Trafalgar class submarine
The Royal Navy's Trafalgar class of nuclear fleet submarines (SSNs) includes seven boats:
Trafalgar (S107),
Turbulent (S87),
Tireless (S88),
Torbay (S90),
Trenchant (S91),
Talent (S92), and
Triumph (S93). It is an attack submarine and is essentially a refinement of the Swiftsure class, designed six years later than its predecessor. The first Trafalgar class submarine was completed in 1983.
The major improvements include a new reactor core and the Type 2020 sonar. Internal layout is near identical to the Swiftsure and it is only 2½ metres longer, but the increased displacement of around 800 tons suggests that a significant amount of extra equipment has been added.
Rather than the seven-bladed propeller used by the Swiftsures, Trafalgar class submarines use pump-jet propulsion - a high pitch, low-revolution propellor which is much quieter but much heavier than conventional propeller designs. Development of this system was not complete in time for installtion in the class's name-ship vessel, HMS Trafalgar, and so the pump-jet was first used in the second in the class, HMS Turbulent.
General Characteristics
- Builder: Vickers Shipbuilding and Engineering Ltd
- Displacement: 4750 tons surfaced, 5208 tons submerged
- Length: 85.4 meters
- Beam: 9.8 meters
- Draught: 9.5 meters
- Complement: 18 officers, 112 ratings
- Propulsion: 1 x PWR 1 pressurized water cooled reactor delivering 15,000 shp for 30 kt max
- Armament: five tubes capable of firing:
- Sensors:
- sonar (bow, flank, active intercept, and towed arrays)
- periscopes (attack and search)
- collision avoidance radar
