Archimede Class Submarine - Design

Design

The ships were designed by the firm Cavallini and were a partially double hulled design. They were an enlarged version of the Settembrini class submarine with ballast tanks rearranged, greater range, fuel and torpedo capacity for ocean service. Like most of the later ocean-going submarines of the Italian navy, their deck armament consisting of two 100 mm guns was conceived to deal with armed merchantmen in surface combat. That was the case of the Marcello class submarine Capellini, which between 5 and 14 January 1941 sank the British steamers Shakespeare and Eumaeus off Cabo Verde after a protracted gunfire action. Another example occurred when the Brin class Torricelli faced three British destroyers and a sloop while surfaced in the Red Sea. Before being sunk, the submarine hit the sloop and damaged the destroyer HMS Khartoum. Khartoum exploded near Perim after a torpedo fault set a fire that reached her magazines later that day. They also mounted two 13.2 mm anti-aircraft machine guns. The number of torpedoes was increased from 12 on the Settembrini class to 16.