Skills in high demand
The Golden Bay in drydock
In-situ boring forward S/T bearing housing
A
uckland's Calliope drydock at the Devonport Naval Base, Babcock Fitzroy, continues to be
busy with some interesting projects and some new customers. In addition to regular New Zealand
Navy and commercial customers, recent vessel projects at the shipyard have included comprehensive work packages for an Australian-based platform supply vessel and a German-owned multi-purpose cargo ship, along with survey dockings for visiting superyachts. Our design consultancy company, Marine Industrial Design, has continued to progress, providing a wide range of naval architecture and marine engineering design support, including: • assisting New Zealand ship management companies NIWA and Kiwi Rail with major vessel conversion projects
• designing an in-water repair process for a full hopper replacement for an Australian sand dredge, and
• providing engineering support for the Cook Island Shipping Registry. An interesting ship repair project for the New Zealand commercial fleet was drydocking the 98m cement carrier MV Golden Bay. The critical task was to remove the tail shaft to carry out stern tube alignment checks. BFL assisted the Lloyd's Register surveyor to re-align the stern tubes. The re-alignment work involved in-situ boring of the
forward stern tube bearing housing to make it concentric and then eccentrically turning the outside diameter of the bearing bush to pre-calculated dimensions. Other drydock work on the Golden Bay included steelwork repairs, changing the propeller blade seals, waterblasting and painting the hull and the water ballast peak tanks. Another regular visitor is Ports of Auckland's retired
76-year-old steam tug the William C Daldy. This is always a challenge as we blend modern engineering with the shipbuilding skills of yesteryear. Babcock Fitzroy is proud to be able to help keep this fine tug in service so the Auckland public can continue to enjoy the age of steam on our harbour.
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NZ WORKBOAT REVIEW 2012 73
