Another Silly Submarine Thread

Hey dudes,

so I was prepping for my usual sunday nightmare series last night (H.P. Lovecraft and Nicorette gum just before bed), and had an interesting thought regarding the engineering problem in the hobby surrounding submarines.

With the advent of digital milling/3d printing, and the rest of that digital tomfoolery, I was thinking that perhaps the solution to the problems of low mass and space could be addressed using a combination of these devices with a mentality similar to that behind the Vac-U-Boats.

This is just an abstract though experiment. I'm not inclined to build a combat-ready sub in the first place, but since I'm just hanging out making unemployed noises in my cabin until Forestry season starts and more boat parts arrive for my Texas, it can't hurt to spend time thinking about the problem.

So what I was thinking on the sub topic is to use a snap-together-like-legos design for the ribs and keel, in which the motors, ballast tank system, servos, etc. were mounted to a wide keel which could be cast in a mould with a similar snap-on bow and stern plate.

The ribs could be prototyped using a 3D printer and used to make moulds (you'll see why the mould would be needed in a moment)

The deck system could be similarly prototyped and cast, in which the subdeck is "lego snapped on" to the top of the pertinent ribs. Something like an Avenger Cannon could be designed specifically for the submarine application, possibly with the magazine integral to the keel system, some of the gun fittings integral to the deck, or both.

I dunno, I keep hearing about people casting/printing guns, so it's a possibility I guess? you guys are the experts, shoot it down if the idea is a flying washing machine.

Back to the structure: So the Keel and top deck system would be the only parts of the boat that will be built to endure punishment. the ribs could be made strong enough to withstand something like a glancing bb impact, a ram, etc. but light and small enough to facilitate maximum internal space. their only purpose is to retain hull form and some semblance of watertight integrity. Since even a single BB hit may be a sink for a sub, there's no point in building her ribs tough enough for an assault role.

So. these little buggers are strategically useless, have glass jaws, and are naturally suited by design to people who are A: super-clever, B: highly experienced, C: are naturally inclined to being the battlefield clown who delights in playing pranks on his or her opponents, and D: has a ton of time on their hands.

With that supposition, a sub captain would be suited to doing a modular replacement regime in the event of a catastrophic rib failure, and the "snap-in Lego" ribs would allow them to cut out a section of the hull, replace the offending rib by pulling the remnants out and snapping a new one in place followed by a re-skin.

In this way, even if one of these fragile glass-jawed little jokers got pummeled by a major combatant, ground into the bottom, etc. it could be rebuilt using the keel and deck components with an entirely new suite of bow and stern plates, as well as ribs. with comparatively little effort. And with moulds available for the expendable structural components, you could crank out enough parts to keep up with the combat demands. similarly, the moulds could be manufactured and sold as a kit of some sort.

If such a thing were to occur, it might be possible to expand the number of boats in the hobby, and the classes available for building due to reduced mass and increased versatility.

It'd be like Vac-U-Boat Fletchers/Gearings, but for madmen!

Alright, guys, shoot some holes in the idea and let's see what comes out on the other side.

 

I am still cooking up something. I have it about 85% worked out. All the major hurdles are overcome in my head. I just need to get a few other things in order first. Mine will be really simple, made from a glass hull, and in 1/96th scale.

 

return on investment is very low. Frank has an I-400 with working gun, so we know it can be done. Not saying don't do it, but be prepared to be underwhelmed.

 

Franks I-400 hit someone once with his spurt gun, very little damage done, no one has hit the sub, except for the Alligator at the last Florida battle, you could see the claw marks on the hull side of the balsa where the gator swiped at it.

 

That pic won the best battle pic on this site. A white pre-dred that let him take the shot for the camera.

 

Keep in mind that water pressure increases with depth and a balsa wood skin can only take so much of that!

 

After the gator hit him, he went to the bottom, thought it got sunk. But it was able to pump itself out, pond depth was 7 ft, and the skin held up to the pressure. But you could see the outlines of the ribs after it came back up.

 

Hey Lou, yeah no worries I'm not planning to make a foray into a sub. It's a thought experiment since fielding a sub in the hobby seems to be such a challenge. Some people put model boats into bottles, I like thinking about how to fix engineering problems.

Though I may start diving into some kind of a CAD program soon and it'd be a good problem to use as a way to figure out how CAD works. Speaking of which, does anybody have a good suggestion as to which program to use?

Warspite, I think you could, if balanced and ballasted properly, set the tanks to a max depth of like three feet or so. 1:1 scale subs can sit on thermoclines and such using the known pressure at the depth with which they wish to remain. It'd probably be +/- 10% at best with temperature and dissolved mineral content adding the uncertainty.

Sounds like I'll have to look up those pictures of the gator-mauling!

 

Fusion 360. Free, full blown CAD program.

 

That's rad, thanks! Also, I just dried up some sourdough start, you still want it?

 

X2... I really like it.

 

cool, looking at downloading soon. Does it work offline? I've no internet at my cabin

 

Yes, just it doesn't automatically update and doesn't connect to the cloud. Otherwise it works fine.

 

Excellent. So, do you still want sourdough starter? I can send a bag of it down in a letter, but be advised, it's going to be white chunks of dried flour in a small ziploc bag, and look as weird/suspicious as that sounds.

 

I'll ask my mom. She's the one that would be interested.

 

Cool. I can email her the instructions and such that I've developed too.

 

Mmmmmmm......... sourdough pancakes....... Mmmmmmmmmmm.



Drooling.............










Drooling continues.............









Ok Im done lol.

 

lol that's every morning for me. had a sourdough pizza last night.

 

My 2002-2003 experiment with a Battlers Connection I-400 hull (long OOP) built to successfully static dive, resurface and fire a spurt gun using a 20gm CO2 cartridge was abandoned due to instability on the surface. In 2009 two other NABS members and I designed an I-400 hull with an even deeper hull which would allow ballast to be placed 3/4" further below the surface than in the BC hull. One of the guys being a real life RCN submariner, we were certain the new hull would be stable on the surface. I made the molds, sold several hull and superstructure kits and heard some successful subs were built. Unfortunately with the hobby dead in Nova Scotia since 2010 and the Frank Pitelli sub challenge successfully met there's been no incentive for me to build another I-400. It's a very challenging project with little practical use if successful. You're much better off building a conventional RC combat model.

I developed a new set of sub construction and battling rules which was posted on the Yahoo IRCWCC group and this site years ago but elicited little if any comment or discussion. The concept was to build sub hulls that were only penetrable in 'saddle'-type ballast tanks to port and starboard, the rest of the hull being 'windowless' fiberglass so it would not crush if sunk in water 15' deep. The ballast tanks were about 5" long and skinned with balsa. Penetrating one tank would at least disable the sub, causing it to capsize toward the damaged side and become unmanueverable. A hit high enough on one tank would probably sink the sub, and penetration of both ballast tanks would guarantee a sink.

I sold the I-400 hull and superstructure molds to Strike Models several years ago but never saw the I-400 advertised. I wonder what will become of those molds and the many others I sold to Strike. The Mogrets made a valiant effort and the closing of Strike has been a great loss to the hobby.

 

Neat. Again, not planning to build a sub. this is just a thought experiment and discussion.

Your ballast tank idea sounds pretty workable. What do you think about the idea of stripping down the weight on the sub to the bare bones concept I mentioned? it would seem that building an ultralight frame would allow you to better distribute the mass and make the boat more stable, and making the ribs easily swapped would negate any serious damage incurred due to the light building.

Tactically, they're goofy almost useless little boats, but if a kit were made to be easily build at low cost, I think they might shine a bit once you can get a proper wolfpack of them together