Wilkins Arctic Submarine Nautilus: Difference between revisions
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In true Simon Lake fashion, the work to convert the boat, now named Nautilus (inspired by Lake's fascination with Jules Verne), took much longer than anticipated and ran considerably over budget. They were pressed for time, as it was the desire of Wilkins and Ellsworth to get the expedition going during the Arctic summer, when conditions were much more favorable. Badly needed work to refurbish the engines, motors, hydraulics, and structure was either rushed through or was entirely deferred. This would prove to be a fateful decision. | In true Simon Lake fashion, the work to convert the boat, now named Nautilus (inspired by Lake's fascination with Jules Verne), took much longer than anticipated and ran considerably over budget. They were pressed for time, as it was the desire of Wilkins and Ellsworth to get the expedition going during the Arctic summer, when conditions were much more favorable. Badly needed work to refurbish the engines, motors, hydraulics, and structure was either rushed through or was entirely deferred. This would prove to be a fateful decision. | ||
The overall design of the conversion work reflected Lake's naivete about Arctic conditions, and his | The overall design of the conversion work reflected Lake's naivete about Arctic conditions, and his predilection towards a romantic and unrealistic view of the rigors of exploration. For instance, the boat was not equipped with heaters, and the crew suffered terribly from the bone chilling cold that radiated inward from the steel hull. Freshwater in tanks routinely froze solid and there was only one toilet for the entire crew, and that was inconveniently placed between the main engines. The ice drill proved very difficult to use in dockside tests and it failed routinely to bore into test blocks of ice. In the arctic against the rock hard ice found there the drill was completely useless and the trunk leaked through the circumferential seal. For some reason, the bow planes had been removed by Lake in Philadelphia, leaving only the stern planes for underwater control, a problematic state of operation at best. The engines failed on the trip across the Atlantic, and they had to be hurriedly overhauled in England before departing for the polar region | ||
Despite the issues, Wilkins pressed on with the expedition, driven by the pressure of his investors and the overbearing influence of Hearst. They made it to the ice pack and even operated under it for short periods. They gathered much useful scientific data, but on an overall basis the expedition was nearly a total failure, with the crew nearly in an mutinous state from the horrid conditions onboard. The expedition ended in a Norwegian fjord near Bergen, where Wilkins and Danenhower lived up to the terms of the contract and scuttled the boat in deep water. It was later discovered and surveyed by Norwegian divers in 1981. | Despite the issues, Wilkins pressed on with the expedition, driven by the pressure of his investors and the overbearing influence of Hearst. They made it to the ice pack and even operated under it for short periods. They gathered much useful scientific data, but on an overall basis the expedition was nearly a total failure, with the crew nearly in an mutinous state from the horrid conditions onboard. The expedition ended in a Norwegian fjord near Bergen, where Wilkins and Danenhower lived up to the terms of the contract and scuttled the boat in deep water. It was later discovered and surveyed by Norwegian divers in 1981. | ||
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[[File:Red bar sub new.jpg]] | [[File:Red bar sub new.jpg]] | ||
[[File: | [[File:O-12 Nautilus Conversion.jpg|left|500px]] | ||
The former O-12 in drydock at the Philadelphia Navy Yard on December 12, 1930, undergoing conversion for the Wilkins arctic expedition. She would be renamed Nautilus. At this point the Navy ostensibly retained ownership of the boat, leasing her to Lake & Danenhower, Inc. for the expedition. Simon Lake and Sloan Danenhower were allowed to make any modifications necessary to the boat, as it was understood that she would never return to naval service. In this photo Lake employees are working topside, having removed the conning tower fairwater, periscopes, and masts, leaving only the bridge access trunk. An extensive superstructure would be built above the main deck. Her torpedo room was being converted into a diver lockout chamber, a scientific instrument "moon pool", and laboratory. The rest of the boat would get refurbishment as well. | |||
<small>Original photo in the private collection of Ric Hedman.</small> | |||
[[File:Red bar sub new.jpg]] | |||
[[File:O-12 wilkins2.jpg|left|500px]] | |||
A photo of the ex-O-12, now renamed Nautilus, from the starboard side, submerging on a trial run after the completion of the Arctic conversion work, May 15, 1931. Her conning tower fairwater has been completely removed and an extensive white painted superstructure built atop the already existing superstructure. The small topside structures were all retractable and the intention was for the Nautilus to slide in under the icepack, running along under the ice like a reverse sled, popping up to the surface when a gap in the pack was encountered. | |||
20. | |||
<small>Photo in the private collection of Ric Hedman</small> | |||
[[File:Red bar sub new.jpg]] | |||
[[File:O-12 wilkins1.jpg|left|500px]] | |||
This from the port side shows Nautilus after the completion of the Arctic conversion work, May 25, 1931. She had an all-civilian crew, captained by Sloan Danenhower, a former U.S. Navy officer and associate of Simon Lake. The newly built ice sled superstructure can be seen atop the former main deck line. | |||
<small>Photo in the private collection of Ric Hedman</small> | |||
[[File:Red bar sub new.jpg]] | |||
[[File:O-12 wilkins3.jpg|left|500px]] | |||
A view of the Nautilus underway at sea in 1931, running alongside a Navy ship. The Wilkins-Ellsworth Arctic Expedition that she was converted for gathered some valuable data on the Arctic environment, but overall it was largely a failure, mostly due to the Nautilus' poor mechanical condition. They struggled with breakdowns during the Arctic voyage, greatly restricting the amount of time that the boat actually submerged. The boat was also unsuccessful in sliding under the ice as it was not understood at the time that the ice pack is not flat underneath like a frozen lake is. | |||
The boat was sailed to a fjord near Bergen, Norway and its ownership was returned to the Navy. On November 20, 1931 it was scuttled in 1,138 feet (347 m) of water in the fjord and forgotten. Her wreck was rediscovered in 1981. | |||
<small>Photo in the private collection of Ric Hedman</small> | |||
[[File:Red bar sub new.jpg]] | |||
{{#ev:youtube|id=8AbtCE-sePc|alignment=left|dimensions=500x300}} | |||
This is a documentary from the Mustard Channel on YouTube. It gives an excellent overview of the Wilkins-Ellsworth Trans-Arctic Expedition and includes some superb CGI graphics of the O-12 in her conversion guise as the Nautilus. We can also recommend the other videos on the Mustard Channel, although they mostly cover aviation stories. You won't be disappointed. | |||
<small>Video courtesy of the Mustard Channel on Youtube.</small> | |||
[[File:Red bar sub new.jpg]] | |||
Revision as of 11:35, 21 April 2024
Notes
At first, Lake offered Wilkins his old submarine Defender, but Wilkins immediately judged the old boat to be too small for the arduous task. Wilkins and Lake approached the Navy and were able to secure an agreement to lease the decommissioned submarine ex-USS O-12 (SS-73), which was laying in reserve at the Philadelphia Navy Yard. This would be an ideal situation for Lake, as his company had built the O-12 during WWI and he was intimately familiar with her design. The obsolete O-12 was no longer wanted by the Navy so they transferred ownership of the boat to the U.S. Shipping Board, who then agreed to lease the boat back to the newly formed Lake & Danenhower, Inc. for conversion for Wilkins. Former USN submarine commander Sloan Danenhower was now a business associate of Simon Lake, and his expertise got him the job of being the expedition's submarine skipper. The Shipping Board agreed to lease the boat for one dollar for one year, with the only other stipulation being that when the expedition was completed that the boat be returned to Navy control or be scuttled in water at least 1,200 feet deep (370 m), so that it could not be used in military operations against the United States.
Lake was granted the rights to use the Philadelphia Navy Yard drydock for the initial conversion work and he used that time to strip the exterior of the boat down to the main deck. He also demilitarized the boat by cutting off the torpedo tubes where they penetrated into the torpedo room. The portions that remained were permanently sealed up with flanges. A diver lock-out chamber was added to the torpedo room, along with a hatch in the bottom to allow the diver to exit and to lower scientific instruments into the water. The rest of the torpedo handling equipment was removed and the remainder of the space turned into a laboratory. The boat's bow was reinforced with concrete and extra steel so that a collision with the ice would not damage it. Other interior refurbishment work was done on the boat, as she had been sitting in reserve for six years and was in bad shape.
She was then towed to the John H. Mathis & Company shipyard in Camden, NJ. where the rest of the conversion work was done. A large ice skid, somewhat like an upside down ski, was built over the main deck and the space underneath in closed in. Other experimental features were added like ice drills that were intended to bore through the ice to bring air to the submerged submarine, a hydraulic spar on the tip of the bow to cushion collisions with the ice, and an extendable skid to provide a shock-absorber effect under the ice. Most of these contraptions were the product of Simon Lake's rather fertile imagination. They were of dubious use and were only barely tested prior to the boat's departure for the Arctic.
In true Simon Lake fashion, the work to convert the boat, now named Nautilus (inspired by Lake's fascination with Jules Verne), took much longer than anticipated and ran considerably over budget. They were pressed for time, as it was the desire of Wilkins and Ellsworth to get the expedition going during the Arctic summer, when conditions were much more favorable. Badly needed work to refurbish the engines, motors, hydraulics, and structure was either rushed through or was entirely deferred. This would prove to be a fateful decision.
The overall design of the conversion work reflected Lake's naivete about Arctic conditions, and his predilection towards a romantic and unrealistic view of the rigors of exploration. For instance, the boat was not equipped with heaters, and the crew suffered terribly from the bone chilling cold that radiated inward from the steel hull. Freshwater in tanks routinely froze solid and there was only one toilet for the entire crew, and that was inconveniently placed between the main engines. The ice drill proved very difficult to use in dockside tests and it failed routinely to bore into test blocks of ice. In the arctic against the rock hard ice found there the drill was completely useless and the trunk leaked through the circumferential seal. For some reason, the bow planes had been removed by Lake in Philadelphia, leaving only the stern planes for underwater control, a problematic state of operation at best. The engines failed on the trip across the Atlantic, and they had to be hurriedly overhauled in England before departing for the polar region
Despite the issues, Wilkins pressed on with the expedition, driven by the pressure of his investors and the overbearing influence of Hearst. They made it to the ice pack and even operated under it for short periods. They gathered much useful scientific data, but on an overall basis the expedition was nearly a total failure, with the crew nearly in an mutinous state from the horrid conditions onboard. The expedition ended in a Norwegian fjord near Bergen, where Wilkins and Danenhower lived up to the terms of the contract and scuttled the boat in deep water. It was later discovered and surveyed by Norwegian divers in 1981.
See the photos and video below for a more complete story of the conversion work and the pioneering expedition. Also see this page for a reprint of an article by Sloan Danenhower describing the conversion work done to the O-12/Nautilus. Special note... the drawings below come from the Syracuse American News Paper, Sunday March 1, 1931 edition. It is likely that the paper has gone out of existence. No mention of it still being in publication could be found anywhere. It may have been absorbed by another paper or just gone out of business as many papers have.
Nautilus configuration drawings
Courtesy of the Syracuse American News Paper, Sunday March 1, 1931 edition.
The former O-12 in drydock at the Philadelphia Navy Yard on December 12, 1930, undergoing conversion for the Wilkins arctic expedition. She would be renamed Nautilus. At this point the Navy ostensibly retained ownership of the boat, leasing her to Lake & Danenhower, Inc. for the expedition. Simon Lake and Sloan Danenhower were allowed to make any modifications necessary to the boat, as it was understood that she would never return to naval service. In this photo Lake employees are working topside, having removed the conning tower fairwater, periscopes, and masts, leaving only the bridge access trunk. An extensive superstructure would be built above the main deck. Her torpedo room was being converted into a diver lockout chamber, a scientific instrument "moon pool", and laboratory. The rest of the boat would get refurbishment as well.
Original photo in the private collection of Ric Hedman.
A photo of the ex-O-12, now renamed Nautilus, from the starboard side, submerging on a trial run after the completion of the Arctic conversion work, May 15, 1931. Her conning tower fairwater has been completely removed and an extensive white painted superstructure built atop the already existing superstructure. The small topside structures were all retractable and the intention was for the Nautilus to slide in under the icepack, running along under the ice like a reverse sled, popping up to the surface when a gap in the pack was encountered.
Photo in the private collection of Ric Hedman
This from the port side shows Nautilus after the completion of the Arctic conversion work, May 25, 1931. She had an all-civilian crew, captained by Sloan Danenhower, a former U.S. Navy officer and associate of Simon Lake. The newly built ice sled superstructure can be seen atop the former main deck line.
Photo in the private collection of Ric Hedman
A view of the Nautilus underway at sea in 1931, running alongside a Navy ship. The Wilkins-Ellsworth Arctic Expedition that she was converted for gathered some valuable data on the Arctic environment, but overall it was largely a failure, mostly due to the Nautilus' poor mechanical condition. They struggled with breakdowns during the Arctic voyage, greatly restricting the amount of time that the boat actually submerged. The boat was also unsuccessful in sliding under the ice as it was not understood at the time that the ice pack is not flat underneath like a frozen lake is.
The boat was sailed to a fjord near Bergen, Norway and its ownership was returned to the Navy. On November 20, 1931 it was scuttled in 1,138 feet (347 m) of water in the fjord and forgotten. Her wreck was rediscovered in 1981.
Photo in the private collection of Ric Hedman
This is a documentary from the Mustard Channel on YouTube. It gives an excellent overview of the Wilkins-Ellsworth Trans-Arctic Expedition and includes some superb CGI graphics of the O-12 in her conversion guise as the Nautilus. We can also recommend the other videos on the Mustard Channel, although they mostly cover aviation stories. You won't be disappointed.
Video courtesy of the Mustard Channel on Youtube.
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