"Lemon" submarines worse even than we knew

"The diesel engines were designed for railroad locomotives and not the rapid stops and starts required of submarines."

BACKGROUND - 2007
Better Options for Canada's "Lemon" Submarine Fleet
THE CANADIAN PRESS - Ottawa is committed to bringing all four of its Victoria-class submarines into service and isn't considering scrapping the troubled fleet, Defence Minister Peter MacKay said Friday. ... When the Liberals first bought the submarines, they planned to outfit them with an air-independent propulsion system to allow the boats to operate in the Arctic. But the Defence Department shelved the idea in 2000 in the face of design complications and a projected cost of $300 million.

UPDATE - 2013 24 June 
Defence Minister Peter MacKay blames the Liberals for Canada’s troubled fleet of second-hand Victoria-class submarines. It was the Liberals who purchased the four British-made vessels for the suspiciously low price of $750-million in 1998. Yet it was none other than MacKay himself who, 10 years later, persuaded his Conservative colleagues not to scrap them. It was MacKay who signed taxpayers up for another $1.5-billion worth of refits and repairs, thereby throwing good money after bad. It was apparent long before 2008 that the submarines were deeply flawed. The diesel engines were designed for railroad locomotives and not the rapid stops and starts required of submarines. [underlined emphasis is mine]- National Post.com

Submarines are always silent and strange.