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Subject: The Russian Boats Are Burning
SYSOP    4/30/2015 6:07:25 AM
 
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keffler25       4/30/2015 1:56:32 PM
Good news for Uncle. As bad as Newport News and Ingalls are, they are still better than most of the competition out there.  
 
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Nate Dog    Really?   5/1/2015 1:04:44 AM
I know everyone has a tendency to burn boats when they're being worked on (plasma torches cut at 3000 celsius, bound to cause fires), but are US shipyards better?
I thought the last boat to burn in the yard was a US one and that was a total loss?
 
 
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frylock    Yeah really   5/1/2015 2:27:38 AM
That was a deliberate act by a disgruntled worker. I don't think any non-biased knowledgeable observer would argue that US shipyards are not superior but it's not like the Russians are setting a high bar.
 
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keffler25       5/1/2015 7:16:23 AM
1. Act of sabotage.
2. He's in jail for a LONG time.
3. Miami was decommissioned to fund an additional Virginia Congress demanded. (You have to swallow some hard choices in an Obama economy.).  

I thought the last boat to burn in the yard was a US one and that was a total loss?

 


 
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Nate Dog    Not what I'm saying   5/1/2015 2:41:53 PM
I can read the article as well as you can.

My point being, fires on submarines are extremely common, and refurb is the most dangerous time for a sub. Western yards have fires quite often too, and not just as a result of sabotage.
 
 
They're improving, less damage, better fire control, even if it is pilfered from US yards, or more likely, French yards as part of the mistral technology transfer deal.
 
 
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jessmo_24       5/2/2015 5:38:56 AM


I can read the article as well as you can.





My point being, fires on submarines are extremely common, and refurb is the most dangerous time for a sub. Western yards have fires quite often too, and not just as a result of sabotage.

 

 

They're improving, less damage, better fire control, even if it is pilfered from US yards, or more likely, French yards as part of the mistral technology transfer deal.

 



Why is this? are sub materials THAT flammable? any fool with  a  gas cutting torch knows how not to set things ablaze.
 
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rkap       5/3/2015 10:21:32 AM
Originally USSR subs used a lot of rubber as sound insulation between there twin hull design. I assume the Oscar Class was still built that way. US Submarines on the other hand were single steel hull design. I think all new Subs now being built in Russia are more like the US subs. All that rubber around the inner hull has to be a big problem when making major changes to the sub.
 
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keffler25       5/3/2015 12:44:45 PM
Good points all. Single hull and rafting are a different approach to sound isolation. Sound is treated a lot like any other wave phenomenon you want to insulate. (literally) You try to cut out ground paths and prevent conductivity. A double hull is very hard to sound isolate. Interconnectivity produces all kinds of sound shorts you can't isolate, so you might just go with the single pressure hull and use sound mount isolaters as the simplest possible construction solution.  
 
It's a choice.
 
Flammable subs... air burns, food burns, people burn, paint burns, insulation burns, clothing burns, and there is fuel and explosives aboard, as well as dozens of catalytic conversion processes (fire hazards) that are essential if a sealed environment full of human beings is supposed to work. The galley fire is the most common fire hazard aboard next to the washing machine, air plant or something electrical shorting out and catching fire either in power distribution or in the battery.  
 
Next to driving the boat, fire-fighting (prevention) is a 24/7 skill-set and requirement.  
 
 
 
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joe6pack    double hulls?   5/4/2015 2:23:31 PM
>A double hull is very hard to sound isolate.
 
 Any layman's info on why the Russians went with a double hull design in many of their subs?

Cheaper, simple, disposable, numerous.. seemed to be the typical red army template.
 
A double hull would seem to an added expense and more complex.  Other than some fiction writers, that went with the idea that a double hull made the subs more durable (seems a reasonable.. but perhaps faulty assumption)... I've never got the "why" behind it?
 
 
 
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keffler25       5/4/2015 5:18:07 PM
Double hull is a misnomer. Depending on the terms used a double hull can mean a pressure hull nested inside a thin streamlined hull for slippage through the water. This is the most common form of submarine construction before all the whale shaped boats started to show up post WW II and it was found redundant to put a thin hull over the rounded torpedo shaped pressure barrel you were making. 
 
The Russians did not get that memo.   
 
The Dutch never got the memo either, because they were in the business of making deep diving boats using a kind of figure 8 hull (seen in cross section, people on the upper part of the 8 all the explosive, fiery and poisonous stuff in the other hull underneath. Made for an interesting choice where it got crowded when you tried to get at the battery or the air plant or whatever else had conked out, but the Dutch liked their figure 8 double hulls with the upside down egg shaped outer hulls. Worked for them.
 
Didn't work for the Russians who stuck with the WW II wrong way of doing things. (Patterned after the Type XXI boats. Didn't get the memo on why those boats weren't so hot either.)    
 
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