Chapter 401: Snorkel

Captain Prien's submarine was the first to arrive at Scapa Flow. As early as the early hours of the morning, he crossed the waterway and arrived here and lurked.

At that time, if he wanted to attack, all the warships in the harbor could be chosen by him, and of course he would firstly target the Ark Royal aircraft carrier.

Or, other aircraft carriers, as well as battleships, take a big challenge and launch four torpedoes at a time.

However, he didn't move. If he did, he would have disturbed the British here and asked them to raise their alerts, and the air raid this morning would not have been possible.

According to the plan, as long as one's own bombers start dropping bombs, the U-47 submarine can act.

In fact, he did the same, sitting in the sinking water and keeping silent. In the early morning, when he heard the first explosion on the water, the officers and soldiers in the entire submarine immediately acted.

Start the engine and go up to periscope depth! The sailors prepared quickly.

The submarine with a huge body of more than 800 tons is slowly floating. The two AEG GU 460/8-276 electric motors at the tail burst out with a maximum horsepower of 750 horsepower. The maximum speed is 296 rpm.

At this time, there is no need to worry about the other party's anti-submarine system. After all, the other party has already been bombed, and it is too late to deal with the bomber overhead. How can you manage the underwater situation? The sound of the explosion will cover the sound of the submarine. live.

Now, they have to act fast, take a seat, and prepare to attack!

And in the bow torpedo bay, the sailors are ready, just waiting for the fierce attack to begin!

Operating a submarine is not as easy as driving a car. Although they have already operated at the most proficient speed, it took about three minutes for the submarine to be leveled at a depth of ten meters underwater. Then, the submarine On the bridge of the ship, the periscope stretched out.

Just as the periscope was extended, a thicker tube was slowly rising on the side of the submarine's bridge.

This tube, which is much thicker than the periscope, is placed vertically on the submarine hull when not in use.

Now, the hydraulic device on the side makes the thick tube stand upright, the root turns, and the automatic locking pin fixes the tube to the rear of the podium enclosure.

On submarines, the use of periscopes has a long history. It can be said that since the submarines entered the naval sequence, the optical equipment of periscopes has been equipped.

However, this thicker tube is now classified. For submarines, it is equipment that greatly increases the combat capability of submarines. Its scientific name is called submarine snorkel.

Submarines use diesel engines to sail on the water and charge their own batteries at the same time, while underwater, they can only use batteries.

Battery power is precious, for example, if you're sailing at top speed, you won't last even an hour.

Therefore, submarines in this era spend most of their time sailing on water, and only dive underwater when they need to attack.

However, navigation on the surface is very dangerous, and the ubiquitous anti-submarine aircraft is the biggest threat to submarines. In this way, it is quite urgent to allow submarines to navigate underwater and use diesel engines.

This device is the vent tube.

Diesel engines can't sail underwater because they need to suck in air and expel exhaust, and now, this pipe is here to do the job.

The inside of the tube is divided into two halves, one for intake and the other for exhaust.

As long as the pipe can go to the outside, it can be exchanged with the outside air, so that although the submarine has not yet surfaced, the diesel engine at the rear can be started!

For the captain of the submarine, keeping his battery fully charged at all times is what he hopes most, and only at that time can he be most confident.

Since only a small snorkel is exposed, it is also difficult to be found by surface ships.

There is a floating mechanism on the top of the intake pipe, which is similar to the floating ball in the toilet flush toilet.

When the mast is in the water, the floating mechanism will automatically close and block the intake pipe, so that the seawater from the outside will not enter the submarine through the intake pipe. When the mast is out of the water, the floating mechanism can be opened by itself, so that the air intake pipe is communicated with the outside world.

Now, with the continuous rotation of the pipe, soon, when it is rotated to the vertical state, the top has been exposed, the ventilation pipe is automatically opened, and the seawater remaining in the intake pipe will flow into the auxiliary ballast water tank on the boat .

"Start the diesel engine," Captain Prien shouted, staring at the periscope in front of him, almost synchronously. After the snorkel went out, the periscope also went out.

At the back, two 1,400-horsepower diesel engines from MAN made a low sound, which was quite familiar to submariners.

After the diesel engine is started, the exhaust pressure blows the seawater out of the exhaust pipe. A faint blue smoke appeared on the sea.

Historically, Germany experimented with this device in 1943 and installed it on a submarine produced in 1944. In fact, this technology appeared very early.

For example, as early as 1938, the Dutch Navy conducted a series of experiments on submarines sailing at periscope depths by using a single-pipe ventilation system to achieve underwater diesel propulsion, allowing submarines to have almost theoretically unlimited underwater range.

It is a pity that the German Navy did not notice the importance of this invention at first. In their eyes, this device is just a means of circulating air for submarines.

And now, the technology of this snorkel was proposed by Cyric at a meeting of naval equipment. After that, after the development of experts, it has matured and become a killer of the German Navy submarine force.

The diesels in the rear were rumbling, and up front, the atmosphere was tense, for the submariners, their attack was about to begin.

After raising the periscope, Captain Prien immediately began to observe the sea surface. At this time, the warships were on fire, and thick smoke was billowing everywhere. There was almost no valuable target on the sea.

Leave me something! Captain Priyan was extremely depressed.

After turning around, Captain Prien was still overjoyed: "Left full rudder, ready to attack!"

On the sea, a few kilometers away from the port, there is still a big guy. Although the angle is a problem, Prien can't distinguish the specific model and ship name of the other party, but it is definitely a large battleship!

This battleship is smoking black smoke, but it hasn't sunk yet, let's just send it to hell!

Full left rudder! The tail of the submarine churned the current, it belonged to the hunt of the submarine U-47, no, the slaughter officially began!