Question 21/51 by Dr. Susan Shaw, PhD, Plattsburg, NY, USA.Can anyone provide information, including appearance sketches if possible, regarding the following floating batteries: 1. Those used by the French in the 1759 defense of Quebec, Canada. 2. Those used by the British at the 1775 Battle of Bunker Hill. 3. Those used by the British during the Napoleonic wars. Question 22/51 by P. C. Jumonville, Chicago, IL, USA.The training aircraft carriers Wolverine (IX-64) and Sable (IX-81), converted from relatively modern side-wheel Great Lakes passenger steamers, were powered by compound rather than triple expansion engines. Did these engines turn their wheels by reduction gearing rather than crankshafts? I believe that these last-generation side-wheels were smaller in diameter relative to vessel size and appear to revolve faster than their predecessors-as if compensating for smaller diameter by turning at a rate between their predecessors and that of a screw providing the same speed for a like-sized vessel of similar hull lines. By what means WAS the power of multi-expansion engines delivered to the side-wheels of Wolverine, Sable and other last-generation paddle-driven steamers on the Great Lakes?
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