Looking for info on 18th century ships / was hull treated with cresote or ??

[Land-Sea]

Hi fellas,
I'm working on a device that captures signals of chemicals in water. I am wondering if 18th century ships hulls were treated with any type of protective compounds like shelac, cresote etc.

Any info on this is appreciated.

Thanks
Jake

[Old Bookaroo]

Land-Sea:

I would look at the books written by Howard I. Chapelle - accurate, and relatively easy to locate.

Good luck to all,

~The Old Bookaroo

[maipenrai]

I dont know about the ships in your area, but wooden ships in the Baltic region were treated with pine tar.

[hammered]

Late 18th century Royal Navy ships hulls had a copper plating, this was replaced periodically at Chatham and one or two other ship yards. The museum there has some original plates.


hammered

[stevemc]

The copper sheathing, and lead sheathing, was put on over canvas that was soaked with tar, most likely pine tar, maybe petro tar, if it came out of the ground in that area. On some of the sheathing you can actually see the pattern of the cloth. They used 1000s of tiny 1 1/4" nails to hold it all on. That was how they would waterproof, and also keep the toredo clams from boring into the hull. And barnacles and oysters and other growth. The copper is what is used in todays bottom paint. Shellac isnt waterproof, and creasote is a byproduct of gasoline production/petroleum breakdown, so I am sure it wasnt around back then.

[RELICDUDE07]

The commercial use of creosote dates back to the late 1700s. Coal tar creosote was used to treat wood for ships to make it resist decay and pests. During the 1800s, the railway industry began using coal tar creosote. It is the most used wood preservative in the country.

[Land-Sea]

Hi,
Thanks to all of you who posted. All are good leads for me. I already have the capibility for detecting the copper and lead. But with those posts indicating their frequent use, I think I will work on raising the sensitivity on those two. I will get some samples of pine tar, and coal tar cresote to test.

I appreciate the help!!

Best,
Jake

[bigkid4]

If I had a machine that could detect copper, lead, tar, and creosote, I would forget about all of those and just set it up for gold and silver.

[Land-Sea]

Ahh... but I can do silver also. Gold has different properties. But near silver is usually gold. With todays technologies though it may not be long before gold can be done as well.