a number of manuals on how to build them so that they work for many many years to come... And that is just the base that does not cover the contours of the land
A minimal road bed on dirt roads tends to very from 3" to 6" and IF you have sink holes it can go into FEET of Ballast Stone and 57 stone (found that out the hard way building a new rail spur at Ft Eustis Transportation musem a few years ago)
With that being said, you need to look at what you would like your road bed to do for you.. i.e. crane for loading weapons/equipment bringing in dump trucks to dump off your 57 stone and ballast ;)
For Tom and his crew he is working on dirt and doesn't have as many issues as the Batfish and remember this is all about the all mighty dollar and what the vision of the museum is because you can't hide railroad ballast stone and 57 stone can be hidden with sand from the existing grounds if needed
Darrin
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Mark,
I forgot that you are not on a permenant hard stand like the Drum and messing with the drainage around the Batfish may cause more erosion and subsequently the base that holds her up to fail and make her list worse. with the only way to get her reset is to fill the basin full of water and hope that she still floats
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Darrin,
I was thinking the same thing about the list. If we were to dig trenches along each side of the boat to channel water back toward the stern, we would have to fill the trenches in right away and then cover it back up with sand. the perforated pipe (french drains) might work, but I would think that they would fill up with sand over time. Especially after a flood. I guess we could install access caps at the bow ends and blow a pressure washer throguh the pipes once each year.
Yes, access to the basin can be "fun" when the grounds are wet. I don't remember how difficult it was for the last truck that went in there with the torpedoes to navigate. I remember it being hot when they offloaded the torpedoes. Usually, when we get into the hot season there isn't any water sitting in the basin unless it recently rained (a lot). It doesn't take long for water to evaporate in OK between the heat and the wind.
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Mark,
when i was a project manager for the government (733d Civil Engineering Division) we used 57 stone as the base when we would pour concrete and we also used it for road beds as needed.. For our drainage basins we did use larger stone i.e. rail road ballast, that was due to the run off issues coming out of drains and I don't believe that you have a deterioration issue due to storm drains, that and cleaning the trash out of ballast isn't too fun and the ballast tends to be somewhat expensive.
You may want to talk to Jim about putting the ballast stone around your stern planes though and then do a 57 stone around the boat, the reason behind the ballast stone at the stern planes is that the stern planes do have a large flat surface area where you will get erosion once unearthed and for the boat setting the way that she does you wont really see a concentrated area like you would for a storm drain. That and with enough of 57 stone you can build up an area so you can bring in equipment for future projects as needed and once compacted it stays in place pretty well.
I may still have the calculations for how much 57 stone is needed for clay/sand/mud based road bed that I used at Ft Eustis, Va.. Sadly my contractors liked to wait until the equipment was stuck in the mud before they would start adding stone to ground and then it was an added expense to drag the stuck equipment out and then slowly try to back fill and then grade with stone until it was firm enough to drive on once more.
If you go to google maps and look at the satelite view of the Batfish you will notice that her starboard side has low depression where water likes to collect (more than the portside) and with the dirt that Jim is removing I would put that on the Starboard side and try to fill in the depression.
Darrin
I'm thinking more of a concrete box with an aerobic pump and float in the bottom. When the pump gets activated we pump it to sprinklers to keep the grass around the museum green.
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To right the boat we are going to have to free the stern and bow and the bilge keel on both sides to start. Floating will be a hit and miss because once its level it may list again with the water gone depending on where it "sits" in. The Ling is a victim of that right now. I am thinking trench the starboard side to allow for ground "crush" into that area, and see if a couple D5 dozers cabled to the welded on barge kleets can give her a "tug" to starboard. We only need about 1-2 degrees. We would also have to govern from the port side so she doesn't go too far. Once level, we have to fill in the starboard trench to compaction and add fill to the port to keep if from possibly rolling back. Theoretically this will all work. The problem is this will take at least 4 D5 or D6 sized dozers and some back hoes to pull off. Two to pull and hold and at least one maybe two to secure the fill on both sides. May need more to cable govern from the port. Theoretically this will all work. Marshalling this much equipment will be costly.
Who knows. Maybe with the bow and stern free she'll right herself. ;D
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In my honest opinion the best thing for Batfish right now is to get the water away from the hull and keep it away from the hull as best as possible, the Drum is a perfect example of what happens when a submarine is taken out of water and not preserved right away(cleaning the inside of the tanks/free flood areas, priming and painting them before the rot set in) and how long it has taken them to restore her structure.
Using a pair of dozers to try to change the list on the boat right now isn't really an option due to the fact that the cleats are welded to the deck and not to the people tank and at nearly 70 years old they would probably twist and rip themselves out of the deck. To do it correctly you may want to look at how the USS STEWART was refloated after the last hurricane that shifted her in it's dry berth and placed a small boat under her keel, either that or look at how Batfish was brought in and then recalculate how much water it would take to fill in the fish bowl once more and have people ready to move weight from the Starboard side to the Port side.
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To right the boat we are going to have to free the stern and bow and the bilge keel on both sides to start. Floating will be a hit and miss because once its level it may list again with the water gone depending on where it "sits" in. The Ling is a victim of that right now. I am thinking trench the starboard side to allow for ground "crush" into that area, and see if a couple D5 dozers cabled to the welded on barge kleets can give her a "tug" to starboard. We only need about 1-2 degrees. We would also have to govern from the port side so she doesn't go too far. Once level, we have to fill in the starboard trench to compaction and add fill to the port to keep if from possibly rolling back. Theoretically this will all work. The problem is this will take at least 4 D5 or D6 sized dozers and some back hoes to pull off. Two to pull and hold and at least one maybe two to secure the fill on both sides. May need more to cable govern from the port. Theoretically this will all work. Marshalling this much equipment will be costly.
In my honest opinion the best thing for Batfish right now is to get the water away from the hull and keep it away from the hull as best as possible, the Drum is a perfect example of what happens when a submarine is taken out of water and not preserved right away(cleaning the inside of the tanks/free flood areas, priming and painting them before the rot set in) and how long it has taken them to restore her structure.
Using a pair of dozers to try to change the list on the boat right now isn't really an option due to the fact that the cleats are welded to the deck and not to the people tank and at nearly 70 years old they would probably twist and rip themselves out of the deck. To do it correctly you may want to look at how the USS STEWART was refloated after the last hurricane that shifted her in it's dry berth and placed a small boat under her keel, either that or look at how Batfish was brought in and then recalculate how much water it would take to fill in the fish bowl once more and have people ready to move weight from the Starboard side to the Port side.
She's leaning to starboard now. So, a shift in weight and sand on the port side would be the key. I've often thought about re-flooding the basin with river water, but it would have to be a large pump with a long hose to reach the river based upon where it is now with a giant sand bar in the way. We would need at least 10 to 12 feet of water in there to get her to start to float. It would be a lot easier to "roll" her, even if she just barely started to lift off the sand, with water in the basin. At that point you would only need one or two tractor to do the "pulling" to port. Even if we went the flooding route, we still need to break the stern free. I wonder what a large industrial pump would cost to rent with about 100 yards of fire hose?
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When did that happen? I was on board and they said (and it felt) to port (left). ?? Is there not a bubble clinometer on board? That's it. I am taking a 6' level and a laser level with me and see what the list is once and for all.
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Whomever said that it lists to port is dead wrong. After being on her since Dec. 2007 I can accurately say that she lists to starboard. There is an inclinometer on the forward periscope housing in the CR that shows the starboard list. I think what it is is that people get confused which way they are facing when they enter the boat. The tours go from bow to stern and as you walk through the boat, the listing is to your left, which is really starboard.
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If that's true we have a whole other problem! When we free the stern it may roll more to starboard. There is a "wrinkle" in the stern that changes with weather and moisture. The rudder/planes may be holding the Bat from rolling more to starboard. I guess we'll free it and see. :o
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Yeah, that's what Rick said. I also think that she'll roll more to Starboard, but maybe this is the time to really get serious about re-floating her in order to get her upright. We can't allow the twisting of the aft hull to continue like this and, honestly, allowing her to list detracts from her dignity and visitors' opinions of her and of the park.
A rough calculation of the amount of water needed: assume a 325' foot diameter cylinder and 12' of water... (Pi x 162.5^2 x 12) = 995492 cubic feet of water or 7,446,797 US Gallons of water. According to a fire fighting website, pumper trucks can pump anywhere from 500 gpm to 2,500 gpm. Worst case scenario, it would take 248 hours to fill the basin with one pumper running at 500 gpm. Best case scenario is 50 hours. Of course, you have a large object in the middle called the Batfish that's in the way (over 1,500 tons displacement on the surface, but that's with a full war load). Still, I don't see a fire department giving up a pumper truck for even 35 or 40 hours.
Maybe we need to rip open the basin dam with a large excavator and do it like it was done in 1972.
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With our current drought conditions I think the river is too low. :-\
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Agreed. Also, remember that the Army Corps of Engineers was letting out a ton of winter melt over the dams that year and allowed the river to rise significantly enough to allow the Batfish to back into her berth.
So, we're back to the pumping issue. If we had a donated pumper truck, we could run her for the number of days that it would take to fill the basin considerably. You wouldn't be able to run 24/7, though, so now you're looking at 20+ days and who knows how much diesel fuel to keep the truck running for that amount of time. Plus, someone to babysit the truck and monitor the gauges.
EDIT: Another thing that you'd be fighting is the seepage. Especially, during the hours that the truck isn't pumping water into the basin. Each day you'd have to make up for a little water loss. I wonder if Rick knows how long it took for the basin to drain after the first time she was backed in or even after the two floods. It probably took longer for the flood waters to lower, since you're at the mercy of the river level. So, the most realistic data point is the first time.
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The flood water would take quite a while since all of the ground would be soaked way past normal saturation. There is no where else for it to go. Right now, the ground would be a sponge for some time.
Edit: and no self-respecting fire dept. is going to let river water in their gear. :knuppel2:
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I actually do know someone with a vintage pumper truck (I think 60's vintage), but I don't think that he has anywhere near the hose needed to get it to the river. Plus, you need a filter basket at the end thrown in the river to keep debris from being sucked in. Supposedly, the pumps are in working order, but not sure if they would handle 20 days of pumping.
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Since money is no object. :2funny: We should put a liner in the bowl like they do for land fills. it becomes a pool. Then we can have all of the dry docking and rust issues. :( . We just don't have the funds.
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I wasn't talking about a permanent pool. Just the ability to right the boat.
It sounds like our best bet is to remove dirt from along the port side(boat-long trench) and allow the boat to right itself - after the stern is dug out. It may take some time... days or weeks. Once we like where she's settled, we fill the trench back in.
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Sound. We need to get hold of the guy in Jersey who just won the lottery $$$. we get him to save the Ling and then come help us out. ;D
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Keep dreaming... and welcome to the shoe-string budget of the Muskogee War Memorial. Our volunteer slogan should be: "Creative Thinkers Welcome".
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it's really a shame. Almost all the other boats are in big areas where they COULD get funds and support. Muskogee OK ain't it. Now if we could get Merle Haggard to sing about the Batfish......and we are off of a PAY turnpike from the largest metro areas that MIGHT get tapped for support. Well, I like a challenge. :uglystupid2:
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a few pictures of the USS Stewart leaning heavily after hurricane IKE, they wound up building a cofferdam around her and refloated her and she had not been waterborne in years and they wound up having to pump out compartments full of water to make it happen.. sadly enough while doing a google search I found out that the Stewart had been vandalized in Feb of this year by 4 punks whom sprayed corrosive fire extinguishers on her decks inside and out..
Here is the size of the new power panel that needed to be installed for the Cavalla to have full power again:
http://www.deepdomain.net/phpBB_cav/viewtopic.php?t=400
here is a good shot of the Stewart, Cavalla and the sail from the USS TAUTOG (a Submarine Squadron 1 boat when I was in Pearl)
http://www.gps2cad.com/images/Afterike.jpg
http://www.navy.mil/management/photodb/photos/080919-N-6575H-603.jpg
More to follow
Darrin
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Here is the size of the new power panel that needed to be installed for the Cavalla to have full power again:
http://www.deepdomain.net/phpBB_cav/viewtopic.php?t=400
Yep. 35 KVA, which is 35,000 Watts. That's a big electric bill.
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Remember Mark that that is powering both the AC systems and the DC systems and a few of the water borne boats have theirs operational right now.
Lance somewhere on this bbs has pictures of the Cavalla after Hurricane Ike came through and they show the rot and deterioration of the bow and stern planes area and once they got back onboard they actually made the whole display better than what it was before because of having more of the boat exposed.
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Because of the way that the main electrical system on the Batfish was gutted, we'll never be able to bring anything major online, except for lighting, radios, and maybe radar some day.
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have faith Mark. Never say never....... 8)
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We're missing 3/4" thick copper cables... and a lot of them. Plus, we'll never be able to replicate all of the missing hardware from the control cubicle. I don't think that we have those prints.
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IF you don't have the diagrams for the Cubicles, you can always ask the Cavalla, Pamanito folks and others on this bbs and if that doesn't work you can always contact the Navy yard in Washington because I believe that they have all of the boats drawings
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How complicated is a control cubicle contact switch to make, though? It also comes down to cost.... and copper wire isn't cheap. This sounds like it would be excellent grant "fodder", though.
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Back on topic. We are definitively PORT LIST. About 1.5 degrees.
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After looking at photos on the internet, I concur that we actually are listing to port. How long is Muskogee Public Works willing to stick around after we dig the stern out? A trench along the starboard side would be nice, too. I'm roughly guessing 4 hours of labor in total with a backhoe (and some people with shovels).
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On dig day I'm going to bring my camera and a tripod and photograph the boat from directly astern. Once we (eventually) get a starboard trench dug I will take another photo from the same spot to document the correction in list.
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Mark,
Per our phone converstation the other night (sorry i didn't post this earlier). And I did recheck what Batfish is currently moored in and it is called a "graving" mooring and what that is for is when a very large ship is being built or sadly in some cases being dismantled. This type of mooring requires little if any mooring lines and if for some reason it floods she hopefully will refloat herself like the Cavalla did during Hurricane Ike which sadly exposed some pretty bad rotted steel and it also opened up a different look for the museum. You may want to look at the Cavalla web page because it does discuss what was needed to clean the bow and stern tubes and preserve them once they were uncovered
Recommendations for digging/releveling the Batfish which currently is leaning 1.5 degrees to port: a few issues that were brought up that you and I also discussed are:
What happens once the boat starts to list to Starboard and can you stop it once it starts?
As we discussed over the phone, I would NOT use the cleats topside due to them not being attached to the "people tank" and only attached to the superstructure that is in who knows what kind of shape at the cleats.
With that being said, I did call a shipmate of mine and asked him what he would do and a very good solution is believe it or not a simple one: they have been called out riggers or blocks that are welded to the hull to keep her from listing either way once she gets to moving.
Now to get her to try to change her list is first and foremost is dig out the stern planes completely and then contact a Civil Engineer and a Mechanical Engineer and have them come out and design a concrete pads with a very large pad eyes so that you can run cabling through both the forward and aft bullnoses (on the port and starboard sides) and again using the idea of using heavy equipment you could use those with some block and tackle to double the capacity of the pulling power of the equipment and still be safe. And again as we discussed on the phone you may want to have them look at doing spring lines also and you can find the diagram in the mooring plan at www.hnsa.org
Another thought is to also think about relocating your buried shore power connection at this point so that it won't be exposed to the elements (if desired)