[PSUBS-MAILIST] publicity

Sat Jun 20 15:29:19 EDT 2020

Neat history Jon, thanks for sharing!
Rick

On Sat, Jun 20, 2020 at 8:48 AM Jon Wallace via Personal_Submersibles <
personal_submersibles at psubs.org> wrote:

>
> Vance, your memory is excellent.  I opened up the documentation last night
> and started going through it again.  I need to put a timeline together
> since many of the documents are scattered chronologically, but as I said
> earlier, it's pretty obvious that it wasn't a good business relationship
> and in the end everything just fell apart.  I've got some interesting
> pictures of some early subs/experiments, also original negatives and even a
> few original Ektachrome slides (remember those??) of the K600 being hoisted
> by a crane.  I'm tempted to create a K600 archive to memorialize the
> project on the website but I'm not sure anyone else is really interested in
> the history.  I wonder how your memory corresponds to what I am seeing in
> the documents and if there are any details you might be able to fill in.
>
> An outline:
> 2/19/76 - George Kittredge and SUB SERVICE of Alesund Norway represented
> by Robert Hartnett, and Leiv Busaet, enter into a contract for
> "...development of a small submarine having a maximum operating depth of
> six hundred (600) feet, to be designed for use in the oil industry or such
> other uses as may be profitable to SUB SERVICE and adaptable by KITTREDGE.
> This submarine is known as the K-600 series submarine and shall include the
> current prototype K-600 and such modifications as are approved by
> KITTREDGE".
>
> Interestingly, SUB SERVICE was not an incorporated business at this time
> with Hartnett and Busaet signing the contract in their individual
> capacities.  The contract was to be adopted by SUB SERVICE after
> incorporation.  Initial payment was $30,000 (equivalent to $130,000 today)
> and he did not receive the balance until December 1980.  Kittredge wanted
> certification by ABS, SUB SERVICE insisted on Det Norske Veritas (now
> DNV-GL).  However Veritas appears to have been difficult to work with given
> some letters I have between Kittredge and Hartnett.  According to those
> letters Veritas was slow to respond to approval of plans and neither party
> had confidence that Veritas had enough experience with submarines to
> properly certify the vessel.  At one point Kittredge traveled to Oslo
> Norway and met directly with Veritas engineers and there is talk from
> Hartnett about Kittredge having to educate them in how to certify a
> submarine.  This must be why they ended up with Lloyds although I haven't
> seen any documents specifically addressing the change to Lloyds.
>
> 3/1/79 - Kittredge had a contract written to license manufacturing of the
> K-600 to SUB SERVICE anywhere in the world except USA.  It looks to me like
> this was initiated by SUB SERVICE, whom were seeking to partner with
> Offshore Inspection Ltd of Glasgow, Scotland, to manufacture, market, sell,
> and maintain K-600 submarines within UK and Ireland.  According to the
> contract, SUB SERVICE would produce ten K-600 vessels per year, for three
> years.  Kittredge would receive 20% of the construction costs for each
> submarine as well as an hourly wage for writing and producing operation and
> maintenance manuals.  SUB SERVICE was seeking a 50% profit margin on each
> submarine.  Stipulations, and if you knew George you likely aren't
> surprised by this, were that each manufacturing license required approval
> by Kittredege "...in writing on a submarine by submarine basis" and "...no
> modification whatsoever of the submarine known as the K-600 series without
> the consent in writing of KITTREDGE".  Even though this is a contract
> created by Kittredge in response to a business proposal by SUB SERVICE, I
> do not have a signed copy of the contract.  And since no additional K-600's
> were ever produced I think we can conclude that he either never signed the
> contract or never gave approval for a license.  I suspect the former simply
> because by this time the submarine was physically complete but he still had
> not received the balance payment for the vessel.  My guess is he wasn't
> going to sign anything until he got final payment for the existing K-600
> but had the contract drawn up as a carrot.
>
> 6/21/79 - The K-600 is approved for certification by Lloyds.
>
> 12/1/79 - SUB SERVICE tells Kittredge they have a buyer from England for
> the K-600 and two people want to travel to Maine to see the sub in
> operation.  The buyers arrive 12/10/79 and on 12/11/79 Kittredge launches
> the K-600 in Penobscot Bay and demos the submarine.  The men tell Kittredge
> they will be purchasing it from SUB SERVICE for $125,000 and leave
> confident that the transaction will proceed.  Obviously it doesn't, however
> there's no documentation on who these folks represented or why the sale
> ultimately failed.
>
> 12/11/80 - After Many letters of promised dates for the payment balance
> and many letters to lawyers on both sides, SUB SERVICE takes delivery from
> Kittredge about 18 months after it was ready.  At the same time, SUB
> SERVICE along with Kittredge met with Bath Iron Works in Maine and reached
> an agreement whereby BIW would manufacture 10 submarine basic hulls which
> Kittredge would finish and then ship to Europe.  It appears this never
> developed into a contract or production.
>
> About a week later Kittredge wrote SUB SERVICE asking what their intention
> was for the other ten submarines they agreed to purchase in their original
> 1976 contract.  Kittredge added that he was willing to release them from
> the agreement if they would mutually release him from the agreement.  I
> have the release document that Kittredge had drawn up, not have a signed
> copy of it.  In 1982-83 SUB SERVICE had internal strife and Hartnett
> informs Kittredge he is taking legal action against some of the other
> owners over misplaced funds.  It's at this point I assume the company
> eventually failed.  Whether because of the release agreement or the failure
> of the company, no other K-600's were built.
>
> As late as 1983, Hartnett was still writing Kittredge about potential
> K-900 and K-1000, seemingly ready to strike out on his own.  Kittredge
> responded at one point that he was 65 and retired.
>
> Jon
>
>
> On 6/18/2020 10:38 AM, via Personal_Submersibles wrote:
>
> Very cool. And I'm pretty sure George thought the Norwegian owners were
> dreaming. Their idea was to put a sub on every rig complex in the North
> Sea, and operate them with only small boats for comms and support. They
> could have asked me. I'd have told them a little about winter gales and 5-8
> meter seas. Aside from a bad idea at the start, what really happened was
> that ROV technology caught up. The oil companies and engineers liked people
> in subs, but the lawyers and insurance companies did not. George had a heck
> of a time reacquiring the 600. It got hung up in legalese in Norway and was
> going to be junked, or just stuck in a corner somewhere and forgotten. It
> was and is (arguably) the nicest sub George ever built, so I was happy to
> see it saved, and very pleased indeed when you snagged it.
> Vance
>
>
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