4 ms·
Big ole batteries - you'd need them anyway to run systems in the first place, should the reactor be shut down at depth. It looks like something like, say, a Los
by glurgh 13y ago
Big ole batteries - you'd need them anyway to run systems in the first place, should the reactor be shut down at depth. It looks like something like, say, a Los Angeles class sub can actually run its generator from batteries
"[...]power can be provided from the submarine's battery through the Ship Service Motor Generators (SSMGs)."
This is a problem that the engineers designing nuclear submarines have thought long and hard about - the USS Thresher and all crew were lost in part due to inability to rapidly restart a scrammed reactor.
- mpyne 13y agoCongrats, great answer. Everything I learned on the boat just taught me that I have so much to learn. So many minor details that a ship designer thought up went into each successive class of U.S. submarine. There were many days when I'm surprised again that we haven't lost more submarines due to design flaws or misfeatures.
- glurgh 13y agoHah, that is surely one of the many differences between reading about a sub and serving on one. Me: US navy nuclear submarines are a much-cited example of the successful design, development and deployment of high-reliability systems. You: I sometimes wonder how it is that more of us are not sleeping with the fishes. Still, everyone from designers to crews must be doing something right since it's apparently possible to drive such a machine into a rock at flank speed[1] or through a boat[2] or have it commanded by someone exhibiting strikingly poor judgement[3]. Without killing everyone on board and better yet, the planet. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_San_Francisco_(SSN-711)#Collision_with_seamount http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_San_Francisco_(SSN-711)#Col... [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Greeneville_(SSN-772)#The_Ehime_Maru_incident http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Greeneville_(SSN-772)#The_E... [3] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/12/michael-ward-affair_n_3071602.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/12/michael-ward-affair...