Technology and Operations
This forum is for discussing technological & operational matters pertaining to U-boats.
Snorkeling and XXI
Posted by:
SuperKraut
()
Date: February 06, 2001 08:49AM
The answers depend very much on which U-boat type and when. Snorkeling was a new procedure and the learning curve was steep, so lots of progress was made in a short time. There were at least 3 snorkel head designs starting with the original ring valve type which was replaced by the ball valve and finally the best one, the T-valve. The T-valve, used on the Type XXIII, was virtually invisible even to 3 cm radar.
Radar detectors were often used on snorkel heads, but they tended to lag behind in their frequency range, so when the 3 cm radar came out, it took some time to get a 3 cm radar detector.
Nonreflective coatings were tried, but they did not work .
The efficiency of sonar while on Diesel varied with the sonar set and the angles of the signal. The balcony sonar late in the war would work quite well toward the front of the boat, but the noise from the engine would wipe out the effectiveness toward the back.
A large deployment of the XXI would have completely upset Allied ASW and led to high shipping losses. The days of just flying up and down the ocean with the radar on and sinkinging unsuspecting U-boats were over. Radar would have been virtually useless so just finding the XXI would have been rather difficult. It would have turned into a sonar war in which finding and sinking an XXI would have been a major production. A scared up XXI could go down below the layer at 200 meters, stay there for up to a week and then stick its snorkel up as far as 350 miles away.
Regards,
SuperKraut
Radar detectors were often used on snorkel heads, but they tended to lag behind in their frequency range, so when the 3 cm radar came out, it took some time to get a 3 cm radar detector.
Nonreflective coatings were tried, but they did not work .
The efficiency of sonar while on Diesel varied with the sonar set and the angles of the signal. The balcony sonar late in the war would work quite well toward the front of the boat, but the noise from the engine would wipe out the effectiveness toward the back.
A large deployment of the XXI would have completely upset Allied ASW and led to high shipping losses. The days of just flying up and down the ocean with the radar on and sinkinging unsuspecting U-boats were over. Radar would have been virtually useless so just finding the XXI would have been rather difficult. It would have turned into a sonar war in which finding and sinking an XXI would have been a major production. A scared up XXI could go down below the layer at 200 meters, stay there for up to a week and then stick its snorkel up as far as 350 miles away.
Regards,
SuperKraut
Subject | Written By | Posted |
---|---|---|
Vulnerability during schnorkeling? | Tom Iwanski | 02/05/2001 01:39PM |
RE: Vulnerability during schnorkeling? | James Stewart | 02/05/2001 09:14PM |
RE: Vulnerability during schnorkeling? | Steve Cooper | 02/06/2001 03:07AM |
Snorkeling and XXI | SuperKraut | 02/06/2001 08:49AM |
RE: T schnorkels | kurt | 02/07/2001 10:22PM |
T-valve snorkel | SuperKraut | 02/08/2001 01:29PM |
RE: T-valve snorkel | Bulldog | 02/08/2001 10:48PM |
Foresight | SuperKraut | 02/09/2001 08:16AM |
Winning with mediocre weapons | Bulldog | 02/09/2001 09:40PM |
High tech weapons | SuperKraut | 02/10/2001 09:07AM |
RE: High tech weapons | Bulldog | 02/10/2001 08:56PM |
RE: High tech weapons | SuperKraut | 02/11/2001 01:34AM |
RE: High tech weapons | Tom Iwanski | 02/11/2001 03:19AM |
RE: High tech weapons | SuperKraut | 02/11/2001 12:53PM |
RE: High tech weapons | Bulldog (which one?) | 02/11/2001 09:50PM |
Bulldog on Frasier | Rick Mann | 02/12/2001 03:49PM |
RE: Bulldog on Frasier | Bulldog | 02/12/2001 09:17PM |
RE: High tech weapons | SuperKraut | 02/12/2001 04:21PM |
RE: High tech weapons | Bulldog | 02/12/2001 11:20PM |
RE: T-valve snorkel | kurt | 02/10/2001 07:11PM |
RE: T-valve snorkel | Tom Iwanski | 02/10/2001 09:25PM |
RE: T-valve snorkel | Anders Wingren | 02/10/2001 10:40PM |
RE: Snorkeling and XXI | Tom Iwanski | 02/10/2001 09:15PM |
Snorkel history | SuperKraut | 02/11/2001 01:50PM |
RE: Snorkel history | Tom Iwanski | 02/11/2001 04:32PM |
RE: Snorkeling and XXI | Don Dirst | 02/06/2001 10:34PM |