How bad would it have been for both the Entente and the Central Powers if Japan had declared the Anglo-Japanese Alliance null and joined the latter in WWI, and how would this affect future naval developments?
In the Pearl Harbor salvage videos, you mention USS Cassin and USS Downes essentially getting new ships built around whatever machinery was salvageable. Were they built to the existing Mahan plans, or were they updated/upgraded at all?
@@arandomdudewithhobbies3318 To greatly oversimplify, up to a point, the reduction in drag from reduced surface area outweighs the slight increase from the blunt front being more perpendicular to the flow. In addition, on the front of an object, you aren't really worried about flow separation - almost no matter what you do, the flow will stay attached to the object. As a result, the best shape for hydrodynamics (and subsonic aerodynamics) is basically the classic "airfoil" shape - relatively blunt and rounded on the front, with a long pointed tapering rear. (This applies to submarines, torpedoes, aircraft, etc, but note that it does *not* apply to surface ships - the details of how they interact with the surface of the water and the waves generated by that complicate things quite a bit)
@@theol.1988 The irony being that Drach is one of those English speakers that tries (harder than most) to speak as little true English (Germanic) as he can so he can sound smurt wid them romance wordz. I'm being a little tongue in cheek, as it's not going to be something he thinks about nowadays, and will stem from his upbringing and schooling, but after getting black pilled on English I can't help but seethe lol
In Whitehead's diagram he calls the back of the torpedo the "Engine Room" which I really appreciate. There are tiny, sweaty, oil and grease stained little mice engineers with goggles and spanners hard at work to keep the engine running. Head canon. Oh and they dive away to safety at the last minute!
I feel sorry for Admiral Roz, he was quite competent and managed to take that circus of a fleet to join battle. That poor man. Heh, I would be throwing the aristocratic coat hangers out the torpedo lauchers. Isn't there a movie writer that can make a good movie, likely a comedy of horrors out of this? I would watch that.
ChatGPT-4 agrees. It first suggested that sloops and gunbots should be assigned the term. But then it was easily swayed... _"Absolutely, the term 'Especially Angry Raft' could be even more fittingly applied to _*_Monitors_*_ , reflecting both their physical characteristics and combat roles in a humorous light. Monitors were a class of warship designed primarily for coastal defense, riverine, or harbor warfare. They were characterized by their low freeboard, relatively flat deck, and one or more heavy guns mounted in revolving turrets. These features made them resemble rafts more closely than traditional oceangoing ships, and indeed, their lack of maneuverability and seaworthiness was a noted limitation._ _Monitors played significant roles in various conflicts, including the American Civil War, where they were introduced. The USS Monitor itself is famous for its battle with the CSS Virginia (Merrimack), showcasing the potential of such vessels. However, their design focused on firepower and armor at the expense of speed and handling, making them somewhat awkward in open sea conditions._ _Describing monitors as 'Especially Angry Rafts' humorously captures their essence: formidable in a fight and heavily armed, yet lacking in grace and agility on the water. This term underscores their surprising ferocity and effectiveness in their intended roles, despite an outward appearance that might not inspire fear at first glance."_
I love that some of those rafts were *SO angry* that they refused to carry their turret, preferring to try and stab the enemy, so the Union Navy relented and gave them a spar torpedo and a Dahlgren gun on a pivot, for potential berserk riverine brawling fun.
A note, The Hunley's crew were likley killed immediately by the blast from the spar torpdeo, the movement afterward was wile it was sinking and affected by the currents. The US National Archives has a talk about it called "The Fate of the Submarine H.L. Hunley" from Dec 11, 2017.
@@kentlindal5422 The suffocation theory is specifically addressed in the talk above and evidence suggests against it. Worth watching the talk if you haven't.
@@kentlindal5422 the most up to date theory is that the shockwave from the blast that close would have killed them in any case, and it’s unlikely they were unconscious beforehand.
Llamas are however, very dangerous; so if you see one near where people are swimming you must yell out "Cuidado! Hay llamas!" (Look out! There are llamas!)
After the second sinking with all hands you would think someone might come to the conclusion it was a bad idea!. The fourth sinking with all hands was avoided by them losing the wreck, much to the potential crews relief 😊.
Like everything else they designed without stealing it from the Union, the Hunley was a piece of Junk that no competent person would go near. Fortunately for the Confederacy, most of their sailors had never seen water bigger than a river before and were blissfully unaware of the horror they were facing.
Fun Fact: the Norwegian coastal defences at the Drøbak sound used whitehead torpedoes to sink the german heavy crusier Blücher, one of the mot advanced cruisers of it's time
@@marshalleubanks2454 The torpedoes were newer than the guns of the fortress, and they both were made by the defunct empires of Austro-Hungary and Germany.
It really is wild to think about just how much the modern concept of the torpedo totally rebalanced naval warfare. Up until the torpedo….there really was no way for smaller ships to go actively toe-to-toe with heavier ships (mines are passive). Size was king, the amount of weapons and armor you can pack onto a vessel directly affects its combat power and size…so ships became larger and heavier which widened the game between a capital ship and lighter craft. Giving much smaller ships the ability to engage and potentially destroy capital ships is a complete game changer to every element of a navy…..from ship construction, funding, crew training, operational range, logistic supply, engine designs….you can go on and on. Truly a game changing weapon once it hit its stride.
And then factor in aircraft carrying them as well, a small craft from well beyond shot range travelling at high speed and you can see why carriers have become king.
@@chrissouthgate4554 Is it a fair point, though? As I understand it, the Armada had guns as a secondary weapon, with the infantry as the primary, while the English went all in on guns. It's the equivalent of hunting carriers from the 1940s with battleships built in the 1910s. That is, you're looking at fleets on different sides of a paradigm shift, in large part the same paradigm that the introduction of torpedoes upended.
And thus did the torpedoboat and then torpedoboat destroyer come into existence, and battleship mains everywhere cursed their coming. And then the carrier nation attacked…
I was thinking it would be another miserable, lonely Valentine's Day for me, but Uncle Drach brought me a Bouquet of Knowledge and has made my day. Thank you, Uncle Drach.
Drach mate, I was among the early Kawasaki(pole type Jet-skiers) and quickly learnt, how to stunt them, as you say porpoising the ski, was the start of any dive or flip stunt, and even something as plastic built as a Jt-ski with 650cc engine was hard work, to get it to go where you wanted, The Italian manned torpedo riders, were braver men than I Gunga Din
My first encounter with the term "torpedo" in the pre-modern context was when I read Mysterious Island from Jules Verne, and a pirate ship cruising up a river was blown up with the help of a torpedo. I wondered how could they have had torpedoes back then, but a footnote in the book dutifully explained that in that era, the term "torpedo" simply meant an underwater explosive.
@@marshalleubanks2454 Yep, and they were right there and had to be steamed over. Jouett and Farragut both knew that very well - they could see the marker buoys. Apparently the torpedoes were heard scraping the hull as 'Hartford' passed over them, but only the one struck by 'Tecumseh' actually fired. Hell of a gamble though. And, of course, 'torpedo' is taken from the archaic term for an electric ray (bottom-dwelling fish which stuns with a bio-electric pulse). Electric fish are cool - it's why my favourite submarine is the excellently-named 'Gymnote' - and equally why I can't fathom that the USN never named a submarine 'USS Knifefish' (English name for the Gymnotids).
I suppose slingers pelting oarsmen would count as that. AFAIK ~4000 BCE copper use was starting to take off around the Mediterranean, Mesopotamia, and around the Great Lakes. Might be guys getting pelted with copper tipped arrows for extra stabbiness when compared to stone tipped ones.
What we know so far is that you need to be on preexisting favourable terms with them before they will tolerate being utilized as a fluffy floatation device. Which seems fair.
My favourite dead-end torpedo design is the Brennan torpedo. Used only in shore-based installations, it was both driven and (via differential gearing) controlled by long wires being wound from spools inside the torpedo via a pair of steam winding engines, giving it a for the late 1870s amazing range of 2000 yards. And arguably (with a guidance mechanism much less vulnerable to saltwater intrusion than the electrically-steered Lay torpedo), it was the first practical guided torpedo in the world. However, being used mainly as harbour defense by the British Empire during the late 19th and early 20th century, and taken out of service before the start of WWI, I don't think it was ever fired in anger.
I'll be honest when Drach started with before all this there was the time of the dinosaurs I was half expecting a Defunctland style tangent which got to and that dinosaur became fuel for a torpedo which sank a ship. 😂
Robert Whitehead was born in Bolton in North West England, although inland it has quite a number of links to the sea, such as the Captain of the Carpathia Athur Rostron who rescued the survivors of the Titanic, everyday when going to school I would pass the plaque where he was born. The town also produced marine engines, iron plating and used to have a Royal naval gun factory at one point. And at the moment produce missiles for the Navy. My grandfather and great uncle were also in the Navy and HMS Dido was "payed" for by the town.
Robert Whitehead was assisted by his son, John, starting at age 12. John died of cancer at age 48, and his daughter Agathe Whitehead was the heiress of her grandfather's fortune. She married one Georg Ritter von Trapp, who became the most successful submarine captain in the Austro-Hungarian navy (using Whitehead torpedoes, of course). She died in 1922, leaving behind seven children. Later, they became (with their dad) the Trapp Family singers, and, still later, "The Sound of Music" was made about them. For some unknown reason this movie did not even mention the Whitehead torpedoes that made it all possible.
I live pretty near Rijeka, which is the now Croatian town previously known as Fiume where Robert Whitehead and Giovani Luppis developed the whitehead torpedo. Im pretty sure the whole factory is still here and has been turned into a museum.
My Grandfathers Brother, a sailor in WW1 was In Torpedoes. He absolutely refused to speak about them and apparently worked at a testing station for them. It seems he regarded them in the same way people who work on stealth do today. He absolutely refused to talk about his job..
1:30-ish "Colanderization..." LOL. That is a new phrase I'm going to need to plunder from you so that i may press-gang it into my daily vocabulary. Good show, Drach, much love to you and yours, from your crewmates across the pond and all of the way down in Texas. Keep up the untouchable work and the enviable wit you put into it.
Naval matters are not one of my longstanding interests and i don't know how you found me in the 'Southern Ocean' of RU-vid. You talk often in my sleep and when awake Sir, i am informed at a better level than in my paid for higher education. History of torpedoes: now i am listening. Long time subscribed.
Yet another excellent episode. (As per usual) You sir are not only a font of wisdom, your work ethic/output of quality content is most exceptional. Thank you muchly, Mr Drach' sir. 🦀🇦🇺✌️
Just a slight correction Drach, the Hunley was never officially commissioned in the Confederate Navy, so although she is referred as the CSS Hunley she was just H.L. Hunley
@Drachinifel I cannot wait for "another day"! That is, I am definitely looking forward to the continuation of this, the 1st episode (I hope), in the series on torpedoes and their development.
I find it rather neat that one of the most significant developments of naval weaponry - arguably the most significant since the whole gunpowder cannon malarkey (and not exceeded since as what is a missile but a torpedo going through air :) ) - came from that very notable naval Nation, Austria :)
austo-hungary was incredible country and made many increfible achivments, so much so that the countries that it had under control have benefit from them. I live in Croatia,, wich was a part of Austro- Hungarian empire, and you can still to this day see impact that country had on croatia. Uljanik the shipyard made some incredible advanced ships, , Rijeka is the biggest cargo harbour in the country, and the land Registry or the cadastre is still mostly based on Austro-Hungarian maps I am so grateful that they did not destroy andconquer, but built and educate, we would be much behind time without them. You can see that with land Registry, it still has no progress ftrom thoes times till today.
13:29 On a side note, it technically has a higher KTD ratio than USS _Monitor._ The _Monitor_ never sank any enemy warships before she sank on New Year’s Eve, 1862.
I wrote a little essay about the Whitehead Torpedo during my time at University. A lecture under the fabulous title "Habsburg goes global". I am quite sure our Professor had not intended to generate a milhist topic essay xD. Anyway, nice to see you cover this.
The poking device! Seriously the skills of Lord Drach to switch from one interesting subject to another is just... Godly! I am gotta find the address of Charles so a very serious thing can happen... Drach to be knighted! And I am a French republican 😂
I've watched every video Drach's done, many of them more than once. This is already a top favorite ...an instant classic! It has everything I love about Drachinifel's videos, it's very informative with outstanding supporting images, and it's highly entertaining (as usual). From the amusing intro: "Okay, maybe we're not going quite that far back" to the trademark sarcasm I've come to expect from the best Drachininifel videos: "Civil wars you see were all the fashion in late nineteenth century South America. You can't really hold yourself to be a proper South American country without at least having had one viscously murderous internal conflict in that time period." I also really liked the look of the brass Howell Torpedo (practically a work of art.) It's videos like this one that maintains Drachinifel's status as my all-time favorite RU-vidr. Keep up the GREAT WORK Drach!
For all the torpedoheads, go and visit Rijeka, Croatia. Whitehead owned company really transformed my hometown. It was a boom in all engineering senses of ways. At one point the best engineerings and craftsmen came to work and live in the Torpedo district. You can see the industry zone to this day, but it has mostly been converted to oil rafinery and tractor fabrication in the 20th century. I've played with the ingenious brass gyroscope head pieces and fuses while setting up a Maritime museum exhibition in 2015. The tolerances on those things are sick. Most parts were used in as cast state. Whitehead's mausoleum, Torpedo museum, Maritime museum and plenty 'private' property lawn displayed torpedoes you can see in Rijeka. My favorite... Torpedo launching 4 story house with an observatory, launching ports, both surface and submerged. Unfortunately, degraded to hell. It is a crime the local governing allowed its decay. On a side note, the history of patent trading and torpedo sales is really interesting. Japanese bought them before WW1, while USA did not believe in it. Oh how they changed their mind quickly!
In re Hunley... The hull was not thick enough to ameliorate the overpressure of the warhead. The crew was either killed or knocked out by the overpressure, and the Hunley then drifted away and sank.
Really interesting, parallel developments, industrial spies, incremental development and consolidation of several ideas around. You can see most of those things happening when new technologies start to flourish.
The neval museum at La Spezia has a full sized version of pretty much every iteration in this video. If you are anywhere close i suggest you visit. Its not a very large museum, but it will fill up 2 or 3 hours , maybe more if you know Italian and can read everything.
Possibly the one naval weapon that changed naval warfare more than any other, from the rise of the submarine to torpedo bombers putting an end to big-gun dominance.
@@burnstick1380Exactly, archers and catapults only go so far - and the Romans basically turned their ships into naval siege towers with gangplank and used their army training to board the ships. Guns really changed sea warfare, but sails and bad weather capable ships and so on also brought a lot of changes.
@@advorak8529 Yup but all in all I think Guns brought the biggest change. Maybe rockets / torpedoes are equal. Maybe we should differ between propulsion and offensive power, because steam powered ships where also true game changers.
Hi from Jacksonville, Florida Drac. Here we have the Union troop transport "Maple Leaf" which was struck by a Confederate "mine", sinking her with the loss of 100 hands.
Enjoyed this dive into the history and much overlooked world of torpedo's. As a suggestion could you do a bio of HMS Wilton. WWII hunter destroyer and her roil in operation Pedestal Many thanks for excellent Chanel. .
I finally realized why many smaller countries couldn't have modern ships like semi dreadnoughts and battleships was because u need such huge amount of infrastructure and industry to even make some of the components for a ship never mind armor and weapons. Its so incredible how much support and supporting experience and technology know how to make a war vessel. It's so impressive what America and Britain came up with during ww2 the battleships and cruisers were so incredible. Being able to build ships that big that just don't fall apart from the weight alone is amazing
I'm not even three minutes in and rolling on the floor cackling - I'd never before considered a ship being "seaworthy" to be possible without the hull being "watertight", but the Jesus of Lubeck altered my consciousness without needing the help of intoxication. Almost 40 minutes to go
I love your dry sense of humour ! And you got away without mentioning the name of the repair ship that I was fully expecting...... (asking if anybody could see torpedo boats ?) ! !🤣🤣
The skipper of the steam torpedo boat that sank the Albemarle, Lt William B Cushing was awarded the Medal of Honor for his feat. His brother, First Lt (Acting Major) Alonzo Cushing, was awarded the honor VERY posthumously as he refused orders to go to the rear after being grievously wounded and continued to command his battery, which ended up being the focal point of "Pickett's Charge" on the Third Day at Gettysburg.
Genuinely excellent, as always. Many thanks "...the various wars that erupted before World War Three..." Oops, I misheard for some reason. Can't imagine why.
Fun fact: my paternal grandfather worked with Robert Whitehead during his time at Kitson & Co. in Leeds prior to his development of the torpedo. Grandpa started working for Kitson & Co. in 1850 and retired in 1923.
I wonder how many people realize that “damn the torpedoes! Full speed ahead!” was spoken by somebody who probably had a thick southern accent (since Farragut was from Tennessee)🤔
