General Discussions
This is the place to discuss general issues related to the U-boat war or the war at sea in WWII.
Surcouf: a good gun platform?
Posted by:
Capt Kurt
()
Date: August 08, 2001 08:29PM
<HTML>it is interesting to note, however, that lots of the British and some of the American escort ships, like
the Flower class corvettes, the Castle class corvettes, the River class frigates, the Loch class frigates,
the Bay class frigates, and the Everts class destroyer escorts, carried depth charges or hedgehogs
but no torpedoes. They were deadly to submerged submarines but would have been at a
disadvantage against the Surcoff on the surface. A near miss from an 8\"er could stove in the hull of
one of these little ones. A hit would be a catastrophe. Also, I\'ve read somewhere that Surcoff\'s fire
direction was relatively good. I know she had stereoscopic (?) a rangefinder.
Reference the submarine as a gun platform: Bob, I would agree with you that a sub isn\'t a good one
except for a book I read some years ago by a British sub commander (in fact, I think that was the
name of the book, SUB COMMANDER). He did most of his fighting in the Med and liked his sub(s) as
a gun platform. He went to some effort to explain how a sub was stable on the surface due to its low
buoyancy, was hard to hit being narrow and low in the water, and had a thick pressure hull that
would shrug off near misses and bounce off small caliber hits. His account doesn\'t square at all with
the stories of aircraft attacking U-Boats on the surface, but then he was driving British built S and T
class vessels which were larger and more robust (I believe). He surfaced and fought with armed
merchants, small patrol vessels and shore batteries. You get the impression he would have liked to
command the Surcoff. His remarks were so far off the concepts that I had developed about subs that
I was amazed.
Michael Lowrey wrote:
-------------------------------
Nonny,
Surcouf was designed to sink merchant ships, not warships. I would not have liked her chances against a destroyer or \\\"torpedo boat\\\" (as the term is used in Conway\\\'s for 600 ton+ escorts/torpedo attack craft). She might have been able to overpower more mundane escort vessels, but if I were her captain I doubt I would have risked it. One hit from an 8-incher is not necessarily fatal to a warship of any size; one 4-inch or 5-inch shell hit on a submarine can be. Armed merchant cruisers also would have been a bad choice for Surcouf to attack - there\\\'s often way too much fire power on such a ship.
Submarines are bad gun platforms. Because they are narrow, the ocean\\\'s motion affects them more than other ships. The result is inaccurate fire. To make matters worse, in the days before radar, accuracy depended heavily on spotting shell splashes. With only two relatively slow firing guns, this would be a problem at longer ranges. The small rangefinder also reduced the guns....</HTML>
the Flower class corvettes, the Castle class corvettes, the River class frigates, the Loch class frigates,
the Bay class frigates, and the Everts class destroyer escorts, carried depth charges or hedgehogs
but no torpedoes. They were deadly to submerged submarines but would have been at a
disadvantage against the Surcoff on the surface. A near miss from an 8\"er could stove in the hull of
one of these little ones. A hit would be a catastrophe. Also, I\'ve read somewhere that Surcoff\'s fire
direction was relatively good. I know she had stereoscopic (?) a rangefinder.
Reference the submarine as a gun platform: Bob, I would agree with you that a sub isn\'t a good one
except for a book I read some years ago by a British sub commander (in fact, I think that was the
name of the book, SUB COMMANDER). He did most of his fighting in the Med and liked his sub(s) as
a gun platform. He went to some effort to explain how a sub was stable on the surface due to its low
buoyancy, was hard to hit being narrow and low in the water, and had a thick pressure hull that
would shrug off near misses and bounce off small caliber hits. His account doesn\'t square at all with
the stories of aircraft attacking U-Boats on the surface, but then he was driving British built S and T
class vessels which were larger and more robust (I believe). He surfaced and fought with armed
merchants, small patrol vessels and shore batteries. You get the impression he would have liked to
command the Surcoff. His remarks were so far off the concepts that I had developed about subs that
I was amazed.
Michael Lowrey wrote:
-------------------------------
Nonny,
Surcouf was designed to sink merchant ships, not warships. I would not have liked her chances against a destroyer or \\\"torpedo boat\\\" (as the term is used in Conway\\\'s for 600 ton+ escorts/torpedo attack craft). She might have been able to overpower more mundane escort vessels, but if I were her captain I doubt I would have risked it. One hit from an 8-incher is not necessarily fatal to a warship of any size; one 4-inch or 5-inch shell hit on a submarine can be. Armed merchant cruisers also would have been a bad choice for Surcouf to attack - there\\\'s often way too much fire power on such a ship.
Submarines are bad gun platforms. Because they are narrow, the ocean\\\'s motion affects them more than other ships. The result is inaccurate fire. To make matters worse, in the days before radar, accuracy depended heavily on spotting shell splashes. With only two relatively slow firing guns, this would be a problem at longer ranges. The small rangefinder also reduced the guns....</HTML>
| Subject | Written By | Posted |
|---|---|---|
Surcouf versus Axis ships
|
Nonny | 08/08/2001 09:48AM |
|
RE: Surcouf versus Axis ships
|
walter M | 08/08/2001 12:40PM |
|
RE: Surcouf versus Axis ships
|
J.T. McDaniel | 08/08/2001 01:25PM |
|
RE: Surcouf versus Axis ships
|
MCE | 08/08/2001 04:29PM |
|
RE: Surcouf versus Axis ships
|
Visje | 08/09/2001 06:17AM |
|
RE: Surcouf versus Axis ships
|
Vin | 08/09/2001 03:29AM |
|
RE: Surcouf versus Axis ships
|
Michael Lowrey | 08/08/2001 02:08PM |
|
Surcouf: a good gun platform?
|
Capt Kurt | 08/08/2001 08:29PM |
|
RE: Surcouf: a good gun platform?
|
kurt | 08/08/2001 09:08PM |
|
RE: Surcouf: a good gun platform?
|
Torlef | 08/09/2001 05:55AM |
|
Surcouf\'s guns effective with its spotter plane
|
Henneman | 08/09/2001 06:26AM |
|
gun conflicts in the atlantic
|
kurt | 08/09/2001 03:35PM |