Submarines

[ls1mike]

Originally Posted By: SHOZ
Originally Posted By: ls1mike
Originally Posted By: SHOZ
I use to work where they made submarine batteries.

Now I have a person I can blame...

What type of sub were you on?

I did nine patrols on USS Michigan SSBN 727 and 2 on USS Alaska SSBN 732.

 

[Schmoe]

WWII sub movies are my favorite, and any other WWII movie.

 

[Blaze]

I want a sub with caterpillar drives like Hunt for the Red October.

 

[HerrStig]

Originally Posted By: Blaze
I want a sub with caterpillar drives like Hunt for the Red October.
Ducted props were tried and were in fact subject to low frequency "standing wave' noise. Like the sound which results when you bang your palm over a long section of pipe.

 

[Blaze]

Growing up in the 60's I never missed an episode of Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea! Loved that show. The original movie was great too. I think David Hedison is till alive today??

 

[HerrStig]

Originally Posted By: Blaze
Growing up in the 60's I never missed an episode of Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea! Loved that show. The original movie was great too. I think David Hedison is till alive today??
The "greater Hedison clan" lived near us in the summer. David had a good size boat and loved to fish. My brother still sees some of them. I'll ask.

 

[SHOZ]

Originally Posted By: ls1mike
Originally Posted By: SHOZ
Originally Posted By: ls1mike
Originally Posted By: SHOZ
I use to work where they made submarine batteries.

Now I have a person I can blame...

What type of sub were you on?

I did nine patrols on USS Michigan SSBN 727 and 2 on USS Alaska SSBN 732.


Those are Trident subs right? What problems did you have with the batteries. I use to test them on the final discharge before shipping.

 

[Donald]

There are some real life stories, like where the Americans captured a German sub and managed to pull off the decryption machine to decrypt messages and Germany was not aware.

And some tragedies like the loss of the Thresher around Cape Cod I think.

 

[HerrStig]

Originally Posted By: Donald
There are some real life stories, like where the Americans captured a German sub and managed to pull off the decryption machine to decrypt messages and Germany was not aware.

And some tragedies like the loss of the Thresher around Cape Cod I think.
Off of Portsmouth New Hampshire in over 1000 feet. The first, of, as I recall "streamline" test subs, the Albacore, is sitting on land beside a main highway in Portsmouth and tours are availible. The boat was powered by two very unusual "vertical" GM diesels which "just happened" to be of the same size and shape as a small reactor kettle. Of course the Nautilus is open in Groton at the sub base. There's a WWII diesel boat open to the public next to the battleship Massachusetts in New Bedford. They also have a PT boat and some other exhibits. Below decks on the Massacusetts there used to be a huge collection of beautifully done WWII aircraft models in 1/48. Half of them made by one guy.

 

[ls1mike]

Originally Posted By: ls1mike
Now I have a person I can blame...

Originally Posted By: SHOZ
What type of sub were you on?

Originally Posted By: ls1mike
I did nine patrols on USS Michigan SSBN 727 and 2 on USS Alaska SSBN 732.


Originally Posted By: SHOZ
Those are Trident subs right? What problems did you have with the batteries. I use to test them on the final discharge before shipping.


Yep Tridents
I was only kidding they are pretty reliable.

 

[SHOZ]

Thanks. We tested 26 or them at a time. They held out the current discharge great for 10 hours then dropped like a rock. It was hard to get voltage readings of all the 26 cells before they went to the cut off point it happened so fast.

1500 amps for 10 hours was the capacity of them.

Took three semis to ship them out. The only ones that went out with acid too usually but that was because most were for new subs at the time. All the rest of the sub batteries that got replacement batteries went out dry charged.

 

[Thermo1223]

Originally Posted By: HerrStig
Originally Posted By: Blaze
I want a sub with caterpillar drives like Hunt for the Red October.
Ducted props were tried and were in fact subject to low frequency "standing wave' noise. Like the sound which results when you bang your palm over a long section of pipe.


Ahh but if you remember it wasn't a prop. It had no moving parts.

It was magnetic drive, based on what I can remember being eddy currents to push the water out.

 

[ls1mike]

Originally Posted By: SHOZ
Thanks. We tested 26 or them at a time. They held out the current discharge great for 10 hours then dropped like a rock. It was hard to get voltage readings of all the 26 cells before they went to the cut off point it happened so fast.

1500 amps for 10 hours was the capacity of them.

Took three semis to ship them out. The only ones that went out with acid too usually but that was because most were for new subs at the time. All the rest of the sub batteries that got replacement batteries went out dry charged.

It is a pretty big evolution to change them out. It does not happen very often which is good!

 

[SHOZ]

Originally Posted By: ls1mike
Originally Posted By: SHOZ
Thanks. We tested 26 or them at a time. They held out the current discharge great for 10 hours then dropped like a rock. It was hard to get voltage readings of all the 26 cells before they went to the cut off point it happened so fast.

1500 amps for 10 hours was the capacity of them.

Took three semis to ship them out. The only ones that went out with acid too usually but that was because most were for new subs at the time. All the rest of the sub batteries that got replacement batteries went out dry charged.

It is a pretty big evolution the change them out. It does not happen very often which is good!


I remember seeing an in house movie on swapping them in the older subs. Sliding them down a chute to the battery room. Don't know how they did the wet cells though.

We didn't get many back for failures. Some did and they would do tear downs of them to see what happened.

 

[SteveSRT8]

Originally Posted By: Al
Many of my friends were navy nukes. Both fast attacks and boomers during the 60's. And 70's. I learned quite a bit. Were it not for Rickover we might have had wwIII.


Absolutely agreed. HR was a visionary.

My good friend Adam is a retired submariner. Not for me, but quite interesting to discuss...

 

[bubbatime]

Originally Posted By: mjoekingz28
How do submarines provide air to the occupants and the engine whilst submerged?


By dividing the hydrogen and oxygen atoms from sea water, duh.

 

[expat]

Was there a Russian class of sub that had an Oxygen pressurized environment so that the Diesl engine could be run while the sub was below the surface?

I seem to remember somthing like this while reading about 'Dodgy' Russian subs.

 

[A_Harman]

I remember reading that the British had a project back in the late 80's that they called "Air Independent Propulsion" which tried to recycle the combustion air from the main propulsion diesels by running them through some kind of chemical processing facililty. I don't think the project got very far.

The Germans also developed some kind of propulsion system at the end of WW2 that would have given their subs the capability to remain submerged for much longer periods of time. During WW2, subs had to stay down during the day and run on batteries, which limited their speed to ~8 knots. Then they would surface at night and run on the diesels to recharge the batteries. The Germans developed the schnorkel mast to allow their subs to run the diesels while just below the surface to make better speed during daytime operations. But they were still relatively easy to spot. Even a periscope makes enough of a white wake to be easy to spot.

 

[pbm]

An excellent book on WW2 submarine warfare is 'Silent Victory' by Clay Blair.....my dad was a torpedo man on subs so I really enjoyed this book .

 

[Benzadmiral]

Serving on a submarine is the closest we will ever come to serving on a starship. Both are tightly-enclosed vessels traveling in a hostile environment; if you step outside you die.

If I'd thought I was in serious risk of being drafted in 1971-73, I'd have signed up for the Navy and tried to get into subs.