Bubble Clinometers

[pekelney]

Folks,

The USS Pampanito bubble clinometers were installed this week.  The story, with photos and acknowledgements  is available at:
http://maritime.org/pres/bubble/

We will be updating this page over the next couple of weeks once we get some better photos on the boat.

Note that earlier this year we mounted the IFF gear, BN and two ABKs.  They have not been wired in, but we are getting more gear hung on the boat.

rich

[Mark Sarsfield]

Very nice work, Rich.  BZ!

[Earl]

Congrats, Rich - sounds like you all are really ratcheting up the bar a lot of museum boats would like to reach. Thanks for being one of "those" boats!

[Mark Sarsfield]

My concern would be someone deliberately smashing them.. at least at the Batfish.

[Earl]

Does make a fella wonder, doesn't it, Mark? Some days, I wonder just who we're preserving the boats for; then I get one person who's genuinely interested and who seems to care, and I'm all better. 

[pekelney]

Mark,

We did put some visitor proofing on them.  Sure someone that really wanted to could destroy them, but the visitor proofing is enough to prevent curious finger damage.

rich

[Mark Sarsfield]

Yeah.  At a minimum you would need "chicken wire" or plexi-glass around them to keep dirty little fingers off.

[Paul Farace]

While you're at it why not encase the visitors in plexiglas tubes and roll them through the boat!  Something is wacky here folks... we don't have that kind of damange on COD...  Why?       And don't give me the "we have more visitors" stuff because in the time it takes COD to meet higher visitation levels we don't have that damage and theft.  Also, believe me, Clevelanders are not "more lawful" than others... we have just as many rapists, murderers, serial killers (maybe more), robbers, and confidence men as you do... I should know, because I've met and paritied with most of them!   

I think the basic rules apply:

1. Don't tell your visitors that YOU don't trust them!  All that visitor proofing shit sends a rather negative message to visitors, and a few will act accordingly.
2. A living ship gets respect... a dead ship is a cadaver and is ripe for the (souvenir) picking -- work on the Martha Stewart aspects of the ship!
3. What impression does your staff give visitors? On COD our "staff" is often the lone ticket-taker in the booth, but they have pretty damn good people skills. A nudnik in the booth sends a message as well about how the visitor should behave.

This topic is always good for a lively round of "debate."

[BrokenArrowtiger]

Yea and Paul you made me want to get on this thanks. As a teen with wacky friends i should know about this. Paul ur right their is alot of bad people in cleveland..but wanna know why ur boat isnt damanged by thevies quit simple.Theirs more things to do in cleveland!!!! Theifs would rather hit a big ass shopping mall then a submarine musem ina big city. .with the guns the cod has they wouldnt stand a chance.   ..I hope thats not complicated to much.

[Mark Sarsfield]

Picking up where BrokenTiger left off... Muskogee doesn't offer a lot to its teens and I think one of the "rights of passage" for the locals is to pillage and loot the Batfish.  We seem to go through phases.  For the past few years (until recently) it would be relatively minor stuff, like a light cover on an electrical panel going missing.  However, lately, we had mattress covers vandelized, switch housings removed from the engine rooms, someone attempting to remove a motor rheostat from the pump room (a rather large device), a smashed gauge on one of the APR sets in the C.R., someone attempting to remove a sound powered handset very forcibly, and the list goes on.  Most of the boat is wide open to the public with a few minor exceptions.  Officer Country has see-through doors that routinely get attempted break-ins.  Stuff like 60 yr old booze has been lifted before - bad place to keep it, but that's what the vets wanted.

My idea for Batfish, specifically, is for the city to hire a second full-time person to help Rick with maintenance and to take turns with him walking through the boat.  If they know that a park employee makes routine walks through her, then they are much less apt to vandelize.  My other idea is for all persons under the age of 18 to be accompanied by an adult.  Granted, Muskogee has its fair share of 18+ yr-old idiots, but the bulk of our problems are kids with Gerber tools.

[MWALLEN]

At one time, Muskogee was 9th (per capita) in the nation in crime.  That should answer Paul's questions.

After spending hard earned money on stuff to put back in the boat and then having it walk off because LeRoy sends Junior under the plexiglass door to get the goods...(i.e. the green package of Lucky Strikes), I'd just as soon bolt everything down so one idiot doesn't ruin it for the rest.   The alternative is metal detectors and TSA employees doing cavity searches.

Mark S. has a valid point, Rick needs help.  He's mostly a one-man show but the board won't turn loose any cashola for additional help.  Last Christmas party one board member showed up and was very vocal about adding staff.  Almost a year later, it's still Rick.  The good 'ol boy mentality may do what the Japanese couldn't...sink the Batfish.

Mark

[Darrin]

All,

I believe that Paul is trying to say that if the crew that is there everyday cares about their boat and the docents care about what is going on people are less inclined to take or destroy the work that we are doing to restoring thse historic boats.

The COD is and incredible thing to behold and he has every right to be proud of the COD and it is bar none one of the best boats out there, not to diminish ANYTHING that the rest of our museum boats are doing because there are crews around the country doing the impossible with less then nothing and still having to deal with those whom dont care about what they do other then make them money.

Earl,

look at all of the great things that TVA has done to make the Torsk come alive once more and how much you are contributing to the restoration of the Torsk.. You are doing so much more now than what I have accomplished over 8 years of work weekends and the times that I have been able to make it onboard..

To the rest whom are dedicating their time and efforts to restore these incredible pieces of military history, never forget that we are preserving our submarine history and the memories of those who served during WWII to include the 52 boats that did not come home during WWII and for the USS Scorpion and the USS Thresher whom crews also never made it home.

[SOB]

Rich's meticulous attention to detail shines thru yet once more! The clinometers are truly 4.0. I know he spent hundreds of hours getting every detail correct - so much so that he found the original WW-II manufacturer of the glass bubble tubes and obtained replicas made to the original WW-II plans.

On to a less pleasant topic --

I swear no matter what kind of visitor-proofing is installed in PAMPANITO, if a knob can be twisted, lever pulled, or switch thrown, someone will do so - without any idea of the consequences.

Thus, to limit liability and protect historic fabric, we must visitor-proof everything. Whatever works in Cleveland sure as hell does NOT work in San Francisco.

Every time we line up to run an engine, we check each and every switch that visitors can access, then unlock and activate the DC bus tie - then double-check everything that now has power available.

Sure as hell, even with an alert, roving below-decks watch, motor controllers get activated by roaming fingers about 25% of the time.

The ICMG switchboard in Maneuvering is well protected - but even then, someone manages to get their fingers behind the plexiglass and snaps one or two switches.

Theft has been a problem from time-to-time but it has been relatively minor for some time now. Ditto vandalism. [knocking on wood here]

The sad fact of life is that some visitors do not respect historic fabric and more to the point, some parents don't give a hoot in hell how destructive their bratty kids' behavior can be.

Another volunteer and I watched one ~8-year-old come thru Control one day with us standing right there -- he ran over to the hydraulic manifold, literally braced his feet, then began jerking the main vent valve control handles.

When they didn’t move, he began spinning the IMO pump switch like a roulette wheel.

About this time, I asked him to stop doing that. In response, he spun around and began jamming the helm to-and-fro.

Get this - his mother was indignant that I dared tell the little bastard to behave himself.

I sure wish I understood what is so magical about Cleveland that makes your visitors respectful of COD.

[Karen D.]

Wow, that's sad to hear that you have that many problems with "busy hands." Like COD, it's not an issue on COBIA, but we also have guided tours. NO ONE is allowed aboard without a staff member. And before people go aboard, the tour guides warn people that this is a landmark and some things still work, so please dont touch anything and most people listen. And if they do touch something, 90% of the time it's one of the spring handles on a wheel and then they freak out becuase they don't know how to put it back before getting caught.
Aside from a few chains across doorways (fwd battery) and locks on lockers and things, we do very little visitor proofing. Ironically the one object that is chained down is the piston head that was removed from engine #4. I'd like to see someone try to steal that!

[Paul Farace]

Well SOB, it's nothing special about Cleveland (we have as many assholes, murderers, theives, etc., as any city, maybe more)... what it does involve is a lot of hard to describe elements, like how the vessel strikes the visitor, what subtle cues are given to the visitor by the boat, its environment, about how they should act and behave. Sure we get kids like you describe, but they're in the minority... just as most of your visitors are respectful of the boat... having more folks does mean you have more idiots, but if we factor in time (at once it took us 10 years to meet your annual visitor levels, today it's only about three years) we're comparable.

It's all about how you treat the visitor...  some ships treat their visitors very badly and they reciprocate by being assholes... some ships don't give their visitors any cues or hints on how to act and you get more than normal "bad" behavoir... and some boats (COD among them) work hard at creating an environment that tells the visitors in many different ways "you're aboard a living ship, don't touch this stuff it all works!

This is a never-ending debate (and an interesting one since we are still learning)... but if you say to the visitor "We trust you!" they reciprocate.  PAMP doesn't say that -- all the plexiglas and visitor proofing, the "party atmosphere" of Pier 45, all combine to form a real challenge for you guys.  And it won't change with a few simple fixes or alterations.

BTW: I just visited a major (the major?) ship attraction and I have to tell you that if I could open some sea cocks and sink the ship after how I was treated by several members of the staff, I WOULD HAVE!!!  Luckily I don't know where those valves are and several other members of the crew were damn nice!  So I will do "damage" via YELP or TRIP ADVISOR... someone else (without the right frame of mind) will damage the ship's fabric.