Seriously, how do you keep it clean ?

[HagarTheHorrible]

I was following a thread that was talking about the colour of some types of Japanese camouflage, some references pointing to a white or off white colour, this is evidently wrong.  I imagined that one of the reasons these aircraft might have appeared white, or at least whiter, is from bleaching, old paints possibly not being as colour fast as modern paints, I also thought that salt laden air might have contributed.  This got me thinking, how in hell's name did they keep aircraft on aircraft carriers clean.  Fresh water is at a premium so you cant use that, so what the hell do you use to wash down the aircraft, to stop them corroding, when they get covered in salt water spray ?

[AndyJWest]

I don't know about WW2 aircraft carriers, but submarines of that era used to distil seawater to provide fresh water, both for normal usage and for topping up the batteries. Clearly this requires energy, but presumably you can get more than a gallon of fresh water by burning a gallon of diesel fuel. 

Edited November 8, 2017 by AndyJWest

[Finkeren]

To be honest, I don’t think the planes would be subjected to that much salt water spray during normal service. The flight deck is situated some 15-20m above the water line. Spray would only reach up there in weather so severe, that the planes wouldn’t be on deck anyway. The hangar decks would normally be fully enclosed as well, so I really don’t see, how the planes would get covered in salt.

[Feathered_IV]

Maybe brown or recycled water was used? It's worth mentioning that Japanese carrier-going aircraft had a very durable red primer beneath their top coat though. Unlike their land based counterparts that often did not receive any at all. The primer is incredibly tenacious and could still be seen covering airframes that had lay in the tropical sun for fifty years or more. Long after every trace of the top coat had worn away.

 

The myth of "all Japanese aircraft had peeling paint" is another subject worth exploring.

[216th_Lucas_From_Hell]

 

 

I don’t think the planes would be subjected to that much salt water spray during normal service.

 

Sea spray refers to sea salt aerosol particles in the air, not the literal splash from the sea. Not sure if it's a problem in Copenhagen but in Fortaleza one could count on having to replace too many household appliances prematurely thanks to corrosion caused by sea spray. Less obvious things like sliding doors and metallic window sills were also common victims.

[HagarTheHorrible]

To be honest, I don’t think the planes would be subjected to that much salt water spray during normal service. The flight deck is situated some 15-20m above the water line. Spray would only reach up there in weather so severe, that the planes wouldn’t be on deck anyway. The hangar decks would normally be fully enclosed as well, so I really don’t see, how the planes would get covered in salt.

 

 

If my ferry trip to Ireland, last month, was anything to go by, 15-20m above the sea is no protection from spray, especially when you consider during flying op's the carriers tend to make best speed into the prevailing wind so there's going to be loads of spray coming over the bows.  The salt environment is still going to be pretty tough on any exposed metal parts.  It must have been a bit of a nightmare trying to keep aircraft operational for extended periods during wartime conditions.

[Barnacles]

Naval vessels carrying aircraft will fresh water wash-down aircraft which have been exposed to salt water. A steam powered vessel has to generate a lot of fresh water for its boilers so it can easily handle enough for washing aircraft.

To be honest, I don’t think the planes would be subjected to that much salt water spray during normal service. The flight deck is situated some 15-20m above the water line. Spray would only reach up there in weather so severe, that the planes wouldn’t be on deck anyway. The hangar decks would normally be fully enclosed as well, so I really don’t see, how the planes would get covered in salt.

Even on a fleet carrier they'd get covered. Sometimes you have to have ac on deck. (Doolittle raid for example, or CAM.)

[MiloMorai]

One can tell where a car is from by looking at where it is rusting. Where there is snow it rusts from the bottom up. If the roof,hood and trunk lid are rusty it is from a sea side area.

[unreasonable]

Naval vessels carrying aircraft will fresh water wash-down aircraft which have been exposed to salt water. A steam powered vessel has to generate a lot of fresh water for its boilers so it can easily handle enough for washing aircraft.

Even on a fleet carrier they'd get covered. Sometimes you have to have ac on deck. (Doolittle raid for example, or CAM.)

 

I assume you mean from its boilers? Burn hydrocarbons and you get (mostly) water  as vapour and CO2. I assume ships were able to condense out what they needed.

 

USN (and later RN) used deckparking - some aircraft would have been always exposed to the elements. Cannot give link/source - traveling, away from my books

[AndyJWest]

I've been looking into this a bit more, and it seems that by WW2 at least, warships used fresh water for the boilers. See this account from someone who served as a stoker on HMS Hood:

 

 

There were three types of dynamo engines; steam turbine, steam reciprocating and diesels, twelve in all, there were the horizontally opposed steam engines that supplied hydraulic power to the main gun turrets, also there were the evaporators that supplied fresh water to the ship.

 

The evaporators were not very efficient as they took seawater by pump into a batch of coils inside the casing. Steam ran through these coils heating the seawater surrounding them, the steam from the seawater was condensed into pure water and pumped into the ships water system, pure water being required for the ships main boilers. There were two ways of testing for pure water, one being that as the fresh water was being pumped away through our electrical circuit if the water was not pure a light would come on, electricity will not pass through pure distilled water, the other test was quite simple a phial of water was taken to which was added two drops of silver nitrate, if the water was not pure a cloud would appear in the phial.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ww2peopleswar/stories/12/a8403112.shtml

 

Earlier, steamships used salt water in their boilers, but this was problematic not just because of the obvious issues with corrosion, scale etc, but because inevitably as the steam boiled off the resulting brine got more and more concentrated. Apparently this was dealt with by periodically discharging the pressurised boiler out to sea. Hugely inefficient, and only practical if you have duplicate boilers.

http://navalmarinearchive.com/research/salt_in_marine_boilers.html

Edited November 9, 2017 by AndyJWest

[Mastermariner]

I’m not sure where this discussion is going to: but as  a former chief mate on ULCCs  (500000)with superstructure way over a 100m in height I can tell you the salt is every were on ocean going vessels’.

As for steam powered ships, and yes I been a captain of one as well as served on the steam powered ULCCs with their steam turbines. They all use sea (salt) water for cooling 

Master

Edited November 9, 2017 by Mastermariner

[Barnacles]

I assume you mean from its boilers? Burn hydrocarbons and you get (mostly) water  as vapour and CO2. I assume ships were able to condense out what they needed.

 

USN (and later RN) used deckparking - some aircraft would have been always exposed to the elements. Cannot give link/source - traveling, away from my books

 

For their boilers, as Andy says, by WW2 ships using steam power would have had distilled water for the steam circuit. That is an absolute necessity for steam turbines I would think. Although the circuit is 'sealed' ie it is not a total loss system like in most steam railway locomotives, there is quite a lot of design leakage, so the feedwater for the steam circuit must be replenished. This was done by taking distilled water from the distilling plant (which can be an evaporator) and topping up the feed water system with it. Modern steam ships use reverse osmosis plants to generate the water, as Raaaid says, although some other ships will be able to 'make' potable water for hotel services etc.

 

 

 

I've been looking into this a bit more, and it seems that by WW2 at least, warships used fresh water for the boilers. See this account from someone who served as a stoker on HMS Hood:

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ww2peopleswar/stories/12/a8403112.shtml

 

Earlier, steamships used salt water in their boilers, but this was problematic not just because of the obvious issues with corrosion, scale etc, but because inevitably as the steam boiled off the resulting brine got more and more concentrated. Apparently this was dealt with by periodically discharging the pressurised boiler out to sea. Hugely inefficient, and only practical if you have duplicate boilers.

http://navalmarinearchive.com/research/salt_in_marine_boilers.html

Edited November 9, 2017 by 71st_AH_Barnacles