Quote:
Originally Posted by rokket
Davey, brilliant stuff...taxing and stretching here maybe: What about Mk 6 exploders and their impellers? Yes, I saw some stuff waaay back in the thread, but I'm interested in the recent "hot run" post...if a fish were sticking out the tube, stuck, and the impeller was spinning, it seems these revolutions would start to arm it...unless there was a governor that only counted revolutions at a torp's normal speed...??? Thanks
|
The Mk 6 exploder is actually electrically powered. On the bottom of the exploder mechanism (which actually forms the bottom of the warhead itself) a channel is cut into the body which directs a flow of water over an impeller. The spinning of this impeller drives a small generator and this is what provides the power. Two different safety mechanisms prevent the exploder from firing the warhead until a certain point of travel (I believe it is 400 yards, but don't quote me on that right now)
So in your scenario (which has happened by the way) the fish is stuck part way out of the tube, which means it has only traveled about 10 feet. The exploder isn't yet armed. The impeller and the associated gear train is set up in such a way that only the force of water moving at the weapon's design speed (31-46 knots) would be sufficient to rotate the impeller and arm the torpedo. The speed of the submarine through the water (< 8 knots) would not be enough to rotate the impeller gear train.
Don't get me wrong though. This is a very dangerous situation. The only real solution is to refire the tube and hope the weapon is ejected. If it is in an aft tube, the boat would probably be running at a full bell to accelerate the separation of the boat and the weapon. If in a forward tube, it would be backing down for the same effect.
The following link has a lot of good info on the exploder operation:
http://www.hnsa.org/doc/torpedo/index.htm