> > I don't think there can be ANY coating to withstand the sharp edges of broken > ice. > Does anyone know how the bottoms of ocean going ice breakers are treated? John
I've got a book about the preserved icebreaker 'Stettin' (in German so I may have missed something). There are good pictures of her in drydock under preservation, where she appears to be painted with normal red anti-fouling underwater (of course she no longer goes out in the ice). There is also a close-up of a new (riveted) plate being put on - there is quite a lot of pitting on the old plates but the text says they are 25mm+ as opposed to 8 mm for a normal cargo ship, and there is close framing as well. As far as I can tell (the older pictures are b&w) both modern and old (back to WW1) icebreakers were painted in the same way as normal ships (until recently balck above the waterline, anti-fouling below). There is a picture of the 'Hanse' in Finnish waters taken from the ice (there is a ladder leant against the ship) showing the black scraped off for 2-3 feet above the waterline. Hanse apparently worked about 2900 days in Finnish waters and 82 in German waters over a 30-year service career - Stettin has apparently now steamed more days in 28 years of preservation than in 45 years of service, which is why the last German steam icebreaker, 'Wal' worked until 1987. A couple of points which interested me - the hull form of Stettin is almost exactly the same as mine (despite 100 years between their build dates) except at the stern, where she has a finer run to the propeller - and the big icebreakers also 'roll like an egg' as the Germans put it! Sean [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
