The ''Viper'' class was a group of two torpedo boat destroyers (or "TBDs") built for the British Royal Navy in 1899. They were notable for being the first warships to use

steam turbine A steam turbine is a machine that extracts thermal energy from pressurized steam and uses it to do mechanical work on a rotating output shaft. Its modern manifestation was invented by Charles Parsons in 1884. Fabrication of a modern steam turbin ...

propulsion. They had Parsons turbines on four shafts, with two

propeller A propeller (colloquially often called a screw if on a ship or an airscrew if on an aircraft) is a device with a rotating hub and radiating blades that are set at a pitch to form a helical spiral which, when rotated, exerts linear thrust upon ...

s on each, one inboard and one outboard of the shaft A-bracket. was ordered and built for the Royal Navy in 1899 by Hawthorn Leslie and Company at Hebburn on the

River Tyne The River Tyne is a river in North East England. Its length (excluding tributaries) is . It is formed by the North Tyne and the South Tyne, which converge at Warden Rock near Hexham in Northumberland at a place dubbed 'The Meeting of the Wate ...

. ''Python'' was built as a speculative venture by Hawthorns and was purchased in 1902. The Steam Turbine, 1911 - Fig 41 - First set of Combination Machinery — in H

The Steam Turbine, 1911 - Fig 41 - First set of Combination Machinery — in H

''Viper'' and another turbine-powered ship, the Vickers special-type were both lost to accidents in 1901: ''Viper'' foundered on rocks in fog during naval manoeuvres near

Alderney Alderney (; french: Aurigny ; Auregnais: ) is the northernmost of the inhabited Channel Islands. It is part of the Bailiwick of Guernsey, a British Crown dependency. It is long and wide. The island's area is , making it the third-largest ...

on 3 August 1901, while ''Cobra'' broke her back in a storm in the North Sea on 18 September 1901. Since then the Royal Navy has not used snake names for destroyers; ''Python'' was renamed ''Velox'' soon after. ''Velox'' was rated as a C-class destroyer in 1913, that is, one of a heterogeneous group of 30-knot torpedo boat destroyer with three funnels. The ships were considered successes when acquired, achieving speeds of up to 36 knots on trials. All subsequent British destroyers from the River or E class of 1903 (only 3 of which employed turbines) to the County class of 1960 used steam turbine machinery.

Ships

* , launched 6 September 1899, wrecked near

on 3 August 1901. *''Python'', later renamed , launched 11 February 1902, mined and sunk off Nab light vessel, 25 October 1915.

References

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Viper class Destroyer classes Ship classes of the Royal Navy de:HMS Viper