soc.history.war.world-war-ii

SolomonW wrote:
> The Maritime Museum of Tasmania, in Hobart has a model of what it claims
> is an Australian-made liberty ship. It claims it was one of 13 such
> liberty ships produced by Australia in WW2.
>
> I studied the model and noticed that it seems slightly different to a US
> liberty ship. When I tried to question the museum attendance who are
> supposed to be experts, I discovered that they useless for any
> information on any of the subjects in the museum.
>
> However although it may be an Australian copy of a US design modified by
> local manufacturing conditions I suspect it is a merchant ship produced
> in Australia and called a liberty ship as a generic name afterwards.
>
> Any thoughts on this?
>

The US Liberty ships were based on the British Ocean class cargo ships.
The US Maritime Commission modified the design by replacing the coal
boilers with oil fired ones. Also the US built ships had enclosed
deckhouses vs. the open deckhouses on the British ships. Additionally
other modifications were made as well to accommodate US manufacturing
standards and the need for mass production.


The Australian ships might have been built closer to the original Ocean
class design than the US ships. Or you might have noticed other
modifications to the design to accommodate local conditions.

ALV