The Origins of the Torpedo - That which lurks beneath...

Pinned post for Q&A :)

"Colanderization of the enemy" might be my new favorite Drach-ism

Torpedoes? But if there are torpedoes, there will be torpedo boats! [Kamchatka intensifies]

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!

Drach: uploads video Ghost of Kamchatka : sees title and shakes in fear

That dig at the Hunley's kill rate is even worse when you consider that the designer, Hunley, was also lost in the third sinking.

Especially Angry Raft. 💯 Percent accurate description of monitors...😂😂😂😂

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.

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

A pet lama being peddled to shore. This trivia fact will stay with me forever 😂

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.

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.

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'm still always amused that a modern heavy cruiser like the Blucher was sunk by torpedoes older than her crews grandparents

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.

0:51 Aw no, and here I was hopeful the channel scope had expanded to 'throwing rocks at your enemy's log raft circa 4000 BCE ' 😆

love me some long range hole poking devices

31:42 I want to know more about the history of naval llamas.

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

Wait, was that THE Rozhestvenskiy? Foil of the Kamchatka? Bane of Shipboard Beast and Fowl? Mighty Enemy of all binoculars Rozhestvenskiy??