Talk:British H-class submarine

Why British?

Why this boats are called "British H class" although they are strictly American H class submarines, just build for Royal Navy? In 1914 the Royal Navy ordered twenty American H class submarines from Electric Boat. To circumvent U.S. neutrality the first ten, ordered in October, were assembled by Canadian Vickers, but the second group, ordered in December, was impounded until the United States entered the war. Four of this group then joined the Royal Navy, while Britain gave five to Chile as compensation for warships under construction in the United Kingdom that had been seized when war began; --Matrek (talk) 10:26, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

Because this is the article about the H class subs in British service, the USN subs are at United States H class submarine. While a US design, twenty five "H"s were built in the UK and their service is covered here rather than overwhelm the Holland 602 article. I've clarified the situation at H class submarine, which is now a disambiguation page. GraemeLeggett (talk) 12:15, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

Okey, I understand that, but this leads to misinterpretation, because it suggest that this is completely different British class of ships just identically named, which is not true because class is the same. And I know, that it also leads to mistakes in some other language Wikipedia's editions, where they are considered exactly as completely different class, because of English language version separates these boats (just mindless translations). To be closer to the truth and without risk of misinterpretation, this article should be named for example "H class submarines in British service", "H class submarines in Russian imperial fleet service", etc., but the best way - in my opinion - is one general article "H class submarines" with with sections devoted to the service of these ships in different fleets. Also, I've seen many books about submarines (i.e. Polmar's, Friedman's, Fontenoy's and others) , and all of them consider these ships as just H class, not "Holland 602 type" (I've never sean that name outside Wikipiedia)- without any difference where the boats were built. Please, look forward - contemporary German boats Type 209 - built by many shipyards around the world - they are still 209 Type submarines, although in service in many countries. Best regards --Matrek (talk) 12:53, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

There is no room for misinterpretation with an opening line as clear as "The British H class submarines were Holland 602 type submarines used by the Royal Navy". You will also note in the article that the third group of H class (built in British yards) are bigger than the others. The naming also comes from the WP:Ships naming convention, it might be worth raising the issue on the project talkpage. GraemeLeggett (talk) 14:58, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

Hm, I'm not native in English, but for me, "HMS H6, was a British H-class submarine of the Royal Navy" in HMS H6 article for example, sounds like "HMS H6 was a submarine of British H-class". --Matrek (talk) 23:26, 28 September 2011 (UTC

Also, "Fresia was an H class submarine of the Chilean Navy. The vessel was originally ordered by the United Kingdom's Royal Navy as HMS H20, but was handed over to Chile in 1917 as H6" - the link from "H class" leads to British H class submarine. This is ridiculous. Did You say above about naming convention and phrase "Ship classes may need to be disambiguated: By nationality: United States Porpoise-class submarine and British Porpoise-class submarine"? So, why don't You guys call Chilean, Italian, Russian and Canadian boats, as Chilean H-class submarines, Russian H-class, etc? --Matrek (talk) 02:52, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

It should be noted as well, that all export version of H class submarines, were designated by Electric Boat as EB-602, not "602", as the opposite of domestic version EB-26. According to Norman Friedman's "US Submarines Trough 1945", p. 69, "Two digits of the EB design number were reversed and separated by zero, so that the export version of EB-26 (the H-boat) was EB-602". What does it mean? In my opinion, it means that all boats exported do United Kingdom, Chile, Canada, Russia and Italy, were EB-602 boats, but not American subs - these were EB-26. Wikipedia says just the opposite. According to en:Wikipedia, American ships were 602 units, but exported ships were "British H class".... It is one of many of errors a series of articles about H-class boats. --Matrek (talk) 02:27, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

The Holland boats built in North America and those built in the UK form the British (the Royal Navy's) "H class". They could have been a mixture of any old designs and if the Admiralty chose to they might still have been grouped in a class of a single name - compare with C class destroyer (1913). GraemeLeggett (talk) 13:30, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but none of the units of H class were built in the UK. The only shipyards building H class, including 20 of British boats, were Union Iron Works (San Francisco), Seattle (Seattle) Canadian Vickers (Montreal, Mikolaiev), Fore River (Quincy) and British Pacific (Vancouver, Petersburg) --Matrek (talk) 13:56, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

J J Colledge disagrees as does the less authoriative but still respected uboat.net. GraemeLeggett (talk) 14:23, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

I,v got different:

Seawolf (6 May 1913), Nautilus (4 June

1913) Builder: Union Iron Works

Garfish (3 June 1913), [Canada]—C C - 1 , CC-2 (1913) Builder: Seattle

[United Kingdom]—H - 1–H- 10 ( 1915), [ I t a l y ] —H- 1 (16 October 1916), H- 2 ( 19 October 1916), H- 3 (26 April 1917), H- 4 (17 April 1917), H- 5 (25 April 1917), H- 6 (23 April 1917), H- 7 (24 April 1917), H- 8 (24 April 1917), [Russia]—AG - 2 1–AG- 26 ( 1917– 1921) Builder: Canadian Vickers

[United Kingdom]—H-11, H-12, H-14, H- 15 (1916), [Chile]—H 1–H 6 (1916) Builder: Fore River

[ Russia]—AG- 11–AG- 15 (1916), [United States]—H-4 (9 October 1918), H-5 (24 September 1918), H-6 (26 August 1918), H-7 (17 October 1918), H-8 (14 November 1918), H-9 (23 November 1918)

Builder: British Pacific

— Paul E. Fontenoy, Submarines: An Illustrated History of Their Impact (Weapons and Warfare), ISBN 1851095632

.. and than, according to the same source:

In 1914 the Royal Navy ordered

twenty similar submarines from Electric Boat. To circumvent U.S. neutrality the first ten, ordered in October, were assembled by Canadian Vickers, but the second group, ordered in December, was impounded until the United States entered the war. Four of this group then joined the Royal Navy, while Britain gave five to Chile as compensation for warships under construction in the United Kingdom that had been seized when war began; Chile also purchased one additional British boat. Italy also placed an order in the summer of 1915 for eight boats supplied

via Canadian Vickers.

--Matrek (talk) 14:35, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

Ok. I have find out what's going on. Fontenoy calls British boat with number higher than H-20, "Improved H class", and these boats were actually build in the UK. He stated as follows:

Vickers developed these boats from the original H-class design by lengthening it to accommodate 21-inch torpedo tubes. The machinery and much of the equipment was identical to that of the earlier boats and was obtained from the same U.S. suppliers for the Vickers craft and from British firms for the others.

But according to Fontenoy, these boats are different class of ships, than first 20 of British boats of H class "Improved H class submarines" --Matrek (talk) 14:57, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

Deck gun

The lead section says Despite their cramped size and lack of a deck gun..., but the picture captioned "H4 at Brindisi, August 1916" clearly shows a gun mounted on the deck, and the infobox has 1 × QF 6 pounder gun (H1–H4 only). Verbcatcher (talk) 01:26, 4 July 2015 (UTC)