Austin's Pontoon and the tug Lumley.

See also: viewtopic.php?f=149&t=3566&hilit=wear+dockyard

R.

Cracking photo Steve. Anyone want a spare propeller, there's quite a few lying to the right of the dock.

Steve has also pointed out something that I missed. The Pontoon is actually docking itself. The Pontoon is in two bits and one of them has been lifted out of the water by the other half. Routine maintenance I presume.

"Anyone want a spare propeller?" As I recall it seemed to be a particular feature of Sunderland Docks that there were spare propellers lying all around the dock estate - many more than I remember ever seeing in any other port.

Ron

I guess these propellers would be the spare cast iron jobs that were often bolted to the deck for use in emergencies. A bit like the space saver tyre in the modern car, will get you home but not much else. The props were probably too heavy to be "borrowed" and not worth enough for anyone to be really inventive about "borrowing" them to the local scrap yard.

But is it Docking itself????

In all the pictures I've seen its only ever had one side and ships went on sideways.

Is the Second Structure just to keep the dock off the Quayside and keep it in Deep Water.

OR Looking at the other picture where it looks longer IS it docking its other half lenghtways???????????????

Yes Paul, just one sided and it is being docked lengthways on its 'other half'.

I must admit I had more or less worked that out before I finished the post having compared the length in this picture with the length in Dave's picture.

Does anyone know if the Wear had another floating dock at any time???

Yes, I have seen photos by Stephen Swinhoe of one of the tugs (Alnwick I think) in a smaller floating dock. It was in the South Dock and in this case had "two sides".