China's new diesel/electric sub looks almost just like the new German sub U212.

Good to see you again.

Your post about the sail mounted planes is pretty much correct. The switch to the bow planes means more stability than the sail mounted versions.
All US attack submarines are now built with retractable bow planes in lieu of sail mounted versions of earlier designs. Retractable mounted bow planes give more stability in rough water especially when launching tomahawk cruise missles.....an increasingly important function of todays attack submarines. It is a large heavy and very complex system in the boats at the foreward ballast tanks. It is obvious in the pictures one sees.
One more thing...when you run at speed with the planes retracted it makes the boat like a torpedo..very fast. No one has told us this but it is obvious by the way the planes are retracted flush and very clean..faired in with the hull...smooth. You just need a good fail safe mechanism to insure you do not go below crush depth at high speed. It would happen very fast...very fast..

Thanks,
Orangetom

Thanks Orangetom

I reread my last post. I guess I should take, just a tad more time and do some spell checking, not to mention avoiding the early morning urge to type up a reply, it would mean my replies would be easiler to read for the most part.

I have to say, that it is interesting in the way that the Chinese have picked up a design feature, which is commonly known as a defect on the newer submarines that the Americans and European nations have been producing.

So I can come to a few conclusions:

1. They know some thing we don't [I doubt it, but it isn't impossible]
2. They have ran out of space on the submarine [Possible if this is a upgrade as we have been lead to believe]
3. It gives them an advantage in thier neck of the woods.

I don't believe its 1, but 2 and 3 are possible but I would lean towards number 2 at present.

Orangetom, would you know of any advantages that this Sail mounted method of vessel design.

- Phil

Well one obvious answer is they felt no need for the added weight, complexity, and cost of retractable planes. Besides, this is a SSK, speed is not nearly as much of a consideration. The nuke boats are capable of "33+" knots, an SSK like this one will rarely exceed 20 knots, presuming it can even reach that speed.

[edit on 10/11/05 by xmotex]

I gotta go with xmotex on this one. The cost and complexity of retractable bow planes is considerable especially the way we build them..with quiet features in mind. VERY...VERY QUIET!!!
They do not appear to have any cruise missle capability in the manner of which we do this buisness so such stability is not necessary. Not that internal cruise missle capability cannot be added on as a later update. The main thing I see on this boat is that it is very small in size.
Keep in mind also that it also means heavy design applications and also heavy complex machine work both in the machine shops and also on the boats to install a retractable bow plane system.
IN the olde days the bow planes folded up sort of like a set of wings on a airplane. NOt so today..they retract completely horizontally into the ballast tanks. The very tips of the bow plane wings fair in flush with the curvature of the hull. A very slick job of fit up.
Cost, complexity , Weight , This is why they dont use bow planes as do we. The advantages to them are of course cost...they obviously by the size of the boat have a space problem. Where to mount bow planes. The sail where they are at is the ideal place. Also this simple fixed designs simplifys noise problems. The KISS principle.
Also agree with xmotex on that this boat is not that fast. I dont think this is their objective per se on this boat. It just gets them into their own design buisness with later upgrades or new designs coming. You have to start somewhere. You usually start at the bottom and work up to more complex designs. I am sure they have other designs on the drawing boards.

I have to say I go with the 'all subs are basically a long tube with a tower on top' idea.

Having said that I thought that the German design cited didn't look completely identical either (the conning tower was nothing like the Chinese boat) and the older Russian one a lot more like it.

In any event so many of the general design ideas on almost anything are freely available now why would it surprise anyone that a military *something* looks like another militaries' *something*?
It is, as said, the details, the systems and the insides that count, not a basic outline.

.....and as for "copying"?
The usual reason why so many things look basically alike is no more mysterious than the design calling for it to be that way.
Why reinvent the wheel?
All subs share a high degree of similarity because it is the most efficient design anyone has come up with yet.

(and many of these designs have their roots right back in the old type 7/21 U-boat; so yes, in an way it's a German assisted copy.

Cue the German bashing - anyway of working France and the rest of Europe in too?

Maybe you could infer the EU arms ban is about to be lifted any second now or that Europe supplies China with less military equipment than the US or that Europe sells China more military secrets than Israel?

....and round and round we go.
)

Now this is getting really spookie... the Chinese ahve released nearlt every week if not moth a new "big" military unit... Frigates, carriers, subs...