At the previous six hour' full power trial of the Phaeton there was a difficulty experienced in maintaining steam from want of draught in the stokeholds.

The effect of these changes at the trial was very marked, the engines being provided with an abundance of steam without their being any necessity for resorting to the blast.

As, however the machinery worked without any hitch of any kind, and was developing power largely in excess of the Admiralty contract, it was agreed by the officers superintending the trial to accept the means of the five hours as a sufficient test of performance.

The mean speed registered by runs on the measured mile was 18.684 knots (34.603 km/h), which was remarkable, notwithstanding her light draught.

"[12] However, by September 1886, it was decided that "due caution was not observed in certain particulars by those responsible for taking over the engines of the Phaëton from the contractors.

In the case of the Phaëton the men who had been so employed had, from various causes, been drafted away before the order was received to commission her, with the exception of three stokers who formed part of her staff.

On 25 May 1886, Phaeton had an accident with a four-barrelled Nordenfeld gun whilst the crew were at quarters and engaged at target practice.

[24] Phaeton was re-commissioned at Esquimalt (Canada) on 10 October 1900 by Captain Ernest James Fleet, to serve on the Pacific Station.

[29] She visited Montevideo in February, then Bahia, São Vicente, Cape Verde and Madeira in March, on her way home to be paid off on 28 April 1903.

[31] In 1913 her "stripped out hull" was sold for £15,000 to a charitable institution that ran a training ship for boys based at Liverpool.

The charity was founded in 1864 by John Clint, a Liverpool shipowner, with the aim of training the sons of sailors, destitute and orphaned boys to become merchant seamen.

Mr Frank Bibby, gave the charity money to buy the Phaeton and to refit her at Birkenhead as a training ship.

The previous Indefatigable had been condemned by the Inspector of Training Ships in 1912 as unfit,[32] and was towed to the West Float at Birkenhead on 5 January 1914, and sold for scrap on 26 March.

[32] An Admiralty warrant for a Blue Ensign defaced with a liver bird for TS Indefatigable was issued on 31 December 1927.

Breakfast consisted of one slice of bread and margarine washed down with 'cocoa flush' which had been prepared in the galley by dropping solid slabs of cocoa, unsweetened, in a cauldron of boiling water.