To the Edge of the Possible

Part 4, the final part of my historical/technical analysis of US high speed destroyers, has just appeared in Warship International, Vol. 50 issue 4.  This completes what was about a 15-year effort, and it should be no surprise that I learned a few things while doing it.

When I presented part 1 to the American Society of Naval Engineers annual symposium in 1997, I started my presentation by saying the high speed period in destroyer design resembled the horsepower war in American cars of the 1960's -- a period when I was too young to have a driver's license but was still an interested spectator.  In reality, there must be a better comparison in history, because the efficiency of high speed destroyers was not a brute-force thing; they had power to weight ratios about like a 1950 VW Beetle, yet could still slice through their own bow-waves into a semi-planing regime.

The second revelation was that the proportions and coefficients of the type were established in a time period when the methods I used to rediscover those elements were not yet known.  How designers and builders figured out what proportions to use is a mystery.  When they figured it out must have been around the time of the Civil War or just afterward.  Again, my earlier notions (aided by published sources, to be sure) that steam yacht builders were at the forefront because owners were essentially racing them doesn't seem to be consistent with chronology -- the smaller, high speed "express" launches hadn't yet come into vogue when fast torpedo boats first appeared with the proportions later to be used in destroyers.

So, while I'm happy with the articles, there is more research that could be done on this subject.