Assistance in identifying artifacts from the USS Westfield:

[justinp]

Hello all,

It has been a long while since I have used a forum, and I hope my etiquette is up to par. Please let me introduce myself, I am the project manager for the conservation phase of the USS Westfield conservation and reconstruction project. The USS Westfield was a former Staten Island ferryboat that was converted into a warship during the American Civil War. Westfield saw much service in the Gulf of Mexico as the flagship for the West Gulf Blockading Squadron, until she met her untimely fate during the Battle of Galveston in the early hours of New Years Day 1863. Most of the wreck was recovered in 2009, in advance of a major dredging operation conducted by the US Amy Corps of Engineers and the US Naval Heritage Command. For the past 5 years, we have been conserving the remains of this warship to ensure the preservation of the artifacts recovered and to ensure the memory of those men that died aboard her.

At the completion of this project, there will be several major reconstructions built out of the surviving artifacts. We have already completed and transported a 9200 lb 9 inch smoothbore Dahlgren cannon to the final museum, where the cannon now sits on a partial deck reconstruction, complete with armored plates recovered from the ship.

The next phase is to take the massive cylinder fragments from the walking beam engine and reconstruct them on to a ghost frame to show what survived and what is missing. We started this on Monday.

The final phase will incorporate a two story boiler built out of thousands of fragments recovered from the site. Half of the display will portray a plywood reconstruction on how we believe the boiler once looked, while the other half will display the actual recovered artifacts.

Despite our best efforts, we still have numerous pieces of steam machinery that we cannot identify. We have theories, but many need the confirmation from a more knowledgeable public. I would like to start posting pictures of these artifacts in hopes that members of this forum can identify them from experience. Definitive answers will be gladly acknowledged in the final exhibit and any resulting publications.

For more information on the project, please see the link listed below:
http://www.thc.state.tx.us/public/uploa ... r-2010.pdf
All the best,

Justin Parkoff, MA
Project Manager / Conservator
Conservation Research Laboratory
Texas A&M University
P.O. Box 2827 | College Station, TX 77841
justinp@tamu.edu
(210)249-1800

[malcolmd]

Sounds like a great project, and we all love a quiz, so pictures of the unknown objects would be great (IMHO)...

[S. Weaver]

We are all standing by, Mr. Parkoff.

[justinp]

Lets start with this one. We like to call him Tubby. He came to us in a tub, and was originally photographed by a guy named Tubby. The artifact is completely cast iron and measures approximately 24 x 20 x 1". There is a circular shaft that runs through the artifact with fins on one end and a square key on the other. I was wondering if it might be some sort of steam powered winch. Thoughts?

P.S. I'm having difficultly uploading the files due to the sizes. Please see the following link for the images and the attached Adobe PDF for an image that you can rotate and take more detailed measurements.

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/oai5qafbm2c4 ... BOxBqcS1xa

[TahoeSteam]

Any pictures of the underside? Also, you can use photobucket to host pictures, then just put the "IMG" link into your post and the photos will come show in your post. Keep it to 3 photos per post though or else the post won't work for some annoying reason

[justinp]

I'll investigate Photobucket. I've seen it before. Will I be able to upload the PDF there as well? The PDF is actually a file that you can manipulate. You just click on the picture and the artifact will rotate in any direction you want, including the bottom.

[malcolmd]

Do you think the "fins" are in fact the remnants of spokes from a handwheel? The shaft looks like it has a doubler on the plate to provide a limited bearing surface, but not enough to imagine that the shaft is designed to "run" continuously or take much load... which would support this ide perhaps?

Mal

[DetroiTug]

My guess:

This is some sort of line or chain handling device, winch etc. It originally had a wood or thin metal drum around the outside. Note the groove in the shaft from a chain or cable? Note the flat area to meet the inside of an external drum. And there looks to be a notch in one of the "fins" where a line or cable was secured. This is part of a deck winch of some type I'd say.

-Ron

[gondolier88]

Following above from Ron; I suggest this could be a deck-mounted pulley for the steering chain/cable/line to pass around. It has the right proportions for a boat of her size, and the fact that it is so worn does suggest repeated use of low tension- it doesn't look anything like heavy enough it's construction to have been a part of a winch drum.

Greg

[gondolier88]

About half way down the page on the link below, under 'steering sheaves' is a picture of the item I describe.

http://www.shf.org.au/explore-the-fleet ... uary-2011/

Greg