USS Sargo (SS-188)

History
Builder:	Electric Boat Company, Groton, Connecticut
Laid down:	12 May 1937
Launched:	6 June 1938
Commissioned:	7 February 1939
Decommissioned:	22 June 1946
Struck:	19 July 1946
Fate:	Sold for scrap, 19 May 1947
General characteristics
Class and type:	Sargo-class composite diesel-hydraulic and diesel-electric submarine
Displacement:	1,450 long tons (1,470 t) standard, surfaced 2,350 long tons (2,390 t) submerged
Length:	310 ft 6 in (94.64 m)
Beam:	26 ft 10 in (8.18 m)
Draft:	16 ft 7 1⁄2 in (5.067 m)
Propulsion:	4 × Hooven-Owens-Rentschler (H.O.R.) 9-cylinder diesel engines (two hydraulic-drive, two driving electrical generators) 2 × 126-cell Sargo batteries 4 × high-speed General Electric electric motors with reduction gears two shafts 5,500 shp (4.1 MW) surfaced 2,740 shp (2.0 MW) submerged
Speed:	21 knots (39 km/h) surfaced 8.75 knots (16 km/h) submerged
Range:	11,000 nautical miles (20,000 km) at 10 knots (19 km/h)
Endurance:	48 hours at 2 knots (3.7 km/h) submerged
Test depth:	250 ft (76 m)
Complement:	5 officers, 54 enlisted
Armament:	8 × 21-inch (533 mm) torpedo tubes  (four forward, four aft)  24 torpedoes 1 × 3-inch (76 mm) / 50 caliber deck gun four machine guns

USS Sargo (SS-188), the lead ship of her class of submarine, was the first ship of the United States Navy to be named for the sargo.

Her keel was laid on 12 May 1937 by the Electric Boat Company in Groton, Connecticut. She was launched on 6 June 1938 sponsored by Mrs. Catherine V. Nimitz, wife of Captain Chester W. Nimitz, and commissioned on 7 February 1939, Lieutenant E. E. Yeomans in command.

Sargo was the first vessel equipped with a new lead-acid battery designed by the Bureau of Steam Engineering (BuEng) to resist battle damage, based on a suggestion by her commissioning commanding officer, Lieutenant E. E. Yeomans. It quickly became known as the "Sargo battery". Instead of a single hard rubber case, it had two concentric hard rubber cases with a layer of soft rubber between them. This was to prevent sulfuric acid leakage in the event one case cracked during depth-charging. Leaking sulfuric acid would be capable of corroding steel, burning the skin of crew members it came into contact with, and if mixed with any seawater in the bilges would generate poisonous chlorine gas. This remained the standard battery design until replaced with Sargo II and GUPPY batteries in submarines upgraded under the Greater Underwater Propulsion Power Program after World War II. Each battery's capacity was slightly increased by installing 126 cells instead of 120; this also raised the nominal voltage from 250 volts to 270 volts, which has been standard in US usage ever since, including the backup batteries of nuclear submarines.

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