When the B-29 bomber was first introduced it was rushed into production and was so full of problems that nearly every one flew out of the factory runway directly to Kansas to be retrofitted with the hundreds of changes and refits. Even so, many were lost due to engine fires. It took some time to work out all the bugs in the design. I suspect that would Germany have had another year they would also have worked out all the bugs on this submarine as well. Perhaps the Type XXI was less than presented but this did not stop navies all over the world finding the sunken wrecks and raising them to use for their own purposes. Yes it had a lot of flaws but it was an innovative boat and far ahead of anyone else at the time. It was also the design that was the influence for many later designs by both the allies and Russia. It's importance should not be discounted.
This kind of logic always ignores the fact that the allies wouldn't have been sitting still waiting for the Germans to finally perfect their "Wunder Waffen". In less than a year there would be entire armored divisions of Pershings, Stalin IIIs, and Centurions running rampant in Germany. The skies would be darkened by P-80s, Vampires and Meteors. There would be surplus B-29s for Europe and the RAF would be rolling out their Lincolns, all carrying RAZON radio guided bombs, not to mention nukes, which were initially designed with Berlin in mind.
Based on your numbers a type xxi could run at 5 kts for 4 days covering conservatively 400 miles. The diesels would then run 6 hours recharging the batteries allowing them another 4 days. Repeating this cycle gives this boat an insane range.
Everything you pointed out is true based on British and US research. However, these are all items which could be explained as the first prototypes in a line and compromises when developing a new class of submarine in war time and especially when you are losing the war. The Type 21 was a major revolution in submarine design which is the reason why British and US tested and examined it so much.
About 7:13 - being submerged alone would not provide complete protection from air attack. The Mark 24 “mine” (also titled Fido) was a very effective air-dropped homing torpedo designed specifically to attack submerged targets. And the later centimetric-band ASV radars could detect Schnörkel heads. The Type XXI represented a major potential advance, but commanding one still wouldn’t have been a sinecure.
The technology to detect a submerged stealthy snorkel didn't develop till the late 1950s or early 1960s and required the use of digital computers and even now is not satisfactory as advancements have kept up. The Type XXI snorkel was wrapped in a radar absorbing material code name "Shornsteinfehger "Chimney Sweep") which reduced radar returns by 96% at 9cm and 80Cm at 3cm. (It was designed before the allies used 3cm radar). It was a semiconducting exponential dielectric absorber of the Jaumann type. The top of the snorkel was coated in a ferrite impregnated PVC that reduced returns by 70%. There two materials were combined to achieve 99% reduction in the same material but that didn't enter service yet. -The snorkel is now returning the same kind of reflection as the water itself and the S/N ratio (signal to noise ratio) is minimal. In post war trials it was found that by increasing the sensitivity of the radar (lower S/N ratio detection ratio) the allies were able to detect the snorkel at 6 miles in calm seas but this also revealed wave tops, jumping porpoises, flotsam etc. In addition as I said the German radar absorbing material had already advanced in the lab from the 96% to 99% absorption range. -The Germans had been caught out in 1942/43 as the allies introduced 9cm ASV radar and it took a while to develop reliable 9cm detectors by which time the allies introduced 3cm ASV (as expected) but by the middle to end of 1944 reliable detectors had been developed. Fliege (fly), Mucke (Gnate), Athos. Athos was a 9cm/3cm detector that mounted on the snorkel and would alert the u-boat of the direction, frequency of a radar threat. -Athos was backed up by an infrared detector. -FuMO 391 Lansing was a radar based on Freya that emitted a single omni directional pulse from its single whip aerial to clear the air. A single microsecond radar pulse before surfacing or raising the snorkel would clear the space around a u-boat for 50km. It would difficult if not impossible to detect a single pulse and impossible to direction find. -So a combination of radar absorbing materials, radar warning receiver, infrared warning rand low probability of intercept radar that could be used sparingly would ensure the u-boat withdrew its snorkel before being detected and even if detected it would be submerged on electric drive running deep minutes before the aircraft got there. -Special snorkel detecting radars were developed in the late 1950s that worked by detecting the radar shadow of the snorkel on the sea and looking for wakes. This required advanced signal processing and memory. This kind of radar was 10 years away and could still be detected.
The problem with FIDO was it had to be dropped near the u-boat. In this case a you boat running on its silent creeper motors makes a very difficult target compared to a FIDO drop on a u-boat that had just dived and was cavitation.
Snorkels and periscopes have a small radio cross section making them a difficult target for RADAR in all but the shortest ranges, plus the Fido was a 12kt torpedo which if heard early enough could be outrun, in theory anyway.
@@brianswan3559 both very true. But they were serviceable and reasonably effective, which posed a threat even to a submerged, snorkeling sub. Also recall that the schnörkel left a visible wake, which could be spotted from the air even without use of radar. Remember also that a snorkeling sub typically could make only 5-6 knots (maybe 7 or so for a Type XXI). Also that a submerged sub couldn't increase speed instantly, and that a Type XXI would basically have to secure the diesels, shut down snorkeling, and engage the electric motors, in order to get up to speed and go deep. That doesn't happen instantly. And it has to be done. The schnörkel had an automatic safety ballcock valve to prevent seawater being sucked in accidentally. When the valve closed, the diesels instantly dropped the air pressure inside the hull, with potentially deadly consequences. And either maneuvering sharply or increasing speed would greatly increase the likelihood of shipping seas over the schnörkel head. So the task of a snorkeling sub quickly doubling its speed and outrunning even a 12 knot torp dropped close by, seems fairly challenging. As I said, the job of commanding even a Type XXI wouldn't be a sinecure.
@@JamesAnderson-dp1dt Hi James thanks for the reply with some interesting points. I was actually referring to a fully submerged boat when discussing the Fido, I'm not sure a Fido would be an appropriate weapon for use with a snorkelling submarine however I'm open to persuasion. The type XXI snorkel had an automatic shut off device to prevent air from being sucked from inside the hull, I presume it worked reasonably well, this was one of the many innovations within the Electroboat program. Snorkelling would have been done at night mostly as snorkelling in a combat zone during the day would be near suicidal especially as the boat would be deaf due to the diesel engine noise and near blind being submerged. Most sources state that the type XXI could snorkel above 10kts in a moderate sea, I have heard otherwise however I do not accept that until it is aknowledged either or by Eberhard Rossler or U-boat-net. Yes the type XXI was not invulnerable even if it was capable as believed.
The 'Schnorkel cam' was a special camshaft designed for operating underwater, it had different valve overlap timings to reduce the effects of backpressure in the exhaust system.
There are methods to get a rough range using hydrophones, but it takes time to do (like an hour) and is limited to something you can repeatedly hear over that length of time.
37:35 This is an ASSUMPTION based on the current design. So you are telling me that you believe the Germans would have just left all of these flaws in place? None of these issues even in 1942 are material based. Most of these issues are design and production related. If the German could have worked out their diesel engine and Schnorchelling problem in order to accomplish the 15 knot requirements, then answer to the question change to possible. It is important to remember that during the development of this type of submarine Germany was already deeply losing the war. Steel, fuel, and skilled workers were already in short supply. As such, compromise had to be made. If this sub had been prototyped and build in 41 like Karl Dönitz has desired, it is possible the majority of these compromises and faults could have been resolved.
Ok, it wasnt as good as people say.... still far and away more capable than anything before it. Wouldn't have changed outcomes but it would have been a pain in the butt
The Royal Navy abandoned its trials with their allotted type XXI U-boats namely U-3017 and U-2502 (and not just one boat as stated) due to accidents, breakdowns and cost instead sending them for disposal at Lisahally (op' Deadlight) and Newport, South Wales in the second half of 1945. Therefore could not have confirmed the results of the USN trials of U-3008 and U-2513. I question many of the claims made in this presentation and the apparently creative interpretation of the sourced information much of which can be easily found online. I also question whether Tim has access to any historical documents other than those already in the public domain especially in support of his most fundamental claims.
My late father (ex RN) would have said'Their Lordships at the then Admiralty are quite capable of their own c - - - ups without involving some other s - -. - .'
This is all a real shock to me. I have read much on U-boats in WW2, and only recently have I discovered that the specs on the XX1 most books quote are wildly exaggerated.
It feels a bit weird to hear the Albacore being referred to as the first boat optimized for underwater drag reduction. Afaik, the german Delphin midget sub predated the albacore by about a decade, and the early Holland-built boats bought by the US and UK predated that in turn. If you want to go really far back, there's the Ictineo II which, apart from being made out of wood, looks quite modern in terms of hydrodynamics, was one of the first submarines to use an air-independent steam engine which is another thing that made me spit my tea since AIP technology in my mind belonged to the immediate pre WWII period, and predated the Albacore by about a century. Frankly, as subs with teardrop hulls had been designed, built, and sailed, long before WWII, and using propulsion methods which, for their time, were far more exotic than even the early but by that time proven electric battery and electromagnet motors used by people like Holland, I can't see this as anything more than cold-war chestbeating. Apart from this possibly overzealous nitpicking, great show! Having recieved most of my early "knowledge" of german subs from "simulators" like Silent Hunter 3, the XXI always seemed a bit off in terms of how fast, deep, and far it could go. Not in the sense that it couldn't have been done by a determined nation in peacetime using the technology of the day, but certainly in that it was utterly puzzling how the germans were (and as you explained, they weren't) able to build such a boat under the existing conditions, and how it "supposedly" would have influenced the war "had they been built sooner". Thanks a tonne for bringing attention to some of the "less interesting" details of this sadly near-mythological subject.
It might be said that the Albacore was the first sub "intended" to research the optimization for underwater drag reduction. Prior vessels may have had that hull form, since it was the form of many fishes, but they weren't research vessels intended for investigation of the merits of that form.
Albacore had the first "teardrop" hull, type XXI isn't teardrop. So Albacore wins the streamline point. XXI is streamline only in comparison to submarines of his era 😐 it still has a superstructure that is not part of the pressure hull but just welded on top of one.
Allied reports on German equipment during the war and at the wars end need to be treated with care. The Tiger tanks notorious ‚faults‘ turn out not to be, for the most part or exaggerated. Propaganda, often unwitting, sometimes deliberate. See Oliver Newsome PhD and his four volume research on the Tiger. Newsome is not just an academic with doctorate, but also a serving Abrams tank officer.
A fascinating presentation, thank you so much for sharing your research. As is so often the case with German wonder weapons, ugly reality, as Mr. Lyon put it, takes some of the sheen off of them. Which is not to denigrate the real engineering achievements of these boats, but merely to put them in perspective.
It's rather absurd to claim this represents the type 21 as it would have been when debugged. These captured boats were from an interim initial set. The superchargers would have been fixed by the manufacturer giving full power to the engines, the snorkel mast which vibrated at 10.4 knots and was restricted to 6.5 knots would have been stiffened, its resonant frequency altered and some kind of streamlining added to stop flutter, the diving depth restriction related to the test depth of a life boat capsule and the welding on the torpedo tube bulkhead was also eminently fixable, the snorkel was supposed to get an electro pneumatic operated valve.
@@nstl440 The Germans had a rewireable reflector called UKW-D in service that allowed this. It was too late to see widespread use but it is stated that Blechelly park would be blind for 2 years. This was to be combined with a device that stepped the reflector randomly. There was also the kurier enigma in which the message could be sent in a burst. In the planed 3F mode the dots and dashes were transmitted on alternate frequencies and the carrier was a SSB-SC suppressed carrier so the pulses would be at different frequencies and there would also be no transmission in between (suppressed carrier) . This is essentially impossible to read or direction find.
I'm always skeptical of people who say "This is the weapon that would have changed the war, there was no way to counter it." That was true of the Type VII and Type IX boats at the start of WWII, it was why the U-Boat service had a "Happy Time". But the allies figured out how to counter them to great effect and the happy time ended. Even if the Type XXI was everything it seemed to be on paper, the Allies would have altered their tactics to meet the new threat.
It would have taken time to develop counter measures and new tactics. The Fairlie Trials of 1944 demonstrated that (HMS Seraph). Before Normandy and in numbers it may have delayed the end of WW2 by making the Allied build up in Britain difficult and maybe given Germany a bargaining chip, but it's moot because it didn't happen. The true significance of the type XXI Electroboat came post WW2 being the first Cold War submarine and the first SSK.
Well, that was a turn up for the books. Claims debunked, theories trashed and lessons learned. Thank you very much for an informative and comprehensive treatise on this less than wonderful weapon. I have a couple of thoughts though. If " Alberecht " coatings had been applied to a Type XX1, could that have made the boat the first real stealth sub... while using the creeper motors at least. Could blind firing have worked if using only the homing torpedos i.e. a boat carrying exclusively this type of torpedo. Lastly a question. Are there any details about the deep diving capabilities of a Type XX1 with the hatch defect corrected?
I know it is traditional pour scorn on the wunderwaffe and therefore the type XXI but I think most the problems would have lasted only a few months. The type XXI was rushed into service and had not completed a comprehensive set of sea trials nor had it been fully debugged in the normal process. The superchargers would have been fixed by the manufacturer giving full power to the engines, the snorkel mast which vibrated at 10.4 knots and was restricted to 6.5 knots would have been stiffened, its resonant frequency altered and some kind of streamlining added to stop flutter, the diving depth restriction related to the test depth of a life boat capsule and the welding on the torpedo tube bulkhead, the snorkel was supposed to get an electro pneumatic operated valve.
Yes his the boats werent perfect when introduced but Hellmut Walther already proposed his ideas in 1933 and was rejected. It then took them until basically the end of 1943 to realise that his idea for a new pressure hull was worth looking at and given the state of the war they did not go for a test run to iron out the problems but directly ordered 170 new boats. So if you change the story, have Dönitz and Walther see Hitler at an earlier stage, have them build a couple test boats with conventional propulsion and develop the "Walther-boat" on the side, you might see the "Type XXI" earlier on and without its many problems Almost forgot, Walther did finish his development of the "Walther-boat" and in November 1943 U-792 and U-794 were finished and apparently sometime between November 1943 and March 1944 during trials they reached underwater speeds of 24 knots, so that apparently was going somewhere, now if anyone wonders why we dont use boats like that, the nuclear submarine ruled out Walthers developments
According to Aaron S. Hamilton, Total Undersea War (pp. 1765). Seaforth Publishing, "Admiral Eberhard Godt served as Dönitz’ Operations Chief during the war and succeeded him as Chief of the BdU. Godt was directly involved with high-speed U-boat designs and their future employment. In his post-war interrogations by Allied Naval Intelligence he revealed that it was on the future design of the Walter turbine-powered Type XXVI that the future of the U-boat arm had rested, not the Electro-boat Type XXI: This view of the German high command is confirmed in the account of said interrogations mentioned in LLewellyn-Jones, Malcolm, "The Royal Navy on the threshold of modern anti-submarine warfare, 1944-1949"; Captain G. H. Roberts concluded that the German plan was to continue the inshore campaign with the coastal Type XXIII, gradually replacing the Type VII schnorkel-fitted U-boats in this role, which had been a stop-gap solution. The Type XXI, itself a stop-gap until the Walter Type XXVI was available. The Type XXVI was planned to be capable of sustaining 23 knots for 6 hours, Roberts' assessment emphasized the lack of any coherent German doctrine for the use of the Walter boats, but this did little to ameliorate the Admiralty's concern over the ability of existing weapons to deal with this 25-knot submarine. Therefore, and somewhat contrary to common belief held during the decades after the end of WW II, the Type XXI was not the ultimate goal in terms of the new ocean-going submarine, but was considered to be just too large for convoy. warfare in the North Atlantic, and that it was too costly to manufacture, this together with the very little published problems caused by the vibrations generated by the snorkel design (and many other problems widely described in this magnificent presentation) led to the decision to invest in the Type XXVIW with its Walter turbine, closed conning tower and completely streamlined hull devoid of anti-aircraft guns. Hamilton, Aaron S. Total Undersea War (p. 173)
There were a couple of other technologies in the works. One was a closed cycle diesel using liquid oxygen, which is tempting if the standard diesels can be used. As I recall the engines were being developed by Daimler Benz. These closed cycle u-boats did have a type number. -The Germans did shut down their nuclear bomb program in 1942/43 on the correct assumption they couldn't get one working before the war would be decided. The German navy continued to work with the nuclear establishment to develop nuclear reactors for submarine propulsion. In fact their uranium enrichment work planed by the German navy was far more progressive than the civilian program. The Germans did manage to slightly enrich gram quantity uranium.
Whereas I agree the type XXVI U-boat was the long term goal of Germany, the commitment to the type XXI design was huge and intended to be long term. We only need look at the Valentin assembly bunker to realise this, the Valentin bunker was to complete one type XXI per day, the scale of the ambition was almost unbelievable. According to U-boats in Action (Robert C. Stern) more than 1,000 type XXI U-boats were on order or under construction at wars end. The German high command obviously thought they were onto something, if not Tim Lyon.
1 mile west of Piney Point Maryland in about 80 feet of Potomac river water sits the wreck of a type 21 U-Boat. The U - 1105 Black Panther was sunk by the US Navy in testing after WWII.
The real game changer of the war would have been when V2's began falling on Washington, DC and NYC. The war would have come to a screeching halt. Germany was just a few months away from developing their New York missile (from what was said on a History Channel documentary).
36:30 Another example of prototyping or compromise. If the German had a few more years to work on this, I am sure they would have figured it out. Over-engineered is a common problem for the first iteration.
The problem with this fuel was not only it's volatility but the shortages in materials needed to construct a fuel storage unit capable of withstanding great pressures when submerged. Storage of the same fuel used in the combustion chambers of the V1 and V2 rockets wasn't a problem since this process was conducted at ground level under normal ground pressures. The current German Navy uses the improved Walter system and fuel storage in their current breed of submarines and hence are the most sought after non nuclear submarine produced.
Sir Bernard Lovell records that a key block on U-boat production was the RAF bombing of a canal leading from the component factories to the main assembly plant - which prevented the transport of the huge 80-tonne modules. Interestingly, the main factory in which the jet fighter was due to manufactured took two years to build - and never saw a single fighter produced. So the RAF/USAF bombing campaign was probably far more successful than many have realised or acknowledged.
The RAF bomber squadron #617, "The Dam Busters", were able to drop a couple of 22 thousand pound 21 foot long "Grand Slam" bombs with delayed fuses through the 14 feet of freshly-poured/still-soggy cement roof of an almost-completed Electro boat assembly line. Gathering all the labor and resources in order to focus on this one project, Admiral Doenitz ordered the building of a massive concrete structure, which enclosed a long corridor with an overhead rail assembly, ending near an indoor tank that was large enough to fully leak-test a finished U-boat. Prefabricated U-boat sections were gathered at the other end, assembled, and hung from the railing, where it was completed sequentially as it moved along the rail towards the test tank, between two or more other hanging U-boats at more or less relative levels of completion, to the tune of one finished U-boat churned out every fifty-six hours. Following the examples set by the bomb-proof Atlantic coast U-boat pens, the whole compound would have been impervious to air attack... Once the cement of the roofs had cured and dried... But before all this could get rolling, the timers on the above-mentioned Grand Slams expired, and the subsequent "earthquake" (local) magnitude explosions turned out to be enough to throw the railing system out of alignment to such an extent that the entire project was abandoned. For a much more enjoyable professionally narrated version of these events, along with cool film and thrilling witness testimonials, check out the following link (~about 44 minutes in...): th-cam.com/video/rR-q1yrPpzY/w-d-xo.html
45:38 My only question is based on the final bit. This assumption that Type 21 would not have had an impact is based on the 1945 delivery date. Are we debating their effectiveness when actually delivered or alternatives. If Karl Dönitz had gotten his way and first boat delivered in 1941, I think the boats features and capabilities would have had a great impact. As to what actually happened, of course the type 21 was never going help win the war, the amount of materials and men coming over in the latter half of war was just too great.
The Type 21 were significantly delayed by allied bombing especially on the canals used to ship the modules. The problems in the allied post war report read like any report on a ship undergoing trials prematurely. How long would they take to get fixed? The hydroelastic flutter on the snorkel above 6.5 knots could be alleviate by a number of means: stiffening, dampening, changing resonant frequency or adding streamlines bellow the surface. It could certainly be increased a little. The diving depth restriction came mostly out of a life raft capsule that wasn't strong enough and the concerns around welding quality in the torpedo bulkhead. The former could easily be fixed and the latter also fixed. The diesel manufacturer would with little doubt fix their superchargers. The snorkel I believe was to receive a electropneumatic valves that closed when sea water contacted a pair of electrodes. That leaves us with the issue of torpedo storage. I do not think it a big problem. A homing torpedo could be stored permanently in one of the 6 torpedo tubes and once the initial salvo was gone it could be swapped out or left.
Germany and Donitz didn't recognise a need for an advanced submarine until the middle of 1942 when losses began to rise, and so it didn't happen. According to Anatomy of the Ship Series there were 119 boats completed, delivered and commissioned by May 1945 with a further seven boats held back for training and experimental duties due to construction defects. I argue those seven boats were the boats whose diving depth was limited and were not intended for combat.
Great presentation that I really enjoyed! you said in the slide “ that surface vessels did not locate and attack submarines by listing to the them.” Which surprised me,What about destroyer concepts like the sprint & drift technique.
52:15 Project 641 (NATO: Foxtrot) was developed from Project 611 (NATO: Zulu) The 611s (and the smaller 613s) in turn took some inspiration from the Type 21.
42:00 I agree this battle plan is a waste of resources and horrible way to use the weapon systems. I think we can agree that German's did not really have a good idea of how to fight with this new capability and would have had to adapt after learning the full capabilities and limitations. Of course, this is from modern point of view and a former U.S. submariner (SONAR) which have lots of experience in tracking and creating solutions and firing modern torpedoes which if put in the correct envelop are very accurate and difficult to escape.
The type XXIII 23 carried only two torpedoes. Every voyage produced two hits. It used the same computer as the type XXI. So I think they knew how to use it..
@@williamzk9083 We are talking about the Type XXI and not the type XXIII. The type 23 (XXIII) was a coastal submarine and could almost be classified as midget. The Type 21 (XXI) had 18 torpedoes.
@@grast5150 The Type 23 however used Type 21 technology and had some of the same advantages such as accurate targeting without surfacing and a much longer underwater range and the few that entered service performed very well in the circumstances. The type 21 also managed to penetrate a British cruiser screen of 3 cruisers using their new passive and active sonars accurate tracking capability and active sonar stealth and their high under water speed. I think they knew how to use them. The Kriegsmarine's problem was a lack of reconnaissance aircraft. Even with the snorkel and engine problems (fixable) they had their remarkable under water range and speed.
Thank you for your informative presentation. As a student engineer who is passionate about submarines, I really appreciate a submarine video that isn't "the biggest most destructive submarines that could blow your mum up and the rest". Please, more videos like this! Also an aside, it was great to see Martin, I do have his book, and it is certainly one of my most prized. [Martin] I don't suppose you feel like doing a presentation on flow dynamics over a submarine hull (say through wwII to now)? Just an idea!
Thank you very much for this informative lecture. The type XXI's do indeed hold an almost mythical status in the history of submarines. As a teenager I read the memoirs of that officer who boasted of his exploit in staging the dummy attack on the British cruiser, which I of course believed, but that you have now debunked! His book was the memoir of his entire war service. No doubt he felt the need to jazz it up in order to assure selling the book to his publisher. In the post war years, employment prospects for an ex-submariner in Germany must have been a bit slim, so I'm willing to forgive his romanticism now, even if he deceived me then. As a young aspiring naval architect, I worked under THE shipyard NA who was a Dutch gentleman. As a young man he had worked (unwillingly) in a yard assembling U-Boats for the German war effort. He had a number of revealing stories to tell. The Dutch workers did their best best to evasively deliver the lowest possible quality in the longest possible time. The Nazi political officer responded by holding lunch time attitude adjustment lectures - i.e. public execution of a couple of randomly selected workers - productivity then improved for a few weeks ... Submarines are very complex creations It's not surprising that at the end state of a war, the delivered product of a new, technologically advanced class, would achieve only about 50% of it's target specifications - after all, they were given only about 50% of any realistic development schedule! One is left to wonder what the result might have been had they started a year earlier? I would anticipate that a number of the problematic issues would have been mitigated. However I agree that at that point, the type XXI would still not have been a war winner. Thanks for your efforts! Gregory Anstey
Why the unwarranted dig at President Trump at the introduction of the question section? Very petty and unprofessional addition to an informative presentation.
The reasoning is because this subject and page pertains to Naval Architecture and Naval issues not politics. Hence there is a great difference between defence of a nation and the political administration of a nation.
As I understand it: Even if the type xxi had delivered on the promised stats it would have made no difference. Germany was in no position to perform air patrols looking for convoys in the latter part of the war… It would be a case of being all dressed up but no party to go to. Only factor that mattered was time. When all was going well for the germans, they did like the americans with the sherman, pumping out proven weapons. When they started looking for new, fancy weapons it was already to late. None of the new weapons the germans was looking into (regardless of how far they were in development) would have made a difference.
Air patrols were helpful but not required. I agree that Germany's position was hopeless by the war's end. In 1945, the Russian army in the East and the Western allies in the West were driving deep into Europe plus the atomic bombs were starting to come off the production lines.
When the B-29 bomber was first introduced it was rushed into production and was so full of problems that nearly every one flew out of the factory runway directly to Kansas to be retrofitted with the hundreds of changes and refits. Even so, many were lost due to engine fires. It took some time to work out all the bugs in the design. I suspect that would Germany have had another year they would also have worked out all the bugs on this submarine as well. Perhaps the Type XXI was less than presented but this did not stop navies all over the world finding the sunken wrecks and raising them to use for their own purposes. Yes it had a lot of flaws but it was an innovative boat and far ahead of anyone else at the time. It was also the design that was the influence for many later designs by both the allies and Russia. It's importance should not be discounted.
This kind of logic always ignores the fact that the allies wouldn't have been sitting still waiting for the Germans to finally perfect their "Wunder Waffen". In less than a year there would be entire armored divisions of Pershings, Stalin IIIs, and Centurions running rampant in Germany. The skies would be darkened by P-80s, Vampires and Meteors. There would be surplus B-29s for Europe and the RAF would be rolling out their Lincolns, all carrying RAZON radio guided bombs, not to mention nukes, which were initially designed with Berlin in mind.
Based on your numbers a type xxi could run at 5 kts for 4 days covering conservatively 400 miles. The diesels would then run 6 hours recharging the batteries allowing them another 4 days. Repeating this cycle gives this boat an insane range.
Everything you pointed out is true based on British and US research. However, these are all items which could be explained as the first prototypes in a line and compromises when developing a new class of submarine in war time and especially when you are losing the war. The Type 21 was a major revolution in submarine design which is the reason why British and US tested and examined it so much.
And incorporated all of the best innovations (of which there were many) into their own first generation SSK's post war. Spot on.
About 7:13 - being submerged alone would not provide complete protection from air attack. The Mark 24 “mine” (also titled Fido) was a very effective air-dropped homing torpedo designed specifically to attack submerged targets. And the later centimetric-band ASV radars could detect Schnörkel heads.
The Type XXI represented a major potential advance, but commanding one still wouldn’t have been a sinecure.
The technology to detect a submerged stealthy snorkel didn't develop till the late 1950s or early 1960s and required the use of digital computers and even now is not satisfactory as advancements have kept up. The Type XXI snorkel was wrapped in a radar absorbing material code name "Shornsteinfehger "Chimney Sweep") which reduced radar returns by 96% at 9cm and 80Cm at 3cm. (It was designed before the allies used 3cm radar). It was a semiconducting exponential dielectric absorber of the Jaumann type. The top of the snorkel was coated in a ferrite impregnated PVC that reduced returns by 70%. There two materials were combined to achieve 99% reduction in the same material but that didn't enter service yet.
-The snorkel is now returning the same kind of reflection as the water itself and the S/N ratio (signal to noise ratio) is minimal. In post war trials it was found that by increasing the sensitivity of the radar (lower S/N ratio detection ratio) the allies were able to detect the snorkel at 6 miles in calm seas but this also revealed wave tops, jumping porpoises, flotsam etc. In addition as I said the German radar absorbing material had already advanced in the lab from the 96% to 99% absorption range.
-The Germans had been caught out in 1942/43 as the allies introduced 9cm ASV radar and it took a while to develop reliable 9cm detectors by which time the allies introduced 3cm ASV (as expected) but by the middle to end of 1944 reliable detectors had been developed. Fliege (fly), Mucke (Gnate), Athos. Athos was a 9cm/3cm detector that mounted on the snorkel and would alert the u-boat of the direction, frequency of a radar threat.
-Athos was backed up by an infrared detector.
-FuMO 391 Lansing was a radar based on Freya that emitted a single omni directional pulse from its single whip aerial to clear the air. A single microsecond radar pulse before surfacing or raising the snorkel would clear the space around a u-boat for 50km. It would difficult if not impossible to detect a single pulse and impossible to direction find.
-So a combination of radar absorbing materials, radar warning receiver, infrared warning rand low probability of intercept radar that could be used sparingly would ensure the u-boat withdrew its snorkel before being detected and even if detected it would be submerged on electric drive running deep minutes before the aircraft got there.
-Special snorkel detecting radars were developed in the late 1950s that worked by detecting the radar shadow of the snorkel on the sea and looking for wakes. This required advanced signal processing and memory. This kind of radar was 10 years away and could still be detected.
The problem with FIDO was it had to be dropped near the u-boat. In this case a you boat running on its silent creeper motors makes a very difficult target compared to a FIDO drop on a u-boat that had just dived and was cavitation.
Snorkels and periscopes have a small radio cross section making them a difficult target for RADAR in all but the shortest ranges, plus the Fido was a 12kt torpedo which if heard early enough could be outrun, in theory anyway.
@@brianswan3559 both very true. But they were serviceable and reasonably effective, which posed a threat even to a submerged, snorkeling sub.
Also recall that the schnörkel left a visible wake, which could be spotted from the air even without use of radar.
Remember also that a snorkeling sub typically could make only 5-6 knots (maybe 7 or so for a Type XXI).
Also that a submerged sub couldn't increase speed instantly, and that a Type XXI would basically have to secure the diesels, shut down snorkeling, and engage the electric motors, in order to get up to speed and go deep. That doesn't happen instantly.
And it has to be done. The schnörkel had an automatic safety ballcock valve to prevent seawater being sucked in accidentally. When the valve closed, the diesels instantly dropped the air pressure inside the hull, with potentially deadly consequences. And either maneuvering sharply or increasing speed would greatly increase the likelihood of shipping seas over the schnörkel head.
So the task of a snorkeling sub quickly doubling its speed and outrunning even a 12 knot torp dropped close by, seems fairly challenging.
As I said, the job of commanding even a Type XXI wouldn't be a sinecure.
@@JamesAnderson-dp1dt
Hi James thanks for the reply with some interesting points. I was actually referring to a fully submerged boat when discussing the Fido, I'm not sure a Fido would be an appropriate weapon for use with a snorkelling submarine however I'm open to persuasion.
The type XXI snorkel had an automatic shut off device to prevent air from being sucked from inside the hull, I presume it worked reasonably well, this was one of the many innovations within the Electroboat program. Snorkelling would have been done at night mostly as snorkelling in a combat zone during the day would be near suicidal especially as the boat would be deaf due to the diesel engine noise and near blind being submerged.
Most sources state that the type XXI could snorkel above 10kts in a moderate sea, I have heard otherwise however I do not accept that until it is aknowledged either or by Eberhard Rossler or U-boat-net.
Yes the type XXI was not invulnerable even if it was capable as believed.
The 'Schnorkel cam' was a special camshaft designed for operating underwater, it had different valve overlap timings to reduce the effects of backpressure in the exhaust system.
There are methods to get a rough range using hydrophones, but it takes time to do (like an hour) and is limited to something you can repeatedly hear over that length of time.
37:35 This is an ASSUMPTION based on the current design. So you are telling me that you believe the Germans would have just left all of these flaws in place? None of these issues even in 1942 are material based. Most of these issues are design and production related. If the German could have worked out their diesel engine and Schnorchelling problem in order to accomplish the 15 knot requirements, then answer to the question change to possible. It is important to remember that during the development of this type of submarine Germany was already deeply losing the war. Steel, fuel, and skilled workers were already in short supply. As such, compromise had to be made. If this sub had been prototyped and build in 41 like Karl Dönitz has desired, it is possible the majority of these compromises and faults could have been resolved.
It would have reduced the number of VII U-boats available which were extremely effective in 41 and 42.
Ok, it wasnt as good as people say.... still far and away more capable than anything before it. Wouldn't have changed outcomes but it would have been a pain in the butt
Love this topic. Thanks buddy !
The Royal Navy abandoned its trials with their allotted type XXI U-boats namely U-3017 and U-2502 (and not just one boat as stated) due to accidents, breakdowns and cost instead sending them for disposal at Lisahally (op' Deadlight) and Newport, South Wales in the second half of 1945. Therefore could not have confirmed the results of the USN trials of U-3008 and U-2513.
I question many of the claims made in this presentation and the apparently creative interpretation of the sourced information much of which can be easily found online. I also question whether Tim has access to any historical documents other than those already in the public domain especially in support of his most fundamental claims.
My late father (ex RN) would have said'Their Lordships at the then Admiralty are quite capable of their own c - - - ups without involving some other s - -. - .'
This is all a real shock to me. I have read much on U-boats in WW2, and only recently have I discovered that the specs on the XX1 most books quote are wildly exaggerated.
It feels a bit weird to hear the Albacore being referred to as the first boat optimized for underwater drag reduction.
Afaik, the german Delphin midget sub predated the albacore by about a decade, and the early Holland-built boats bought by the US and UK predated that in turn.
If you want to go really far back, there's the Ictineo II which, apart from being made out of wood, looks quite modern in terms of hydrodynamics, was one of the first submarines to use an air-independent steam engine which is another thing that made me spit my tea since AIP technology in my mind belonged to the immediate pre WWII period, and predated the Albacore by about a century.
Frankly, as subs with teardrop hulls had been designed, built, and sailed, long before WWII, and using propulsion methods which, for their time, were far more exotic than even the early but by that time proven electric battery and electromagnet motors used by people like Holland, I can't see this as anything more than cold-war chestbeating.
Apart from this possibly overzealous nitpicking, great show!
Having recieved most of my early "knowledge" of german subs from "simulators" like Silent Hunter 3, the XXI always seemed a bit off in terms of how fast, deep, and far it could go. Not in the sense that it couldn't have been done by a determined nation in peacetime using the technology of the day, but certainly in that it was utterly puzzling how the germans were (and as you explained, they weren't) able to build such a boat under the existing conditions, and how it "supposedly" would have influenced the war "had they been built sooner".
Thanks a tonne for bringing attention to some of the "less interesting" details of this sadly near-mythological subject.
It might be said that the Albacore was the first sub "intended" to research the optimization for underwater drag reduction. Prior vessels may have had that hull form, since it was the form of many fishes, but they weren't research vessels intended for investigation of the merits of that form.
Albacore had the first "teardrop" hull, type XXI isn't teardrop. So Albacore wins the streamline point. XXI is streamline only in comparison to submarines of his era 😐 it still has a superstructure that is not part of the pressure hull but just welded on top of one.
Ictineo II is quite impressive!
I can see where Jules Verne got his inspiration to his book!
Great video, thanks for putting it together.
Allied reports on German equipment during the war and at the wars end need to be treated with care. The Tiger tanks notorious ‚faults‘ turn out not to be, for the most part or exaggerated. Propaganda, often unwitting, sometimes deliberate. See Oliver Newsome PhD and his four volume research on the Tiger. Newsome is not just an academic with doctorate, but also a serving Abrams tank officer.
That's interesting indeed
A fascinating presentation, thank you so much for sharing your research.
As is so often the case with German wonder weapons, ugly reality, as Mr. Lyon put it, takes some of the sheen off of them. Which is not to denigrate the real engineering achievements of these boats, but merely to put them in perspective.
It's rather absurd to claim this represents the type 21 as it would have been when debugged. These captured boats were from an interim initial set. The superchargers would have been fixed by the manufacturer giving full power to the engines, the snorkel mast which vibrated at 10.4 knots and was restricted to 6.5 knots would have been stiffened, its resonant frequency altered and some kind of streamlining added to stop flutter, the diving depth restriction related to the test depth of a life boat capsule and the welding on the torpedo tube bulkhead was also eminently fixable, the snorkel was supposed to get an electro pneumatic operated valve.
If the German's got this thing 2yrs earlier Britain may have been really screwed. Amazing tech for the times. Great video.
They needed to regularly change or upgrade their enigma.
Then their defeat would have taken longer.
@@nstl440 The Germans had a rewireable reflector called UKW-D in service that allowed this. It was too late to see widespread use but it is stated that Blechelly park would be blind for 2 years. This was to be combined with a device that stepped the reflector randomly.
There was also the kurier enigma in which the message could be sent in a burst. In the planed 3F mode the dots and dashes were transmitted on alternate frequencies and the carrier was a SSB-SC suppressed carrier so the pulses would be at different frequencies and there would also be no transmission in between (suppressed carrier) . This is essentially impossible to read or direction find.
If the Germans had them 2 years early, I am sure the Allies would have been working for 2 years too.
I'm always skeptical of people who say "This is the weapon that would have changed the war, there was no way to counter it." That was true of the Type VII and Type IX boats at the start of WWII, it was why the U-Boat service had a "Happy Time". But the allies figured out how to counter them to great effect and the happy time ended. Even if the Type XXI was everything it seemed to be on paper, the Allies would have altered their tactics to meet the new threat.
It would have taken time to develop counter measures and new tactics. The Fairlie Trials of 1944 demonstrated that (HMS Seraph). Before Normandy and in numbers it may have delayed the end of WW2 by making the Allied build up in Britain difficult and maybe given Germany a bargaining chip, but it's moot because it didn't happen. The true significance of the type XXI Electroboat came post WW2 being the first Cold War submarine and the first SSK.
Well, that was a turn up for the books. Claims debunked, theories trashed and lessons learned. Thank you very much for an informative and comprehensive treatise on this less than wonderful weapon. I have a couple of thoughts though. If " Alberecht " coatings had been applied to a Type XX1, could that have made the boat the first real stealth sub... while using the creeper motors at least. Could blind firing have worked if using only the homing torpedos i.e. a boat carrying exclusively this type of torpedo. Lastly a question. Are there any details about the deep diving capabilities of a Type XX1 with the hatch defect corrected?
I know it is traditional pour scorn on the wunderwaffe and therefore the type XXI but I think most the problems would have lasted only a few months. The type XXI was rushed into service and had not completed a comprehensive set of sea trials nor had it been fully debugged in the normal process. The superchargers would have been fixed by the manufacturer giving full power to the engines, the snorkel mast which vibrated at 10.4 knots and was restricted to 6.5 knots would have been stiffened, its resonant frequency altered and some kind of streamlining added to stop flutter, the diving depth restriction related to the test depth of a life boat capsule and the welding on the torpedo tube bulkhead, the snorkel was supposed to get an electro pneumatic operated valve.
Yes his the boats werent perfect when introduced but Hellmut Walther already proposed his ideas in 1933 and was rejected. It then took them until basically the end of 1943 to realise that his idea for a new pressure hull was worth looking at and given the state of the war they did not go for a test run to iron out the problems but directly ordered 170 new boats. So if you change the story, have Dönitz and Walther see Hitler at an earlier stage, have them build a couple test boats with conventional propulsion and develop the "Walther-boat" on the side, you might see the "Type XXI" earlier on and without its many problems
Almost forgot, Walther did finish his development of the "Walther-boat" and in November 1943 U-792 and U-794 were finished and apparently sometime between November 1943 and March 1944 during trials they reached underwater speeds of 24 knots, so that apparently was going somewhere, now if anyone wonders why we dont use boats like that, the nuclear submarine ruled out Walthers developments
What about U - 505 Being Captured by USA ?
According to Aaron S. Hamilton, Total Undersea War (pp. 1765). Seaforth Publishing, "Admiral Eberhard Godt served as Dönitz’ Operations Chief during the war and succeeded him as Chief of the BdU. Godt was directly involved with high-speed U-boat designs and their future employment. In his post-war interrogations by Allied Naval Intelligence he revealed that it was on the future design of the Walter turbine-powered Type XXVI that the future of the U-boat arm had rested, not the Electro-boat Type XXI:
This view of the German high command is confirmed in the account of said interrogations mentioned in LLewellyn-Jones, Malcolm, "The Royal Navy on the threshold of modern anti-submarine warfare, 1944-1949"; Captain G. H. Roberts concluded that the German plan was to continue the inshore campaign with the coastal Type XXIII, gradually replacing the Type VII schnorkel-fitted U-boats in this role, which had been a stop-gap solution. The Type XXI, itself a stop-gap until the Walter Type XXVI was available.
The Type XXVI was planned to be capable of sustaining 23 knots for 6 hours, Roberts' assessment emphasized the lack of any coherent German doctrine for the use of the Walter boats, but this did little to ameliorate the Admiralty's concern over the ability of existing weapons to deal with this 25-knot submarine.
Therefore, and somewhat contrary to common belief held during the decades after the end of WW II, the Type XXI was not the ultimate goal in terms of the new ocean-going submarine, but was considered to be just too large for convoy. warfare in the North Atlantic, and that it was too costly to manufacture, this together with the very little published problems caused by the vibrations generated by the snorkel design (and many other problems widely described in this magnificent presentation) led to the decision to invest in the Type XXVIW with its Walter turbine, closed conning tower and completely streamlined hull devoid of anti-aircraft guns. Hamilton, Aaron S. Total Undersea War (p. 173)
There were a couple of other technologies in the works. One was a closed cycle diesel using liquid oxygen, which is tempting if the standard diesels can be used. As I recall the engines were being developed by Daimler Benz. These closed cycle u-boats did have a type number.
-The Germans did shut down their nuclear bomb program in 1942/43 on the correct assumption they couldn't get one working before the war would be decided. The German navy continued to work with the nuclear establishment to develop nuclear reactors for submarine propulsion. In fact their uranium enrichment work planed by the German navy was far more progressive than the civilian program. The Germans did manage to slightly enrich gram quantity uranium.
Whereas I agree the type XXVI U-boat was the long term goal of Germany, the commitment to the type XXI design was huge and intended to be long term. We only need look at the Valentin assembly bunker to realise this, the Valentin bunker was to complete one type XXI per day, the scale of the ambition was almost unbelievable.
According to U-boats in Action (Robert C. Stern) more than 1,000 type XXI U-boats were on order or under construction at wars end. The German high command obviously thought they were onto something, if not Tim Lyon.
Not a Collins model at 1:13 - looks like a Type 214 to me
1 mile west of Piney Point Maryland in about 80 feet of Potomac river water sits the wreck of a type 21 U-Boat. The U - 1105 Black Panther was sunk by the US Navy in testing after WWII.
U-1105 is a Type VIIC
The real game changer of the war would have been when V2's began falling on Washington, DC and NYC. The war would have come to a screeching halt. Germany was just a few months away from developing their New York missile (from what was said on a History Channel documentary).
History Channel? Really? Did the Germans get the design from the History Channel's aliens?
Never know??? On a History Channel series they said that Aliens were in contact with Germans.
36:30 Another example of prototyping or compromise. If the German had a few more years to work on this, I am sure they would have figured it out. Over-engineered is a common problem for the first iteration.
How dangerous was H2O2 propulsion and was there a serious risk of spontaneous combustion?
The problem with this fuel was not only it's volatility but the shortages in materials needed to construct a fuel storage unit capable of withstanding great pressures when submerged. Storage of the same fuel used in the combustion chambers of the V1 and V2 rockets wasn't a problem since this process was conducted at ground level under normal ground pressures. The current German Navy uses the improved Walter system and fuel storage in their current breed of submarines and hence are the most sought after non nuclear submarine produced.
Interesting and eye-opening. Thanks for posting.
Sir Bernard Lovell records that a key block on U-boat production was the RAF bombing of a canal leading from the component factories to the main assembly plant - which prevented the transport of the huge 80-tonne modules.
Interestingly, the main factory in which the jet fighter was due to manufactured took two years to build - and never saw a single fighter produced. So the RAF/USAF bombing campaign was probably far more successful than many have realised or acknowledged.
The RAF bomber squadron #617, "The Dam Busters", were able to drop a couple of 22 thousand pound 21 foot long "Grand Slam" bombs with delayed fuses through the 14 feet of freshly-poured/still-soggy cement roof of an almost-completed Electro boat assembly line. Gathering all the labor and resources in order to focus on this one project, Admiral Doenitz ordered the building of a massive concrete structure, which enclosed a long corridor with an overhead rail assembly, ending near an indoor tank that was large enough to fully leak-test a finished U-boat.
Prefabricated U-boat sections were gathered at the other end, assembled, and hung from the railing, where it was completed sequentially as it moved along the rail towards the test tank, between two or more other hanging U-boats at more or less relative levels of completion, to the tune of one finished U-boat churned out every fifty-six hours.
Following the examples set by the bomb-proof Atlantic coast U-boat pens, the whole compound would have been impervious to air attack... Once the cement of the roofs had cured and dried... But before all this could get rolling, the timers on the above-mentioned Grand Slams expired, and the subsequent "earthquake" (local) magnitude explosions turned out to be enough to throw the railing system out of alignment to such an extent that the entire project was abandoned.
For a much more enjoyable professionally narrated version of these events, along with cool film and thrilling witness testimonials, check out the following link (~about 44 minutes in...): th-cam.com/video/rR-q1yrPpzY/w-d-xo.html
@@666rivers Many thanks! I'll certainly take a long look..
Great presentation
45:38 My only question is based on the final bit. This assumption that Type 21 would not have had an impact is based on the 1945 delivery date. Are we debating their effectiveness when actually delivered or alternatives. If Karl Dönitz had gotten his way and first boat delivered in 1941, I think the boats features and capabilities would have had a great impact. As to what actually happened, of course the type 21 was never going help win the war, the amount of materials and men coming over in the latter half of war was just too great.
The Type 21 were significantly delayed by allied bombing especially on the canals used to ship the modules. The problems in the allied post war report read like any report on a ship undergoing trials prematurely. How long would they take to get fixed? The hydroelastic flutter on the snorkel above 6.5 knots could be alleviate by a number of means: stiffening, dampening, changing resonant frequency or adding streamlines bellow the surface. It could certainly be increased a little. The diving depth restriction came mostly out of a life raft capsule that wasn't strong enough and the concerns around welding quality in the torpedo bulkhead. The former could easily be fixed and the latter also fixed. The diesel manufacturer would with little doubt fix their superchargers. The snorkel I believe was to receive a electropneumatic valves that closed when sea water contacted a pair of electrodes. That leaves us with the issue of torpedo storage. I do not think it a big problem. A homing torpedo could be stored permanently in one of the 6 torpedo tubes and once the initial salvo was gone it could be swapped out or left.
@@williamzk9083 Exactly, The issue with the type 21 was when it came online in the war. Germany had already lost the war by that time.
Germany and Donitz didn't recognise a need for an advanced submarine until the middle of 1942 when losses began to rise, and so it didn't happen.
According to Anatomy of the Ship Series there were 119 boats completed, delivered and commissioned by May 1945 with a further seven boats held back for training and experimental duties due to construction defects. I argue those seven boats were the boats whose diving depth was limited and were not intended for combat.
Interesting info. Thanks!
Great presentation that I really enjoyed! you said in the slide “ that surface vessels did not locate and attack submarines by listing to the them.” Which surprised me,What about destroyer concepts like the sprint & drift technique.
sprint and drift is a modern technique requring a few generations of sonor improvement
That is simply not true. They used a combination of passive listening and active pinging.
Hey, i have a luger P08 from boat XXI.2. Appreciate your video!
52:15
Project 641 (NATO: Foxtrot) was developed from Project 611 (NATO: Zulu)
The 611s (and the smaller 613s) in turn took some inspiration from the Type 21.
42:00 I agree this battle plan is a waste of resources and horrible way to use the weapon systems. I think we can agree that German's did not really have a good idea of how to fight with this new capability and would have had to adapt after learning the full capabilities and limitations. Of course, this is from modern point of view and a former U.S. submariner (SONAR) which have lots of experience in tracking and creating solutions and firing modern torpedoes which if put in the correct envelop are very accurate and difficult to escape.
The type XXIII 23 carried only two torpedoes. Every voyage produced two hits. It used the same computer as the type XXI. So I think they knew how to use it..
@@williamzk9083 We are talking about the Type XXI and not the type XXIII. The type 23 (XXIII) was a coastal submarine and could almost be classified as midget. The Type 21 (XXI) had 18 torpedoes.
@@grast5150 The Type 23 however used Type 21 technology and had some of the same advantages such as accurate targeting without surfacing and a much longer underwater range and the few that entered service performed very well in the circumstances. The type 21 also managed to penetrate a British cruiser screen of 3 cruisers using their new passive and active sonars accurate tracking capability and active sonar stealth and their high under water speed. I think they knew how to use them. The Kriegsmarine's problem was a lack of reconnaissance aircraft. Even with the snorkel and engine problems (fixable) they had their remarkable under water range and speed.
If Hitler had nearly 100 Type XXl Submarines, he could have swept the oceans clean of all allied shipping. Think about it.
The relentless ads ruin this unfortunately
Thank you for letting us know. We have updated the settings to improve your experience.
Thank you for your informative presentation. As a student engineer who is passionate about submarines, I really appreciate a submarine video that isn't "the biggest most destructive submarines that could blow your mum up and the rest". Please, more videos like this!
Also an aside, it was great to see Martin, I do have his book, and it is certainly one of my most prized. [Martin] I don't suppose you feel like doing a presentation on flow dynamics over a submarine hull (say through wwII to now)? Just an idea!
Thank you very much for this informative lecture. The type XXI's do indeed hold an almost mythical status in the history of submarines.
As a teenager I read the memoirs of that officer who boasted of his exploit in staging the dummy attack on the British cruiser, which I of course believed, but that you have now debunked!
His book was the memoir of his entire war service. No doubt he felt the need to jazz it up in order to assure selling the book to his publisher. In the post war years, employment prospects for an ex-submariner in Germany must have been a bit slim, so I'm willing to forgive his romanticism now, even if he deceived me then.
As a young aspiring naval architect, I worked under THE shipyard NA who was a Dutch gentleman. As a young man he had worked (unwillingly) in a yard assembling U-Boats for the German war effort. He had a number of revealing stories to tell. The Dutch workers did their best best to evasively deliver the lowest possible quality in the longest possible time. The Nazi political officer responded by holding lunch time attitude adjustment lectures - i.e. public execution of a couple of randomly selected workers - productivity then improved for a few weeks ...
Submarines are very complex creations It's not surprising that at the end state of a war, the delivered product of a new, technologically advanced class, would achieve only about 50% of it's target specifications - after all, they were given only about 50% of any realistic development schedule! One is left to wonder what the result might have been had they started a year earlier? I would anticipate that a number of the problematic issues would have been mitigated. However I agree that at that point, the type XXI would still not have been a war winner.
Thanks for your efforts!
Gregory Anstey
Why the unwarranted dig at President Trump at the introduction of the question section? Very petty and unprofessional addition to an informative presentation.
Because TDS is a real condition unfortunately.
@@ThatZenoGuy You are correct! Donald Thug is fully deranged!!!
The reasoning is because this subject and page pertains to Naval Architecture and Naval issues not politics. Hence there is a great difference between defence of a nation and the political administration of a nation.
yeah, I agree it was petty and unprofessional.
You triggered bro? 😂😂😂
Netter they buy this sub bevor they buy the US or frech sub, s 😜👍
As I understand it:
Even if the type xxi had delivered on the promised stats it would have made no difference. Germany was in no position to perform air patrols looking for convoys in the latter part of the war… It would be a case of being all dressed up but no party to go to.
Only factor that mattered was time. When all was going well for the germans, they did like the americans with the sherman, pumping out proven weapons. When they started looking for new, fancy weapons it was already to late.
None of the new weapons the germans was looking into (regardless of how far they were in development) would have made a difference.
Air patrols were helpful but not required. I agree that Germany's position was hopeless by the war's end. In 1945, the Russian army in the East and the Western allies in the West were driving deep into Europe plus the atomic bombs were starting to come off the production lines.