Originally Posted by
tartare
At an ADFA open day a few years ago, I had a long discussion with a senior RAN submariner.
He hinted they already spend a lot of time cruising around in the South China sea itself - shallow water.
The supposed rationale for diesel electric boats was primarily that they are quieter and smaller than nuclear boats.
The current quietest sub in the world is Swedish and diesel/electric.
I suspect that in the classified world - the capability of long range UUVs is getting to the point that nuclear mother boat will be able to sit in deeper water for months and dispatch loyal seamen (tee hee) to sneak in and do the ultra quiet shallow water stuff.
I wonder whether the RAN will get off the shelf Virginia class boats, or the Astute class and what the weapon load out will be.
The Swedish technology uses a Stirling engine for AIP (air independent power), and according to this article, is battery-powered, not Diesel-powered when it needs to run fast:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/hisutto...h=22d85d532bfb
The German U212A class uses Diesel-electric for speed and fuel cells for quiet AIP:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Type_212_submarine
https://www.bundeswehr.de/de/ausrues...t-klasse-212-a
More background on how these rather small, quiet, shallow-water boats are used here (sorry, you'll need to use autotranslate):
https://www.abendblatt.de/politik/au...nd-machte.html
It does not seem clear which ones are the most quiet. While the first and fourth link mention Swedish AIP and older German Diesel-powered (non AIP) boats breching US defenses in manouvres, this article seems to say the Americans consider theirs to be the most quiet, followed on the heels by Russian boats:
https://www.businessinsider.de/tech/...ennen-2018-10/