Batjan

The steamship Batjan.

NEW VESSEL FOR NETHERLAND STEAMSHIP COMPANY

(Northern) Daily Mail 24/12/12

Messrs. Wm Gray and Co, Ltd., yesterday launched the handsome steel screw steamer Batjan, which they have built for the Netherland Steamship Co., Amsterdam.

The vessel will take the highest class Lloyd’s Register and is of the following dimensions vis.: Length over all, 412ft. 6in.; breadth, 53ft. 6in., and depth, 29ft. 7 ½ in.
 
She is a handsomely modelled vessel of the awning deck type, having three decks laid. The saloon, staterooms, captain’s, officers’, and engineers’ rooms, and the crews accommodation are all fitted up in houses on the awning deck.

In addition to cellular double bottom and after peak tank for water ballast, there is a deep tank or hold compartment fitted abaft the engine room, giving a total capacity for water ballast of about 2,100 tons.

The whole of the outfit, including 22 derricks, and one 30 ton derrick,  steam windlass, steam steering engine controlled by tele-motor gear, 12 steam winches, with exhaust steam returned to winch condenser of the C.M.E.W. type, are  of the most improved description. Electric lighting is fitted in all accommodation and working parts as well as fixed lights in all cargo compartments.

The engines are of the triple-expansion type being supplied by the Central Marine Engineering Works of the builders, having cylinders 28in., 46in., and 77in.  diameter, with a piston stroke 48in, and four large steel boilers adapted for 180lbs. working pressure per square inch, and fitted with Howden’s system of forced draught.

A special feature in the boiler installation is the superheater, designed and made by the engine builders with a view of utilising to the utmost the heat from the gasses on their way to the funnel.
Another feature of interest is the C.M.E.W. type of main condenser, which is designed to give a high vacuum in tropical waters. A special system of C.M.E.W. auxiliaries, including a winch condenser, will be fitted in the engine room.

The vessel and machinery have been constructed under the superintendence of Mr. S. G. Visker and Mr. W. J. Feykes, on behalf of the owners, and the ceremony of naming the steamer Batjan was gracefully performed by Mrs. J.  G. Bolsius, one of the superintendents of the Holland-America Line.