China says new supersonic sub would reach San Francisco in 100 minutes

Sounds interesting, and I think it's technically possible.

Keep in mind that supercavitation means the vessel will be traveling inside a steam bubble, not air. Steam is a lot less dense and has little fluid friction compared to water in its liquid state. Known supercavitating torpedos use a rocket based device in the nose to form a steam bubble. However using a rocket of some sort seems limited in efficiency. There are also ways to flash water to steam by having a high-pressure shockwave pass through a venturi, I'd guess the novel approach for this proposed sub takes advantage of something like that.

However I'd bet it's not without it's problems. It's traveling in a shroud of superheated steam, so it's likely to have a limited run time due to heat-soak problems. Eventually the rest of the thing will want to reach a thermal equilibrium, so it may need to dump water from onboard tanks to cool itself. It will be traveling blind, with no obvious means to use sonar in this mode. Also traveling within a cavitation bubble is a sort of laminar flow problem, this thing will be going in a pretty straight line when operating this way.

a reply to: pauljs75

Once again, there is a huge difference between a torpedo traveling at 250 mph using that technology and a submarine traveling at 4000 mph.

One just does not make evolutionary leaps in technology of that magnitude. You do realize that just doubling the current speed of a submarine to 100 mph would be revolutionary progress, no? How many magnitudes of advances would it take to get from 100 mph to 4000 mph? We are not at 100 mph yet.

For those of you insisting that there are black projects out there doing this right now: If ignorance is bliss, well... somebody is really really happy.

originally posted by: bbracken677
a reply to: ArchPlayer



To suggest that a sub could travel at over 6000 km/hr through water when there is not a single plane in existence that can accomplish that is.... ridiculous. Ludicrous. Laughable. Stupid.

Who is you calling stupid?

Juss because you got schooling and all that you think your smarter then us, well i say no way.

Many people hear have been abdicated by alein craft capible of speeds much faster then 6000 mph and some that even go underwater to and that is a proven fact. Look it up.

People like you always saying sience this and physics dont have any idea about the reel stuff goin on out their.

everyone nos the chineese have been around longer then any other peoples and have been visited regluary by xtra-terestrials for thousands of ions. Thats how they probly no how to make things like this.

Jus saying.

that's a lot of water to travel in100 mins...story to hard to swallow for me

bbracken677

I am familiar with basic physics and common sense.

As are we too, yet current schoolroom physics laws do not take into account the advances made in technology "discovered" by the government to allow them to push the boundaries like they are doing.

You still ignore the obvious trail left in ATS threads which point to some pretty amazing technology. Why would you ignore this kind of thing when you say you are familiar with physics and when you make such an effort to persuade us(me) that this technology does not exist.

In spite of what you have learned in the physics classroom, there are advances made in universities and other research institutions which do not come out into the real world for years. There maybe papers describing the methods whereby these things are achieved but these papaers are not often read by the population and if the technology is of a sensitive nature, these papers will not be published at all due to foreign scientists reading them too.

For those of you insisting that there are black projects out there doing this right now: If ignorance is bliss, well... somebody is really really happy.

I am so glad you are happy in your blissful state, but you seem to me to be a person who likes science, so why not make yourself familiar with the threads I mention above - the ones which describe technology which is far, far, far beyond the kind of physics you already know about. That is what I am not understanding at the moment.

va reply to: qmantoo

Sorry, but threads in ATS about fringe science does not make it science.

All we have to do is wait and see. Either this technology will surface eventually, or it won't.

We WILL see who is right. Thank you. Meanwhile, I am sure you are excited that Santa Claus is coming in a few months

a reply to: bbracken677
How about "water cooled", for some reason I seem to remember seeing some footage of a very fast underwater weapon system, I can't find it now..this was years ago. I think to defeat the friction of water it would need something to displace it..air maybee?
Ok it was An Iranian cavitating torpedo and travelled 100m per second.

a reply to: nighthawk1954

They can not even steer the Russian Sunburn torpedo so how can they even figure out how to steer a bubble the size of a sub and im sorry but your not going to get a sub to go faster than the SR-71 Blackbird unless they have some UFO technology lol?

originally posted by: vonclod
a reply to: bbracken677
How about "water cooled", for some reason I seem to remember seeing some footage of a very fast underwater weapon system, I can't find it now..this was years ago. I think to defeat the friction of water it would need something to displace it..air maybee?
Ok it was An Iranian cavitating torpedo and travelled 100m per second.

Its the Russian Sunburn and its a spruce goose with no way to steer it. Its also the same torpedo that sunk the Russian Kursk sub during testing. 100knots is not even close to 3000 lol.

a reply to: Psynic

I cant help but laugh at everything you say, and the way you say it.

a reply to: bbracken677

All true and think of the horse power requirements for a second. According to unclassified sources a nuclear sub requires a nuclear power plant to turn out 35,000 shaft horsepower which produces 35 knots according to some open sources. Probably more like 50-60 knots but to get to a hundred times that speed?? Probably would take something over a couple million hp. That is a lot of power. What size of vessel would it take to carry such a power plant and the fuel that runs it? Nope, not too concerned about the Chinese building that, yet.

a reply to: whywhynot


If they did, we could order Chinese food directly from China.

originally posted by: bbracken677
a reply to: SLAYER69

It is absolutely impossible given our current level of technology. We are talking about an 800% increase when considering current speeds... one does not go from 50 mph to 4000 mph in one leap of tech advancement.

Just consider our flight speeds in a medium that is hundreds of times less dense than water... how the eff would we reach those speeds underwater even, let alone almost 8 times the speed of sound....underwater!!

It's ridiculous, therefore it is either not true that the Chinese stated such, or it is a propaganda statement/disinformation that is supposed to fool...who?

Consider what the effects would be if an underwater vessel could travel at 8 times the speed of sound. Consider how much heat would be generated by the friction of that speed in a medium that is practically 1000 times more dense than air...................................

Really? lol

If you read the links they are stating that theoretically they could achieve speeds of up to 6,000kph, not that they are making a sub that can go that speed.

And what is all this about friction? I thought that with all your hydrodynamics knowledge you would have solid understanding of supercavitation?

While the articles are an exercise in hyperbole, this is not fringe science. And yes I am looking forward to Santa's visit. I suggest you write a letter to him requesting books this year.