Recent uboat pictures

[He Who Shall Not Be Named]

Names escape me. Was he staff? Small world, I wound up on the GILMORE (steam shop) four years later, after four cold years proofing torpedoes aboard the AKL-17 out of Keyport NTS.

I remember the hangars at the Key West Annex, right next door to the barracks. No sea-planes at the time, but a few ASW helo squadrons operated out of there and the NAS up the road. Don't remember an escape training tower, never did any lock-out training there.

Never went to sub-school or did escape-training (would teach at the New London Tank in later years, but always from the fifty-foot lock) -- I cross decked off the GILMORE straight to a boat that needed young, dumb, Torpedoman. The TRUTTA. Qualification was a *****, but nine months later I had my pin. At that time my boat 'owned' The Boat Bar on Duval street.

You were a Frog? We did pier-side escape training to support the UDT school from the TRUTTA, but always from the forward trunk. And from the crushing depth of ten-feet.

David

[Von Hilde]

That was the summer of 68. You might know Kenneth (Dinaling) Lingle TM3 off the Gillmore. He was over there at the school about that time. Did you go thru the Munsonlung training tower we had over at Trumbo by the seaplane hanger? we put bunches of TM strikers and SO A school guys that were going bubble after graduating A schools, FFt to the fleet. We even did a demo lock out with some on the Archer fish. I pushed the lung in front of me in one of the forward tubes. Not enuff room to wear one of those bags on your chest. That was fun. We wernt underway or anything dramatic like that, in fact we were tied up at the outer moll pier. Just took on a little balast and wet the deck. Was the H19 Pearl Harbor Ko Hyo Teki sitting outside the Chief's club on the way out the Main Gate when you were there?

[He Who Shall Not Be Named]

Now ... that was interested reading!

Yeah, I did my A-school at the Key West 'Annex'. A bit of a shock after graduation from BEE school at Great Lakes in January. Got onto the plane with piles of snow either side of the runway. Landed in the land of palm-trees and hot trade-winds.

Our TM-A school classes were some of the first after the SCORPION loss -- and man! did they pound into us to NEVER use A-cables for in-rack weekly checks! No instructor ever said why the emphasis. But, decades later, I put two-and-two together and figured that at that time (1967) they thought that SCORPION suffered an in-tube or in-room hot-run of a MK 37, likely the result of getting firing current across the AK and little-U (battery electrolyte squib) pins through incorrect alignment of the test cable(s) during the weekly PM checks.

[Von Hilde]

GUPPY torpedos, Hydrogen and oxygen and karosene same fuel for the V2 and the Me 163, some volitile stuff to be fooled with. I didnt know you were a TM. Some of my best friends and shipmates were TMs. They had an "A"school at Key West back in the 60s. I think the Germans had a Kurtz nozzle on some of their tin fish instead of the conventional fin mounted controls. The fins were kept to keep the torpedo in the launch tracks, but they were modified to mount the nozzles. I know there were some that were aboard the type XXIs we took after the war. They had one up in New London at the museum sitting outside on a stand rusting away for years. Walter Rocket powered was the G7ur the Walter turbine power was the G7ut which was seawater injection with ingolin/dekalin/florian fuel. The T-VII was also an earlier Walter turbine, altho wasnt as fast as the G7ur (48kts) or the G7ut around (35kts) The G7 ut and ur didnt get deployed with around 100 completed during tests, all were captured and utilised by the Russians and USN for post war testing. There were major issues with the detonation system during the German and Allies tests. Some of the early Walter turbine powered torpedos were deployed attached to seehunds as well. Quit a bit of German engineering in all phases of weaponry at the end of the war was too little too late and no funds. If Hitler would have stayed out of Russia for a year or so and let the development of the wonder weapons catch up, We would all be speeking German now. Hindsight is always 20-20 my dad always said.

[He Who Shall Not Be Named]

If that's a rocket propelled torpedo, what appears to be intakes ahead of the stabilizers make it an augmented rocket -- it draws in water to add mass to the exhaust flow. An eductor. Neat!

You find the neatest stuff!

David

[MFR1964]

Yeah, makes us feel like cave man,

That pumpjet i mentioned, isn't a pumpjet after all, i reviewed the book again and found out that it was actually a rocket propelled torpedo, blimey!!, i was wondering where that claimed speed came from, that thing used a freaking rocket chamber!!!, weird guys those germans.


Manfred.

[He Who Shall Not Be Named]

This is all new to me. And most interesting. As a Torpedoman in the US Navy, I never heard of these developments so long ago. Wonderful stuff, Manfred. Thank you.

David

[MFR1964]

I was wrong about the T11, they called their wireguided torpedo the Lerch,



This is a scematic drawing from the book i have, they did some succesfull testing on attacking a testboat, and succeeded in doing three passes within a few meters of the bow and the stern.
Later planning was, to combine this torpedo with a active sonar device, which could take over in the intial attackfase, pretty space stuff in the late 40's!, luckely for the allies, not ready to go in mass production.



They also did research on different propulsion methods, the picture above shows a waggle tail propulsion, strange as it sounds, it worked!!!, but having that much moving parts at a delicate mechanism as a torpedo is asking for trouble during maintenance, sometimes the germans over-designed things to be rather unpracticle.



As for a more reliable propulsion they also designed a pumpjet as propulsion, this was placed on a Igolin Walter torpedo, designed by the same Helmuth Walter, which also designed the V80 and type XVIIb.
It ran on the same fuel as used in the boats, getting speeds above 40 knots, reading all those things, that were made in the 40's !!!!!, i wonder if we at the present time are re-inventing the wheel again, as usually offcourse.


Manfred.

[Warpatroller]

Warpatroller, google translator has your signature translated as " We Get Them Unknown". Im just dying to know.

The correct translation is "We come to them unknown"...

[Von Hilde]

I have seen several "Battle for the Atlantic" series on the History channel as well as the Smithsonian series, Lots of great movies of the boats and post war crewmen interviews. and narration. It seems there are quit a few that have been produced in the past 68 years, but a lot of the same footage

[modelnut]

Thanks, Manfred!

I might watch the show on YouTube or I may just spend $10 and get the DVD.

- Leelan

[MFR1964]

I've dugged into the archives for some pics about the T5,



This was the start with the feeler type ignition they used during the early years.





Inside and outside of the second generation T5 sensorhead.



The first generation had only three sensors, the second one four sensors, the second generation also could detect the difference between a towed noisemaker and the ship itself, and would go for the ship and not the decoy.



Some retrieved T5 torpedo's from the type IX which now is located at England.

And if you guys wondered if they allready had wire guided torpedo's, yes they had, i have to digg in in my archive, but i recalled something about the T11, which was wireguided and acoustic, all those where exported to England as a warbooty after the end of the war.
To be continued.


Manfred.

[greenman407]

Warpatroller, google translator has your signature translated as " We Get Them Unknown". Im just dying to know.

[Von Hilde]

U 869 was found off the coast of New Jersey, It was indeed hit by its own T5 a "circle runner" Which is when the torpedo looses contact with the inital target and then homed in on the u boats acustic signal, however it was eventually sunk with all hands by a destroyer. The only u boat that didnt return from the gulf of mexico was u 166. The recovery of a crewmans knife with his name engraved was the first clue as to which boat was found during the first dives on the wreck. The UZO and several othar artifacts from the wreck had identifing numbers from the boats construction, and thats how it was finally identified in the late 90s. There were two other u boats that had malfunctioning T 5s and were sunk by their own shots. U 972 and U 377 in 1944. Incidently U869 was schedualed to go to Gibralter after the East coast US Patrol, snd was assumed lost near Africa by the DKM

[MFR1964]

Leelan,

It's the same story, they published it on youtube in 12 parts, U869 was found in the gulf of Mexico, she was reported missing near Gribraltar accourding to the german reports.
She carried the newest T 5 Zaunkonig torpedo's, the fore father of the acoustic torpedo, those things where pretty advanced those times, only drawback was, no friend or foe detection onboard, that factor sunk the U869 by hitting it with her own torpedo.


Manfred.