As you might think this is the place where the ships oil is tested. This is also where a group of guys called Oil Kings work. We actually took care of fuel, boiler water, aviation fuels, and lube oil. Like a typical Navy work space it was too small to hold everything we needed, but it was big enough to hold what we wanted.

We did all sorts of testing in there fuel flash point, boiler water quality, fuel quality, lube oil quality, and so on. We had a file cabinet, desk, sink, counter, tooooo many books, and a large steel cabinet. We had chemicals to test water, treat water, test oils, and all kinds of other fun items. What we did not have was lube oil or fuel oil. We had to keep the oil either in bulk storage or in the flammable liquids locker.

Extra equipment we had to have was a radio with tape player, CD’s were too new. As many tapes as we could get into the empty drawer in the filing cabinet. We wanted a small refrigerate, but never could get the wiring done. We did have a storage locker next to the lab that we did clean out and we used that for those over flow items that would not fit in our lockers. Then we got inventive and “rented” space to fellow engineers and a few selective supply types in return for favors.

The oil lab was a nice place to hang out at times. It was normally cool and it at all possible we would turn off one of the two lights in there. I miss the oil lab, it was a nice place to work.

Even though we did mess around a good deal we did a very important job. All of the testing made sure things were running correctly and smoothly. We also took a series of oil samples to our local SIMA every month. Part of the NOAP program. But more on those two later.