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PT Boats of WWII
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PT Boats - General
Post a reply to: Hickman Sea Sled
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[StartQuote]
Here's the only photo I could locate showing C378 on trials in 1918. It's from a Motorrboating magazine advertisement (sorry about the Moire marks - couldn't make them go away without totally destroying the image). The Sea Sled is up on plane at high speed. Notice the lack of bow spray. It's also a bit lower in the stern most probably due to the heavy bronze engines. If you look at photos of the 55 foot aircraft launching version (which had lighter weight aluminum engines), the high speed profile is almost flat, which is also the profile you'll see on racing sea sleds). This flat profile is important since as the angle increases, the tendency for the boat to ride rougher increases. The Admiralty, who bought some of the smaller all wood Sea Sleds during WW1, complained about them. From what I can find out, the Royal Navy was freaked out about the way the boats sat idle in the water so they loaded them heavily in the stern to raise the bow. This messed severely with surface piercing props performance and increased the pounding forces by not allowing the sled to slice through the water. This type of tinkering seems to be a recurring theme when issues came up concerning the sled. The sled was quite the machine, but it was a total Hickman package: hull design, weight distribution, surface props, side rudders, and later beveled chine. Hickman used each element of the design to support the others, but when the government insisted on changes that greatly affected either one component or the overall design, bad things happened. These boats had tremendous weight carrying capability, and it was said that weight improved it's rough sea performance, but the weight had to be properly distributed for the best performance. ....and back to the photo, the helm of C378 is forward of the engine housing with what looks like a metal hand rail running from port to starboard just behind the helmsman. The search light is on the forward deck and it does not look like there is adequate room for a 3 pounder Hotchkiss. Usually if a boat is armed, the search light is aft of the gun and mounted higher. You can just make out an old style anchor on the starboard foredeck and the two men aft look to be standing in a cockpit just aft of the engine house. Also, no apparent ventilators, which suggest an engine compartment with large folding hatch covers to allow complete access to the engines. This is a common design on his civilian versions of the sea sled. The version I decided to build is more based almost entirely on Hickman's original 1914 proposal (complete with ventilators and gun mount), but with some acknowledgement of information I obtained from the photograph. The whole bow launched torpedo and information stating C378 designed specifically for the MkVIII torpedo is a head scratcher for me. Due to the setup, the MkVIII would need to be loaded fins first, so probably it was envisioned that these boats would be on deck of the mother ship so the torpedoes could be loaded using the standard torpedo wheel carts used on the old Battleships and Cruisers. The breach mechanism and firing of the torpedoes is also a puzzle. Maybe there was a deep cockpit area forward of the helm with the torpedo man standing on this lower deck and just able to look over foredeck to see the target. Another shipmate would operate the search light. Some of the 1914 information suggests this setup for the non-gun version of the boat. Probably a better torpedo setup would have been the one used by the WW1 MAS boats with two smaller 18 torpedoes launched from the sides amidships. Probably the increased stability of the sea sled would have also worked well for the boat davit torpedo rack that Melville came up with in 1941. Just some thoughts. I love this stuff!!! [EndQuote]
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