Submarine Yacht project

yacht submarine cruising speed testing adequate

- i am sure that my test site is anything else than calm, on contrary it reflects a surprisingly wide range of conditions from tropic in summer to ice in winter, storms that make the roof of a -well built- house fly away and crack trees like a match - i get this opinion especially since i know first hand the conditions in open pacific ocean from my activities in malpelo expeditions and open boat tours in the caribbean in tropical storms. I agree to what Bobby Schenk (german sailing legend) is saying about weather: - i have sailed 3 times around the world lived for years in polynesia got trapped by a cyclone in the pacific - but i assure you that some of the worst weather conditions i experienced in my life was on alpine lakes... this is due to the fact that mountains around a lake create pressure and temperature differences you NEVER see on open sea where weather develops relatively slowly and maintains steady.
Cheers Wil

 

hull speed of a submarine yacht

hull speed of a submarine yacht
the speed of a displacement yacht is given by its lenght/widh ratio there are lots of formulas about that - some simple some complicated which basically all lead to a graph energy versus speed that starts horizontally and then goes vertically. Which basically means that a displacement hull needs very little energy to move at a few knots and than needs a lot of energy to go ANY faster and finally comes to a point where all energy input converts completely to turbulence and waves and not speed. Where this point is depends basically on length of the hull. This is why old shipbuilders said "length runs".
If you see a heavy fishing boat passing by what you will see is waves - waves is energy - energy that the engine has to produce and that is not useful for speed. When you see a submerged sub passing by you see NO waves so a sub spares this wave resistance. This is why subs use their propulsion energy more efficient than surface ships. So the answer how fast a sub can be is simply it can go to speeds given by displacement hull formula AND it can do it more energy efficient - with less energy input. So if you ask yourself how fast would a 12m submarine go ask the captain of a 12m heavy fishing boat how fast he can go - ask for his engine power. Take for granted that a sub with the same length and the same engine will come to same speed - just it may do it at half throttle - if well designed and blimp shaped. This is the physics behind the fact that nature has eliminated the concept of long distance surface swimming during evolution - no long distance surface swimming animal exists because this is not energy efficient. Even whales that need surface for breathing (because they started as a surface animal similar to a otter -ambulocetus-) swim now below surface - why ? because they cruise up to 12,000 miles each year and nature shapes all animals to be energy efficient. Here we are - if you are looking for a model for a energy efficient ocean crossing submarine yacht take this. A 200 ton whale with a length of 30m (cut some of the tail section for hydrodynamic efficient length - take some 25m) can come up to a speed of 30 knots and has been measured at those speeds. Biologists and Physiologists estimate its maximum power output at 400 horsepower. Whales are mammals so their energy physiology is similar to other mammals. Which means there is a big gap between the energy output you can get from the organism in a emergency situation for a few minutes of fast swim and the energy output you can get 24 hours a day. The most educated guess on that is a factor 10 you can run very fast for 1 minute but if you wander 24 hours a day you have to do it at a slower rithm. This means what you have on a whale tail 24 hours a day during wandering is maybe 40 horsepower possibly less. If you take into account that whales do not feed which means do not re-fuel 6-8 months during wandering - how is this possible ? - only if they use VERY VERY little energy for swimming over VERY VERY long distances. What is the efficient speed range ? Smaller whales cruise at some 3 knots bigger whales at up to 6 knots. Taking a stream speed of 3 knots in your favor as ben franklin did in its 30 day Golf Stream drift dive - you could have a whale economic ocean crossing at 9knots over ground in a submarine yacht - not bad ! Having this in mind i took my prototype concrete submarine to water back in 1996 it was whale shaped had 20 tons like a small whale and my most important question was not top speed with a big engine - this is quite clear anyhow - my question was the limbo - how low can you go... so what i did first was installing a ridiculously small electric engine of 200W into the sub and pushed the switch. - What happened? First nothing then after a couple of seconds the hull took up speed and kept taking up speed until it reached a speed of what would be in the range of a whale efficient cruising speed - some 3 knots. So i never came to the point to install the big combustion engine i had in mind in first place - it was not necessary. I later put a small generator in to reload the small battery pack and extend the range - that was all. In all my submarine yachting years i never saw a situation i would have had a need for a bigger engine. This ridiculously small engine pushed me trough storms had no problem to get nose into the wind... So i am well aware what engine size is recommended for surface yachts - BUT - based on my own experience i would be concerned that such a engine would have a short life in a yacht submarine yacht because it has to run all the time in under load during cruising . I also have no problem if somebody wants a 400hp engine in a 200 ton submarine yacht to run all the time at whale emergency speed of 30 knots - you could water ski behind it...
My personal preference is doing it like those gentle giants - cruise oceans energy efficient at moderate speed.

carstens euronaut is designed as a saturation and technical diving base for documentation and heavy salvatage in carstens home area - big compressors, big electrical equipment needs - his engine reflects that. Euronaut is built to work as diver host not optimized as economic cruising yacht... so very different cases very different needs very different solutions...do not compare...

Cheers Wil

 

Wil> but in terms of precise manevours I'd fit the c-sub with a couple of bow thursters..

In any case my top list of efficient/luxury cruisng is as follows:

1. Big c-sub, with deploarable side inflatable hulls and large bimini/tent for giant surface camping (see my pictures page #5)
2. Big catamaran 40-60' Wharram or Duflex kit based (but expensive and laborious 4000-8000hours)
3. Small 7-8m (cabins in hulls) trailable catamaran upto 750kg, prefferably upto 500kg
4. Small 7-8m inflatable catamaran with sail kit aka take your cat on the plane/train/bus/car/bike with cargotrailer
5. Any sailing yacht of classical design

 

yacht submarine hull connectors

connectors hull

when it comes to anchor things in a concrete hull you should look to concrete building sites. You can do with a concrete hull more or less what you can do with a structural column in a building. Drill a hole in of about 10cm depth put water in to get the drilling dust out then fill in fixation cement and finally a piece of steel rebar. Wait a week or two - now you have a anchor point in steel. If you put a hydraulic cylinder on that anchor and pull with several tons of force you will find that it will not break out - it will hold to a point where you get the steel extruded but it still stays anchored in the concrete. So you can get steel anchors in a concrete piece as easy or even easier than in a steel hull and you can get it AFTER building the hull whenever the need appears. On that kind of steel anchors you can solder a steel tank with several tons and it will hold. So you can perform a barren hull and make the anchor points for the interior LATER. But be always aware that your hull is a structural piece - so do not do things you would not do in a structural column in a building - hammer out a big piece to put the family safe in - for example. If you put a reasonable number of small holes for steel anchors in it will be no problem. In glass fiber, carbon fiber, ferro cement yachts one of the mayor issues is that you MUST integrate everything into the form as you can not drill holes in and create fixation points LATER in a reasonable and technical correct way. In a thick walled concrete piece you can. Yust go to a building site and see steel fittings, wood panels, aluminmum covers get fixed to structural columns and thick concrete pieces all the time - no technical problem at all. Integrate big things like a steel flange for a diver chamber into the form but there is no need to plan every single anchor point for your interior panels - even a a tow point to hold a couple of tons can be made later. It is not necessary to solder a anchor to the rebar net as long as you anchor it sufficiently deep into the concrete - below 3cm break out is impossible.

Forget those complicated aproaches of steel frame sticking out...
Cheers Will

 

A sailing submarine is the faster displacement hull sailboat,

...,so one adds a keel with a lead ballast and a snorkel/mast, and here he goes! Such a craft can be faster than a monohull displacement sail boat of the same length...

 

submarine yachting makes sense and is affordable

Why submarine yachting makes sense


* save harbor beneath the waves
* no hurricane season wandering
* marina and harbor free operation
* closed burglar and pirate safe
* quiet living space at sea
* drift dive operation
* economic cruising
* small engine
* enormous range
* lower slip and maintainance cost
* lower hull building and engine cost


save harbor beneath the waves

A surface yacht, needs to be designed to have the means to withstand adverse weather conditions or to reach a safe harbor before such conditions come up.

For a submarine yacht a save harbor is always near - just a few meters below. This has a mayor impact in the way how you operate a submarine yacht vs a surface yacht and in its cost o operation. First of all your tour plan is not limited by weather forecast and by harbors available along your route.

no hurricane season wandering

A submarine yacht as suggested at (www.concretesubmarine.com) exposes almost no surface of its hull to weather except a small sail (tower). So you can get the nose into the wind with a very small engine under any condition. On anchor place this means that the bow area is not lifted in any wave as it is the case in a surface ship which tends to bring tremendous forces to the anchor rig, which is the cause of anchor break out in severe conditions. A submarine yacht as my tested prototype brings very little force to the anchor rig - even in storm conditions.

For surface yacht you need to find a hurricane save place during hurricane season so yacht owners frequently move their ships. A submarine yacht you can be left on anchor place in a open bay during that time - no weather condition will damage or affect it - this is a mayor cost benefit.


marina and harbor free operation

A surface yacht must stay in marinas due to its vulnerability to weather - a submarine yacht allows true marina free operation any place is ok to stay during your trip you can have a nice meal and a fine night sleep in open sea.

closed burglar and pirate safe

A burglar can break into a surface yacht of any kind using a light hand tool - this is not the case for a submarine yacht. A hatch can be made with security features of a bank safe - break in with tools you can deploy on an anchor place is impossible. A act of piracy is also impossible a pirate can get on deck - but never into the hull.

quiet living space at sea

The main reason why yachts stay a lot in marinas and very little time at sea is wave action. A submarine yacht can go to snorkel depth and is perfectly quiet in a minute without relaying on breakwaters. You can have a nice meal and go to sleep with no ship movement and security concern at all. Sub surface living space is the only quiet and safe living space available at open sea.

drift dive operation

In July 1996 Ben Franklin a 130 ton research submarine made a drift dive of 30 days over a distance of 2700km in Golf Stream. This dive compared with a submarine balloon trip was performed without any engine use. Submarines that have a non-compressible buoyancy regulation can stay stable at certain depth to do that kind of voyage.

economic cruising

No long distance surface swimming animal exists because this is not energy efficient. Even whales that need surface for breathing (because they started as a surface animal similar to a nutria -ambulocetus-) swim now below surface - why ? because they cruise up to 12,000 miles each year and nature shapes all animals to be energy efficient. Here we are - if you are looking for a model for a energy efficient ocean crossing submarine yacht take this. A 200 ton whale with a length of 30m (cut some of the tail section for hydrodynamic efficient length - take some 25m) can come up to a speed of 30 knots and has been measured at those speeds. Biologists and Physiologists estimate its maximum power output at 400 horsepower. Whales are mammals so their energy physiology is similar to other mammals. Which means there is a big gap between the energy output you can get from the organism in a emergency situation for a few minutes of fast swim and the energy output you can get 24 hours a day. The most educated guess on that is a factor 10 you can run very fast for 1 minute but if you wander 24 hours a day you have to do it at a slower rithm. This means what you have on a whale tail 24 hours a day during wandering is maybe 40 horsepower possibly less. If you take into account that whales do not feed which means do not re-fuel 6-8 months during wandering - how is this possible ? - only if they use VERY VERY little energy for swimming over VERY VERY long distances. What is the efficient speed range ? Smaller whales cruise at some 3 knots bigger whales at up to 6 knots. Taking a stream speed of 3 knots in your favor as ben franklin did in its 30 day Golf Stream drift dive - you could have a whale economic ocean crossing at 9knots over ground in a submarine yacht - not bad ! Having this in mind i took my prototype concrete submarine to water back in 1996 it was whale shaped had 20 tons like a small whale and my most important question was not top speed with a big engine - this is quite clear anyhow - my question was the limbo - how low can you go... so what i did first was installing a ridiculously small electric engine of 200W into the sub and pushed the switch. - What happened? First nothing then after a couple of seconds the hull took up speed and kept taking up speed until it reached a speed of what would be in the range of a whale efficient cruising speed - some 3 knots. So i never came to the point to install the big combustion engine i had in mind in first place - it was not necessary. I later put a small generator in to reload the small battery pack and extend the range - that was all. In all my submarine yachting years i never saw a situation i would have had a need for a bigger engine. This ridiculously small engine pushed me trough storms had no problem to get nose into the wind... So i am well aware what engine size is recommended for surface yachts - BUT - based on my own experience i would be concerned that such a engine would have a short life in a yacht submarine yacht because it has to run all the time in under load during cruising . I also have no problem if somebody wants a 400hp engine in a 200 ton submarine yacht to run all the time at whale emergency speed of 30 knots - you could water ski behind it...
My personal preference is doing it like those gentle giants - cruise oceans energy efficient at moderate speed.

small engine

So the recommendation for a engine in a submarine yacht must be between 2HP/ ton which is emergency power for a blue whale. This is already considerably less than you would have in a surface yacht but you should be aware that in a surface yacht you need a engine surplus to fight against a storm that could smash you against a reef. For a submarine yacht you could get away with a even smaller engine that would take you just to efficient cruising speed which is the range of 0.2 HP / ton of displacement. You may have a engine that is 5-10 times smaller than a similar sized surface yacht which means a mayor reducction in building and maintainance cost.

enormous range

In a yacht submarine you have about half of the displacement as ballast weight. If you push it to the extreme you could replace all your ballast with diesel tanks. This would give you a tank reserve of 100.000 liter in a 200 ton submarine yacht. Which can take you 10.000 cruising hours at 3 miles/hour - So without taking the possible tank volume to the limits - you can have a tank size for oceancrossings in a submarine yacht.

lower slip and maintainance cost

The concrete submarine hulls of our concepts are built according to the same rules that apply to submarine tunnels and bridge foundations - in the same way the only surface that is exposed to saltwater environment is a rounded concrete surface - therefore the maintainance needed is similar to a bridge foundation or tunnel - it stays in water for liftime - no dry dock, no painting, no sandblasting, - this is a mayor maintainance cost reduction compared to a normal yacht.


lower hull building and engine cost

The hull building cost of our concrete hulls is less than 1/3 of building a comparable steel hull. The engine size you will build in is less than half of the horsepower you would have on a surface yacht of similar size. This is a mayor building cost reduction compared to a surface yacht.


see more: http://concretesubmarine.com


sail handling is not the strong point of a submarine yacht as you can not place a mast on deck and have no space for sail handling - also form stability is a critical point in sail area you can pack on a boat - and a submarine has almost no form stability - so if sailing it is limited to auxilary sail on a snorkel or to flying sails type kite surfing. Not very suitable solutions for fast regatta solutions... there are many reasons to go for a submarine yacht - fast regatta sailing is not among them...

Cheers Wil

 

Concrete submarine discussion

There is a discussion about concrete submarines going on at http://www.boatdesign.net/forums/boat-design/concrete-submarine-24361.html

Cheers,

Wil

 

Smugglers vessels, ultimate hideaway but a cruising submarine you’re kidding .............surely.

Surface vessels will always be faster more efficient, safer and more serviceable

Lots of very well trained professional submariners have been lost in small submarines they are inherently dangerous vehicles.

The sub will need just as regular antifouling as any surface vessel.

People do go nuts in small confined spaces very quickly, they want to see the sky the sun and feel the wind and breath fresh air.

Weather can both aid and hinder a passage similarly for currents. Currents will be the real bugbear for the submerged craft, a 2 knot current on the nose is going to make for a very slow passage in you are submerged in it.

Wave orbital action can be deep in heavy weather orbital waves set up lower submerged orbital currents these can propagate surprisingly deep in sustained heavy weather. Even I think to 300 ft before the sub could trim properly because it was being rolled around this was in a typhoon after a few days. Standard oceanography says that the wave orbital effect is significant to a depth of one half the wavelength below the average surface height. That means you need to go mighty deep to escape an angry sea, at the same time you cannot surface or you will be thrown around being so tender as to sustain damage to people and equipment- catch 22 if anything goes wrong.

On the surface it will be very tender and a propensity to roll deeply. this will not be a comfortable surface vessel in other than smooth water. No safe decks or cockpit make submersibles very poor and unsafe surface platforms at sea and deadly on deck in heavy weather.

Risk of collision is high, risk of entanglement is higher, rescue is unlikely for a submersible, high risk of collision when submerging and surfacing particularly when surfacing, even US military subs hit yachts and fishing boats when surfacing.

A common loss has been the failure of ballast blowing equipment as the sub dives ironically it must lighten itself, if it can’t it dives rapidly.

Coastal cruising
Sitting on the bottom with what water overhead? If you have a snorkel up then presumably you can be hit by a ship or deep keeled racing yachts bulb keel ( imagine 8 tons of bulbed keel at 25 knots ). If you havn’t a snorkel up then it’s the odors and the stale air.

Then there’s the grim reality of humans in a small space that gets lost in the fantasy world of Jules Verne.

Even if you like being entombed consider Privacy, Fresh air, Rapid removal of odors. Human flatulence alone could turn the experience into a nightmare, the head tends to dominate a small surface boat and unless well ventilated then there’s the cooking smells body odour dirty socks and even vomit before you escape the rough weather……. and your supposed escape is to submerge to peace and tranquility?
Novelty might overcome claustrophobia for a while but for cruising you’d very quickly swap for a surface craft. It's also much colder below the surface which begs the question about heating.

Also in reality you need some very sophisticated and expensive equipment to be safe sane and sensible with a cruising submarine. Safety equipment, backup systems self releasing thethered epirb bouys , and the electronics package to 'see' and avoid all the obstacles.

I think you are much better marketing this as a specialist platform, forget the cruising it will be a disaster. You also need a number of equalizing escape hatches on different sides/ends of the vessel that can take a large man and his scuba gear.

As for engineering your website is a crackup, I must admit I laughed to see the whole analysis based on the assumption of a guess of the strength of a caisson that you have observed has not collapsed.
Given what you are achieving with such little engineering think what you could do with some decent analysis.

Couldn’t you do this in a FEA package ?

 

Here is a little video i found of a crude sub.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7VKF9sFBAo&feature=related

 

surface vessels more efficient?

No - on contrary locomotion below surface is far more efficient than on surface.
This is the reason why no long distance surface swimming animal is existing.
Even whales (that need surface to breath) swim below surface - Studies estimate that for a whale the difference between surface swimming and submerged swimming is about factor 5 - see more at:

http://imulead.com/tolimared/concretesubmarine/anuncios/ay/

Cheers,

Wil
concretesubmarine.com

 

lots of death in small submarines

No - modern civilian small subs have a excellent safety record. - indeed they are the vehicles with the best ever seen safety record ...

Cheers,

Wil

 

antifouling maintainance

Yes, to keep a submerged surface free of marine life you need the same antifouling no matter if it is a boat or a submarine.

But maintainance does not only mean barnacles - a steel hull needs sandblasting and recoating on a regular basis to conserve the steel - so if you have a steel hull - scrap off barnacles and leave the ship in water for several decades will not work. For a concrete hull it does work.

Cheers,
Wil

 

submarine confined spaces sun

Ben Franklin Drift dive was a testing out what is possible. Ben Franklin had 130 tons, a 4 man crew and did a month without ANY surfacing. ( Ian´s boat has 200 tons)

But months submerged is not my favorite scenario when i talk about submarine yachting - on contrary.

I think about a weekend trip to the rosario islands make a nice beach dinner on a un inhabitated island - and go for a fine night sleep in a shallow sandy bay just a few meter under water with the snorkel sticking out having a flashlight - on contrary to a surface yacht - not be concerned about a tropical storm at night or pirates coming on board. A simple yacht trip just cutting out the "run home for a safe marina" when sun goes down.

Check a day in a submarine yacht owners life:
http://imulead.com/tolimared/concretesubmarine/anuncios/ar#day

Cheers,
Wil

 

Look Wil you are impassioned and an achiever BUT you are not critically analysing anything here. It's a great fantasy but in reality you need to consider things in more detail. You also need to provide some real data and calculations to support your claims. Not "read this fantasy that I wrote"

If you need to go to 200 tonnes displacement to make it workable then you have to slip the vessel weight and size, what does the 200 tonner weigh ??? If the ratio is the same as your other one close to 100 tons ? So you need to haul this each year in a shipyard. For the same internal usable cabin sole area you could achive this with 20 tons easily and get the decks and cocpit thrown in for free.

Then how are you measuring "EFFICIENCY" certainly not by the speed of the passage but by an idealistic propulsive force to reach a certain velocity for a certain mass. You are making the claims and you need to provide some meaningful numbers here.

What happens to that figure if you tried to match speeds..............then your argument is reversed big time. Also the sub for the same usable cabin space is massively less efficient by any criteria I can think of.

Most of the fun in yachting is being in the sun and seeing the view. Pirates can board you in daytime too in broad daylight. Rough weather will roll you on the bottom at snorkel depth and roll you more horribly on the surface.

Safety of current small subs is due to very high levels of technlogy and stringent training and support vessels . This high standard is becasue of the inherant dangers.
Nuclear power plants are safe so everyone can have them without problem in their personal subs too....... right !

 

submarine yacht fantasy

LyndonJ, i built and dived my first concrete submarine (a 1 tonner) at the age of 15 - i built a 20 tonner weekend concrete submarine yacht prototype in the mid nienties and tested the concept of submarine yachting extensivly for many years - this is the reason why people that trust me and give me the funds to make the 200 tonner submarine cruiser i am working on now - i made my homework - and i did my testing and prototyping. I do base things on step by step realization - not on fantasy.

Cheers,
Wil