Sorry guys, saw this on TV last night - gave me a few chuckles ... Ice Ship

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"I die for my fatherland. I have a clear conscience." - Admiral Wilhelm Canaris

I have a great article in my collection (somewhere) on this. It includes design details in it. What it really demonstrates is just how overwhelming the Allied advantage in production and logistics really was that this was not only seriously considered but actually was being acted on at one point.

The bit about the search light reminds me rather of the 'Plib,' a magnificent design pattented by one E. L. Wisty. The idea was for a pill that would cure any disease, virus or ailment instantly. Unfortunatly when asked how it would work he said that it was just in the ideas stage but he was sure that he could work out the minor detail later. I believe the pattent clerk then showed him a new invention, a sponge on a stick, known as a 'nit poker.'

I guess it seemed like a good idea at the time. Then again what nation was it that spent millions of dollars developing a pen that would write in zero gravity? The rest of the world uses pencils

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There's no honorable way to kill, no gentle way to destroy. There is nothing good in war. Except its ending.

Quite interesting...!

The lessons learned during the construction of the prototype revealed the full size Habakkuk (designed to be 2000-feet long, 190-feet high, and weighing 1.8 million tons) would need over 280,000 Pykrete blocks and take over 8000 men eight months to complete. Suddenly, "free" ice wasn't so free anymore...

http://www.de220.com/Strange%20Stuff/StrangeStuff.htm



The first layer of the ice blocks are in place. The corner pipes are being installed. Notice the insulation, which appears to be pine needles) up to 6-feet.
National Archives #80G702433



The second layer of Pykrete blocks are laid and the vertical coolant pipes are in place.
National Archives #80G702434

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Any idea how they planned to keep the ice from melting from the boilders? How about crew? Were they supposed to live inside the ice - winter gear all the time. I can't imagine much comfort Better not sit on the toilet seat - you'll freeze your bum onto it!

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"I die for my fatherland. I have a clear conscience." - Admiral Wilhelm Canaris

Oh Yes!

One of the most fantastic ideas to come out of WW11 was to build a super iceberg aircraft carrier. Gaining the support of Churchill and Mountbatten, British inventor, Geoffrey Pike, set out to build a prototype on Patricia Lake near Jasper in Canada, where it could be naturally frozen. The steel hull structure was filled with a compound of paper pulp and sea water which was frozen to produce a substance called 'Pykecrete' after the inventor. Pykecrete was almost as strong as concrete. The actual carrier, to be named HMS Habakkuk (after the Old Testament prophet) when built, could be up to 4,000 feet long, 600 feet wide, 130 feet high with ice walls 40 feet thick constructed from 280,000 blocks of ice and weigh anything up to one million tons. Pipes, circulating cold air from a refrigeratation plant inside the berg, would keep the ice from melting. It would be driven by 26 electric drive motors giving it a speed of around 6 knots. By 1943, technical problems meant that the vessel would not be ready until 1945 which was too late to be of any use in the Battle of the Atlantic where convoys were sailing part way to Britain without air cover. The model on Patricia Lake was eventually scuttled after the ice took almost a year to melt. A commemorative plaque was placed on the lake's shore in 1989. Sadly, the inventor, Geoffrey Pyke, committed suicide in 1948 with an overdose of sleeping tablets.

http://members.iinet.net.au/~gduncan/1942.html

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We learn by our failures. While this may have been a lost cause, the ideas were not unsound. One of the big concerns today, is concrete submarines. Cheap to build, they blend in with the bottom. They have the potential to make horrific terror weapons in the hands of certain groups and nations. This aircraft carrier could have been made with concrete, but ice had repair advantages.

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Lord, let me be the person my dog thinks I am.