Keith Halliday
Keith belongs to: The Doxford Engine Friends Association
Keith was born in 1938 and went to school in Ryhope. He began his apprenticeship at Doxford's in 1954 and moved to Palmers Hebburn in 1958. Keith spent seven years at sea as a marine engineer before he returned to work in the Doxford's Service Department in 1970.
Keith was interviewed by Carl Greenwood on 7 December 2005. The interview took place at Beamish Regional Resource Centre and lasted 22 minutes and 43 seconds.
Routines in the Service Department
"Well, when I came, when I went back in 1970 to start in the Service Department, at that time there were still a thousand Doxford engines in service"
Well, when I came, when I went back in 1970 to start in the Service Department, at that time there were still a thousand Doxford engines in service, and the Service Department had been set up initially as a non-profit making arm to Doxford’s to give customer service. So at that time there was 10 service engineers in Doxford’s, so we had 10 divided into a 1000 is a 100 engines, so we were kept quite busy. The bread and butter was, we used to do an alignment of the crank shaft. If, say, some owners used to get it done just had it done just prior to dry dock, or the owners would get it done after every trip, others would only get it done when they were in trouble, when the deflections showed that the alignment wasn’t right.
But we used to be involved in all kinds of breakdowns where connecting rod bolts had broken and the connecting rod had more or less come free and had been whipped round with the crank shaft. I’ve been on ships where the, you know, there was a big gouge out of the bedplate and, you know, the damage to cylinder liner, the cylinder liner landings and it was a matter of stripping everything out, checking everything and then returning everything to what it was prior to, you know, before the accident, which involved cutting out fabricated steelwork and welding pieces back in again and dressing them up and making sure everything was inline, putting the wire, putting the wire down the liner and checking the, that everything was inline with the centre guide.
Keith has 13 memories in the memorynet:
Keith's memories with a Roles and Routines theme:
Routines in the Service Department
- Service call outs
Keith's other memories:
TelegramThis memory has these themes:
Roles and Routines | Work
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