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    Allied Torpedo Boats
    Allied Torpedo Boats
    Allied Torpedo Boats
    Ebook287 pages1 hour

    Allied Torpedo Boats

    By John Lambert and Les Brown

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    About this ebook

    “An inspirational/enjoyable book with excellent representations of a wide variety of [Motor Torpedo Boats] by various modelers in a variety of scales.”—ModelGeek
     
    The ShipCraft series provides in-depth information about building and modifying model kits of famous warship types. Lavishly illustrated, each book takes the modeler through a brief history of the subject class, highlighting differences between sisterships and changes in their appearance over their careers. This includes paint schemes and camouflage, featuring color profiles and highly detailed line drawings and scale plans. The modeling section reviews the strengths and weaknesses of available kits, lists commercial accessory sets for super-detailing of the ships, and provides hints on modifying and improving the basic kit. This is followed by an extensive photographic gallery of selected high-quality models in a variety of scales, and the book concludes with a section on research references—books, monographs, large-scale plans and relevant websites.
     
    This volume follows the format of the highly successful Flower Class Corvettes where the extent has been doubled to include far more detailed drawings of the many different designs of British MTBs and US PT-boats, including their fittings, sensors and weapons.
     
    “The content is packed with information that makes you want to turn a page, from the history of torpedo boats from 1915-1945, which then goes on to model products, showcase, construction, aftermarket products for scales 1-1200 to 1-100 . . . Not only a reference to torpedo boats, but a wonderful guide to building and getting the best out of a model.”—AutoModeler
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherOpen Road Integrated Media
    Release dateSep 13, 2010
    ISBN9781783468911
    Allied Torpedo Boats
    Author

    John Lambert

    John Lambert has translated Monsieur, Reticence, and Self-Portrait Abroad by Jean-Philippe Toussaint, as well as Emmanuel Carrère’s Limonov. He lives in Nantes with his wife and three children.

    Read more from John Lambert

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    • 5/5
      Brilliant! An absolute must-read for torpedo boat historians. WONDERFUL historic background on US/UK development. If you're a detailed model builder, you'll need this reference!

    Book preview

    Allied Torpedo Boats - John Lambert

    Coastal Forces Development 1915-1945

    Early in 1915, In the opening phase of the First World War, three junior Royal Navy officers (Lieutenants Hampden, Bremner and Anson), who were then serving in the Harwich destroyer force, put forward the idea for small, fast craft – Coastal Motor Boats – each carrying a single 18in torpedo, to be capable of passing over the German protective minefields and attacking enemy ships in their home ports under the cover of darkness. When fully loaded their speed was to be at least 30kts, with sufficient fuel for a useful range. The theory was accepted and by the end of 1915 the company of John I Thornycroft had designed the 40ft Vedette Skimmer, based upon a lightweight wooden, single-step hydroplane hull.

    The first twelve were in service by August 1916, and proved effective on operations, launching their torpedoes tail-first over the stern and swerving to get out of its track. A larger 55ft version followed, some of which were capable of carrying two 18in torpedoes in troughs or mines and depth charges, and in 1918 a larger 70ft singlestep design was ordered in small numbers. During the conflict much was learned and the type benefited greatly from operational experience. Gradually the bridge was enclosed, giving some protection from the weather, first with canvas screens then a wooden cockpit cover.

    In each case the hulls proved to be strong, lightweight, fast and seaworthy and these craft established the value of the RN’s first Coastal Forces. At the end of hostilities (1918) there were about 100 Thonycroft CMBs in service, but by 1922 expenditure had dried up, and by 1926 Coastal Forces had ceased to exist altogether. Thornycroft, however, continued to build limited numbers for export and maintained and refined their engine production. Indeed, many under construction in 1939 were to be requisitioned at the outbreak of the Second World War.

    BETWEEN THE WARS

    In the years after 1926 the design of fast motor boats developed quickly, but it was largely in response to the commercial market and, in particular, the growing sport of power boat racing. One of the most influential men in the British side of this story was Hubert Scott-Paine (1890–1954), or ‘Scotty’ as he became known. A skilled mechanic and designer with a keen interest in sailing and aircraft, he was a leading light in the early years of the Supermarine company, which – long before the famous Spitfire – specialised in flying boats and seaplanes. After the war he watched the relative decline of the British motor boat industry with dismay as American craft made huge inroads into the sport, and in 1927 he set up the British Power Boat [BPB] Company at Hythe. The company’s boats were very successful in the racing world, and throughout the 1930s he worked assiduously to promote the development of powerful lightweight marine engines.

    40ft Vedette Skimmer

    The Thornycroft prototype for the Coastal Motor Boat.

    55ft Coastal Motor Boat

    Details and hull construction.

    MTB 2 leaving Portsmouth in June 1937 for passage to Malta. Note the folded torpedo frame at the stern.

    In the absence of Royal Navy interest, Scott-Paine sold the idea of fast seaplane tenders to the RAF in 1930, the resulting 37ft 6in design being called RAF 200; orders for a further 15 followed the prototype, and he went on to design a fast target boat for the same service. He also designed a revolutionary aluminium boat, Miss Britain II, for the 1933 Harmsworth Trophy race, which was powered by a newly developed Napier Sea Lion engine. Therefore, when naval interest in small craft revived in the mid-1930s, Scott-Paine was well positioned to take advantage.

    In October 1931 the Admiralty had appointed a ‘Coastal Motor Boat Committee’, which had consulted Scott-Paine, and in September 1935 the Admiralty finally ordered the first of a new generation of coastal craft. These were two 60ft hard-chine ‘Motor Torpedo Boats’, not surprisingly to a new British Power Boat design, to be followed by a further four a month later. These were to form the 1st MTB Flotilla, being sent out to the Mediterranean under their own power, through the French waterways system in 1937. Another three units were ordered in December 1936 and another nine ordered in January 1938. Six were shipped to Hong Kong to form the 2nd MTB Flotilla, whilst the other six, destined for Singapore, reinforced the 1st Flotilla at Malta.

    The 1st MTB Flotilla on parade on the Thames before the outbreak of war.

    British Power Boat 60ft MTB 4, 1937

    The first motor torpedo boats built for the Royal Navy since the First World War, two of this design were ordered on 27 September 1935 and four more on 19 October 1935. MTB 4 was completed at Hythe on 22 September 1936, and was capable of 38kts. Two 18in torpedoes were carried on rails overhead in the engine room and launched tail-first via frames that folded down over ports in the transom. Gun armament was two quad 0.303in Lewis machine guns on slip-rings fore and aft, but they were moved to gun tubs either side of the superstructure, just abaft the cockpit hatches.

    MTB 18 and two other 60ft BPB craft off Felixstowe in mid-1940. Each carries two quad 0.303in machine guns, one each side of the bridge.

    The launch of MTB 22, one of the first Vosper 70ft boats, on 3 April 1939. The large drums aft of the torpedo tubes are additional fuel tanks. The earliest boats were not designed to mount the power-operated twin 0.5in MkV and had two ‘tubs’ for manually directed machine-guns. The clinker-built wooden dinghy carried aft in the early boats was soon replaced by a carley float in service.

    These early boats displaced 18–22 tons and were powered by three Napier ‘Power’ Sea Lion petrol engines each of 500hp giving a maximum speed of 35-37kts for a short time, or 29kts continuous. Length was 60ft 3in, beam 13ft 3in with a draught of 2ft 9in. They were armed with two 18in torpedoes, still launched stern-first in the WWI manner (but through ports in the transom), and two quadruple 0.303in Lewis machine guns. These early craft proved that the boats were practical and when in service helped to iron out many of the inherent operational problems. They were all completed by March 1939.

    However, when it became clear that another war was approaching, the bulk of new orders went to BPB’s rival, Vosper at Portsmouth, and their designs formed the bulk of the RN’s ‘short’ boats throughout the war. Short boats were up to 80ft in length, whilst those over 100ft were known as ‘long’ boats. Vosper’s achievements in terms of MTBs during the 1939-45 War was two-fold: firstly, in the number of craft constructed to their designs – 127 in the United Kingdom and 64 in the USA for the Royal Navy under Lend-Lease, plus another 100 built in the USA for Russia, and other Allies, making up a total of over 300; and secondly, that in spite of ever more taxing requirements that involved increased displacement due to better equipment, armament etc., the performance did not substantially fall off.

    This can be seen in detail in the drawings, but is best illustrated by a comparison between their 1938 and 1943 building programmes. The former had a displacement of 35.8 tons with a maximum speed of 42kts, the latter, a displacement of 44.4 tons with an increase in military load of 60 per cent over the 1938 boats but still with a speed of 40.5kts. The propulsive engine power increased by 9 per cent but against this various refinements, including the increase of generator output required for radar etc, prevented a substantial improvement in the overall machinery power/weight ratio. The change from the Italian-built power plants to the US-built Packards – once they were available in numbers – maintained performance. The following year speed did fall to 36kts at 48.8 tons displacement, due to further increases in military load, as might be expected, in particular the addition of the 6pdr Mk VII power-operated gun mounting.

    When the BPB Co at Hythe had obtained the first orders in 1935, virtually sweeping the board, Vosper had been very disappointed, but under the chairmanship of Commander (E) Peter Du Cane, the company set out to take over the lead. In 1937 they designed a boat displacing 32 tons, 68ft long and powered by three imported Italian Isotta-Fraschini petrol engines of 3450hp to give a top speed of well over 40kts. This PV (Private Venture) one-off design formed the basis of all their wartime development.

    Vosper’s 68ft Private Venture boat (later MTB 102)

    The boat displaced 32 tons loaded and three Isotta-Fraschini engines totalling 3450hp gave it a top speed of 47.8kts in that condition. Armament was a single 21in torpedo tube beneath the foredeck discharging through the stem, plus a reload torpedo.

    Thornycroft 71ft 9in MTBs 24 and 25

    Ordered on 15 August 1938, these 37-ton boats were armed with two 21 in LC Mk I torpedo tubes and two gun tubs for twin 0.303in Vickers K machine guns. Three Isotta-Fraschini engines gave them a designed top speed of 40kts.

    The Vosper Private Venture boat became MTB 102 and is seen here early in 1940, when the stemhead torpedo tube had been replaced by a conventional pair of sided single tubes.

    This groundbreaking design was purchased from her builders in October 1937. Initially with a bow-mounted torpedo tube firing through her stem, she underwent long trials at HMS Vernon, the Torpedo School and was reconstructed and modified as a result of these experiments. She became MTB 102, took part in the Dunkirk evacuation, and still survives to this day, although with less powerful main engines.

    Faced with the prospect of hostilities in the near future, the

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