Surcouf Submarine WIP

[Swabbie]

Originally Posted by keltos01

this boat is nearly done

Does that mean Christmas will be coming a little early?

EDIT:

Keltos, you can count me in as one of the many looking forward to this mod. Was thinking about today in work and I have a few questions.

Since she's a French boat does she come with a white flag?
Surcouf took 2 minutes to dive. Will your version also take that long? If not, can that be change easily by me?
Her stern tubes could only be used on the surface. They also were able to be turned like her guns. Did the SH4 program allow you model that?
It seems to me that this boat is unique in that she could both be Allied or Axis. If you imagine her crew deciding to go Vichy. This would allow her to be used in the U-Boat mission. Have you thought about this option?

Thanks in advance for doing all the hard work to get this mod out. I'm sure I and many others will be getting many hours of fun using it.

[Admiral Von Gerlach]

wow. I go away for a month and come back and you have made "Le Baleine" ! as they called her back when.

wonderful work! can't wait to try her out.

[Sledgehammer427]

Well, I jsut dug this up, from this source

A friend of mine was stationed at the U.S. Naval Submarine Base in New London Connecticut the same time that the Surcouf was there. A U-boat was sunk off the New England coast by Destroyers and some of the flotsom that came to the surface was loaves of bread still in their wrappers from a bakery in New London. The Navy figured that the Surcouf had to be supplying the u-boats with food. Also she would go to sea with a full load of torpedoes for training purposes and come back having expended a number of them. The Navy also figured she was sinking our ships as well as supplying the u-boats. According to him one of our submarines followed her out to sea and when they found her setting up to torpedo one of our ships, the U.S. Submarine torpedoed her. End of Story. Naturally nothing could be said about this because it would have upset the Free French, so everything was hushed up. I don't know what U.S. Sub it was that sank her.

[Swabbie]

Interesting read Sledgehammer. A lot of mystery surrounds the sinking of Surcouf. I remember reading an article about it in Sea Classics. There was a picture of the Thompson Lykes in dry dock with her bow pretty smashed up. Be darned if I can't find it on the interwebs now.

Wiki gives a position of her wreck. But again I can find no pictures of it.

[keltos01]

from peabody post#51

Very pretty sub, just in time for Christmas. I also don't remember what caused that color problem but I have seen it on other ships/boats so someone may remember.

Info I found:

Fleeing to Britain in June 1940, she was taken over by the Royal Navy in July (after a fight that left four men dead and two wounded). She remained under British command but operated with a Free French crew.

After patrolling the Caribbean for several weeks without incident, the Surcouf was ordered to the Pacific.

An American freighter reported colliding with an unidentified submarine on February 18,1942 in the Gulf of Mexico; as the Surcouf was never seen again, it is assumed it was the sub struck.

However, one conspiracy theory claims that the French crew had allegiance to the Vichy government and was secretly resupplying U-boats; when the Allies discovered the treachery, they sank the Surcouf.

While the collision is likely the truth (and bitterly ironic, as a submarine designed to prey on merchant ships was herself sunk by a freighter), the conspiracy theory has more
adventuring potential. In a truly illuminated campaign, the sinking may have been faked to allow the Surcouf to perform some special mission . . .

The most unusual feature of the Surcouf was the two turreted 8” guns just forward of the conning tower. While they were quite powerful (only the British M1 of 1918, with a single 12” gun, has carried a heavier deck armament for a submarine), the range-finder was set rather low, allowing the guns to reach only 12,000 yards; presumably the plane would be used to spot for the guns at longer ranges. There is some debate as to how much the turret rotated; one opinion is that the 8-inch guns only fired straight ahead in combat; the turret rotated to only one side for maintenance dockside.

From Sledgehammer427 :

Originally Posted by Sledgehammer427

Well, I jsut dug this up, from this source

A friend of mine was stationed at the U.S. Naval Submarine Base in New London Connecticut the same time that the Surcouf was there.

A U-boat was sunk off the New England coast by Destroyers and some of the flotsom that came to the surface was loaves of bread still in their wrappers from a bakery in New London.

The Navy figured that the Surcouf had to be supplying the u-boats with food. Also she would go to sea with a full load of torpedoes for training purposes and come back having expended a number of them.

The Navy also figured she was sinking our ships as well as supplying the u-boats. According to him one of our submarines followed her out to sea and when they found her setting up to torpedo one of our ships, the U.S. Submarine torpedoed her.

End of Story. Naturally nothing could be said about this because it would have upset the Free French, so everything was hushed up. I don't know what U.S. Sub it was that sank her.

from jan Kyster post #60:

Special Reports

Surcouf Redux, by Jerry Casius.

[Ed. Note: In Newsletter #8, Bill Moyer reported on French super-submarine Surcouf and the possibility of it participating in Operation Westindie. The Surcouf (or perhaps a large tanker) sank under strange circumstances on February 14, 1942, or two days prior to U-156's attack on Lago. In the following special report, Jerry Casius also weighs-in on the possibilities of the Surcouf's demise.]

(08/26/06): "The sinking of the Surcouf - It seems highly likely that Surcouf was sunk by U-502 (Ed. Note: Our Oranjestad Harbor "friend") under Kapitan Jurgen Rosenstiel. So far, it has been possible to identify only six of the seven ships reported as sunk by U-502 and the unidentified target matches Surcouf - although at the time of the attack it (unidentified vessel) was identified as a tanker.

This action happened on February 14, 1942, in Square EC9436. This (location) is about thirty-two (nautical) miles southwest of Aruba and five (nautical) miles north of the lighthouse on Peninsula de Paraguana, Venezuela...Surely it would be a simple matter of going to this position and diving to see what is down on the seabed. It is quite likely that Kptit. von Rosenstiel's tanker of 2500 tons turned out to be the missing submarine.

(08/28/06): "First let me say that this Surcouf research is not mine, but was done years ago by Eddie Rumpf...The following was published in Germania - The German Navy Study Group's newsletter, which has been out of print for some time.

"In February 1942, three U-boats left France (Operation Neuland sic)...U-67 (Kptit. Gunther Muller-Stockheim); U-502 (Jurgen von Rosenstiel); and U-156 (Werner Hartenstein)...[Ed. Note: U-129 (Nicoli Clausen and U-161 (Albrecht Achilles) were also a part of Operation Westindien aka Gruppe Neuland]...The U-boats would not have known that such a huge submarine was in their operation area and at night it would have been easy to confuse such a large submarine with a tanker.

Their reports of torpedoed ships are almost perfect, except that the Allies cannot account for one of the ships sunk by von Rosenstiel (emphasis added).

Von Rosenstiel claims to have sunk a tanker of about 2400 tons in square EC 9436 on February 14, 1942. This position is 12 degrees 09 minutes North by 10 degrees 21 minutes West. The depth of the water at this location is approximately 50 fathoms (300 feet).

"Von Rosenstiel saw his target burst into flames and sink rapidly - so it is highly unlikely that this was an imaginary sinking. He almost certainly sunk something - but what? The dates and positions fit quite well into the last hours of Surcouf and it shouldn't be too difficult to find the wreck which had been von Rosenstiel's target. The aforementioned position is about 32 nautical miles southwest of Aruba and five nautical miles from the lighthouse of Peninsula de Paraguana."
[Ed. Note: Some mighty interesting speculative information. Anyone for a dive?]

In a book I read, it says she was struck by the USS Lincol Lykes but survived and when she limped towards Panama she was sunk by either a U-Boot or a US Search Plane.

keltos

[keltos01]

working on a second tower for 1942 onwards with Jan Kyster's data :



new color scheme


keltos

[keltos01]

for now the turret doesn't get a new paintscheme...




tower close-up :






Surcouf's 1942 paintscheme

thanks to peabody who fixed my upc mistakes we now change tower on July 1st 1942, this means a whole new paint job for the sub.

keltos

[Jan Kyster]

The planes...

Hate to say it, but these are not up-down operating, but horisontal:



Photo from 1942 refit:

[Jan Kyster]

Didn't quite understand myself what the above photo actually shows, so I made some "cut'n'paste"...
What better to do one early Sunday morning?

Both planes rotate fixed, so above photo shows front end of both planes sticking out.
A shot of other side of sub would show both rear ends of planes.


Images below:
Top image is with planes "extracted" - front of sub is up.
Middle image rotates planes in and
Bottom image show planes fully retracted:



Now there! That's how you give Keltos something to do on a lazy Sunday!


/edit:
The planes must rotate the opposite way of what I show above!
Otherwise they would "collide" with the sidepanel shown between the two parts of the planes sticking out, if they rotate like I guessed.
The slot on the other side of the sub therefore must be one long one...

And here it is!
If you look at the photo from post #60, you'll clearly see this side has just that!


I'll do some further investigation in my books... please don't run away...

[Schwieger]

wonder what the underwater performance is like.

On an unrelated note, I feel inclined to bring up the wish for a C.S.S.Hunley mod.

[keltos01]

Originally Posted by Jan Kyster

Didn't quite understand myself what the above photo actually shows, so I made some "cut'n'paste"...
What better to do one early Sunday morning?

Both planes rotate fixed, so above photo shows front end of both planes sticking out.
A shot of other side of sub would show both rear ends of planes.


Images below:
Top image is with planes "extracted" - front of sub is up.
Middle image rotates planes in and
Bottom image show planes fully retracted:



Now there! That's how you give Keltos something to do on a lazy Sunday!

did you get my pm with the latest Surcouf ? I fixed the anim though the planes rotate independently in my model... I had that on the Jyunsen B, seems the japs used the very same system !!!

but since none of their subs remain... and the blueprints etc are scarse... THANKS !!!!

keltos

[Jan Kyster]

Perhaps I should do research before uploading stuff?? nahh!

Anyway, these port and starboard shots better shows how the slots are made.
Playing a bit further with my little papermodel and these shots do confirm the planes rotate opposite of what I show above.



I've uploaded the above "collection" of bowplane details as a fullsize image for better clarity (1600x3000, 1.4 MB)
http://www.mediafire.com/?aadmf918qwd1mb1

Btw. I got the file, Keltos, but when trying to run a mission, the tower is missing?

[keltos01]

Jan, I just sent you the link to the latest version, the one that worked for me yesterday..

but I use no other mods with this one

keltos

[keltos01]

Surcouf V 1.6.3 2 paintsb





9 December 1941, off to Honshu



notice the stowed bowplanes when surfaced



perscope depth ordered : planes come out horizontally









Submerging...






danger passed... cruising on the surface, dive planes stowed away !

keltos

[Arael]

Originally Posted by Schwieger

wonder what the underwater performance is like.

On an unrelated note, I feel inclined to bring up the wish for a C.S.S.Hunley mod.

Pbbt, Hunley. If you really want a challenge, wish for a K-class. 3 minutes for a crash dive, 5 for a normal dive. Crush depth is less than half the length of the boat. Does do 24 knots on the surface though.