 S-class submarine S-44
| |
| Class overview | |
|---|---|
| Name | S class |
| Builders | |
| Operators | |
| Preceded by | R class |
| Succeeded by | V-boats |
| Subclasses | Holland, Lake, Navy Yard, 2nd Holland, 2nd Navy Yard |
| Built | 1918–1925 |
| In commission | 1920–1946 |
| Planned | 65 |
| Completed | 51 |
| Cancelled | 14 |
| Lost | 9 |
| Retired | 42 |
| General characteristics | |
| Type | Submarine |
| Displacement | At most 906 tons surfaced, 1230 Submerged |
| Length | 219–240 ft (67–73 m) (S-2 207 ft (63 m)) |
| Beam | 21–22 ft (6.4–6.7 m) |
| Draft | 13 ft 1 in – 16 ft 1 in (3.99–4.9 m)[1] |
| Speed | 14 knots (26 km/h; 16 mph)-15 knots (28 km/h; 17 mph) surfaced |
| Range | 5,000 nmi (9,300 km; 5,800 mi) at 10 kn (19 km/h; 12 mph) surfaced |
| Test depth | 200 ft (61 m) |
| Complement | 38 |
| Armament |
|
The United States' S-class submarines, often simply called S-boats (sometimes "Sugar" boats, after the then-contemporary Navy phonetic alphabet for "S"), were the first class of submarines with a significant number built to United States Navy designs. They made up the bulk of the USN submarine service in the interwar years and could be found in every theater of operations. While not considered fleet submarines, they were the first submarines in the USN designed for open ocean, blue water operations. All previous submarines had been intended for harbor or coastal defense. These boats were intended to have greater speed and range than previous classes, with improved habitability and greater armament.[2]
The S-class were designed during World War I, but not completed until after the war. Many boats of the class remained in service through World War II.
The United States Navy commissioned 51 S-class submarines from 1920 to 1925. The first boat in name sequence, USS S-1 (SS-105), was commissioned in 1920 and the last numerically, USS S-51 (SS-162), in 1922. Severe production difficulties encountered by one of the contractors threw the production sequence into disarray and the last of the class actually commissioned was USS S-47 (SS-158) in September, 1925. The S class is subdivided into four groups of different designs:
- Group I (S-1 class, or "Holland" type): 25 boats, S-1 and S-18 to S-41, built by Bethlehem Steel at Fore River Shipyard in Quincy, Massachusetts and Union Iron Works in San Francisco, California, as subcontractors for the designer, the Electric Boat Company.
- Group II (S-3 class, or "Navy Yard" type): 15 boats, S-3 to S-17, built at the Portsmouth Navy Yard and Lake Torpedo Boat at Bridgeport, Connecticut.
- Group III (S-42 class, or "2nd Holland" type): 6 boats, S-42 to S-47, built at Fore River.
- Group IV (S-48 class, or "2nd Navy Yard" type): 4 boats, S-48 to S-51, built by Lake.
S-2 was a prototype built by Lake, and was not repeated.
The first three boats in name sequence, the S-1, S-2, and S-3, were prototypes authorized in Fiscal Year 1918 and were built to the same specifications: S-1 designed by Electric Boat, S-2 by Lake, and S-3 by the Bureau of Construction and Repair (BuC&R) (later Bureau of Ships).[3] The Electric Boat and BuC&R designs were put into series production in later fiscal year appropriations.
SS-159 to SS-168 (2nd Holland) and SS-173 to SS-176 (2nd Navy Yard) were cancelled and, contrary to later practice, the hull numbers were used for subsequent submarines.[4] Some of the material for these was used by Electric Boat to build the Peruvian Navy's four R-boats.
The first S-boat placed into commission was the S-3 on 30 January 1919, followed (in order) by S-4, S-5, S-6, and S-2.[5] Electric Boat's contractors in Quincy and San Francisco worked in parallel, with the first unit, S-1, built in Quincy and commissioned on 5 June 1920, and the first unit from San Francisco being the USS S-30 (SS-135), commissioned on 29 October 1920.[6]