Distroyers subs and ramming???

[Task Force]

Ive always wondered, Wouldnt a distroyer kill its hull after ramming a sub. I mean How can a distroyer survive ramming a sub without cutting its hull open.

[donut]

It happened !

[SandyCaesar]

I've heard of destroyers built with specially reinforced bows just for the purpose. Destroyers may be small ships, but they're still two and a half times the tonnage of your U-Boat, and plus they have way more reserve buoyancy. What would send a destroyer to the dockside could easily keep a submarine on the surface or beneath it permanently. On the surface, it was sometimes more feasible than gunfire (you know how small your silhouette is!) to just run a U-Boat over. Especially at night, when visual detection range might have been only a few hundred meters.

[nirwana]

if u wanna give the escort a pause line up with his course and run towards him at flank speed. the chance is about 50:50 that u take it with u to the bottom of the ocean. 2x i managed to survive and sunk the annoying bugger which both times broke apart.

[Jimbuna]

In RL (on mamy occassions) a destroyer would ram a U-boat (if in close proximity and in a favourable position) in an attempt to breach its pressure hull.

A bonus could result in disabling the U-boat enough to prevent it from submerging rather than destroying it.

Either way, the result was usually the incapacitating the U-boat.

Many escort Captains considered the risk of damaging their own vessels as a result well worth taking.

[UnderseaLcpl]

As has been said, they did have specially-built prows for ramming. However, many escorts were damaged, sometimes heavily, by ramming.


edit-oh buna beat me to it.

[Sailor Steve]

Funny, I served on a destroyer and have done years of research and I've never read one thing about a specially reinforced bow for ramming.

However: Have you ever heard the expression "From stem to stern", meaning the whole ship from front to back? Every single surface ship built has this thing at the front called a 'stem piece'. Its main function is to have a starting point where the hull plates are welded; otherwise there would be a chance for the constant wave action to peel the plates apart. The thing is, the stem has to be strong enough to withstand the pressure of all kinds of waves, plus the chance of hitting random stuff in the water, so it is almost always one solid piece. I've read posts commenting that a destroyer's hull is only 1/2" (12.7mm) thick, which is true, versus a u-boat's pressure hull which is at least 7/8" (22mm) thick, which is also true. However, the stem piece is around 6" thick! Surprise, surprise - a destroyer ramming a submarine is going to cause a lot of damage, usually fatal.

On the other hand, if I remember rightly, in his book U-Boat Killer Donald MacIntyre describes what happened when one destroyer rammed a u-boat at full speed as the sub was trying to submerge. The sub was sunk, but the destroyer ran completely over it, ripping off both propellors and rudders. The DD survived, but had to be towed home and missed several months of action while being repaired.

[UnderseaLcpl]

Originally Posted by Sailor Steve

On the other hand, if I remember rightly, in his book U-Boat Killer Donald MacIntyre describes what happened when one destroyer rammed a u-boat at full speed as the sub was trying to submerge. The sub was sunk, but the destroyer ran completely over it, ripping off both propellors and rudders. The DD survived, but had to be towed home and missed several months of action while being repaired.

I got that from "Sea Wolves" by Wolfgang Frank. I also thought there was a passage in which MacIntyre talks about a certain class of escort having an enhanced capactiy for ramming but I'm not sure. I can guarantee that more than one escort vessel was heavily damaged by ramming though.

[Jimbuna]

Originally Posted by UnderseaLcpl

I got that from "Sea Wolves" by Wolfgang Frank. I also thought there was a passage in which MacIntyre talks about a certain class of escort having an enhanced capactiy for ramming but I'm not sure. I can guarantee that more than one escort vessel was heavily damaged by ramming though.

There is one incident reported in the Clay Blair volumes (not at home to quote precise page number etc) where the escorts propellor shafts become entangled in the wire rigging of the conning tower.

[Task Force]

Thanks for the info everyone. But I still wonder. With those fleet boats, which where often alot bigger then U boats. Would the same thing happer.:hmm:

[Sailor Steve]

Bigger isn't always better. The fleet boats had thinner pressure hulls than u-boats, and both British and Americans were surprised to find this out when they captured a couple. Also, even if the pressure hulls were the same thickness the larger boat is more susceptible to flexing from direct impact; so if anything the result would be worse.

Originally Posted by UnderseaLcpl

I got that from "Sea Wolves" by Wolfgang Frank. I also thought there was a passage in which MacIntyre talks about a certain class of escort having an enhanced capactiy for ramming but I'm not sure. I can guarantee that more than one escort vessel was heavily damaged by ramming though.

Well, I did say I had never read that, not that it didn't happen. It's been a decade or more since I read MacIntyre. You could well be right. I think I might have been a little more insistent than was warrented.

[PappyCain]

Ramming is more riding over the top of a sub and crushing it with the weight of the hull rather than cutting into it. Sort of like breaking ice, you use the hull to break it up not the bow. Not a good idea to plow into a sub by any means and risk the damage.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Enemy_Below

Originally Posted by Sailor Steve

Bigger isn't always better. The fleet boats had thinner pressure hulls than u-boats, and both British and Americans were surprised to find this out when they captured a couple. Also, even if the pressure hulls were the same thickness the larger boat is more susceptible to flexing from direct impact; so if anything the result would be worse.

Well, I did say I had never read that, not that it didn't happen. It's been a decade or more since I read MacIntyre. You could well be right. I think I might have been a little more insistent than was warrented.

The US used several classes of Coast Guard cutters for escort duties and passed some of them onto the UK via Lend Lease. It's reasonable that these would have strengthened hulls to deal with ice since they were pre-war vessels and this might account for the urban legend of destroyers with reinforced bows. I can find no reliable references that indicate any class of escort including destroyers were reinforced specifically for ramming. The high command did not encourage it and several escorts became total losses due to damage from ramming U-Boats.

Having said that, it was an effective tactic even if somewhat desperate. KL Peter Cremer (U-333) was rammed twice and got away both times. On the other hand the frigate HMCS New Glasgow rammed and sank the Type VII U-1003 but sustained damage that took over two-months to repair.

Good Hunting.

[PappyCain]

A few subs were lost since WWII who were ran into by commercial and other ships - was involved in a few noteable subsea search and 'sail' recoveries. Accidents (?) unreported or shall we say classified incidents.

S'