<div dir="ltr">Neat history Jon, thanks for sharing!<div>Rick</div></div><br><div class="gmail_quote"><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Sat, Jun 20, 2020 at 8:48 AM Jon Wallace via Personal_Submersibles <<a href="mailto:personal_submersibles@psubs.org">personal_submersibles@psubs.org</a>> wrote:<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
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<div>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.<br>
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<div>An outline:</div>
<div>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".</div>
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<div>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.</div>
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<div>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.</div>
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<div>6/21/79 - The K-600 is approved for
certification by Lloyds.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>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.<br>
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<p>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.</p>
<p>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.</p>
<p>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.<br>
</p>
<p>Jon<br>
</p>
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<div>On 6/18/2020 10:38 AM, via
Personal_Submersibles wrote:<br>
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<blockquote type="cite">
<div style="color:black;font:12pt Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif">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.
<div>Vance<br>
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