[HN Gopher] Torpedo juice: Legendary, illegal WWII liquor drunk ...
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Torpedo juice: Legendary, illegal WWII liquor drunk in Alaska and
the world
Author : speckx
Score : 113 points
Date : 2024-12-17 03:28 UTC (2 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.adn.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.adn.com)
| aq9 wrote:
| More recent analog: https://simpleflying.com/tupolev-tu-22-booze-
| carrier-why/
| m463 wrote:
| "American torpedoes utilized 180-proof ethyl alcohol as fuel for
| the miniature steam engines that drove them toward their
| targets."
|
| I wonder if this was by design ...
|
| I think isopropyl alcohol is probably generally available/popular
| only because it is not drinkable.
| ethbr1 wrote:
| Apparently modern US production ratios for ethyl vs isopropyl
| alcohols are roughly 100:1.
|
| Expect they would have been the same during the war era, hence
| engineering torpedos to run on a more widely available fuel.
| lazide wrote:
| It's currently that way because of ethanol in fuel correct?
| It seems unlikely it would have been that way during WW2?
| cyberax wrote:
| Ethyl alcohol is _cheap_. You literally need just a bunch of
| sugar, yeast, and a still. Straightforward, low-tech, and safe.
|
| Isopropyl alcohol needs to be synthesized from acetone, which
| itself is synthesized.
| kleton wrote:
| Acetone-butanol-ethanol fermentation was itself a critical
| WWI technology, as cordite required acetone. That
| fermentation process requires only sugars and an
| acetobutylicum strain. The first president of Israel
| developed this process.
| pfdietz wrote:
| Yes, Chaim Weizmann.
|
| When was this supplanted by the cumene process?
|
| EDIT: this process was developed from 1939-1945.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cumene_process
|
| https://shop.tarjomeplus.com/UploadFileEn/TPLUS_EN_2421.pdf
|
| BTW, isopropyl alcohol is industrially produced from
| propylene, not acetone.
| lupusreal wrote:
| I don't know how the balance broke down during WW2, but
| synthesis of ethanol from ethylene in more recent times is
| economically competitive with fermentation. So for instance,
| fermentation of sugarcane is easily cheaper in Brazil, but in
| America most industrial ethanol came from synthesis until
| corn subsidies were introduced in the 80s which made
| fermentation cheaper than synthesis.
| pfdietz wrote:
| The US has ample ethane now (it's abundant in much fracked
| gas) so I suspect this synthesized ethanol would be
| superior here without the corn subsidies.
| n8henrie wrote:
| Isopropyl is drinkable (and highly intoxicating). Just very
| unpleasant to drink and highly irritating to the mucosa.
| RajT88 wrote:
| If I recall correctly, a politician's wife back in the 80's
| was hospitalized for drinking isopropyl.
|
| (Just looked it up on Wikipedia - I recall correctly)
| ryandvm wrote:
| "When it comes to drinking rubbing alcohol, the digestive
| tract suffers the most, even when only swallowing a small
| amount. The body metabolizes these extremely high alcohol
| levels into acetone. If consumed to intoxication, the
| substance can lead to organ damage. Because it's a central
| nervous system depressant, side effects can include
| dizziness, headaches and inebriation. Because it's a
| gastrointestinal irritant, it can cause nausea, abdominal
| pain and vomiting blood. In addition, "due to having a higher
| molecular weight than ethanol, isopropanol, is more
| intoxicating than ethanol and can produce an altered
| sensorium, hypotension, hypothermia, and even cardiopulmonary
| collapse. Hypotension is associated with severe overdose and
| related to a mortality rate of nearly 45 percent," according
| to the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI).
|
| I am not sure I would call that "drinkable", unless you just
| mean it will physically go down your gullet.
| theophrastus wrote:
| What was the source of the oxygen to maintain ethyl alcohol
| combustion in a sealed WWII torpedo?
| ceejayoz wrote:
| Compressed air. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torpedo#Wet-
| heater
| ranger207 wrote:
| There's a story from the USS Drum (now a museum ship in Mobile,
| Alabama) that the skipper eventually gave up trying to get his
| crew to stop drinking the torpedo juice, and just ordered them to
| leave enough alcohol for a 1,500 yard range (out of 4,500yd or
| 9,000yd at slower speeds). Their success rate actually went up as
| a result, because they were making shots from much closer in.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZQ-uMspz5c
| killingtime74 wrote:
| That's good leadership
| gullywhumper wrote:
| The museum also includes the battleship USS Alabama, a good
| collection of aircraft, and then some tanks, artillery, and
| other equipment. My grandpa took me there every summer as a kid
| and I could never get enough.
| gadtfly wrote:
| See also the Mark 14 torpedo, the primary American torpedo in
| WWII, which didn't actually work for the first 2 years of the war
| because they had never bothered to actually test it because it
| would be too expensive.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_14_torpedo
| CoastalCoder wrote:
| There's a building at NUWC Division Newport that's designed to
| survive a direct hit from a 500 lb bomb.
|
| The joke is they had to build it to survive attack from Navy
| crews that were livid about the quality of the torpedoes built
| there.
| cdot2 wrote:
| If I remember correctly part of the issue was that they used
| magnetic detector based firing systems and only tested them off
| the coast of California. When they fired them elsewhere the
| Earth's magnetic field was different enough that the detonators
| failed.
| knute wrote:
| Not only did the magnetic fuses not work, the impact fuses
| would collapse and fail if the torpedo made a direct hit. And
| the torpedoes would consistently run deeper than they were
| set to. US torpedoes in the early stages of the war were
| nearly completely ineffective.
| jvanderbot wrote:
| I had never heard that theory before!
|
| FWIW, everyone in the beginning of WWII had magnetic
| detonator / torpedo problems, so it couldn't be _just_ that.
| They were difficult to depth-keep _just right_ to pass under
| a ship but within detection, for one thing. The sub captain
| had to correctly identify the ship, look up the draft, and
| call down to manually set the depth keeping. (Good luck in
| the swells of north atlantic). Often it just didn 't use that
| depth anyway, due again to issues with design/testing.
|
| The contact detonators had their own issues, for one they
| couldn't explode at an oblique angle, instead needed near-
| right-angle impact - but even then had a high dud ratio.
|
| So, in theory the magnetic ones were preferable, even though
| standard doctrine was to fire for right-angle impact
| regardless (it makes evasion much more difficult, for one
| thing).
| mrguyorama wrote:
| >because it would be too expensive.
|
| Specifically, they didn't want to waste 1-10 torpedoes for
| testing, which maybe that can be defensible, but it became
| utterly indefensible when every single submarine came back from
| patrol with reports of "we launched a spread of 4 torps, 2 hit
| the hull of the enemy ship, zero detonations".
|
| The lost value in un-sunk enemy shipping, the number of dead
| seaman that should have come back victorious, the number of
| subs that got sunk after an attack utterly failed, all were
| individually prices that dwarfed a single Mk14 torpedo, and
| together had a measurable impact on war performance.
|
| All because the bureau of ordinance basically refused to hear
| any feedback.
|
| Nearly every single component of the torpedo was unfit for
| service. The magnetic exploder didn't work. The contact
| detonator was nearly incapable of working because of the
| physics of torpedo impacts in a way that meant getting a
| perpendicular hit, which was considered optimal, actually was
| less likely to detonate. The depth keeping system was
| calibrated incorrectly, due to module integration mistakes, and
| ran 10 feet deeper than it was supposed to in some cases.
|
| It's actually kind of common for US military procurement to
| produce a somewhat failed piece of equipment initially, but it
| usually gets modified and iterated on and improved to the point
| of being very respectable hardware in short order. The refusal
| of BuOrd to hear feedback is the real problem here. Their
| insane delays in fielding and responding to feedback cost real
| US lives. Once the torpedo was fixed up, the American sub fleet
| in the pacific ran roughshod over Japanese supply and utterly
| crippled their abilities to maintain control over the island
| chains.
|
| The reason BuOrd gave for refusing to double check their work
| as these scathing reports came in? You see, the navy was
| struggling to produce enough torpedoes to meet requirements, so
| we can't waste a couple for testing. Instead, HUNDREDS of
| outright non-functioning torpedoes were sent to the bottom of
| the pacific, completely wasted, with almost no hope of actually
| working, because they were never tested.
|
| The entire situation should be required reading for anyone in
| management, anywhere. Textbook case of penny smart, pound
| foolish.
| natmaka wrote:
| In France, around 1985, an old man said to me that just after WW2
| he was, as a French soldier, working in Germany in some airfield
| or military site which was then used to host Allied soldiers of
| various nationalities.
|
| They had a problem with Soviet soldiers dying due to some
| poisonous/toxic substance they consumed.
|
| It lasted for days, maybe weeks. Nobody had a clue.
|
| Then they realized that some/many Soviet soldiers had discovered
| a tank containing jet fuel and secretly drank from it. Those who
| drank too much or were too weak just died, but other ones weren't
| deterred.
| namanyayg wrote:
| Why were people even drinking jet fuel? Did it have any
| psychotropic effects?
| genocidicbunny wrote:
| My guess: jet fuel is commonly kerosene, which if ingested
| (especially at somewhat palatable dilutions) will majorly
| fuck you up, but with effects that can somewhat mimic being
| drunk. That said, it's also going to fry your liver, kidneys,
| and pretty much anything else, but if you were already a
| conscript that spent 26 hours a day in a state somewhere
| between unconscious and drunk, a little kerosene nightcap
| might be just the thing. And if you ended up in the
| infirmary, at least they'd change the sheets between patients
| -- no such luxury in the barracks.
|
| Some universities in the USSR, especially ones that dealt
| with electronics and silicon manufacturing, would keep their
| solvents under strict lock and key. Mostly because the
| military 'cadets' tended to pretty quickly consume any
| solvents that didn't immediately kill them.
| natmaka wrote:
| Indeed! The man who told me this did not know the reason
| but his hypothesis was indeed that they wanted to get
| drunk.
|
| Thank you for the details. I heard about Russian women
| hiding their perfumes for men not to find (and drink)
| them...
| rightbyte wrote:
| It is funny how putting on a uniform instantly makes you
| ... stupid. It is like a part of your brain shuts off. The
| social behaviour regress to like 5th grade in adult men.
|
| Like of someone tells you you tie your shoes in the wrong
| way you become a child mentally or something.
| lupusreal wrote:
| It's probably not the clothing, but rather some aspect of
| the circumstance that coincides with the uniform (such
| as, loss of freedom.)
| rightbyte wrote:
| Oh ye ofc. There are many normal professions with
| uniforms.
|
| But when you are in it, putting on the uniform is the
| magic transition between the real you and vice corpral
| Rightbyte.
|
| Loss of freedom is certainly the main factor.
| genocidicbunny wrote:
| Being a Soviet/Russian conscript is a terrible fucking
| lot in life. Being raped, beaten, denigrated was and
| remains extremely common. You're taken from wherever you
| had probably spent your whole life, thrown into a shitty
| uniform, shipped off like cattle to wherever it is that
| the motherland needs you, and used as an inanimate tool
| until you were either too broken and destroyed to
| function anymore, or you had managed to survive to the
| end of your term.
|
| Alcoholism was and remains rampant, and in many cases
| even encouraged, as to keep the system 'lubricated'.
| Getting shitfaced on whatever you could find that'd get
| you there quickly is just an extension of that.
| scottLobster wrote:
| You clearly don't know many people in uniform, to make
| that sort of sweeping generalization.
| rightbyte wrote:
| I am a NCO in the reserve. I am speaking from experience
| and I can add that I am not arguing I am smart and others
| are stupid.
|
| Note, that my emphasis is on the system that make people
| behave strange.
|
| It is somewhat ironic too, since being a soldier exposes
| you to so many practical and different problems that are
| so different each time that there is no room to be
| actually stupid.
|
| And I am not talking about combat, but mundane stuff
| like, tying a rope between two trees to hang wet cloths
| on. In normal life people that would fail at stuff like
| this can get routine and hide that they can't do such
| tasks without messing up, but soldiers do so much
| different things that they don't get routine and if you
| are a bit off you are exposed.
|
| If you are the kinda guy that can tie ropes between trees
| to dry cloths on, the military structure makes you behave
| like you would have been "stupid" in many situation that
| only is a problem because you lack power.
|
| So Soviet or American sailors, that wanted booze but had
| no way to get it, solved it in the way they could. In
| civilian life they could just not have put them self in
| the situation where they couldn't buy booze.
|
| Hazing is maybe a big problem since you are locked in
| with some jocks you can't escape since the front gate is
| guarded by MP.
|
| Simple as that. The limitations make you stupid.
| snozolli wrote:
| I saw Russians depicted as drinking brake fluid in _Beast
| of War_ and couldn 't believe it. A few searches proved it
| true!
|
| Here's an excerpt from "Inside the Soviet Army in
| Afghanistan" by Alexander Alexiev (US Army document):
|
| _You cannot imagine what they drink. They will drink
| shaving lotions and cologne. That 's good stuff. Then they
| will drink toothpaste. The best one is the Bulgarian
| Pomorin brand. They will simply squeeze four or five tubes
| in a jar, dilute it with water and drink it. They also
| drank truck antifreeze, glue, and brake fluid. The brake
| fluid they used to heat up and put some nails in it for
| some reason. I don't know why. They will also take shoe
| polish and smear it on a piece of bread and leave it in the
| sun until the alcohol separates from the shoe polish. Then
| you eat the bread and get drunk._
| int_19h wrote:
| There's a legendary Russian recipe for drinking brake
| fluid. I've seen claims that this goes as far back as
| WW2, with Soviet soldiers using their Mosin rifles to
| treat German brake fluid in this manner.
|
| 1. Be someplace very cold.
|
| 2. Find a steel crowbar or something similar (metal and
| long).
|
| 3. Stick it in a bucket.
|
| 4. Drip brake fluid onto the exposed end such that the
| liquid flows slowly along the surface into the bucket.
|
| This supposedly filters out most of the chemicals as they
| freeze onto the cold metal surface, leaving the liquid in
| the bucket drinkable.
|
| I would strongly advise against actually trying this for
| real, though.
| kdmtctl wrote:
| One can't drink glue. You need to make a mixer head
| (drill and wire is OK) and collect the solid dissolved
| mass on it. The rest you can drink.
| russell_h wrote:
| I read somewhere that some Soviet jets used huge quantities
| of alcohol for cooling.
| echoangle wrote:
| Specifically the Tu-22 is known for this.
| kevin_thibedeau wrote:
| Many of the Russian fighters still in active service have
| alcohol coolant. The ground crews are reputed to partake
| when they want a tipple.
| p_l wrote:
| MiG-21 radars used high quality pure ethanol in
| evaporating cooling system
| natmaka wrote:
| Some did, however there were no Soviet jets at the time of
| this story.
| genocidicbunny wrote:
| Still do, though these days they're a little more
| efficient, so it's only the flight crew that needs to be
| cooled with that alcohol.
| nicbou wrote:
| I read the same story from Anthony Beevor's book about the
| battle of Berlin, although I think it was a different chemical.
| The Red Army seemed to have a drinking problem.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > The Red Army seemed to have a drinking problem.
|
| s/seemed to have/has had and still has/
|
| Life in Soviet/Russian armies is grim. Many of the recruits
| come from remote regions so poor that they lack fridges,
| washing machines and even toilets (today as well [2], hence
| all the looting in Ukraine [3]). Broken-down equipment -
| either because it was crap from the factory or because
| someone along the chain sold off parts and fuel on the black
| market -, substandard equipment, shoddy living conditions,
| and on top of all of that (which would turn most Western
| soldiers into alcoholics already) come brutal hazing rituals
| [1] that traumatise those who manage to survive it (there's
| _tens of thousands_ of incidents a year, and as late as 2006
| hundreds of deaths a year), and the meatwave battle strategy
| that both past and current leadership have embraced.
|
| No wonder that the Russian / Soviet / Russian army has always
| been associated with alcoholism, most of them self-medicate
| with it (or whatever other drugs they can get their hands
| on). And it's also no surprise given the traumatisation that
| many of the Russian soldiers act completely depraved on the
| battlefield - why not rape, torture and kill for fun, when
| you're probably not going to survive the war long enough to
| get held accountable?
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dedovshchina
|
| [2] https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2019/04/02/indoor-
| plumbing-st...
|
| [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Looting_by_Russian_forces_d
| uri...
| pnutjam wrote:
| Look for a copy of Zinky Boys. It shows the conditions for
| Soviet soldiers during the Afghan war, I think it hasn't
| changed much.
| ahartmetz wrote:
| Don't forget shitty leadership - harsh, anti-intellectual,
| and expecting obedienece, not initiative.
| W-Stool wrote:
| Where have I heard that before?
| fvvybfbfbyg wrote:
| > today as well
|
| To be fair it's hard to reconcile with them being paid
| relatively high wages due to manpower shortages (since they
| are generally reluctant to send conscripts into Ukraine).
| cafard wrote:
| According to my father, a number of GIs blinded or otherwise
| injured themselves experimenting with antifreeze around VE day.
| saalweachter wrote:
| Alcoholism in Russia, and most of the former USSR is just like,
| real bad. The sex ratio in Russia is something like 80 men :
| 100 women, and it's mostly due to alcohol.
| mock-possum wrote:
| Do women not drink? Or are men somehow more susceptible?
| saalweachter wrote:
| > Do women not drink?
|
| Kinda, sorta? The global data is roughly "the more
| patriarchal a society is, the less women drink".
|
| > Or are men somehow more susceptible?
|
| That's also possible, but it's hard to suss out of the
| data, because the cultural aspects are so large. In some
| countries, alcohol use is like an order of magnitude higher
| for men than women, and in others it's roughly equal.
| rob74 wrote:
| TIL:
|
| > _Alcohol proof (usually termed simply "proof" in relation to a
| beverage) is a measure of the content of ethanol (alcohol) in an
| alcoholic beverage. The term was originally used in England and
| from 1816 was equal to about 1.75 times the percentage of alcohol
| by volume (ABV)._
|
| (from Wikipedia)
| ninalanyon wrote:
| That omits entirely the origin and meaning of the word proof in
| this context.
|
| Proof originally related to _proving_ that the alcohol content
| was of such a degree that excise duty was due not to actually
| _measuring_ the alcohol content.
|
| "In 16th-century England, the original test involved soaking a
| pellet of gunpowder with the liquor. If it was still possible
| to ignite the wet gunpowder, the alcohol content of the liquor
| was rated above proof and it was taxed at a higher rate, and
| vice versa if the powder failed to ignite."
| https://homepages.uc.edu/~jensenwb/reprints/111.%20Proof.pdf
| rglullis wrote:
| When Ethanol started being used as car fuel in Brazil (in the
| 70's), there were not life-threatening additives on it, so of
| course some people would use it to mix with drinks.
|
| The practice only stopped in the late 80's when there was a
| supply crisis and Brazil had to import _methanol_ and the TV
| started reporting cases of people going blind due to severe
| methanol poisoning.
| folli wrote:
| Methanol is a biproduct of fermentation, and will be part of
| the destillate if not done carefully.
|
| I doubt that ethanol used in car and torpedo fuel will go
| through the same quality control than drinking alcohol.
| rglullis wrote:
| This is why I've written _severe_ poisoning. It was never a
| healthy thing to do, but it took a case of "shit, people are
| actually going blind because of this" for it to stop.
| potato3732842 wrote:
| The torpedo grade ethanol (fuel grade alcohol generally)
| necessitates quality control than ethanol for consumption
| because it has to pair with a precise number of oxygen
| molecules (which in the case of a torpedo are pre-allocated
| so you can't just tolerate it running lean or rich without a
| huge change in range) and produce known energy in the process
| and calling a bunch of subs and ships back to have their
| ethanol tested because you put out a bad batch is a way
| bigger PITA than telling a bunch of distributors to trash
| product and collect a refund.
|
| If unsafe for humans amounts of methanol in the product was
| tolerable for the torpedos they would have just done that to
| prevent consumption.
|
| The cleanliness and hygiene controls along the way are going
| to be lesser. It's not like it's being made in a food
| factory.
| vanderZwan wrote:
| > _The cleanliness and hygiene controls along the way are
| going to be lesser. It 's not like it's being made in a
| food factory._
|
| Sincere question: isn't "hygiene" usually referring only to
| bacteria, viruses and other organic contamination? Don't
| get me wrong, I'm with you that I'd worry about
| contamination with all kinds of _other_ toxic stuff.
| dec0dedab0de wrote:
| No, hygiene means anything done for the purpose of
| maintaining good health. It is commonly used as a synonym
| for cleanliness.
| wildzzz wrote:
| Probably more like trace amounts of heavy metals and
| other things like benzene or residue from other
| substances from the vessels. Stuff that would be awful to
| consume but likely won't make much of a difference in
| fuel. Like with anything else, the price will increase
| for how ever pure you need the substance to be. Using
| alcohol as a solvent doesn't require much purity, any
| other alcohols in the mix will still do the job. If you
| want to be able to drink it, then the alcohol needs to be
| as pure as possible.
| crazygringo wrote:
| You really got me wondering about that. I can't find a
| definitive answer, but Wikipedia certainly suggests it
| is:
|
| > The terms cleanliness and hygiene are often used
| interchangeably, which can cause confusion. In general,
| _hygiene refers to practices that prevent spread of
| disease-causing organisms._ Cleaning processes (e.g.,
| handwashing) remove infectious microbes as well as dirt
| and soil, and are thus often the means to achieve
| hygiene.
|
| > Home hygiene pertains to the hygiene practices that
| _prevent or minimize the spread of disease_ at home and
| other everyday settings such as social settings, public
| transport, the workplace, public places, and more.
| Hygiene in a variety of settings plays an important role
| in _preventing the spread of infectious diseases_.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hygiene
|
| It does seem like hygiene controls are going to be
| concerned exclusively with infectious disease, while
| cleanliness is going to prevent broader contamination of
| anything toxic.
| oakwhiz wrote:
| If I recall correctly, there might be benzene remaining in
| the alcohol from the water removal process.
| devilbunny wrote:
| Benzene really only shows up in traces if you're trying to
| get absolute ethanol (100%). You can distill up to 95%
| ethanol (the EtOH-water azeotrope) without introducing
| anything else.
| ordu wrote:
| Ethanol is an antidote for methanol. Methanol is a very
| poisonous by itself, but when mixed with ethanol, its
| consumption might end without long term consequences like
| blindness or death. The deadliness of their mix depends on a
| ratio, I believe that 50/50 is survivable.
|
| So if you are not very picky when it comes to drinks, it
| doesn't really matter if your ethanol has 10% of methanol.
| next_xibalba wrote:
| Depicted in the 2012 Paul Thomas Anderson movie "The Master" - a
| movie I love for reasons I don't understand.
| eschulz wrote:
| https://archive.is/cGLMS
| jcgrillo wrote:
| The Navy medical corps that deployed with the Marines in Korea
| deliberately used pure (not denatured) ethyl alcohol because they
| knew if they put stuff in it the soldiers would drink it anyway.
| Better not to poison them.
| veggieroll wrote:
| I wonder if you can heat up a nice hotpot from that torpedo
| juice.
| int_19h wrote:
| There's a similar story about Soviet hard drives.
|
| See, the early hard drives used in Soviet computers required a
| lot of manual maintenance, which included cleaning the heads with
| ethanol. They also topped out at ~5Mb.
|
| In late 80s these were gradually replaced with imported Western
| hardware that offered more storage for less. In some places, the
| engineers in charge of servicing those things got creative and
| used such upgrades as an excuse to up their ethanol quota. After
| all, if a 5Mb HDD needs N ml of ethanol to service daily, it
| stands to reason that a 20Mb HDD needs N*4, right?
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