IT was .in 1904 that, as an experiment, the first petrol engine was fitted in a pulling and sailing life-boat. It was an engine of 10 horse power. Two years later three other sailing life-boats were fitted with larger engines. The experiment was a success and in 1908 the first three motor life-boats were built. Two of them were self-righting boats, one with a 24 h.p. engine and the other with a 30 h.p. engine. They went to Fishguard and Stromness. The third was a Watson boat, with a 40 h.p.

engine. She went to Broughty Ferry.

These three boats, built forty years ago, were the beginning of the motor lifeboat fleet of to-day.

Now, in December, 1948, the last of the sailing life-boats has been replaced by a motor life-boat.* The mechanisation of the fleet—much delayed by two wars—has taken just forty years to complete.

156 Boats instead of 280 In 1908, when those first three motor life-boats were built, there were 276 pulling and sailing and four steam lifeboats on the coast. To-day the work of those 280 life-boats is done by 156 motor life-boats. Only one life-boat which has not an engine remains in the * An article on the last of the sailing life-boats will be published in the next number of The LUeboat.

fleet. She is likely to remain. This is at Whitby, where, besides a motor lifeboat, there is a pulling life-boat for work in the harbour entrance between the piers; there a boat under oars can work more easily and turn more quickly than a motor boat.

The first three motor life-boats, like the fleet of pulling and sailing life-boats, were open boats, with a cover over the engine itself, but no protection for the mechanic. They had single engines and, in case the engine should fail, carried a full set of sails. The sails continued to be carried, and still are, by all motor life-boats with only one engine.

For Launching off the Beach Ten years later, when the first war ended, there were twenty motor lifeboats in the fleet. Building could now be resumed and the next few years were busy with big developments.

With greater confidence in the petrol engine, larger and more powerful motor life-boats could be designed. But there was a'more difficult problem. It was to design smaller and lighter boats.

Up to this time all motor life-boats .had been launched down slipways. What was most urgent was boats that, with the added wtight of an engine, would be light enough to be launched off a carriage on the beach. There were many stations where the boat could be launched in no other way. Until a lighter boat was designed these stations could not use motor power. The first of these light boats was placed at Eastbourne in 1921. She was 35 feet long and weighed under seven tons, two tons less than the lightest then on the coast. She had a 15 h.p. engine.

Next year saw another important step. A new boat, of the Watson type, went to Penlee with a new type of engine. It was the largest yet built, of 80 h.p. More important still, it was the first watertight engine. It could work with the engine-room flooded.

The First Cabin Life-boat A year later, 1923, the first motor life-boat with a cabin was completed.

Like the Broughty Ferry boat of 1908, she was of the Watson type. She was 45 feet long, weighed over 17 tons, and had an 80 h.p. engine. She was also the first boat to have a canopy over the engine-controls. It was of canvas, but in the next and succeeding boats, it was made of wood.

The same year saw an even more important advance. The first motor life-boat with two engines and twin screws was built, the first to be independent of sail. She was of a new type, much larger and heavier, the Barnett type, 60 feet long, weighing over 41 tons. She was stationed at New Brighton on the Mersey.

Up to this time, and for another three years the exhausts of the engines had discharged first at the side and then at the stern of the boat, where the disadvantage was that the fumes might blow back on the boat. In 1926 the first boat was built with the exhausts carried up a funnel.

A Heavier Beacb Boat The light type of boat, of which the first had been completed in 1921, had made it possible to have motor lifeboats at nearly all stations, but there still remained a few from which they were excluded—stations where the boats had to be launched off the open beach, but where conditions at sea made it necessary to have larger and heavier boats-than - this new light type. Ten years later, in 1931, a new type was designed to meet this special need, and the first of this type, the beach boat, was stationed at Aldeburgh. She was 41 feet long, weighed over 16 tons, had two 35 h.p. engines, and was launched not off a carriage, but down wooden skids.

Dietel Engine* For the first 28 years all motor lifeboats had petrol engines. The engine driven by heavy oil had great advantages.

With it there was much less risk of fire, and with the same quantity of fuel the boat could travel nearly twice as far. But a heavy-oil engine was much heavier than a petrol engine. It was too heavy for a life-boat. By the middle of the 'thirties Diesel engines were being built which weighed little more than petrol engines of the same horse power, and the first boat with Diesel instead of petrol engines was stationed at Howth in 1936. She was a 46-feet Watson cabin boat with twin screws. Each engine was of 40 h.p.

Thereafter all the larger boats were built with Diesel engines, but petrol was still used in the light boats.

Up to this time also, only the larger boats had twin screws, but in 1936 two boats were built—and were followed by five more in the next three years-— smaller and lighter than any in the fleet.

They were the surf type, 32 feet long, weighing under five tons, and they had two 12 h.p. engines. The first two were stationed at Wells, in Norfolk, and Ilfracombe.

Beginnings of a New Fleet That was the state of the fleet when war broke out in 1939. A year later the building of new life-boats almost ceased, but during the war a new design was prepared. Until then the steering wheel in all life-boats was right aft.

That was a necessity with sails. Now that an increasing number of life-boats had twin screws and were independent of sail, it was decided to put the wheel amidships where the coxswain would have a better view, and be better placed for controlling his crew.

Plans were also prepared for a new fleet to be built when the war ended, in which all life-boats,,light as well as heavy, should have two engines and two screws, and all engines should use heavy oil, instead of petrol.

Aluminium Alloy A new material has now made possible yet more developments in the design of life-boats. This is aluminium alloy, which is lighter than wood, of which life-boats are mainly built, or the mild steel which has been used for many years for engine-casings and bulkheads.

Aluminium alloy was first used in life-boats in 1927 for the panel of the engine-controls. Now, with the help of this metal, the first life-boat has been built with a deck cabin as well as a cabin below deck. She went to herstation, St. Helier, Jersey, in September, 1948. She is of the Watson cabin type, 46 feet 9 inches, by 12 feet 9 inches, and she weighs 22 tons. Not only the deck cabin, but the whole of the superstructure—the shelter for the mechanics, the mast and the ventilators —is made of aluminium alloy. Had it been of wood and mild steel the weight would have been over a quarter of a ton more. This deck cabin has seats for eleven persons, besides the -ten for whom there are seats in the cabin below deck. It has space between the seats for a stretcher. It has a chart table, and a locker with a paraffin cooker. This is the first life-boat with means for cooking food. There is a separate room for the radio telephone. The engine exhausts are, for the first time, carried up the mast, instead of a funnel, and in this way they escape well above the heads of the crew.

The St. Helier boat has also what has already been fitted in the wind-screens of one or two other life-boats, a Kent clear-view screen. It is a circular piece of glass which is spun round on a central pivot by an electric motor, and by spinning throws off all spray and rain, so that there is always a clear view through it.* To-day the fleet has seven main types of motor life-boat, varying in length from 35 feet 6 inches to 60 feet; in weight from 8J tons to 43£ tons; in power from two 18 h.p. engines to two 80 h.p. engines.

* This new life-boat has attracted much attention, and photographs ot her have appeared not only in many British papers, but in papers in Canada, South Africa, New Zealand and South America..