Similarly, we fired numbers of torpedoes down a torpedo range through a series of nets, marking and calibrating exactly at what depth each fish was actually running for each net position.
We built up great experience tabulations, based on the net shots and the explosion tests. To get more data for our tables, the sub base strung guy wire's to a building, slid torpedo war- heads down them-loaded with a mixture of sand and sawdust to the right weight, however, instead of TNT to collide with a section of steel plate on the ground. We used several guy wires so as to simulate various angles of impact, and the heights were carefully calibrated to produce the proper speeds.
The results of all our tests, when Admiral Small finally gave them his approval, were conclusive. The magnetic feature was so delicate and intricate-a marvel of design and ingenuity but totally undependable in service-that it might as well be for- gotten. The mechanical part of the exploder, which should in- variably go off upon impact, was also too delicate and at the same time too heavily constructed. Its inertia was so great that upon impact the firing pin, key to the whole thing, would be deformed or bent before it had a chance to do its job. And the torpedoes habitually ran as much as twenty feet deeper than they were supposed to. Like everything else about them, how- ever, the depth was erratic; they wobbled down the course like a sine wave, alternately deep and shallow. It was just luck what part of the curve the target happened to be on.
The more we got into the problem, the madder everyone got.
Everything we had discovered should have been found out on the proof ranges long ago, before the war in most cases. The design failures should have been discovered by proper tests be. fore the torpedoes ever got to the proof ranges. And there was no excuse for our not receiving the correct depth-running data, no more than for the refusal of the torpedo designers to accept, or at least investigate, our earlier findings that the torpedoes ran deeper than set. When the Admiral took off for Washington this time, he was loaded.
When he returned, not many days later, there was a glint of cold fury in his eyes. Captain Blunt and I met him at the air- field. By this time I had given back the cane, though the leg still bothered me. "They believe us at last," he growled, "but they're not doing a thing about it. The new exploder will be the answer to everything, when it's ready." He snorted. "Ready! Hell!
Maybe next year, it might be ready! They haven't even built one yet!"
Blunt turned to me. "Tell him your idea, Rich," he commanded.
The idea was simply stated. "I've been looking over the exploder," I said, "and of course if we could make it work the way it ought to, that would be the best answer of all. It occurred to me that perhaps if we could rebuild the mechanical firing gadget with lighter parts and completely disconnect the magnetic part of the exploder, we might get acceptable results. far as the depth settings on the torpedoes are concerned, which is an entirely separate problem, at least we know what's wrong and can make allowances for it."
Admiral Small's reaction was characteristic. "Hop to it, Rich!" was all he said, but I found doors opening for me wherever went. More weeks of work followed, and I had the heady feeling that we were at last getting somewhere. Our research, if it could be called that, now had a definite goaclass="underline" a firing-pin mechanism strong enough and light enough to complete the necessary motion upon impact with the target before the crushing force of the impact itself bent it all out of shape. We were working with split seconds, and the answer, when it was finally found, was unbelievably simple. Airplane propellers had to be very light and very strong. We collected all the damaged propellers we could find and cut the required parts from the hard, light metal.
"Better use for a busted prop," the Army Major at Hickam Field told me, "could not be found anywhere!"
From then on the problem became one of production, for the Admiral insisted that he would hold a submarine back from patrol, if necessary, before letting her go without previously having seen to it that every exploder she carried in her torpedoes had the modification. Every available machine shop in the submarine base was pressed into service to make the new parts.
A rigid inspection system was set up, too, for Admiral Small was adamant on this score.
The reports from the first few boats which took the modified exploiters to sea were jubilant. Where previously torpedoes had been fired with the hope they would function properly if they hit, they were now fired with the certainty that they would. The only problem remaining was the only one we should have had to worry about from the beginning: hitting the target.
My duties were changed also, for with the final solution of the torpedo problem and the setting up of the production and inspection lines, there was nothing left for me to do. Blunt refused to give me another submarine; I would have to wait a while longer, he said, and I found myself detailed, instead, as Officer in Charge of the Attack Teacher.
This was virtually the same gadget which Walrus' crew had trained on during our precommissioning days in New London, with one difference: the trainees here would within weeks be doing it for real. Some days we were extra busy, and for weeks at a time I would have to allot appointments just as a doctor might, trying to give most to those who needed it most. And there were slack periods when nobody seemed to want our synthetic attack training. During those times, to keep the small crew of the Attack Teacher from growing stale and at the same time to keep my own hand in, I used to run off attacks on my- own, sometimes taking the part of the submarine skipper, some- times for variety that of the tar get. On these occasions it be- came a sort of no-holds-barred competition and our favorite cast of characters was to pit the destroyer against the submarine, one of each, with the destroyer, to make it even, aware of the sub's presence, though perhaps not exactly where. The Attack Teacher included a sonar-attack section also, so this was integrated into the game.
The men loved it; especially whenever one of them got me, as make-believe submarine skipper, into a box from which, try as I might, I could not escape. More than once my theoretical submarine was rammed by the destroyer; and much more frequently I was driven below periscope depth, after which the whole group would repair to the sonar rooms and with high. hilarity try to knock me out with depth charges. Part of the time the submarine won the fight, too, and when it was my turn to shoot torpedoes at the destroyer, I always pretended, in my own mind at least, that I was shooting them at Bungo Pete.
Stocker Kane showed up with the Nerka shortly after had taken over the Attack Teacher, and many pleasant hours of visiting with him in the Royal Hawaiian Hotel ensued before he set out for his next patrol. He had loved Australia. was as he imagined America must have been a hundred years ago, he said.
He talked a lot about Hurry, too, and a little, not much, about Laura. "You know how you'll take a liking to someone," said. "Laura and Hurry seemed to hit it off especially well, and they've been corresponding with each other ever since you all left New London. Hurry doesn't think she's happy, though.
She's been trying to get Laura to come out and stay with her in San Francisco, so that she'll be there when they send the Walrus back for overhaul." He chuckled. "She says Jim doesn't write enough. Hurry's always looking around for someone to mother a little, not having any youngsters to keep her busy." The faintest suggestion of a shadow crossed his face.