Brooklyn Navy Yard & Manual Heavy Iron

[texasgeartrain]

Do to covid restrictions and lack of man power, I caught a couple jobs at GMD Shipyard, inside the Brooklyn Navy Yard. I'm originally from South Jersey, across from Philadelphia, so I'm pretty familiar with shipyards and refineries from Baltimore to NY.

If you ever had the pleasure of traveling the Bronx Queens Expressway, better known as the BQE, you can understand why people can begin to hate life, and hate everyone and everything . Just a murderous wall of traffic where people turn into cannibals. And pretty much the only way to get to the Brooklyn Navy yard. One up side is the morning view of a section of Manhattan can be nice:



My youngest daughter kept asking me if I was going to the Statue of Liberty. No, but I could see it while parked in traffic. So this long blurry shot if for her :



The Brooklyn Navy Yard, much like the Philadelphia Navy Yard, is not run by the Navy or Dept of Defense now. Nor is it one business, inside those Navy Yards there are many businesses now. The dry docks in the Brooklyn Navy Yard are run by GMD Shipyard:



A 1945 aerial pic of the Brooklyn Navy Yard with carriers being built:



Gmd Shipyard is mostly using two dry dry docks and a pier just a bit longer than the dry docks themselves,circled in red:



I borrowed the 1945 pic from Wikipedia on the Brooklyn Navy Yard, found here:
Brooklyn Navy Yard - Wikipedia

 

[texasgeartrain]

One job I was here for was working on a few engines on a barge. The other job was overhauling KT50 Cummins main engines on a tug.

Standing aft on the barge looking at some other vessels there:



Looking out a port hole of one of the engine houses on the barge, and into part of the shipyard:



A view of the end of the shipyard, and the tug I'd be working on next. Both it and the barge were waiting to get into dry dock.



Some other ships and vessels already in the two dry docks there:

 

[texasgeartrain]

About two weeks into the job, and the tug and barge I was working on finally got a dry dock berth. The dock is still partially flooded in these pics, as they get the blocking for boats sorted out.

You can only see 3 vessels in this pic due to perspective, but there are 4 vessels in this one dry dock. It took about a day and a half to flood, block the boats, and then drain the dry dock.



More to come, as I get pics sorted. . .

 

[texasgeartrain]

I had down time due to the boats getting dry docked. So I wondered into the machine shop to have a peak around. At first entry, my view was of a massive lathe from Niles-Bement-Pond Co.

To make for a funny, and nearly perfect pic, a South Bend 13" lathe parked near the tailstock and follower rest:



The headstock inside that red shed. Due to lighting a little hard to see the faceplate in the pic, but I put it between 6' and 8' in OD.



The tag I found on headstock:



A closer look and it seems this a 120" swing, with a 50' bed. I didn't get pics of it, but there were steady rests going in a line past the bed as well. This shipyard was in full swing building carriers in the 1940's. This is surely the machine used to turn the wheel shafts of those carriers.

Also note the "U" and anchor on the serial number line. Not sure the U meaning, but the anchor was put on Navy items.



Part 1 of 2.

 

[texasgeartrain]

Part 2 of 2:

Hindsight being what it is, I wish I had taken more pics of this lathe. I did get two more pics from the left end of headstock.

Left, front side of headstock:



Left, rear side of headstock, with complimentary ladder to climb on top of HS :



Unbeknownst to me, the outfit that made this lathe had acquired Pratt and Whitney in 1901 !

Niles-Bement-Pond Co history:
Niles-Bement-Pond Co. - History | VintageMachinery.org

Pratt & Whitney History:
Pratt & Whitney Co. - History | VintageMachinery.org

 

[John Garner]

Thanks for the pictures! I'd love to walk around that place myself.

 

[Steve in SoCal]

The follower for the Niles out weighs the SB by what three times?

Cool pics for a boat nerd, is that tug shaft or pod drive?

Steve

 

[jaguar36]

A 1945 aerial pic of the Brooklyn Navy Yard with carriers being built:

Its depressing how little industry is left in the NY/Philly area compared to how much there used to be. The shipyards a shadow of their former selves. The aerospace industry is almost completely gone (with one or two exceptions)

 

[texasgeartrain]

The follower for the Niles out weighs the SB by what three times?

Cool pics for a boat nerd, is that tug shaft or pod drive?

Steve

The tug is two screw boat with two shafts. One shaft per main engine and marine gear. I'm thinking Reintjes marine gears, but i didn't look at those too hard. I have some main engine pics during the course of overhaul. I'll get those posted in the coming days.

 

[Bob-O]

Texas,

My grandfather, Mom's dad worked, as a machinist in the Brooklyn Navy Yard from the late 1930's up until he retired in the late 50's early 60's. Mom grew up on Skillman St. about 10 or 12 blocks from the yard. Grandpa never owned a car, Mom said he walked to and from the yard. He died soon after he retired so I really don't remember too much. I do remember visiting him in the VA hospital in Bay Ridge by the Verrazzano Bridge, as he was a WWI vet.

As Jaguar36 said, it is depressing about the little industry left. Dad worked at a big metal stampings company not far from the yard that was founded in 1852 in Mahattan. They moved to Brooklyn in the around 1900, and owned pretty much most of the property on Kent Ave and Franklin Ave., between Flushing and Park Avenues. Pop started there in 1939 straight out of high school. They bailed out Brooklyn in the early 70's and moved to Pompano Beach. Florida. By that time he was Plant Manager, so off to Florida we went.

 

[reggie_obe]

Its depressing how little industry is left in the NY/Philly area compared to how much there used to be. The shipyards a shadow of their former selves. The aerospace industry is almost completely gone (with one or two exceptions)

Small two or four story industrial building can't survive in an area where developers want to build 30 story buildings where a studio apartment rents for 3k a month.

 

[michiganbuck]

Did you know my Grandfather Joe Brand//a lathe hand
I guess he retired from the Navy Yard about 1955 or so,

 

[ncjeeper]

Man that is cool.

 

[texasgeartrain]

I'll post more on the tug boat engine room soon.

I got a few more pics of the shipyard's machine shop. I didn't get a pic of everything. They had several Leblond lathes and Niles lathes, and a whole lot of Bridgeports of different sizes and set ups, a couple of K & T mills. . . Anyway, here's what I got:

 

[Bob-O]

Reggie,

I would agree with you if you were talking about Manhattan real estate. My son is a site supervisor for a Manhattan based construction management company. However, in the case of the place in Brooklyn where my father worked, the majority of their buildings, including the original building from 1907, are still standing. The granite stone over what was the main office entrance still has the company name in it. One of the larger main 4 story building today houses a Hebrew school, as well as other, much smaller companies and stores. Only 1 building was torn down to build a hotel. I know the area quite well, and can follow the buildings on the NYC Buildings Department website. They have records including CO's going back to the 1920's. I've shown my mom the house she grew up in. Except for new windows and a front door, it looks the same as in 1965 when my grandmother moved out. You can see the interior remodeling on pretty much any website offering apartments for rent.

 

[jaguar36]

I don't think it was real estate prices. The Philly navy yard sat mostly empty for years, just recently have some new office buildings been put up. Same thing for the Camden ship building areas. Grumman's HQ on long island got replaced by Amazon warehouses. Pratt and Whitney in NJ's buildings are empty. Beyond Aerospace there were all the car factories in the area, and machine tools like Bridgeports in CT.

Its depressing that it's all left the area.

 

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

Anybody remember the film “ A Tree Grows In Brooklyn “ ? Great little film. I believe it was a book also.

Regards Tyrone.

 

[texasgeartrain]

Anybody remember the film “ A Tree Grows In Brooklyn “ ? Great little film. I believe it was a book also.

Regards Tyrone.

I remember Bugs Bunny holding that book up to defend himself when cornered in an alley in NY by street thug dogs. . .

Dear God, that cartoon was from 1947 :
A Hare Grows In Manhattan (Western Animation) - TV Tropes

 

[EmanuelGoldstein]

Dear God, that cartoon was from 1947 :

Don't you hate it when you go to the antique store, and all the junk they are selling was stuff you had around the house as a kid ?

 

[texasgeartrain]

Cool pics for a boat nerd, is that tug shaft or pod drive?

Steve

I have a guy still up and checked, that tug does have Reintjes marine gears:



Sort of top down pics. The black coupling at the bottom of pic is what connects marine gear to flywheel of engine. Not a good view, but the wheel shaft is upper right side of pics.: