The record-union. [volume] (Sacramento, Calif.) 1891-1903, 1898-04-18
ROCKET TORPEDO GUN.
REAR ADMIRAL HOWELL'S I'M
PORTANT INVENTION.
The New Weapon Can Hurl lOO
Pounds of Guncotton a Dis
tance of 5000 Yards.

|
ated party lines and united the differ
ent sections, but has stimulated IN
ventive genius. The Patent Office at
Washington is daily flooded with ap-
plications, some of which may play
an important part in the next great
war. Among these is a recent one
filed by the Commander-in-C Chief of the
European station, now on his way to
the United States in the cruiser San
Francisco.
Rear Admiral J. A. Howell needs no
introduction to the American people,
nor to naval and military experts, for
his great automobile torpedo has won
for him a worldwide fame The gyro-
scopic principle, which keeps the rifle
ball straight in it's path, and which
he first applied to the underwater tor
pedo, has been extended to the throw
ing through the air with safety, ac-
curacy and velocity of a great mass
of high explosive. In other words, the
United States will soon be the pos
SCISSOR of an aerial torpedo that will
fulfill all of the conditions demanded
by the most eXacting critic
The new weapon of destruction will
be giant 3O0-pound rocket that will
go Kissing and sputtering through
space with the accuracy of a rifle ball
and falling but little short of it in
range. TIE means of imparting a ro-
tary motion to the projectile is simple,
yet novel in the extreme.
Ever since the discovery of high ex-
plosiveS ordnance experts have been
endeavoring to produce a gun that
could throw great mass of dynamite,
nltro-gelatine or gun cotton with safe
ty and accuracy The different ele-
mentS were antagonistic, however, and
the weapons that could throw it ac-
curately could not do so with safety
While those that could throw it safely
could not do so with accuracy The
problem was soon given up as far as
the powder gun was concerned, for
the shock of discharge communicated
by a pressure of fifteen or twenty tons
to the square inch was so great that
the high explosive was detonated be-
fore leaving the muzzle of the gun,
thus destroying the weapon.
Compressed air, at a pressure of l.
OOO pounds to the square inch, was
then tried; and for a time it looked as
though success had been attained-so
much SO that the United States Gov
eminent built the Vesuvius, special
type of vessel known as a dynamite
cruiser. After a series of exhaustive
experiments, although the guns of the
new vessel succeeded in throwing 500
pounds of gun cotton a distance of
$500 yards, the idea was abandoned,
owing to many defects in both gun
and projectile, the expensive and deli
cate machinery needed to compress the
air. and the impossibility of securing
a fuse that would function when de-
sired, and be safe at all times.
HUNT FOR A NEW PRINCIPLE.
A few years later another gun was
invented, consisting of three tubes, one
of which contained blank cartridge
and the other the high explosive projec-
tile. The third tube acted as a conductor
for the powder gases, which compressed
the air. This served as a cushion be-
hind the base of the projectile, and thus
minimized the shock of discharge.
Limited range and the heating of the
tube from rapidity of fire initiated
against this principle, however, so that
the problem remained where it had
been before.
Experts then turned their attention
the discovery of gun powder-the rock
ct Though the general principle full
filed all the conditions for throwing
high explosives with safety, that is a
low initial velocity, there were other
objections which seemed almost insu-
perabe. Admiral Howell. however, af-
ter many years of study and a series
of careful experiments has triumphed.
vnfc
been in use for centuries-in fact, his
terry tells of their having been employed
for war purposes as early as the year
500 A D. Owing to the numerous con-
ditions to be fulfilled to attain accuracy
of flight, however, their use for mill
tary purposes was always restricted
indeed, the path described is so irregu-
lar and erratic that they have been
known to return to the very point from
which they had been fired. Many at
tempts have been made to improve the
rocket, the gist of each being to impart
a rotary motion, for the purpose Of CIV
ing great directive force.
In 1904 Sir William Congreve took up
the study. He substituted an IRON case
for the paper one, and was thus enabled
to use more powerful composition. He
also employed a shorter and lighter
stick, and removed one source of mac
curacy by attaching it to the center Of
the base instead of to the side. Another
improvement was the use of vanes.
These were attached to the rear of the
rocket, and, acting against the atmos-
phere during flight, steadied rather than
revolved it. Later came the Hale war
rocket, in which a rotary motion was
produced around the longer axis by the
escape of gas through five vents situ
ated obliquely to it.
Though all of these changes improved
the rocket they by no means perfected
it, and it's use gradually became limited
to incendiary rather than war purposes.
Admiral Howell however, was disciple
of the rocket theory, and saw in it pos
sibilitieS that had escaped the atten
ton of other experts. He reasoned that
the absence of the initial shock of dis
charge made it an ideal method OF
throwing great mass of high explo-
sive with perfect safety, the only OBJ
lection being inferior directive force
and inaccuracy.
These defects would be eliminated, he
argued, only when the rocket could be
given the same rotary motion as rife
ball. The old gyroscopic principle that
he applied to his automobile torpedo,
and which, by the way, Is the same
that keeps the bicycle upright when in
motion, had to be applied to the rocket.
The law is thus stated: eff a mass be
set in rotation about it's principal ac-
ton of inertia it will continue to re-
volve about it, and unless extraneous
force be applied the direction of the
axis will remain unchanged"
THE ROCKET GUN.