Hellmuth Walter - Entrepreneur

Entrepreneur

After working for some time at the Germaniawerft shipyard in Kiel, Walter branched out on his own in 1934 to form his own company, Hellmuth Walter Kommanditgesellschaft (HWK, or Walter-Werke), to further research and development of his ideas. That same year, he made a proposal to the Oberkommando der Kriegsmarine (OKM – Naval High Command) suggesting that a submarine powered by one of these engines would have considerable speed advantages over the conventional combination of diesel engine(s) for surface running and electric motor(s) while submerged. The proposal was met with much scepticism, but Walter persisted, and in 1937 showed his plans to Karl Dönitz, who was able to assist in obtaining a contract to produce a prototype. Construction started in 1939 on a small research submarine designated the V-80. When it was launched in 1940, the submarine demonstrated a top speed of 23 knots submerged, twice that of any submarine in the world at the time. Despite these spectacular results, problems with the production, supply, and safe handling of hydrogen peroxide prevented wide-scale implementation of Walter’s revolutionary engine. In the end, only a handful of German Type XVII submarines were built using this engine, and none saw combat.