| The Paddle Steamer Antrim of 1868
Specifications
Length: 82 feet.
Beam: 16.1 feet.
Depth: 7.3 feet.
Draught: 2 feet, 9 inches.
Displacement: 56.96 gross tons; 35.68 net tons.
Construction: Timber; 2½ inch Red Beech carvel planking in hull the below the waterline.
Propulsion: Compound engines with inclined cylinders driving direct to wooden-blade paddle-wheels were built by Kincaid and McQueen of Dunedin. Two cylinders, but dimensions unknown; slide valves Stephensons valve motion.
Service speed: 8 knots.
The funnel was originally fitted with a balloon-type spark arrester.
Log
1868 October 28 The Antrim was built by J. W. Robertson and Company at their sawmill at Greenstone on the shore of Lake Wakatipu from March 1868 and launched on October the 28th.
Detail from the 1882 painting by J. Gibb showing the Antrim at the sawmill where she was built.
1869 January 1 Her first trip under steam.
 
Two stern views
1885 The wood-fired locomotive type boiler was replaced by a coal-fired boiler.
1891 Engines altered to simple type by inserting a sleeve in the low-pressure cylinder.
1894 Fitted with a new locomotive type boiler, it was built by Morgan Cable and Company 0 Port Chalmers, with a working pressure of 110 lb. per square inch.
1905 She was laid up from 1905.
1920 Dismantled from 1920, her boiler and engine are still in use on the Earnslaw's slipway.
Other Lake Wakatipu Steamers
Above: moored at Queenstown are the Railways Department's Lake steamers Antrim of 1868 and on the right, the 108 ton Mountaineer of 1879. Although neither has survived, the Antrim's steam engine and boiler are still in use at the Kinloch slipway and are used to haul the Earnslaw out for her bi-annual survey.
The Twin Screw Steamer Ben Lomond of 1872
The Paddle Steamer Mountaineer of 1879
The Twin Screw Steamer Earnslaw of 1911
Bibliography
Mackay, Malcolm
Lady of the Lake The TSS Earnslaw Story
Queenstown: Author, 1999. Pictorial card covers, 48 pp. Illustrated: colour and B&W plates, line drawings.
Meyer, R. J.
All Aboard The Ships and Trains that Served Lake Wakatipu
Wellington: NZ Railway and Locomotive Society, 1980. 196 pp. Colour frontis. Illustrated: B&W plates and line drawings. Index.
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New Zealand Maritime Record
web site.
20050112
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