USS Texas in Drydock - 2023 (Lets go inside!) 

Pinned post for Q&A :)

So glad she's finally in dock for a good bit of repair work, it would be a crime to lose such a historic ship. We're extremely fortunate to have people doing their best to keep her in one piece for years to come.

Painting a fireplace onto a steel wall of a 30,000 ton Super Dreadnaught is maybe the best expression of the human condition i have seen.

Drachs obsession with knife edge switches and calling for people to pull levers-has given me the slighly worying image of Drach attempting to use kites electricity and a tall tower to attempt to bring warships to life.

The last WW1 dreadnought left in the world. Definitely worth saving. Great to see the people of Texas taking care of a national heirloom of a bygone era.

It is so fascinating to me how rudimentary everything on Texas is. Compared to an Iowa, its all there: the barbette interior, ready-use shells in the turrets, flash doors, even the hoist for the 3 inch powder. I can see where things like the dredger hoist, shell decks, and the powder passing was evolved from, but its just much older and very first generation compared to an Iowa. Same with the Bureau Express boiler, its so rudimentary and first generation I love it! I plan on visiting Texas when she finds a new home. COME ON TEXAS!

The state of the art of DC electrical technology on the Texas is from 1912. The components look to be right out of a Frankenstein movie.

It's remarkable the last Dreadnought battleship is still around, the Texas is 110 years old, so it's impressive she has endured the test of time. I have not visited the Texas since 2009, I was part of a tour while I was in the RCN, she was quite impressive, so I hope the Texas will be restored for everyone to marvel at.

I'm very pleased to hear that, vis-a-vis the USS Texas, "the reports of my death are greatly exaggerated." An ironical phrase attributed to a man, who was himself, a Mississippi river pilot.

I think the point made in the intro is definitely one worth making. Yes, Texas has got into a terrible condition but then (Taking an example as a Brit) so did HMS Victory, and while I think faceless bureaucratic apathy has certainly played a significant part, a lot of the issues Texas is having are, like Victory, down to the fact no-one has gone through these lessons of how to preserve a ship this big before. USS Olympia and Georgios Averof are probably the next oldest ships and they are a LOT smaller than Texas so simply won't have the same problems as Texas or on the same scale. In fact, it's probably worth saying that the current volunteer crew are just like anyone else and had been so utterly appalled at how much Texas was suffering, and they've taken action to form the current administration and so they are literally on the same side as anyone else who wants Texas to live on for another hundred years. I imagine the rest of the Battleship Museum fleet are all watching the lessons of Texas and furiously making notes, which is a nice continuity for Texas herself; she is still informing US Battleship development that leads to the Iowa's, just in museum form than combat form. I'm hopeful those ships, perhaps even something like Salem and Little Rock will be able to learn from Texas and suffer fewer problems of their own because of Texas.

Thanks for the tour. Screw the rust as that can be addressed over time. It's a miracle that the old girl still even exists. It's also fortunate that she was never modernized like the Iowas and still retains that old school battleship ambiance.

It’s like looking at a preserved ship wreck. Saved from the abyss, and intact. Fascinating.

The men whose battle stations were basically inside the 14-inch guns were their era's real-life equivalents of the guys stationed in the Death Star superlaser subway tunnels. :)

My grandfather's brother, Joseph Anton Droll, enlisted in the Navy in 1918, at the same time as my grandfather. My grandfather spent WW1 as a deckhand on a transport, and got an expeditious discharge at the end of the war. His brother Joseph decided to stay in and on the 1920 US Census he appears as an Engineman 2nd Class aboard USS Texas. I really appreciate seeing the pictures of the lower half of one of the engines he worked on.

The state of the ship has almost has as much to do with time as it does with money and the know how to apply it. Got to remember, BB-35 was the first museum ship and no one knew how to take care of them or how much money it was going to take. On top of that, the decay of the ship which was held back by a full complement was now being managed by a small skeleton crew of volunteers. I think they did a great job considering what they had to work with.

I camped out on the Texas as a cub scout years ago. They let us crank the wheels to aim the AA guns at the San Jacinto monument back in the day. Glad she’s getting repairs!

I made a donation a while back and received a jam nut from one of the 5" guns. It is the centerpiece of my militaria collection. I am glad there is a significant effort to preserve this ship.

This is an OSHA nightmare and I love it. Thank you for bringing this masterpiece to us, Drach.

Those volunteers sound like they went through what the US Navy went through with Congress, with having to do and wanting to do a lot of work but none of the budget to do it, so well done to them for keeping the old girl alive this long.

I thank you volunteers they are supporting and doing a great job. When i was living in Houston i was eight years old my dad took me on the great USS TEXAS i had a ball,and she was a lot more healthier. I'm so ready to Aboard she again I'm turning 77 in June so i can't wait !❤

16:10 "I highly doubt anyone will be able to go up or down this without some serious clearing going on." >> Ryan Szimanski has entered the chat.

I saw her as a boy about 1969. She was in much better shape then. Everything was painted dark blue but the amount of rust was not like this. Still, she will rise again!

It’s really telling that under the Texas Department of Parks and Wildlife, Battleship Texas had been in the water so long that her frames had rusted to nothing. Within 3 years of the Battleship Texas foundation taking over, she was in drydock getting massive structural repairs.

The restoration team has my respect for tackling such an old vessel. I wish them luck!

16:34 If I remember correctly from one of the videos over on the Battleship New Jersey channel, Ryan was talking about something very similar going on with New Jersey's armored trunk, I think it got to the point where one end was mostly blocked off by cabling making it very difficult to actually get out of the shaft on that end.

I toured this ship nearly 25 years ago during a very hot Texas August afternoon (hot for someone from southern Ontario, Canada) and it was really heartbreaking to see her listing at her location at San Jacinto so many years later. A salute to those who are striving to keep this old battlewagon intact. She is one of a kind and all of her contemporaries are long gone.

Thanks for your excellent doc of BB Texas. As a child I walked and climbed down her gangways, almost falling down some of them. My father kept a hand on the back of my shirt luckily.. Guess it was 54. I was very disappointed when told I couldn't fire the big guns. Not even the 40 mm. Seems like Dad mentioned I was just the right size to fit into the 14in breach... He was there off North Africa and saw the Texas fire. His transport was placed in sight of her in the convoy from the states. Your presentations are always appreciated. Glad to see you bringing attention to ships like the Texas and other important remnants of naval history before its too late. Your efforts will always be appreciated.

Thanks for the encouragement for us all to donate to Battleship Texas Foundation no matter how small. Made my donation about three weeks ago. If every Drach subscriber could give a dollar, we’d raise $425k. If everyone could even give $10, it’d be $4.25M. Nice tour Drach!

My Grandfather was a WW1 US Navy Veteran. He was A Electrcians Mate 1st class. While I don’t know exactly what ship he was on I can only imagine that he was very familiar with those old electrical systems such as these. Thank you for sharing these videos. They help me reconnect with my family history.

I toured the Texas back in 2000ish, I am hopeful to get to tour it again once she lands a new home. The amount of work needed/being done is mindblowing to me.

Glad I went to see her in Huston before she was moved to dry dock. A very impressive ship, even with the extensive corrosion. Thanks for bringing more attention to her.

Very cool project. So glad people still care about such important history.

Amazing. She's beautiful in a terrifying way. Loved the engines. So glad they are saving her. I still wish Enterprise CVN 65 was saved as a museum ship. She was/is one of the most famous ships.

I'm 60 years old this year. I went to the USS TEXAS back when I was in the first grade. I was in awe at the size of the ship. Being there awakened my interest in WWII history. I hope they continue to repair and maintain it. It is a shining example of our countries Navy!!! Great video thank you for the info and keep up the great work ❤

Can't wait to see the restoration finished

Time for you to take a trip back when they move her so you get to see a battleship move on water, or convince Travis to let you on when you move it

they need to give Drach the keys , take it for a cruise. 3:58 i love the fact it's guns are pointed at a cruise ship, too tempting

Great tour! I think you went places that even the old "Hard Hat" tour didn't go. It was nice too see part of the conning tower, when i visited years ago the upper compartments were screened behind plastic partitions. Another good video source is from one of the volunteers: "Tom Scott, the Older One". He has dozens of deep dive videos on Texas. I'm pretty sure that unlike the gun you saw, they have one (I don't know which turret) gun fairly cleaned up and mechanically functional. It's in one of Tom's videos.

My wife and I own a rental property down in Galveston, I get down there about once a month to check up on the house and make my way over to the dockyard afterward. The amount of progress with repairs made between months is astonishing. In regards to how she got to the sad state that she's in, well its been an inter-agency mess over the decades, greed and abuse. At least she's in good hands now, and will be the best she's ever been post WW2.

On the topic of rust, sometimes it's actually better to leave it alone. Depending on the structure and quality of steel, once a surface has corrosion present, it typically doesn't acquire any more beyond the surface layer. So long as moisture is kept away from it, it will sit quite happily for many years. That's why old airplanes are mothballed in the desert, because while parts of them may acquire a surface level of rust, it rarely penetrates the metals to any depth. That's why when you mothball a ship you seal it up and emplace dehumidifiers everywhere, by removing the interior moisture you preserve the ship without undue expense. If they are not ready to de-rust and coat each surface with whatever product they use to prevent rust, leaving it alone is often the best choice.

Absolute amazement that she is still with us.

As a naturalized Texan, I'm happy for you that you were able to visit this beauty! I'm also happy the government isn't directly responsible for her; otherwise, none of this would have been happening. I hope you're able to be with her on her next journey and hopefully my family can get to go visit her some day.

Somewhere on RU-vid is an organization that 3D scanned Texas' triple expansion engine and explains the various parts and how it works. It was very interesting, and quite strange seeing the virtual engine floating in the void of space.

Thank you for making this video, I last saw Texas in person about 20 years ago, and seeing her as she is now fills me with a broad spectrum of emotions. I have always felt a certain connection to this ship, more so than other museum ships, as my grandfather served aboard her in the late 1920's .

I love this. My grandfather was on the Texas before the refit. He was an F1 "black gang -no offense) working the engine room using coal. He also helped during the first launch of an aircraft off the turret 2 I believe. He was a boxer and although they now don't have all of them,, his name was on one before 1928. He loved that ship. Thanks for all of the videos. My son has toured it with me in 1996. Awesome.

Nice to see her innards this time! I very much hope to visit her myself in person one of these days. My mom’s fam is from Massachusetts & I’ve lived in the South Jersey/South Philly area most of my life-USS New Jersey, Olympia & the denizens of Battleship Cove are well-known to me and much loved! I’ve always wanted to visit The Texas, though. USS Massachusetts is a perfect snapshot of a Treaty Battleship Era & New Jersey tells a story of how modern BBs evolved into Their Final Form. I like to think of New Jersey and her sisters as the right-side bookends of battleship history. Battleship Texas is the left-side bookmark of Big Gun Battleship Saga, The Last of the Dreadnoughts. Like The Iowas Texas she tells a long story, but hers is the story of the first half of battleship evolution. Like New Jersey & her sisters she’s kitted out with gear from from many years & multiple eras. She’s the first half of the story that The Iowas complete. (The Star Wars fanboy in me likes to think of Battleship Texas as the SW Prequel Era with the Iowas standing in for The Original Trilogy and the Expanded Universe. There is no equivalent to the Star Wars sequels, of course, because the sequels never happened. They were just a terrible dream Grandmaster Luke had one night after drinking some blue milk that had gone off. I suppose if one really wanted to extend the Star Wars analogy you could compare The Sequel Trilogy to the Littoral Combat Ship, the Zumwalts & the Ford class. The QE-class carriers are more like Solo, I think. They still cost too much & don’t deliver much value but they’re only mildly offensive.)

Thank you, Drachinifel.

Awesome pictures and great tour. On my bucket list is to visit all the US battleships at some point (New Jersey is already checked off). COVID put a crimp in my plans as my trip to USS Alabama was cancelled as a result. The pictures of the switchboards and Drach's love of knife switches is one of the best parts of the video. Those panels are referred to as live front-open panel systems. They are obviously extremely dangerous, but also the easiest to maintain, repair and generally keep clean. They served for a long time in the fleet (longer than most people would think). USS Vulcan still had a panel like that in the mid 80's before getting it replaced with a closed panel-dead front switchboard after a sailor had been electrocuted. Having panels like that on a big ship like Texas and even Vulcan is one thing, but they were also aboard small ships like the 4 stackers as well and one can imagine that the watch was very attentive to what they were doing while underway in any sort of sea while standing near one of those panels. It was also interesting for me to see the EOT's (Engine order telegraph) and other position repeaters for the guns, etc. Part of my rating in the Navy was to work on that stuff and it is remarkable how little it changed over the years between when Texas was built and the 1980's. Thanks for sharing Drach and hope you have had very enjoyable visits all over the states. We do seem to have a lot of ships to visit. 😀

Great to see this majestic ship from the inside - thanks Drachinfel!

Fascinating look at a relic of ships long gone. I cannot help but admire how they built them and of course fought ships like this. Definitely a ship worth preserving and even in her rather poor state she is magnificent. Thanks for the informative vid, and put that knife switch down!

been listening to this channel for awhile and now i work on a dry dock. keep up the great content!

Good one, Drach! Your photography is excellent, and having many superb photos accompanying your commentary makes for a superb result. One of these days they need to let you shoot one of those big guns. I'm loving those knife switches, too. One thing that comes to mind that I learned doing historic restoration in my career is principle in physics that gravity is not just a good idea, it's the law and it never stops. All that weight topside pressing downward creates a lot of stress the ship is not designed to bear. I wonder how much the main deck has sagged. I would think they would need to remove armor and those turrets to make it easier to jack things back in place. I do wish the restoration crews all the best. Another issue I imagine they are encountering is lead paint and asbestos.

The USS Texas is a beautiful ship. We have a beach house on Galveston Island and almost every time we go there from Dallas we stop by to see her. It's amazing that men lived on this ship, nothing like a Carrier or Cruiser of today. Bunks and hammocks were stacked in 3's, in some of the worst place's you would want to try to sleep. We went there one time about 6 months after my wife had a miscarriage. They put her on blood thinners and we drove down to have some relaxation time. While on the ship we found a state room that had been set up for guest latter that night. You can book time to stay aboard like Boy Scouts and such. So I locked the door, and we did our thing. Our daughter was conceived that weekend and I like to think it was aboard the Texas. Maybe the only time a life was brought into the world on a Battleship instead of destroying lives.

I toured the Battleship Texas as a kid decades ago and thought it odd this WW2 battleship seemed so outdated, especially with the second deck side guns, not aware it was a WW1 style dreadnought. Now I think it is Avery neat antique. Great video on all these hidden details

Thanks! I just learned that the USS Texas conducted the first ever naval flight of a non-seaplane airplane. It was a Sopwith F.1 Camel that was one of six purchased by the US navy after the First World War. The flight happened in 1919. Awesome history!

This ship was one of my grandfathers (who was a Navy man)favorite places to take us in the 70s. Then you could climb in and out of this magnificent ship. I’m so very glad they finally got it dry docked. Thank you for the video.

HEY DRACH- Next video is your 1000th video! Any big plans? Congratulations!!

I think many people forget just how corrosive salt can be and salt water is no better. I am amazed she isn't in worser shape.

I really see Texas as restoring a giant Steam Locmotives, especially in terms of rust. Just on a massive scale.

Thank you, thank you, thank you. I hope you enjoyed our lovely State while you visited but thank you for documenting our lovely Texas getting repaired.

What a great video!!!! One quick point however. When talking about the 3"50 AA guns and the magazines for them, you showed some shells stacked up. Those actually look like 5" shells for the 5"51s. They had seperate shells and powder bags. The 3"50s were all one piece like the 5"25 AA of other BBs of that time. Other then that, this video again was excellent and i absolutely love being able to see the inside of the ship. This is definitely a bucket list stop!!

😌The fact she is still here at all shows you the quality and strength designed into her from the very beginning.

My personal frustration with the cline of USS Texas condition and the rust in particular is that in the early 50's, not too long after she was berthed at San Jacinto, my grandfather, who was one of the leading experts in cathodic protection for corrosion, offered to engineer protection schemes for the hull at no cost. He would volunteer his engineering time, the sacrificial anodes would have come in the form of scrap metal, and the labor was volunteered from his crews in their off time between pipeline projects. He was based out of Houston and lived approximately 18 miles from the ship. This would have been easily accomplished, and was unceremoniously declined by the officials responsible for her maintenance and care.

Some of it was negligence, but a lot of it was ignorance. Like they didn't know keeping furl oil in her bunkerage would become so acidic over the years. (Per Ryan of BB New Jersey). It's why Olympia is in such disrepair also. Texas was one of the 1st museum ships.

Being next to all those open electrical switches on a rolling pitching ship.... yeah. Those were different times safety wise.

I've always found it fascinating that Texas and her sister New York were, to my knowledge, the only US battleships that stored their shells nose down in those cups. I'd love to find out if there's a story behind that choice and the change back to storing the shells on their bases. I hope to go see her one more time in dry dock! I hope to tour her in full when she is open again.

I’ll be visiting USS Texas this weekend!

The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department got ownership of her as a hulk already. The original group that saved her from the breakers were funded the one time but then it has always been a matter of maintenance costs vs budgets of the organization that inherited her. Glad to see that the public is bankrolling the restoration, but the decision to put her back in the water after this work is done means we may be right back here again in 30 years. A real restoration, as the volunteers are finding, was a massive investment and TPWD never had anything like the funds to maintain her.

I was actually surprised how good the condition of some areas of texas look ( boiler room, parts of the engine room ,turrets and the shell handling equipment ) yes its not as good as on the iowas for example and these and other areas need restoration wich would take a long time ,money and a lot of people to work on it . But i think she deserves it and im happy she gets mutch needed attention ,looking forwards of seeing her in the future . COMMON TEXAS ❤

Awesome tour of my local Battleship!

Good to see she's being taken care of just recently got to see the ship from across the channel on a cruise ship.

@Drachinifel That top layer of 'wood' decking you saw where the 5" mount was removed is actually concrete, laid down in the 1960s and brushed to resemble wood. Unfortunately. Texas only actually has one layer of wood decking.

Love to see the breechblocks still work! She’s a battleship, so it’s great to see she still has some fight in her.

Long before I truly understood the importance and history of the ship, we made several visits to the Texas. Back in the early 70s, I spent hours climbing and descending to all parts of the ship. It seemed like everything was open with countless stairs, ladders, levers, dials, and controls to discover. Thank you to all who served on her and who have done so much to maintain her over the years.

Thanks for publicizing our beauty. Texas is very proud of her. Come on Texas!!!!!!!

I love the Emperor's New Groove reference. I appreciate the humor.

Nice video again! I have been on the Texas twice, and the time was in 2016 when it was sitting in the water right next to the San Jacinto tower and museum. But at 43:46 or so you show a place in the ship there is a plate partially covering the two chain link chains that go downwards, and you commented on the flash issue it presented, and that you could also lose your foot in the opening. It looks like the plate to the left is flipped over 'incorrectly; and that it looks like it is meant to cover this hole, and just flipping this cover over would fill the gap. The chains look like they would fit into this opening perfectly, and there is even 2 rollers, one per chain, that would roll as the chain moved up or down. Perhaps you could find out?

Today I watched the movie Downfall. It's incredibly amazing that all the events of the world since this ship first joined the fleet have happened in less time than it takes to rust a ship.

18:57- You mean the lower deckers slept in the hallways like on the U.S.S. Cerritos? :D

Absolutely fascinating, and great video. Thank you, Drach!

I remember when my brother and I were kids we would “shoot up” everything around the ship channel on 1 of the open mounts guns, back then you could raise and traverse the gun by cranking the handle while seated in the original seats. Good times. Watched it come down the ship channel when it returned from its last dry dock 30+ years ago with my then young son. Really impressive seeing it round the bend and seeing it bow on approaching her berth

Right after her last dry docking my cousin and I climbed into turret one and got down into the station under the starboard gun. It was very tight.

Much thanks. Incredible tour and narration.

Great video Sir and thank you so much in doing part 2 (interior). Hope will be part 3 later maybe when it's time to go back into the water and see the exterior and interiors again as more restoration takes place. Thank to all involved in making the repairs and restoration that was long overdue. God bless you all.

THANK YOU DRACH! THIS WAS AN AWESOME VIDEO - FASCINATING AND SO WELL PRESENTED!

Wow what a terrific video. A lot of great information. Thank you for sharing!

Thanks for the video. Enjoyed, Been visiting the BattleShip Texas for decades. Very glad to see the repairs.

Amazing ship, thanks for the visit 😀

primitive is the word that comes to mind, there's very little electronics on these ships even in the 1940s and yet they fought along side of the iowas which look like old ships inside today

I can't think of a better way to start a Wednesday!

EXCELLENT! She looks pretty good for her age, can't wait to see her final refloating!

Really cool to see, appreciate the tour!

14:47 To be fair, I do kinda get what you mean. It's a mechanical battleship, not electro-mechanical like the newer museum ships.

Excellent video...thanks.

Sailing ship gun crews: the beams are a little low here, mate. USS Texas gun crews: hold my Dr. Pepper, pardner.

What a wonderful ship to tour.

Drach was so Englishly polite and soft spoken about not blaming the current regime for Texas’ condition. Here’s the American version....shut your pie holes and don’t blame these guys...they didn’t do it!

Yay I'm so early. I didn't know your videos came out this early in the morning

Great video. I live in Houston, Texas and always go visit Battleship Texas when I can. Extremely detailed tour of Texas

Thank you for going into the engine room and other places I couldn't go into when I was there because I'm rather rotund.