Torpedoes??

It's the fuel that is used in Mark 48's When on the sub, we ran a lot of different casualty drills (Fires, Flodding, Radiation leaks, etc.) Occasionally they ran the Otto Fuel spill drill. It was a chance for the Torpedomen to be the stars :)
 
Otto fuel is nothing more than "bug juice" poured onto the deck......Otto fuel spill in the torpedo room, all hands done EAB's !!!!

Ok, really it is something like a liquid propellant that does not need oxygen to burn. If I remember right it makes its own O2.
 
It is all in once mind, with me if someone yells TORPEDO I start looking around for some woman with a big rack ;-)
 
did the torpedo guys have one without the warhead to play with and test? are the engines not reusable or does the fuel destroy it? ever fire one up on land? can the engine be throttled? is it muffled? how did they exaust the engine? thru the props?to prevent cavation? nitromethane used in drag racing is an oxidizing fuel but it takes a massive amount
 
As mentioned earlier, torpedoes in WWII were initially steam powered. This left a nice, bright wake pointing right back to the sub. On top of that, there were problems in the firing pins in the warheads. Far too often the firing pin would snap in two rather push back into the explosives. There were many reports from American subs early in WWII of launching torpedoes, hearing them hit the enemy ship with a dull thud, listen to the torpedoes fall useless to the ocean floor, and prepare for an absolute beating since they knew where they were.

The saving grace early in the war was that the Japs didn't think our subs could go below 200 feet.

(WWII sub warfare has always fascinated me.)
 
So the questions never seem to end on this one.

AUTEC WEAPONS RANGE

Deep Water Range - The deep water Weapons Range lies roughly parallel to the east coast of Andros Island. It is the largest and most versatile of the AUTEC ranges, and it is capable of tracking up to 63 in-water objects simultaneously. The range is supported by the Main Base (Site 1) and various smaller sites located to the south along the east coast of Andros Island. AN/WQC-2A Sonar Communications Sets and Bi-Directional Communications Nodes provide underwater voice communications for mobile target and emergency command signal coverage, while HF, UHF, and VHF radio communications are available over the entire range.

In-Air Tracking - In-air tracking is provided by radars and various other in-air tracking systems such as LATR, the Hyperbolic In-Air Tracking System (HITS), and DGPS. These in-air systems cover the AUTEC Weapons Range up to a distance of 500 nautical miles (926 kilometers) from Site 1 and a height of 70,000 feet (21,000 kilometers). Surveillance radars operate to support air and surface safety.

In-Water Tracking - The in-water portion of the Weapons Range covers 500 square nautical miles. This range can be divided into two distinct tracking areas consisting of roughly 250 square nautical miles. This flexibility allows for the unique operation of two distinct individual exercises. Use of the total range is referred to as "Weapons Range", while dividing the range into two distinct portions, the northern section is referred to as "Weapons Range North", whereas the southern portion is called "Weapons Range South".

http://www.raytheon.com/media/pac08/pdf/mk48_torpedo_fact.pdf

Torpedos are not designed to be reusable however the test weapons are used without warheads and can be reused. I cannot find much on the internet about the true safeties on the weapon so until I can I wont post to much on here. As far as lighting one off on land.....I am sure you could do it but I am not sure why you would other than to test a test weapon. I do know that with test weapons they were designed to shut down and float to surface to be reused. However I am sure I was not the only one to hear one bounce off the sub because it didnt shut down. Autec was and is the testing range for subs and other vessels to go play and be monitored.
 
Hydrogen peroxide is a well known component of rocket fuel that has it's own Oxygen.

I find all this absolutely fascinating. I was wondering how you could have an 'engine' that doesn't leave an exhaust trail if it burns.
 
we have used peroxide rocket engines, they leave a huge steam cloud! maybe thats what the early ones were, as the peroxide rocket engine is stupidly simple.... really just a platinum screen in a chamber a way to spray fuel on it and a nozzle and keeeewhoosh thrust!
 
Boy, I wish I had some torpedoes aboard my boat yesterday! I woulda sent a couple idiots to the bottom of Fisher's Island Sound! More morons than I could count motoring by me all at full tilt as close as they could.

Larry
 
Yes, many torpedoes were peroxide powered. Most countries stopped using peroxide fuels as they are so combustible, especially with sea water. Russia continued to use peroxide fuel, which was blamed for the loss of the Kursk. There are also some electric Russian torpedoes.

Torpedoes may overheat if run dry. Bad idea.

The US has perhaps the best homing system with the mk 48 ADCAP, but Russian torpedoes sport some scary capabilities. They have wake homing torpedoes that detect a vessel's wake then follow it to it's source. The most interesting torpedoes are super-cavitating. Pretty fast--perhaps 250kts. Hard to defeat, although their guidance is rudimentary.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VA-111_Shkval

Brett
 
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