nerfed torpedoes with RuB? Uber Tankers?

[iambecomelife]

Originally Posted by Etienne

Depends. Tankers can carry peanut butter as well as JP4. It all depends on what the customer needs.

Do you have a phd in chemistry and work for shell oil? I'm a merchant marine cadet, and sort of qualified to work on a tanker. They might explode, or they might not. It depends on many, many factors, some of them not even factored into the game, like temperature. So while a tanker going up in a fireball is realistic (And I've had it happen in-game), a tanker slowly taking on a list and chugging on toward home is also realistic.

The most explosive thing, as I've explained in a previous post, would be an empty tanker that hasn't yet been cleaned.

That sounds about right. I read about several catastrophic explosions in empty ships caused by crews not filling cargo tanks with inert gases.

Re: the type of fuel - I've read of WWII-era ships carrying both crude and refined products; the latter seem to have been more dangerous. AFAIK gasoline and aviation fuel were not popular cargoes...

[Etienne]

Originally Posted by irish1958

Remember the PanAM Jet off New York? A a spark set off the fumes in the fuel tank. They are very explosive. The fuel in liquid state will burn if its flash point is reached.
irish1958

Fuel FUMES are explosive. The flashpoint, you will recall, is the temperature at which the liquid emits enough fumes to cause a short explosion at its surface (Not enough to sustain a fire).

I've put out a match with diesel, as the outside temperature was below the diesel's flashpoint. Pain in the ass when you have to burn something. I'd do it with JP4 as well, but I believe it has a very, very, very, very low flashpoint. Colder than I'd want to get my hand in.

The environment in a cargo tank is such that you can throw a cigar in the tank, and it'll go out. The mixture's too rich - Remember, there's as little space as possible left in that tank, and the oxygen was mostly expelled when the cargo was pourred in. Finally, the north atlantic being the cold hearted biatch that it is, most cargoes (Except, say, avgas, JP, gasoline maybe) would be below their flashpoint.

To get an explosion, you'd have to pierce the cargo tank in such a way that the cargo would be opened to the atmosphere (IE, around the waterline) OR, and that'd be a stroke of luck, cause a list large enough that tanks would overflow on the deck. Cargo could also overflow if water starts infiltrating the tank and the vents are open (But tanker crews would, logically, close all the vents as soon as they expected to take on water)

So yeah, tanker might explode. But they also might not. I'm not saying that I'd stick around to grill marshmallows and watch it burn.

[lafeeverted]

Originally Posted by Schpeedy

ok, so if ye stand next to a barrel of fuel, and from a safe distance I shoot at the barrel... you will be totally safe yes?

Saw "Mythbuster's" repeatedly shoot a barrel full of gasoline with multiple weapons. No explosion, only leaks.

[Etienne]

Originally Posted by lafeeverted

Saw "Mythbuster's" repeatedly shoot a barrel full of gasoline with multiple weapons. No explosion, only leaks.

They later revisited the fuel tank myth and shot at it with tracer rounds. They got flames after a few try (They were shooting from too close at first), and agreed that had the tank been more intact (It was swiss cheese at that point), it would have exploded.

But conventional bullets aren't dangerous.

People, for some reason, are convinced that flammable materials are dangerous.

[Steeltrap]

Couple of comments:

1. Read about operation Pedestal, the convoy re-supply to Malta (I think that's it...). There was a USA tanker that made it to port with the sea level almost lapping over the main deck...I think it's name was 'Ohio'. Couldn't be bothered to check...being lazy :rotfl:

2. Tankers were notoriously difficult to sink. The most likely ways to make sinking a near certainty were (a) a massive explosion of the cargo (especially avgas), (b) breaking the back through a detonation beneath the keel or (c) hitting the engine spaces aft. As commented by others, it was quite possible to hit a tanker midships yet not sink it (you can read accounts by Edward L Beach from USS Trigger, Richard H O'Kane from USS Wahoo and Tang etc....).

3. I'd have a problem with tankers ALWAYS requiring the same number of hits irrespective of where they are struck.

Cheers