From: "Frank Haber" 

Curiosity question:

Thinking back to accounts of chasing down the Bismarck, etc., I remember
being struck by the fact that the ?Hood, was it, had to stop chasing
because it was running out of fuel.  I also seem to remember that it had
only been steaming 1000 mi. or so. So,

o Was fuel consumption so high at flank speed that a battleship couldn't
carry enough fuel for more than that?

o One would assume that they'd have to build for a 4-5000 mile range at
cruise, at least?  Did flank burn 4-5x the fuel?

o And when did capital ships go from coal to oil in the US and Brit navies?

o For coal-fired ships, was it all slurry-coal and automatic stokers after
the WWI era?

o How did a collier (ship) work in the Dreadnought era?  Was there
mid-ocean refueling?

-from NYC, where they're just getting rid of the last *manually-fired*
anthracite furnaces in our public schools, fercryingoutlout, in 2003.

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