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WW2 Torpedo Anti counterrmining mechanisms

Dronic69

Well-Known Member
Premium Member
Evening All,

One of the reported WW2 ship's defense against a torpedo attack was to drop depth charges in-front of the incoming torpedo with the purpose of activating the Torpedo's Anti Countermining mechanism.

An anti-countermining mechanism was a mechanism within the torpedo pistol to detect the shock waves from a nearby exploding torpedo (i.e. salvo firing) in order to prevent premature detonation before reaching the target.

The intention of course was to time the depth charge to explode activating the torpedo's anti-countermining mechanism thereby striking the ship in a deactivated state before the impeller transverses far enough to re-activate the exploder.

The mechanism as in the case of the attached photo of the Japanese Type 2 Exploder, was a rubber diagram which flexed against strong spring pressure and a system of levers, resulting in a "safety wedge" preventing the firing of the exploder. The impeller then runs the wedge outwards again during the next 21 revolutions.

Sounds great in theory, however I'm curious how practical this was and did it ever worked against an incoming torpedo?

If anyone has any information on this, would be most interested.

Thanks
Cheers
Drew
 

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This is knew to me and incredibly fascinating. Pretty amazing research! Hope more information develops.

Jason
 
Yes, this is new to me too and very interesting indeed. Thank you Dronic69. Frank
 
Yes fascinating indeed!

I stumbled across a single reference to the above (transcript) while investigating the "anti-countermining" functionality - of course do you think I can find it again!!!! (LOL)

Bear in mind that the Japanese for example had a couple of different exploders (i.e. Type 90 / Type 91 etc) which did not have the anti-countermining mechanism incorporated, it appears to have been only the Exploder Type 2, so dropping a depth charge(s) in that case certainly would not have worked - I guess desperate times needed desperate measures.............

Seems a few countries had incorporate the anti-countermining type mechanism - another example is the US Mk 4 Mod 1 Exploder - I'll post some related extracts and photos from the Mk13-1 Aircraft Torpedo Instruction Pamphlet.

Cheers
Drew
 
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For those interested, here are some extracts on the US Mk13-1 aircraft torpedo's ant-countermining mechanism

Cheers
Drew
 

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Here is an interesting insight by Lieutenant Commander J.W Cole of the USS Skipjack having concerns that the anti-countermining de-activation period of 5 secs was far to long and if the Japanese got wind of it could drop depth charges to activate the anti-countermining feature:

(Extract from the Book: "Iron Men and Tin Fish")
 

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