"engines hp?" Topic

Perhaps this has been asked and answered before but in the purely for info category does anyone have any info or idea of the amount of hp the steam engines of those times produced, on average? I haven't found any info in my research, there is plenty of it on the ships of both World Wars and earlier.
Anyway, like I said mainly a curiosity question I hope some one knows or maybe based on real life experience with ship engines could make a guess.
If I had to make a guess based on just some general info about the ships and the time period I would guess the engines produced around 200 hp or so, but I may be way off either way, like I said just my guess. And yes I know coal quality, steam pressure and other factors would have played into exact numbers which is why I said on average or in general. Thanks.

Travis

Here is an article on the Monitors engine which weighed around 30 tons and could produce 400 HP.

link

Very cool, thanks. Looks like my guess was in the ballpark at least. I imagine the Virginias engines were not as powerful considering her very sluggish movement.

I'm not at home right now, but I have a couple of reference books which might contain the kind of information you want. Check back tomorrow.

Based on this site 1294hp for the CSS Virginia
link

"Warships of the Civil War Navies," by Paul H. Silverstone has HP ratings for most of the major ships.

Here's a sampling from Paul H. Silverstone's "Warships of the Civil War Navies (Annapolis, Md.: U.S. Naval Institute Press, 1989):

Union monitors
U.S.S. Monitor (1862), 320 I.H.P.
U.S.S. Weehawken (1863), 320 I.H.P.
U.S.S. Dictator (1864), 3,500 I.H.P.

Other Union ironclads
U.S.S. Keokuk (1862), about 500 I.H.P.
U.S.S. Galena (1862), 800 H.P.
U.S.S. New Ironsides (1862), 700 H.P.

Union screw frigates
U.S.S. Merrimack (1856), 869 I.H.P. as built
U.S.S. Minnesota (1857), 973 I.H.P.

Union screw sloops of war
U.S.S. Hartford (1859), 1,000 I.H.P.
U.S.S. Kearsarge (1862), 842 I.H.P.

Union gunboat
U.S.S. Princeton (1852), 195 H.P.

Confederate ironclads
C.S.S. Albemarle (1864), 400 I.H.P.
C.S.S. Stonewall (1865), 1,200 I.H.P.

Confederate cruiser
C.S.S. Alabama (1862), 600 I.H.P.

By way of comparison, the following from "Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships, 1860-1905" (New York: Mayflower Books, 1979):

French broadside ironclad
Gloire (1860), 2,500 I.H.P.

British armored frigate
H.M.S. Warrior (1861), 5,267 I.H.P.

Thanks guys, had no idea the ships of that time could generate that much. Seems to be a wide range there, I know that a multiple of factors would go into that.

Travis