USS Nautilus SSN 571

**drschmidt** · 11-10-2020, 01:59 AM

Surfacing of the Nautilus....bow planes not horizontal:

**feet wet** · 11-10-2020, 09:19 AM

Beautiful! That picture is worth a thousand speculations! Angled they were.
Thank you all!

**PaulC** · 11-10-2020, 10:50 PM

Originally posted by drschmidt View Post

Surfacing of the Nautilus....bow planes not horizontal:

Now that is very interesting.

**feet wet** · 11-20-2020, 01:14 PM

drschimdt,
If I may, what did you use for original drawings for you Nautilus builds?
Thanks
Jonathan

**tom dougherty** · 11-21-2020, 11:28 AM

I am happy and relieved to see this thread. When I built a resin model of the Nautilus years from Combat Subs, I had the planes parrallel to the surface. When the Blue Ridge kit came out, they had modelers placing the planes at that 30 degree anhedral. It...just...looks...wrong. They used the posted photo as an argument, and Inpointed out the cable holding the bow planes. Blue Ridge Models still went ahead with the instructions having them at that odd angle. A lot of, to my eye, odd looking models at shows.

As to the vibration problem. That was caused by water flowing past the forward ballast tank flood ports at speeds not encountered before. At speed, there was a resonant oscillation of the air in the forward tanks with the high speed water flow over the ballast tank flood ports on the lower hull. At high speed, this caused severe oscillations and ripped ring stiffeners away from the hull, tore ballast tank air lines and split some of the ballast tanks. I seem to remember that the solution was to add louver covers over the ballast tank flood openings on the bottom of the hull. Not sure if Inam remembering that correctly.

**feet wet** · 11-21-2020, 01:34 PM

Tom,
I believe you are correct. I seem to remember John Craven discussing that in his book. As for her planes, her hull geometry always puzzled me. Unless the plane shaft extended outboard of the hull a significant amount, and it does not appear to do so in photographs, then the trailing end of the planes would strike the hull at a relatively shallow rise command. Deployed at an angle such that the planes deployed were 90 degrees to the casing, there is not conflict because the planes pivot 90 perpendicular to the casing. I think. At least that is what I am sticking with......

**feet wet** · 11-22-2020, 12:06 PM

Another Nautilus question: Did Nautilus ever carry wood decking on a portion of her casing? Or was it always bare steel? I can locate photos showing the latter, but not the former.
Many Thanks
Jonathan

**X Bubblehead** · 11-23-2020, 05:25 PM

Not sure what you mean by "casing" but if you're referring to the superstructure, she's always had a teak deck, just like the Seawolf. A recent picture and a shot from '55. The interior of the superstructure is painted white.

CCC

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**feet wet** · 11-23-2020, 06:24 PM

Many Thanks X Bubblehead. I had not seen those pictures and all of the ones I had seen showed a steel deck, although I had always thought she had wood. Still getting educated, I am.

**X Bubblehead** · 11-23-2020, 07:40 PM

Here's a cross-section of the decking, showing the heavy coating of black and white non-skid applied to the upper and interior surfaces - part of my Seawolf memorabilia collection I'll donate to the Submarine Force museum at some point, along with a pressure hull section.

CCC

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