janner said:I had three DE A boats, they all leaked, Artemis was the worst and proved it by sinking just after I came off her for demob.
Who remembers the joys of pooping on an A boat, no Elephants foot rigged just a full bore entry down the Conning Tower hatch, diesels going full bore and the vacuum trying to pull your eardrums out.
I brought the Amphion home from Singapore, exercising with the Yanks off Panama they hit us with a practise Asroc, that was the last time she dived as the foreplanes gave up the ghost and had to be secured by a wire strop to stop them flapping around. We already had 4 x 4 lengths of timber from the deckhead to the cylinder heads on the donks because the cylinder head bolts had started sheering off.
On the Alaric off of San Juan, one of the Props fell off and they had to fly another one out from Canada to replace it.
P & O Boats were drier, but to be fair a lot younger than the A's when I joined them.
Ah! the joys of being a Submariner in the '60's
lsadirty said:Has to be the Valiant 1974-1978: there were things going wrong that even Rolls Royce and Vickers couldn't fix, let alone the crew and Guzz Dockyard. Somehow, we struggled along until Chatham refit, and I went outside just afterwards. Life as a civvy is less stressfull.
TheMaxi_77 said:lsadirty said:Has to be the Valiant 1974-1978: there were things going wrong that even Rolls Royce and Vickers couldn't fix, let alone the crew and Guzz Dockyard. Somehow, we struggled along until Chatham refit, and I went outside just afterwards. Life as a civvy is less stressfull.
I remeber Valiant before first refit and she was not that happy a boat then either.
I find it difficult to pick a woirst boat because I had a good time on them all, even Olympus during 6 months unfit to dive with dicky stern tubes, which Harold would pay to have fixed. If really forced I would pick Finwhale, not because there was anything wrong with her or the crew but because I was taken off her after I did my part 3 to go Nuclear instead of going with her to Singapore, that really pissed me off.