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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Longshaor" data-source="post: 68896" data-attributes="member: 254">According to Friedman, the hull for ConForm was intended to be HY-130 with HY-100 as a fall-back if the former wasn't ready in time.The Glenard P Lipscomb was a great example of the ongoing turf war between McNamara's people & Rickover.  Where most military officers could not oppose McNamara because of his position as SecDef, Rickover as an AEC employee could use his Congressional contacts and support - as well as the office of the AEC - to undermine McNamara.  To that end,he forced through the construction of a one-off experimental sub that would never see series production (which is why McNamara tried to kill it) as a sound test bed.  The idea was that if the gear whine inherent in all other USN nuclear subs was removed, the designers would have a "clean" boat to test for other sources of radiated noise.  The net result was a quiet, if very slow, boat.  The DC direct-drive system, known as TEDS, was much larger than originally envisaged, and in service it proved both ineffecient and unreliable.The interesting upshot of this battle was that <blockquote>The TEDS fight did make OSD more wary of attacking Admiral Rickover; as a result, TEDS deeply influenced later decision in favor of Los Angeles.</blockquote>     -Friedman, US Submarines Since 1945, pg. 149.</blockquote>