Rate of decay of fittings and fixtures

[Aidan Bowe]

How long would it have taken for the fixtures and fittings to start to decay? I often wonder what the wreck and it's contents would have looked like say a year after the sinking...sure the perishable stuff such as food and plant material would have gone in a few weeks but what about the rest..wardrobes,chairs,carpets etc..what an eerie and atmospheric sight it would have looked then.

 

[Jason D. Tiller]

Hello Aidan,

I moved the thread to here, where it's more appropriate and will generate a better response.

 

[Mark Draper]

According to Ballard's Discovery book, wood and fabrics would decay in a matter of months.

 

[Michael H. Standart]

And yet, there's a lot of wood that survives within the wreck itself. It would appear that the deeper into the ship you go, the better the preservation.

 

[Yuri Singleton]

Which leads one to wonder, what might be lying inside the Turkish Bath, or in Boiler room 5?
Perhaps the boots of the two engineers lost when the bulkhead gave way?

 

[Mark Draper]

Well, the preserved wood is due to the lead paint used at the time. Any organism that tried to eat the tainted wood would die from the lead in the paint.

It also suprises me that Henry Sleeper Harper's bowler hat is still there. Some say wood or any fabrics can survive if near any metal which would deter organisms from going near.

 

[Michael H. Standart]

>>Well, the preserved wood is due to the lead paint used at the time.<<

Ick...that would tend to give the little critters a terminal bellyache! I wonder what else might have been preserved this way just by being close enough?

 

[Mark Draper]

Many things probably, you just have to go deeper inside the ship to find out. D deck has many suviving wooden materials, as seen in GotA. Who knew before hand that the stained glass windows would still be there? That is a new piece of the puzzle for the Titanic story.

Speaking of which, what about the Renault, was that it in GotA? It sure looked like parts of the famous car to me.

 

[sandro campisi]

where is the piano of the recepcion Deck D, the piano was big and of wood but in the inside was of metal. The metal would deter organisms from going near.

 

[Jason D. Tiller]

"...what about the Renault, was that it in GotA?"

What James Cameron and his team thought to be the car, really in fact wasn't. There are a lot of structures there that are man made, but nothing to identify the car with.

Even if they would have found it, I don't think there would be much to see, since most of it probably rotted away.

 

[Michael H. Standart]

Regretably, no positive identification of the car has been made and I don't know if any ever will be. The problem is that the hold itself is such a jumbled mess that it's very difficult to identify much of anything at all. As Jason indicated, it's unlikely that there's much there that would even be recognizable. The only really substantial part would be the engine block. The rest from the frame to the chassis was made of much thinner metal none of hich salt water would be very kind to.

 

[Mike Bull]

And isn't it right that unlike in the movie, the car would actually have been shipped somewhat take apart, a bit like a big flat pack on a large pallet?

Surely the contents of the holds were also thrown all about the place upon bottom impact, as well as some having floated around during the initial flooding?

 

[Jason D. Tiller]

Hi Mike,

Yes, the car was in a crate, so it would have been in several pieces.

Without a doubt, the items in the cargo holds would have floated at the time of the sinking and later on been tossed about as she hit the ocean floor.

 

[Matt Simons]

>>where is the piano of the recepcion Deck D, the piano was big and of wood but in the inside was of metal<<

The piano would of moved around when the ship was begging to slant. It probably crashed into the wall and broke apart.
I heard the paino on the 1997 Titanic movie was a fake piano in an underwater set, otherwise it was another piano since there was not a paino in the dinning room (it was in the Reception Room), as stated in the movie.

As for the metal protecting the wood, I have no idea. If anything remained of the piano it would probably be protected by the metal, unless the metal is gone, I do not know?

 

[Shane Worthy]

Could the piano have possibly been bolted to the floor? In rough seas, you would NOT want that thing flying about!
Interesting...this is my 3rd posting on that piano today...
All Ahead Full!