Ceramic hull subs?
 

I remember a Cheif once talking about the navy experimenting with what he called "Glass" for future use in making hulls for subs. At that time I thought how cool that would be because then I could see stuff. But I think he was referring to ceramic. Now I am reading a book by Joe Buff, where these subs have ceramic hulls and can acheive tremndous depths. So I was wondering if any one else heard of theis and what your opinion of it might be?

Scary is my opinion.

Ceramics break, they don't bend. I would prefer to have something that can give a little when I have many tons of ocean that might want to come in on me!

Just my 2 cents.

-S

I have not heard of this, but I do know that the hull of the deepest diving submarines (The Alfas and the K-278 Komsomolets (Mike)) is made out of a titanium alloy

I'll take titanium any day! :D

-S

Me too

Ceramic has the unfortunate problem of being highly brittle, which is why it would perform rather poorly under stress (IE, in the bottom of the Ocean)...me thinks...

However, it is worth noting that ceramic materials is a wonderful absorbing medium against shocks.

Does anyone here know if ceramics have sound-absorbing qualities?

I don't know if it has any sound-absorbing qualities, but if it does, it could theoretically be used to coat the outer skin of a submarine in a shallow-depth infiltration mission, trading depth for stealth, right?

I would suggest if this technology is being pursued then they will have moved onto "Cermets".

Remember ceramics have been used in gas turbine engines for some years.
Ceramics can be very strong in both compresion and tension and have excellent "Creep" properties.

But this is old hat in materials technology now. One possible future is Cermets.

A composite structure composed of ceramic around a metal matrix at the molecular level.

I hate to break it to ya, but that sounds like a box of sinking rocks! :D

-S

Also if I remember correctly both ceramics and cermets are used in the construction of Chobham Armor.
Developed in the UK and used on Challenger and Abrahms Main Battle Tanks. Pretty tough stuff eh?

A tank's armor and a sub's hull need to face very different things

Can it handle the stress of deep water?

No idea at all.
Just trying to illustrate how some materials turn up in some pretty incredible places.

Shouldn't be to hard to calculate though if you've a mind for maths and can get hold of some of the stats for both cermets and very high grade steel.

My interest is piqued. I may have to do some reading.

It might be possible, It might not...

I've never heard the term "Cermet" before, I'll search around and see if I can find any stats on it ;)

For something designed to float, with a controlled sink rate, not so much! :D :p The keyword was 'controlled' back there!

Next you are going to push cement aircraft! Hahahaha!

-S

Cement?