# Ordering stores etc



## Dickyboy (May 18, 2009)

Hi!
Having had little to do with Radio Officers, or their boxes of tricks. I have often wondered if when ordering the ships basics, like food stores, or engine spares, or whatever, there were codes or abbreviations used to shorten the message? It always seemed to me, that to order a full shopping list of stores, in Morse, but as a full translation from English would have been a very time consuming affair.
LEFO is one abbreviation that I do know about.


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## hawkey01 (Mar 15, 2006)

Dickyboy,

In my experience they were always sent in longhand/full description. Food would be per item required followed by amount weight/quantity etc. Ships stores mechanical/electrical again would be in full with the relevant ref numbers. If a ship came up with a stores list you could guarantee that it was going to be long and sometimes complex. 
Some companies also required the ship to advise how many items were still aboard. 
We used to get quite a lot of stores lists for chandlers at Suez/Port Said as it was obviously easier to send them to us at Portisheadradio than try and contact Egypt direct. 
Some companies may have had some code groups for items but overall it was all in full.

Hawkey01


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## Dickyboy (May 18, 2009)

Sounds very time consuming. How did you get it through all the clutter of hundreds of other ships signals? Different frequencies no soubt, but there must have still been a lot of clutter. I assume R/Os had to transmit to suit the receiving ends time? Office hours as it were.


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## MARINEJOCKY (Nov 25, 2007)

Besides getting the football scores, what else did they have to do (*))


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## surfaceblow (Jan 16, 2008)

The last R\O on the Valley Forge had thick coke bottle lens in his glasses and a pair of hearing aids. You never knew if the legal pad with the double spaced lines of parts or spares ordered would be received correctly. At times there would be lines skipped or pages that were not sent. Since we were one of the last ships to update its Radio Shack and being on a Coastwise trade the younger R\O's just stayed clear. I should add that this was not the norm. But there was some amusing orders like receiving 12 dozen eggs instead of 12 gross and the 10 pounds of potatoes instead of 100 pounds. 

Joe


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## les.edgecumbe (Dec 24, 2007)

MARINEJOCKY said:


> Besides getting the football scores, what else did they have to do (*))


Get yourself a real life Marinejockey ~ this is a very tired argument and most often lost when discussed seriously.


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## MARINEJOCKY (Nov 25, 2007)

I have a very real & succesful life and do not take myself as seriously as some, yourself included, on here. 

I was waiting for a serious answer from a professional sparkie who has the experience but there seems to be a lack of that. 

Why not give us your "serious" answer. 

The "serious" companies I worked for had a very serious list that had codes or numbers representing whatever had to be ordered. fill in the blanks, send it to sparkie and all he had to do was dit and dat that 100 of XYZ was needed. XYZ being pounds of spuds etc, etc. 

Of course that was when Sparkies were needed, now we all know we can sit in front of the computer and insult, I mean communicate, with one another instantly from anywhere in the world.


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## Dickyboy (May 18, 2009)

Gentlemen.......gentlemen.....Please!


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## John Dryden (Sep 26, 2009)

I always thought the old man went ashore with a wad of cash to do a bit of shopping..ah but that was tramping with Bank Line(Jester)


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## Troppo (Feb 18, 2010)

Sorry, we can't reveal secret sparkies business...

(==D)


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## Baulkham Hills (Jul 11, 2008)

In my experience they were always in plain language, the longest I sent was less than a thousand words. I used to split it up in sections of 50 words and get a confirmation every 50 words. So it was time consuming but pretty straight forward. I would also wait for good conditions which made it easier.
The last one I sent was to Lisboa/Cul but when I contacted them on w/t and told them the number of words they replied "go to satellite", which is what I did.
As regards ordering I was on a ship where there were a few boxes of 20 ton shackles in the radio room. Nobody knew where they came from, so looking through the records I found they were delivered in place of aerial shackles at the last minute leaving New Zealand and were duly signed for by someone who had not seen them.


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## John Dryden (Sep 26, 2009)

I like the 20 ton shackle tale,could be a good thread this one!(just hope that MJ falls over laughing!)


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## reefrat (Nov 4, 2007)

When the computor/satelite revolution arrived and long hand requisitions were replaced by a ready made program, I ordered 5 sticks of silver solder, a normal 12 week supply, was I suprised when a furious marine super asked who had authorised the purchase of 50 kg of silver solder,, the boffins had changed the unit of supply, sticks, to 10 kg lots, in line with other items e.g cement etc.


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## G4UMW (May 30, 2007)

The only compliment I ever received from GKA came after sending a long stores message. As previously described the message was broken into sections of 50 words, all longhand. Got the QSL with the comment "Nice Morse OM, that'll put the wind up the office at coffee time". 

Made my day!


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## les.edgecumbe (Dec 24, 2007)

MARINEJOCKY said:


> I have a very real & succesful life and do not take myself as seriously as some, yourself included, on here.
> 
> I was waiting for a serious answer from a professional sparkie who has the experience but there seems to be a lack of that.
> 
> ...


I couldnt take you seriously if I tried old chap.

You have convinced me why engineers were always below the waterline ~ to much saying and very little thinking.


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## ART6 (Sep 14, 2010)

When I worked for Esso in the nineteen-sixties, as far as I am aware, all orders for victuals etc were radioed direct in plain language to chandlers in the destination port. There was, however, in the London office, a Materials Supply Group. This dealt with all engineering requirements for parts, materials, and consumables, and it also dealt with any emergency situations that did occur with some regularity.

In the MSG there was always a sea-going engineer with at least a second's ticket, assigned there for six months at a time, to act as a translator for the plain language messages that would come in to the central comms room. The idea was that the engineer would, given his up-to-date knowledge of the fleet, be able to understand exactly what was needed, when the office staff would not necessarily understand the terms used.

In emergency situations the in***bent could be called out of his bed and told to get his a**e into the office fast, as I was on one occasion. That involved not only translation of messages, but also advising on what to do about them. In my case it was a tanker with total engine failure in the North Atlantic a few miles off the Irish coast. I was expected to understand the flurry of radio messages that defined the failure, and to then start finding tugs and possible destinations for the ship, while finding a yard that would accept her for repairs. 

In the latter case, that meant talking to repair yards and explaining the problem, getting their agreement that they could do the job, and then handing the issue over to the marine super who had the unenviable task of persuading the authorities that a fully-loaded tanker without power should be allowed anywhere near their beloved coastline!


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## chadburn (Jun 2, 2008)

Maritime Fruit had a similiar position for an Engineer in their Head Office, it was a position that was used to win friend's and influence people, if you catch my drift(*)). The longest Morse Message's I have seen were the RN's Broadcast's.


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## King Ratt (Aug 23, 2005)

Further to Chadburn's post. The RN and RFA ordered their stores using a signal format called Logreq (logistic requirements). These signals were extremely lengthy and in the days of traffic clearing by CW must have been a pain for the GKA staff. Eventually the RATT system (from where my user name is derived) came into use in the late 1960's and traffic went, by radio teleprinter, straight into the Naval Comms Stations (GYA). GKA must have breathed a sigh of relief.
During these days of morse comms, I sent many long signals, some in long groups of code, via GKA and GKR. These stations were a pleasure to work and I never had any hassle from their operators. 
Belated thanks to them.


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## holland25 (Nov 21, 2007)

King Ratt said:


> Further to Chadburn's post. The RN and RFA ordered their stores using a signal format called Logreq (logistic requirements). These signals were extremely lengthy and in the days of traffic clearing by CW must have been a pain for the GKA staff. Eventually the RATT system (from where my user name is derived) came into use in the late 1960's and traffic went, by radio teleprinter, straight into the Naval Comms Stations (GYA). GKA must have breathed a sigh of relief.
> During these days of morse comms, I sent many long signals, some in long groups of code, via GKA and GKR. These stations were a pleasure to work and I never had any hassle from their operators.
> Belated thanks to them.


I found that the hardest part was making the tape. I tried RATT in 1969 much to the amusement of my senior colleagues who still preferred CW, as you say it worked well. The SRO declared it was the way of the future.


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## Tony Selman (Mar 8, 2006)

Although it was not standard practice on PandO passenger ships (not in my day anyway) to send stores requirements it did happen once on Oronsay when I was there in the early 70's. I do not know the reason now, if I ever knew it, and indeed do not know what the standard practice was. However, a humungously long list came in somewhere between Honolulu and Sydney for transmission to Sydney where we were due to have a 4 day layover. The 1st R/O, Jack Gawley, decided to keep it for a quiet period and as there was not too much press that night it landed in my lap on the morning 12 to 4. I contacted VIS and told him we had an exceptionally long and complicated message for him and how did he want to handle it. He said let's break it into about 100 word gaps and see how we get on. That guy was excellent and the whole thing went very well but I know it took me almost an hour to send it at fairly fast speeds. God knows how long the message was at this distance but you can imagine a stores list for a passenger ship contains a good few items. My wrist knew I had been sending at the end of that lot as I recall.


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## tunatownshipwreck (Nov 9, 2005)

What about RTTY?


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## Tony Selman (Mar 8, 2006)

I'm not sure if the RTTY question is directed at me or not, but that answer is we hadn't got it then.


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## King Ratt (Aug 23, 2005)

For Tunatownshipwreck.
Also used RTTY on HF but the naval RATT system got our traffic very quickly to multiple addresses in dockyards and the like and was also unpaid. Unless of course you consider what it cost the taxpayer to fund a separate and massive comms system. Also used Marisat when it was introduced but again it was expensive.


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## Varley (Oct 1, 2006)

My first TOR 1976 ish MIMCO/Texaco Spain.


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## Larry Bennett (Aug 28, 2005)

Probably the best ever QSO I had at GKA was with the Esso Northumbria (callsign long forgotten) circa 1982 - his RTT was out of order and I had to take vast amounts of traffic (in one go) by cw, including stores orders of over 500 words. In those days traffic was taken down by typewriter on Post Office 'Green' forms with room for around 100 words per form. We arranged to break every 100 words to give me time to reload the typewriter.

Traffic was duly sent (around 25 wpm) using this method, and all was sent and received with no mistakes, no errors and no repeats - the perfect QSO in all respects!

If the R/O is a member of this site, many belated thanks!

Larry +


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## trotterdotpom (Apr 29, 2005)

No worries Larry.

John T


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## trotterdotpom (Apr 29, 2005)

R651400 said:


> Waiting for Nomoss to shoot this QTB balloon down in flames.
> The DWS or Diplomatic Wireless Service cw operators between Embassy and CRS (Central Receiving Station) at Hanslope Park exchanged telegrams mainly five letter code groups well in excess of 350 wordes per telegram without QSZ and similarly plain language press from the COI (Central Office of Information) at 2000 words plus.
> All in a days work.


Yes, but they weren't rolling all over the place and they didn't have to get the weather as well.

John T


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## hawkey01 (Mar 15, 2006)

Malcolm,

remember sitting on the Tel Aviv circuit during the first conflict sending thousand upon thousands of groups of press and code. Many never made it to tape as there was just so much. Mostly newspaper reports of useless garbage. Cannot remember the old codes now but we used something other than QRM was it QLN? but the other end was one of the wiz kids and could receive at mega speed. Reply something like QLN3 QRK3 K LOT. Ah! them was the days.

Neville


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## R719220 (Oct 5, 2011)

R651400 said:


> Nev... QLN3 ?????
> QLN? What speed..
> Generally you just got K the lot QLN 35 or just K nip.
> More tfc in one day than the Queen's sent in a week!


And you couldn't do that on an up and downer, that's for sure!


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## R719220 (Oct 5, 2011)

Bonjour Malc

My younger daughter bought me an old up and downer with a side-tone oscillator off e- bay for Xmas. It sits here on my desk on a Red Ensign mouse mat. Probably do about 20 on that. The problem is that no matter who or how often I call there's never any answer! Memsahib makes me keep the volume turned down to no more than QSA 1/2.


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## Dickyboy (May 18, 2009)

Yawn............................


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## Tai Pan (Mar 24, 2006)

MARINEJOCKY said:


> I have a very real & succesful life and do not take myself as seriously as some, yourself included, on here.
> 
> I was waiting for a serious answer from a professional sparkie who has the experience but there seems to be a lack of that.
> 
> ...


No good trying to explain to a car mechanic the secrets of Radio


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## Dickyboy (May 18, 2009)

R651400 said:


> Oh dear not a clue and still indulging in number one vindi past-time..
> Gobbing on the swans..
> Yawn Yawn.


Yeah, and watching clouds pass over my head 
PS I never gobbed at swans, I thought of them more as food


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## hawkey01 (Mar 15, 2006)

Malcolm,

Knew I would get the codes wrong. It was a longtime ago! 

Neville


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## NoMoss (Mar 14, 2007)

R651400 said:


> Waiting for Nomoss to shoot this QTB balloon down in flames.
> The DWS or Diplomatic Wireless Service cw operators between Embassy and CRS (Central Receiving Station) at Hanslope Park exchanged telegrams mainly five letter code groups well in excess of 350 wordes per telegram without QSZ and similarly plain language press from the COI (Central Office of Information) at 2000 words plus.
> All in a days work.


I'm not shooting anything down. Yes we did have long telegrams - 5000 groups was not that unusual. I remember going on watch in the morning and my releif arrive at lunchtime and I suddenly realised I hadn't stopped, even for a pee, all morning. We may not have been rolling about but we had very low powered equipment and often had to often change frequencies to avoid QRM. It all changed with the advent of 'more mechanical' systems which required just keyboard operating.


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## NoMoss (Mar 14, 2007)

R651400 said:


> Neville...
> Each rx bay used to have a thin green book with the firm's exclusive Q sigs.
> Favourite was QKM..
> I'm experiencing propo black-out or more to the point have to piss off there's a harry cockers on the go....


The 'exclusive' Q codes caused a lot of confusion to new blokes. We soon found out that weren't asking your name that were asking for another operator!


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## Steven Lamb (Apr 18, 2009)

MARINEJOCKY said:


> Besides getting the football scores, what else did they have to do (*))


Try to be the 1st in the bar !

Rgds
Lamby


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## Robert M Hughes (Oct 16, 2010)

One ship I sailed on (better remain nameless) and being friendly with the Chief Steward I happened to be having a drink or two with him as he made out his store list for the Chandlers - I noticed he made a tick against certain items on querying why his response was "those are the ones that won't be coming on board " !!

Bob


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