# Canadian Aircraft Carriers made of Ice-wow!



## Bfalcon.cf (12 May 2005)

Hey every1
I am currently working on a Canadian History project on the topic of pykrete-or a canadian aircraft carrier made of ice in world war tow (u can still see the smaller scale version of it in the bottom of patricia lake in jaspar!) anyhoo, if some of you can further enlighten me on this topic (local library has crap on it, and not much on the net) that would be great. Here's a link or two for starters
http://www.geocities.com/Broadway/1928/pykrete.htm
http://www.combinedops.com/Pykrete.htm


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## mover1 (12 May 2005)

If you can find the old book by readers digest "Canadians at war" which came in a single book or the more in depth two version book. There was a chapter or related stories which mentioned the Ice Ship. and it had quite the drawing on it too as well at a story on some of the scientists who were working on it. It was one of those ideas that never made it past the testing stages.

Hope this helps


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## jmacleod (12 May 2005)

Go to the Imperial War Museum London UK, for access to PM Churchill's scientific advisor, who
was as I remember it, a Doctor Tizard PhD. There was indeed a plan for an "ice ship" which 
would have been constructed of plywood and covered with ice. I remember seeing RCN and RN
ships in Halifax during the winter's of the forties, covered in ice, especially the Corvettes and
Frigates - never forget the site of HMS "Puncher" a converted freighter aircraft carrier covered
in North Atlantic ice - despite reports to the contrary, salt water freezes, and is a great danger
to especially small ships. The "ice ship" idea however, was laughed out of existance in the
naval Ward Rooms of the period. MacLeod


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## Bfalcon.cf (12 May 2005)

Hey
Ummm, JMcleod, I believe you are mistaken in this topic.  As a matter of fact it was not to be constructed out of plywood and covered in ice, it was infact to be a ship that would displace 2 MILLION tonnes, which was like hundreds of times larger than any other ship of that period. Plywood would never support that. Second of all, this topic refers to project habbukuk which was a project sanctioned by churchill and mountbatten themselves. It was scrapped only after d-day when this was not needed, certainly not out of laughter and ridicule. This was a different wubstance that would withstand anyhting including torpedos. I would like some comment that would actually go into detail rather than skim details please


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## jmacleod (13 May 2005)

You are referring to one of the many ideas put forward by the brilliant but eccentric Dr. Harold
Tizzard Ph.D, whose idea was to indeed construct a vessel of ice - the ice would be formed into
the shape of a landing craft type vessel by constructing a plywood form, pouring in water to form
the ice, removing the plywood, and sailing off into the horizon - no one could quite determine
how to power the ice-ship, whose engines would melt the ice, it was thought. This was one of many
schemes which had no hope of actually being undertaken - it was fraught with too many problems
not the least being the apprehension of ice and vessels at sea, by professional naval and merchant
naval personnel. some of whom from my family commanded Corvettes and Frigates in the North
Atlantic for the entire period of World War II. Tizzard was impressed by the size and density of
North Atlantic icebergs, but I believe spent little time considering the bouyancy characteristics
of icebergs, two thirds of which remain below the ocean surface. I don't think a massive ice boat
for instance could survive a trip from England to Gibralter in any event. You will find additional 
information at the Imperial War Museum, and the BBC did a series on Churchill's "boffins".MacLeod


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## winchable (13 May 2005)

Only a man named Tizzard..


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## pbi (13 May 2005)

jmacleod is right as far as I know. Habbakuk was to be built of a composition of ice and wood fibre (sawdust) and (IIRC) powered by aircraft engines. A trial model was built and tested in Lake Louise, but later sank there. I believe that the metal portions are still on the bottom of the lake. Doesn't really strike me as a particularly good idea for all the effort involved, but then the Allied laboratories of WWII were a fertile ground for many odd ideas.

Cheers.


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## jmacleod (13 May 2005)

The material the ice ship (HMS Habbakuk) was to be constructed of pykrete, a super-ice invented
by Geoffrey Pyke, described by the Times of London "as one of the most original if unrecognixed
figues of the present century". Pykrete is strengthened tremendously by mixing in wood pulp
as it freezes. You will find detailed information about Pyke, his concept, Churchill and Mountbatten
in Cabinet Magazine Online - "The Floating Island" Issue 7, Summer 2002, and in Pyke, the Unknown
Genius, (London:Evans Brothers, 1959), and descriptions of pykrete in various listed papers and
scientific journals. MacLeod


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## Bfalcon.cf (13 May 2005)

jmacleod said:
			
		

> You are referring to one of the many ideas put forward by the brilliant but eccentric Dr. Harold
> Tizzard Ph.D, whose idea was to indeed construct a vessel of ice - the ice would be formed into
> the shape of a landing craft type vessel by constructing a plywood form, pouring in water to form
> the ice, removing the plywood, and sailing off into the horizon - no one could quite determine
> how to power the ice-ship, whose engines would melt the ice, it was thought.


Umm first of all, this had absolutely zilch to do with tizzard, a geoffrey pyke invented this idea, and it was not ice, pyrkete is 14% sawdust and 86% ice. The other thing is, it basically DOE NOT MELT. Engines would not melt pykrete-this substance can last an entire BC SUMMER! without melting, and is virtually indestructible if in enough quantite (see the posted links above). Second, this had nothin to do with your bloody corvettes man, it was for an AIRCRAFT CARRIER. look up project habbukuk on the web, all the sites point to a gigantic aircraft carrier





			
				pbi said:
			
		

> jmacleod is right as far as I know. Habbakuk was to be built of a composition of ice and wood fibre (sawdust) and (IIRC) powered by aircraft engines. A trial model was built and tested in Lake Louise, but later sank there.


As a matter of fact, it did not sink, but rather, it wuz SCUTTLED because of the d-day landings which made a huge aircraft carriers useless (they could get airfields on mainland france).Also, it was patricia lake in jaspar man


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## jmacleod (13 May 2005)

Actually, I have the entire scientific overview of pykerete in front of me. Dr Tizzard was the senior
science advisor to PM Churchill and the British War Cabinet - Geoffrey Pyke would not have gotten
anywhere with his idea without the approval of the science council of the period. Martin Perutz
presented a paper "Description of the Iceberg Aircraft Carrier and the Bearing of Mechanical
Properties of Frozen Wood Pulp Upon Some Problems of Glacier Flow", in the Journal of Glaciology
March, 1948. Dr. Martin Perutz was a colleague of Pyke, and the experimental vessel was built
at Patricia Lake Jasper Alberta. Martin Perutz wrote an article "Enemy Alien" for the New Yorker
12 August 1985 on pp 35-54 Perutz notes that design flaws might have made the Habbakuk
impossible anyway. A lake in Alberta is not the North Atlantic Ocean, and the naval officers of
the period, busy fighting a real war would never have accepted the project in any event. If one
is writing about vessels and oceans, a study of disintegration of ice, and its unstable conditions
is mandatory I would think, but then I am just a consultant in the aerospace and technology sector
with more than thirty years of experience in the industry, plus some years in the design of artificial
islands, groins and breakwaters, using soil stabilization engineeting techniques. MacLeod


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## Bruce Monkhouse (13 May 2005)

Falcon, for someone who is looking for freely given info, you are being rather rude and condensending to those freely giving it. Methinks some apologies should be forthcoming........man.


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## old medic (13 May 2005)

Bfalcon.cf said:
			
		

> As a matter of fact, it did not sink, but rather, it wuz SCUTTLED because of the d-day landings which made a huge aircraft carriers useless (they could get airfields on mainland france).Also, it was patricia lake in jaspar man



It melted and sank. Get your facts straight.
And it wasn't Canadian. It was British, as was most everyone involved.
And it had nothing to do with airfields in France.

 "  In the end, the Habbakuk was never built anyway. Land-based aircraft were attaining longer ranges, U-boats were being hunted down faster than they could be built, and the US was gaining numerous island footholds in the Pacific â â€ all contributing to a reduced need for a vast, floating airfield. And deep within the newly built Pentagon was the knowledge that America already had a secret weapon in development to be used against Japan â â€ an end to the war that would be brought about not by ice but by fire.

The prototype ice-ship, abandoned in Patricia Lake, did not melt until the end of the next summer.  "

I was easily able to find that with a simple search engine on the web. 
I've decided not to give the link, Because I happen to agree with Bruce. Apologies are due... man.


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## Ex-Dragoon (14 May 2005)

Didn't we have the same problem with Mr Falcon back in the winter?


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## jmacleod (14 May 2005)

My final word on this topic - ice melts, sad, but true. MacLeod


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## old medic (14 May 2005)

Ex-Dragoon said:
			
		

> Didn't we have the same problem with Mr Falcon back in the winter?



Shades of : 

http://forums.army.ca/forums/threads/27159.0.html


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## winchable (14 May 2005)

ah yes, the old "Does anyone have any information out of the kindness of their hearts?" "No you're wrong" trick...oldest trick in the book.


Locked


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