Well, the milling machines are not easy to make yourself. Back then, the computer/electronics level was still quite low, certainly when compared to Japan, the milling machines on their side are controlled by a very complex computer system, including a huge software program. The level of electronics/computers was not bad in some areas as their specialists were very well educated and had great skill, this is probably one of the advantages of their advanced mathematics. But, the work and research for hardware was lacking, they generally bought some computers from the West if it was really necessary. Of course the computer is not all, you still need a good machine and the software to fit everything together, it was much easier to make this leap by buying the things abroad, certainly from Japan, then it was to try to develop it themselves. It would have taken many years more.

The Victor III and Kilo sound level was indeed a lot lower than what they had before, yet it was still not sufficient. They still lacked the good designs needed for a really good propellor, the Victor had already a seven-blade propellor, milled for better performance and less cavitation damage, yet it did not have a skewed propellor yet. It still had the regular shaped blades, so was Kilo’s six-blade propellor.

The first classes featuring the real skewed seven blade propellors were the later subs, namely Akula, Typhoon and Oscar II, all of them featured the seven blade skewed propellor, but only about 10 years after the first Victor III was built. I am not sure, but I think the Mike was the first submarine to test this new propellor on a real ship.
Akula also left away the small manoeuvering propellors, these things, when stopped created some noise too. Akula had them retractable, a much better configuration. So basically it’s not all about the propellor alone and not about these milling machines alone either, it gave them a leap, but it took some years to get the full advantage out of them.

As for why they returned to normal propellors, easy, titanium sucks. It’s hard to get a good propellor from it, the milling machines were not built for this kind of material and titanium is equally vulnerable to cavitation problems, parts get ripped out equally easy as in the normal propellors. So better take a cheaper material then… I do think the Alpha’s had titanium propellors, maybe Papa too.

that is because they wanted their blades to be extra smooth. The finish of the blades was pretty rough on Soviet ships, this meant that some of the cavitation bubbles stuck in these “unconformities”. When the blades goes down, the pressure rises, the bubbles that are stuck to the blade collapse and rip out parts of the propellor.
They wore out pretty quickly this way, causing even more noise.
So they had some good reason to get better equipment.

Crobato, I was actually meaning Austin and Chinawhite with that.
Of course certain countries can do it, but if it is as easy as Austin seems to think, then he should be capable of doing so too! I had seen the Chinese versions of it already. Swedish, German and other subs have it too.

As for Titanium, the Soviet Union used to try that.

Something puzzles me, the Chinese Kilos seem to have a left turning propellor, while the normal ships/submarines have right turning ones! Can’t see the real reason for it though, Sankt-Petersburg also has a right turning one. At first I thought they would have the same propellors, yet this is not the case judging from some pictures. You can also see the Song has a right turning one.

Not really the SSK are still the masters of Liotrral waters just as the SSN are the masters of open ocean , SSK are definately quiter than any quite SSN outthere for the simple reason that they dont use Nuclear Reacort and those huge Turbines to generate electricity , The SSK on the other hand relies on Batteries for power , Why on earth do you think that USN is building those special Litoral capable Virginia class SSN.

Of course, one thing sounds strange to me? Why exactly would the SSN need “huge turbines” to generate electricity? An SSK makes it from the salt in the water??? They as well use turbines.
Have you ever heard the sound of a nuclear reactor? I don’t think so… As they’re damn silent, it doesn’t make the sound of a missile blowing near your ears…
I do hope you are aware of the fact that the SeaWolf can reach speeds of up to 20kts with natural convection, gives you a slight idea of what the SSN does/can do nowadaysthese things are “rather” silent too. The Reduction gear, well they really know why they have so many people in the engine room, if you keep those things well kept and use their bearings. Add to it that they have coatings on the inside which the Kilos don’t have and some extra measures to keep the noise from these reduction lockers and you have a fairly good idea how silent they are. Without the possibility of course of telling how silent (in dB) they are, as said, due to age and wearing of these bearings it becomes a bit more noisy, certainly broadening the frequency range.

I haven’t seen anyone from USN acknowledge this fact either, as Vaiar said, they do take it more seriously as North Korea and Iran also posses small submarines, they are just being cautious.

Also you might be aware that just recently the Australian Collins outsmarted the Improved Losangeles Class sub in an exercise .

Yes of course, and did you hear about that Walrus class SSK that outsmarted both Ohio and LA classes and of the U-209s that outsmarted an LA and of the MiG-21 that beat the F-15 and of the US Seals being beaten like a bunch of pussies and amateurs by the Dutch, French and other special forces? Of course… It all happened you know… Sorry if it sounds offensive, but it’s a bit naïve to believe those results are genuine, if those exercises with US were all so real, then why should Iraq have feared US? And why did Sadam’s forces lose of US forces, if the latter are just a bunch of losers?

There you have a point, the ART of building propellors, is an art mastered by the West. There’s little art about designing them, but the human touch in building them is the problem, it seems that the Russian props have had some bad human touch. I’ll try to upload some movies or pictures of rudder and propellor tests of time allows.

Pesho, Korund is no noise generator, it’s just a decoy. With noise generators we mean a device that makes noise as to conceal the real level of silencing in a submarine.

As for length/Volume,
Typhoon COULD be the best, yet they didn’t use the length, something US submarines do use, remember the long flank array etc. Same with SeaWolf and the panels on her sides/bottom. And her double hull configuration (well, actually five hull config) gives her indeed additional noise-reduction, although they have forgotten other measures to really exploit this advantage.

As for the Inside, you think all that space is used for the reactor and the turbines? As for Volume, my main idea/thought was the bow, large spherical sonar, which doesn’t fit in any SSK due to its sheer size. Add to it that the nuclear reactor does help in this as there would be no SSK power plant able to support such sonars, which is again a reason of size advantage.

Also in nuclear sub you have more “cuts” in the hull,thus increasing the water flow vortex and the hydrodynamic noise.

Is that so? Please show me all those cuts in an LA or Trafalgar class SSN and then count them and compare to a Kilo’s (or other SSKs in this case)?

Neither do I have to prove any thing on that , Try not to make fun of Indians and I will be gentle , Behave like a gentleman and then you can expect the same from me.

I haven’t made fun of Indians, all I did was say that US chose the Gotland class for some very good reasons and that Kilo is very much overrated. And there you guys got all jumpy about it. And I made a comment on that, which actually seems to be more commonly thought over here.

There are many ways to know its , Spies on ground are the greatest asset besided the US had tapped under water cables etc besides they do have good National Technical means , Subs is just one of them.

Indeed, and how do you actually think they tapped those cables???? Indeed, as far as I know that was with submarines and what does that mean? That Russian ASW sucks? Or that the LA might indeed be better than any of you is rating it? If it was so easy to track them even with a Kilo, do you think they wouldn’t have found out there were US submarines in their own waters tapping their cables (while having many and much more advanced ASW means than a Kilo)

And those specialists are???? Strangely, specialists never really reach the internet, well, they do, but not on this kind of sites. If you want to find one, better go search a canary or car-forum.

As for the shock absorbing engine, what a surprise, really well invented, couldn’t have come up with that myself, which sub doesn’t have it??? I don’t think there’s any of those around.
For propellor, US propellors are generally better made than any others, except for German ones and that really makes a difference for propellors.

What I mean is that it would be great for a Godavari to track an LA in its territorial waters and that the Indian government/Navy would surely make use of such things and make sure it was known. On the other hand, do you think it’s an achievement for an LA to track a Godavari? Not really uh?
As for the Kilo, believe it or not, the LA is more silent in any environment, no matter whether these pumps are turning or not, at 3-5kts, the speed a Kilo is mostly cruising around, is still within the extreme silent speed of the LA class. And for Kilo tracking it, its worse electrical suite will rather prevent it than the endurance.
ANyway I’m not into arguing with some Indians, if I would have said Algerian or Polish Kilo I wouldn’t have had response, yet the Indians always have to make sure they are best. Of course Kilo is better and Viraat CVBG is much better than any US CVBG, in fact with ADS, India will attack and easily beat USN without any casualties, nothing we didn’t know there yet is there?

Because when they are tracking it, they don’t have an opponent. Simple, if they lease it like they do with the Gotland, they can set up an exercise, test everything they want to test. Now, for a Kilo they can just trail it, keep an eye, but nothing really interesting about it.
USN does follow a lot, in exercises they have the noise generators, no problem for a Godavari, but have you ever heard of a Godavari detecting an LA class that was NOT in an exercise? An exercise also gives a very determined area, not to disturb traffic too much, the LA has to stick to that too, in reality they might even hide among the merchant traffic, be sure you won’t hear an LA when there’s a 50,000hp engine roaring in the area of her. Merchant traffic is not allowed during exercises. So the Godavari, if it really detected it, was really lucky and already in the knowledge of what it was looking for.
As for the Kilo vs LA, a Kilo tracking an LA, sure go and try it. I hope you have a very good navigator and an even better sonarman.

Netherlands Zvaardvis? The Walrus class is already a step ahead of that! Zwaardvis, the improved version of it, is what Taiwan got. Netherlands have four Walrus class SSKs for now.

Swedish subs are excellent when in their normal environment, they were simply not made for Australian waters… The Americans didn’t chose the Swedish Gotland class to practice against because it was a crappy sub you know! They’d have asked India for a Kilo or even the Germans for a 209 or so if those designs were so good. They didn’t so they must have had a reason for choosing that Swedish boat, and it wasn’t cheap…

I don’t recall any Italian loss, are you sure you’re not talking about the Daphné design of which three sank in the Med? That was due to some valve that didn’t close, the problem was detected when the third was sinking, but eventually was saved. (from the top of my head, not sure whether two or three sank and one survived)