Maintaining Your Battleship: Jan 2023 Update 

Make sure you change the oil every 3 months or 3,000 curator units - whichever comes first.

"Only used as a desk" That had me dying

"If you have your own Iowa Class Battleship at home." I liked that. There is no doubt that there's a super wealthy individual out there right now checking to see if that's possible.

"Doesnt mean we're not a cool Iowa class battleship too.... Missouri was only used as a desk anyway"...🤣Good stuff Ryan, had me in tears... Even though I was almost a Missouri sailor... Thank for update, glad to see she getting lots of work. She's definitely in good hands...!!!

Hi, I'm Ryan Szymanski, curator for Battleship New Jersey & Memorial. You might remember me from such instructional videos as "Mothballing You Battleship" and "Dig You Own Grave And Save!"

Many thanks to all New Jersey staff and volunteers for all you do to maintain this huge naval artifact. Ryan, your love for this vessel shows with each video you do. Your priorities are correct - re-decking and then off to drydock. Thank goodness you are in freshwater and your tow to drydock will be short.

"90 story building laying on it's side in the water" wow, that's quite the way to visualize the size of the ship

You are a content Juggernaut. Amazing ambassador for your ship.

A unique individual in a unique job. I know, there are other museum ship curators, but none I know of have your particular flair for presenting your ship and its history in an entertaining and yet entirely professional manner. Kudos!

The Imperial War Museum in London uses aromas in their exhibits The Blitz Exerpience and The Trench Experience. It is frightening how much realism it adds. Good luck with the trial. Congrats to the Eagle Scout!

Great update. NJ is in such excellent hands, well done all.

If you are doing “smell-immersion” you must include the heavy stench of bunker in engineering spaces; b/o and smelly socks in berthing spaces; something burnt in the galley; a cigar in the wardroom and finally for a Viet Nam interpretation a little skunk weed smell from the Deck Dept office. Truly a tour no guest could forget.

Please make a video “Things to look for when purchasing an Iowa class battleship”

Glad you mentioned safety when entering tanks and voids. Red devil blowers were standard equipment on my boat with Drager Tubes to check air quality. We had a shipmate suffer brain damage because of violations in this area. Great video.

The bread slicer ban was short lived though, as the machinery used to make them, and the actual amount of metal needed, was still going to be made into bread slicers for the military, and the manufacturers still had spare capacity to make for the commercial market, just the home market was limited. That ban was overturned soon after it was introduced, due to every congress member receiving thousands of complaint letters from their constituents about this. The History Guy had a show recently about this exact thing, and the short life of this ban.

Hope to see an aerial view of that clean perfect teak deck

If only the state of New Jersey were run as well as the battleship New Jersey museum and memorial!

The work you all do is amazing. I was fortunate enough to visit last spring, and it really did feel like the ship was "alive", almost like the ship was still in service but all her crew had left. I think additions like the smell of fresh donuts will only reinforce that feeling. On another note, I'm currently building a Trumpeter 1/700 scale model of New Jersey in her 1982 configuration. I'm planning on buying a piece of deck from your store to act as a stand, and I think it will be a great way to connect my model to the real deal.

It would be awesome if you guys could get in contact with Mike Rowe and do a "Dirty Jobs" episode. The show is back on the air and from the looks of Ryan in that tank, there are PLENTY of dirty jobs aboard.

Big J is in good hands with guy like Ryan taking care of her, keep up the good work you guys!

"Missouri was only used as a desk anyway" - Ryan Szymanski

We have smell diffusers in UK in all sorts of museums , it helps soo much to having a full museums experience .

That is one hell of an Eagle Scout service project. Puts mine to shame!

Got a good laugh out of that playful inter-battleship rivalry. Even without the donut shop, you're still the coolest battlewagon in my book.

@10:30 "Missouri was only ever used as a desk anyway." Pure curator rivalry on display here!

Really happy to hear you are preparing for future maintenance and checking the ship out. Hopefully she can stay in like new condition.

"Missouri was only ever used as a desk anyway" Shade of the century. 😆

Nice to see a MARDET birthing space! Would love to see more about the Marines aboard NJ!!

I really enjoy these behind the scenes videos on what is going on at the museum. Thank you Ryan and BB NJ crew!

Ryan’s Missouri comments had me in tears 😂. “She’s just a desk anyway”

Since you mentioned the extra sensory exhibits it could be cool to have a room that has a projector showing people walking around and doing their job in that room or just daily life or something. It could be cool to walk by a room and see the people working in it

"Smell difusrer". That was pretty much my highlight of my day!

Hi, I'm Ryan Szimanski. You might remember from such do it yourself videos as "Mothballing Your Battleship."

You should have got the cake from the documentary "Under Seige"...

"Missouri was only used as a desk anyways " Ah I loved that line!

An I the only one to notice that hilarious remark you made about the Missouri? (meow!)

It's impressive you and your volunteers are prepared To make videos in some of these spaces . Over the years I've been inside or sentry and it's not usually pleasant . Spending the budget you have on the right things has to be the most important . The work you do makes a big difference to the longevity of the ship . New Jersey looks in great shape thanks to your efforts .

In the 1060s, on destroyers, we had a night baker that made the bread and any deserts. As you passed thru the mess deck, if you were quick, you could snag a fresh loaf. Deserts were on big trays, too big to snag.

Going to visit this early summer or in the fall. I'm really looking forward to feeling like I stepped back into my service time in the 80s.

Ah, ye olde confined spaces safety procedures. While I don't have my own Iowa class battleship Ryan, I do have my own personal nuclear power plant and I am quite familiar with those kind of procedures. 😉

Liking the updates, great work! Just ordered a small piece of Teak. Very excited can't wait to see it! Keep it up!

I spent 7 years working intermittent contracts as an industrial safety person in a trash burning power plant (and I have the OSHA card to prove it :) ). Confined space procedures are serious business.

Loved the gentle jab at BB63.

Hah, I'm glad you mentioned ship smell. Every museum ship I've visited has that smell. My Chevelle has that same smell. I guess it's just old metal?

Please tell me you guys have the historic recipe books around. I've heard enough about the donuts that the video I want to see is someone preparing a batch of battleship donuts and Ryan's commentary on how they compare to some easily obtained modern reference donuts. Big plus if I can follow along at home and bite into my own battleship style donut.

alright i have the schedule to work on for 2023: 1. taking the engine, turbines and boilers out, rework it so its good as new (has to be done over the weekend i case the ship is needed again for WW3) 2. panting the entire ship new, using only a toothbrush to proof that you are serious with your work 3. overhauling all 3 gun turrets. and yes that also means taking them out (if no crain is available, get a keyboard and some cheat codes to lift them out.... "No gravity cheat" works good) 4. replacing the entire electric systems within the ship. that means, new wires, new cables, all new and up to 21st century standards. should be done in a week 5. vacuuming 6. getting rid off all of the rust on the ship so its completly rust free 7. replacing all steel on the ship with stainless steel so it cant rust again. 8. Installing Windows Vista on all Computers on the ship, because history and nostalgia 9. raising the ticket prices for entry 10. kidnap some of the visitors as cheap work forces 11. reworking all of the weapon system so they can function again 12. cleaning the toillets. 13. repeating all steps with the other iowas

I will use this video as a reference for my battleship…..thank you!!!

This is a new hobby urban naval splunking.

The smell of diesel fuel, gasoline, paint, cigarettes, etc. always brings back memories from my shipboard life aboard destroyers, cargo ships, tankers. The best smell was on one container ship we had a leaking container filled with 200 proof Scotch Whiskey.

Mess deck Smellerizer? As started by Disneyland's Main Street starting in 1955? Making the mess deck smell like a mess deck is attention to detail. The first Fantasia presentations were supposed to include ushers walking down the aisle with various scent sprayers back in 1940. In the Imperial War Museum at London, I toured a section mocked up as a Great War trench. I've been on real battlefields (fortunately AFTER the shooting had stopped) and battlefields have a distinct stench. The IWM had a light battlefield scent that I immediately recognized, and fortunately that odor was low-key. Real battlefields reek. That's a nice touch when you can pull it off because it more fully immerses the visitor in the experience.

I would love to see some of the hidden compartments on the New Jersey! After staying on the ship for an over night program, I would love to see more of the ship.

Oh man! I don't know what it was exactly, but 20 years ago I went to sea on a frigate for a day as a cadet, and I can still smell the galley. It was very distinctive.

I am beginning to think that reactivating the ship's laundry would be great for not only the filthy curator, but for the cloths of the volunteers! What a neat fringe benefit for all those that get dirty keeping the Big J ship shape for us to visit!

can't wait to bring my ham and cheese sandwich to the mess hall to experience the bakery smell!! Great job !!

Just make it smell like paint. Also I was there for an overnight a few weeks ago, great expirience, tell the retired commander "duck" and he'll remember me. Also no I'm not striking, might do reserves though.

A scratch-n-sniff battleship! Huzzah!

Mans getting dirty for us, big ups to you.

You should talk to the folks that take care of our girl (the uss north carolina) some dignitary from Malaysia visited her and fell in love with her and donated a huge amount of wood for her deck

I'd like to see diagrams of the ship flash up so that when you are talking locations, you can put a red dot on the drawings to quickly give us landlubbers a "compass point".

I’ve been on 3 of the Iowas, New Jersey is plenty cool and the tour spaces are exceptional but seeing that dent in Missourah’s hull from the kamikaze is pretty hard to beat…

Wishing you all the best with the maintenance

Ryan must live on the ship! Let see that!

After 21 years of pushing paper for sailors coming and going, reenlisting or separating, getting married/divorced/having kids and needing ID cards, not only for NJ crew, but the "small boys" in our company, I would like to see the Personnel Office. Even as the Navy attempted to transition to a "paperless" operation, paper service records were the norm throughout my career. What a headache the Ship's Diary was to prepare to submit in particular before getting underway. Perhaps something could also be said about the working relationship/rivalry between the crew in the Personnel Office and the folks in the Disbursing Office, which was also paper intensive with their own set of records on each sailor. R. Rose, PNC(SW), USN(Ret)

Right...Bring Ryan donuts when we visit.

fabulous update Ryan, thank you.

Right after the bakery was opened in 2002, it still smelled of fresh baked bread.

They should have been making fries in those deep fat fryers. I never saw any donuts on CVN-71. Lots of burgers and fries.

A bit testy about donuts see .. LoL the I would be too.. Great job by the volunteers keeping this ship in great shape. 🤣

On a side note, this must be the first video Ryan's belt end isn't dangling out a foot. Must have tucked it in for safety reasons. ;).

Terrific work!!!

Awesome Eagle project.

Ryan, you spoke about not doing scent infusion before now. The laundry smells like clean laundry and it really hits you when you visit because it doesn’t smell like the rest of the ship. Is that residual from the ship being in service?

I’ve looked into warships around southwest Ohio but I think the closest one is in the Cleveland area with the USS Cod. Cool ship with a minimum of display plexiglass to restrict looking around corners but hardly close enough to do any work for helping to improve any features.

Halfway to Full Teak!

Coolest scouting project ever!!!

What a great job to have!

World record for youtube videos on a single subject channel coming up!

Amazing work!

"Missouri was only ever used as a desk anyway" HAHAHAHA, Epic!

Another great video from the battleship. Keep it going

Man that looks like fun

I love this video.

Awesome job, good news!

Bahahahaha the slight shade to highway construction is gold! 😂 I get that life, we have construction season and winter…nothing in the middle… Omg edit: 7:13…who would have their own battleship‽‽‽ 😂

Thank you.

Can you show some of the underwater videos to see what the battleship looks like in the water? Bought some more decking to add to the collection.

Bravo on the good job that you have done to date with the teak decking! When I visited the ship in 2019, most of the deck was all warped and old. The old gray lady will look beautiful again.

You COULD buy sliced bread in the US for the vast majority of the war. From January 18-March 8, 1943, sliced bread was banned. This short lived ban resulted in a rush on bread knives, which by then nobody had, and increased food waste due to uncut loaves drying out faster and waste due to poor bread cutting. When the ban was finally rescinded, all authorities pointed fingers and nobody took responsibility. Various excuses were given by the media for the ban but few had any source in government and fewer of those turned out to be logical or based on any actual need. The sliced bread ban resulted in more steel and food consumption than before or after its existence. Bread slicer manufacture was banned for the majority of the war, but since bread slicers are a common item in bakeries and pretty reliable, there was never actually a real shortage of either bread slicers or sliced bread except for that period where the government banned bakeries from using their slicers.

It's cool to see how much you love your job.

Great episode Ryan thank you.

Incredible amazing effort

I want to see how the battleships made ice cream back in WWII for themselves and the fleet.

😆 Ryan getting green with envy over donuts 🍩! I assume the open hatch in the bulkhead between the bakery and bread cooling room is for passing the bread directly between rooms?

Just purchased a small part of the ww2 deck. I love this channel.

For me doughnuts have a very narrow temperature range- If they burn your lips/tongue they are too hot; if they don't burn your lips/tongue then they are too cold. You need to get a fully functional doughnut maker.

the smell diffuser is a really cool idea. i was just thinking you guys should put smell diffusers in the gally. what would be cool is like get a bunch of the diffusers and put them on timers. like morning you would smell breakfast, afternoon you would smell lunch and night you would smell dinner. It would be fun to get one for night rats but there would be no one there to experience it.

10:08 oh that was funny jealous are we Ryan?

The Nevada State Museum in Carson City is also a historic artifact--the Carson City Mint building. I lived in Carson City and more than once the Mint building had scaffolding on the exterior to preserve that artifact. It's not unusual for a museum building to also be an artifact and historical site. Another museum complex like that is the Union Station building in Ogden, Utah, housing a train museum, a railroad museum, the Browning gun museum, and an automobile museum. There are other museums and a theater there as well.

Thanks for the info! I was wondering how I should check the tanks of my own Iowa class Battleship that I have in my backyard pool😁

Got me a piece of teak and a deck bolt :).