Tom Scott, The Older One | Deep In The Heart of Battleship Texas, Getting Electrical Power @tomscotttheolderone364 | Uploaded April 2021 | Updated October 2024, 45 minutes ago.
The ship's 1910 design included four 300,000 watt dynamos that produced 120 volt d.c. power. While she received new 400,000 watt dynamos later in her career, 120vdc main power never changed. While there were plenty of reasons to go to alternating current at a higher voltage, the cost to do so was likely prohibitive, plus, there were compelling reasons to not change. Hundreds of motors on board ran on 120vdc and because of that, they were ridiculously easy to control. Do you want to reverse the motor? Easy! just reverse polarity. To slow it down, just throw some resistor banks on the line. It's a lot harder than that on a.c. motors.
Even with the 400,000 watt upgrade, power was at a premium as additional large electrical loads such as more radios and radar were added. One very effective solution to the problem was to remove the original crew galley electric stoves and ovens, which were major power hogs, and replace them with similar equipment that burned fuel oil.
The four dynamos are paired in fore and aft dynamo rooms located immediately forward and aft of the boiler rooms. They were well protected, deep down on the second platform level. Above each room was a distribution board and beneath a condenser room. Besides the two big reciprocating steam engines, these dynamos were the only other large steam operated devices on the ship with their own condensers.
Two 100,000 watt emergency diesel generators were added in the early 1940's to provide critical power to pumps and emergency lighting in the case steam was lost.
The ship's 1910 design included four 300,000 watt dynamos that produced 120 volt d.c. power. While she received new 400,000 watt dynamos later in her career, 120vdc main power never changed. While there were plenty of reasons to go to alternating current at a higher voltage, the cost to do so was likely prohibitive, plus, there were compelling reasons to not change. Hundreds of motors on board ran on 120vdc and because of that, they were ridiculously easy to control. Do you want to reverse the motor? Easy! just reverse polarity. To slow it down, just throw some resistor banks on the line. It's a lot harder than that on a.c. motors.
Even with the 400,000 watt upgrade, power was at a premium as additional large electrical loads such as more radios and radar were added. One very effective solution to the problem was to remove the original crew galley electric stoves and ovens, which were major power hogs, and replace them with similar equipment that burned fuel oil.
The four dynamos are paired in fore and aft dynamo rooms located immediately forward and aft of the boiler rooms. They were well protected, deep down on the second platform level. Above each room was a distribution board and beneath a condenser room. Besides the two big reciprocating steam engines, these dynamos were the only other large steam operated devices on the ship with their own condensers.
Two 100,000 watt emergency diesel generators were added in the early 1940's to provide critical power to pumps and emergency lighting in the case steam was lost.
