A Submarine That Doesn't Make Waves

Wading through water can be such a drag. Even streamlined submarines have to fight the pull of the ocean slowing them down. But with the right outerwear, they may be able to zip through the sea as unburdened as a rocket in outer space—and without leaving so much as a ripple of wake.

Pretty cool stuff here. But why does it seem like advances in technology only have a military application?!

The proposed cloak would be a mesh of wires or blades, mounted on the surface of the object moving through water.

Does this make it less visible on radar though?! I would think not. Anyone.

A Submarine That Doesn't Make Waves

Nobody uses "radar" underwater...
Sonar on the other hand can hear "cavitation" ( bubbles created by low pressure areas) on the backside of blades or fins. Don't know;but I'm sure the engineers thought of that. The Iranians have tested a super-sonic torpedo that blasts air(gas) out of the nose creating a bubble the torpedo travels in to cut water drag resistance, guess it works, that'd be really noisy but so fast you couldn't get out of the way.

Radar doesn't work in/under water very well. Hence the use of sonar.

Cavitation is not really all that new - and it does leave a wake. Passive sonar would be able to track you with no problems at all - and you would be 'swimming blind', as the process of cavitation would render your sonar useless. Generally speaking, sonar performance degrades appreciably above five knotts, and you may as well be charging around blind by time you hit 30 (and above - exact velocities of submarines is classified).

Cavitation can allow for much faster velocities due to greatly reduced drag - but you're going to be making enough commotion that you'll spazz-out fish-finders a thousand miles away.

But you should be moving fast enough that the only thing with a hope and prayer of hitting you would be an ASROC - or an air-launched torpedo/depth-charge head-on into your bow.

But it won't be hard to find out where you went - so unless you high-tail it outside of their air-based ASW measures' range... you're only making it easier to set up a new search box.

reply to post by cluckerspud


I hate that signature tone it down!

Perhaps the underwater radar is not from EM waves and can
go through all matter. That would be better than sound wave
detection. Thus anything is detectable even noiseless submarines.