Daring, in common with Dainty, Defender and Delight, had a DC electrical system and these ships comprised the 2nd Destroyer Squadron.

Power was provided by Parsons steam turbines giving 54,000 shp (40 MW) and a maximum sea speed of 30.5 knots (56.5 km/h).

She was inspected by the commander-in-chief of the Mediterranean Fleet, Admiral Lord Louis Mountbatten of Burma, a previous captain of the last ship to bear the name Daring.

Daring acquired an early reputation as an 'unhappy ship',[3] and this was exacerbated when her commanding officer, Captain Vernon John St. Clair-Ford, died suddenly in August.

[3] Visits to Syracuse, Navarin, Tripoli, Toulon, Golfe-Juan and Naples preceded operations in the Suez Canal Zone in October 1952.

On 26 July she sailed to attend the scene of a collision in fog between the British-registered merchant ship Culrain and the Spanish Duero.

Having landed stores, food and water, and having set up an emergency hospital, she took casualties to Zante on 18 August and passed through the Corinth Canal to Piraeus.

[1] The ship's company remained on board for a further ten months after the end of the first commission, serving with the Home Fleet in the Arctic and then back out to the Mediterranean again.

To all of the engineering staff she was a completely new design with high pressure four drum boilers and two furnaces operating at 650psi and 850 F superheat.

The safety valves on my boiler lifted within seconds as the engine room responded shutting off steam to the ahead turbine.

[citation needed] In October 1958 she paid off for refit in Devonport, during which her after torpedo tubes were removed and replaced with a deckhouse, providing additional accommodation.

[2] She sailed on 26 January for trials and this revealed faults in the gunnery system which necessitated a long spell in Devonport for repairs.

Leave was given during the second half of April prior to sailing for the Mediterranean, but further faults were discovered in the gunnery system, and a further two weeks had to be spent in the Dockyard rectifying the problem.

Stopping briefly at Gibraltar, Daring arrived in Malta and on 20 June was visited by Flag Officer Flotillas, Mediterranean (Rear Admiral Ewing), before joining 45 other ships for the NATO-run Exercise Whitebait off Libya.

Reaching Malta on 29 July, the ship's company immediately began final preparations for the Fleet Regatta at Augusta on 4 August.

She spent the night at anchor off Fiumincino cleaning the ship of oil before making her rendezvous with HMS Battleaxe for a visit to Civita Vecchia.

Shortly afterwards she led the 2nd Destroyer Squadron in a farewell steampast in honour of the Flag Officer Flotillas, Mediterranean, embarked in HMS Tiger.

For ten weeks during Christmas 1959 and New Year 1960 Daring remained in Malta, except for a short visit to Annaba (formerly Bône), Algeria during January.

After a brief period of leave the ship returned to Portland for weapon training, and then went by way of Portsmouth to Bremen in company with Crossbow and two submarines.

After a nine-day visit she sailed down the Elbe estuary and through the Kiel Canal in thick fog, making her way in to the Baltic Sea.

Admiral Wise, CSO(T) to CinC Home Fleet, came on board for the acceptance inspection and pronounced the ship operational, despite problems with the gunnery system.

[6] In August 1968 she was stationed at Gibraltar for guardship duties, which included a visit by Admiral of the Fleet Earl Mountbatten of Burma in September.