The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1916-03-29


 How to go down in the sea to depth of 256 feet and to remain there fairly comfortable and moderately safe for about 0 minutes, was graphically explained at a meeting of the Fore mems club of the Remington Arms & Ammunition Co.,, last night, by Philip l B. Bri1l works manager of the Lake l Torpedo Boat Co.
 MT. Brill held an intensely interest | ed audience speIIbound for nearly two hours while he talked to them of the N evolution, progress and prospects of | the submarine and it's usefulness both i military and commercially.
 The lecture, illustrated by a num- Der of lantern slides, opened the eyes of the club members to many won- derful facts concerning the undersea craft and it's deadly missiles which hitherto had been yelled in a haze of mystery.
 MT. Brill, whose experience has car ried him through many years of naval architecture, began by describing the various units which comprise the sea fighting strength of a nation.
 There are first, the battleships, the pre-dreadnoughts, dreadnoughts, and uper-dreadnoughts, which form the backbone of the navy. Then come the battle and armored cruisers, the de- stroyers. torpedo boats, gun boats, submarines and auxiliary vessels, all or Wn1Cn play CnS1r f6Sp6cClV0 parts and are virtually essential to the eff1- cheney of a fleet.
 As a power for offense and defense. the smallest of these, the submarine ranks with the super-dreadnought They are in the relative position of David and Go1iah. The giant is grow ing bigger and more powerful at every launching and the little fellow more 1.-the and adept at torpedo singing. Each type of craft and it's purpose was explained by the letcurer but the main interest centered in the subma- rine, as being the most dangerous foe of the battIeship which now exists With a f1otilla of undersea boats about the only safe place for the cruisers and dreadnoughts is in a narrow necked harbor with friendly f'sub'' 1 at the entrance.
 The idea of submarine is not a new one. A great many inventors have worked it and it's history dates beyond the Christian era. At tempts at submarine building were made as far back as the sixteenth century but it was not until the end of the eighteenth century that such N boats were in any sense successful, and it may surprise many to learn that among the fairly successful build CTS of undersea craft was Robert Full ton, who built the first steamboat to sail up the Hudson from New York to Albany. Another builder was David
 
 who constructed a diving boat with the purpose of blowing up British ships during the Revolutionary war Had the art of explosives been known i11 these days, he would have succeed ed. Fulton built the ''NautiI1s'' but failed, either in France or England to find a purchaser.
 Confederate submarine in 1884 sank the U. s. s. Housatonic during the Civil War. though the crew which a pon mi cIon5
 These Confederate submarines were called "Davids.''
 The present development of sub marines in the United States is due to two Americans, Capt. John P. Hol- land and Simon Lake. The former was school teacher of an inventive turn of mind and the Iatter's first in terest in the undersea boat was arous- ed from reading Jules Verne's story, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea-" His first submarine he called the Argonaut.
 The seagoing submarine today rep resent a considerable development in size, say 1000 to 2,0O0 tons dispIaceZ ment, 20 knots surface speed, and a large surface radius of. action from 5000 to 5000 miles so that they can cruise with the battleship fleets under any conditions of weather.
 There are single hull boats and double hull boats. The former are circular in cross section. The double hull boats are really only partially double hull, as the double hull does not extend for the full length They have a circular section for the main hull which resists the sea pressure due to the submergence.
 | When running on the surface, sub
 marines are driven by internal com bustion engines There are a few vessels in which steam is used for surface propeIsion but the difficulties of getting rid of the extreme heat generated by the steam plant when getting ready for submerging are so great that it is better to employ the 1nternalf combustion engine. The | latest types employ heavy oil engines generally of the DeiseI type
 When a boat is submerged there is no way Of getting rid of the exhaust therefore, electric motors are used: the power being supplied from stor- age batteries. boat, therefore has two complete sources of power
 submarine cannot remain inded- n1teIy under water, and her cruising powers beneath the surface are linn ited- While she is amphibious, she must frequently come to the surface to l breathe, and the stories of long under, sea cruises are fa1lacies.
 All U. s. submarines are designed to submerge 200 feet and are tested at this depth before acceptance. At 200 1eeI the pressure on the null IS SS pounds per square inch which means a total pressure of many thousand tons on the hull.
 The testing of the ''sub's'' endur- ance under water is an exciting opera tion for the crew As the captain of one of them explained when his boat } was down 256 feet, ''The only sound : could hear was the beating of my i heart
 The crew of a submarine, however, is not packed in like sardines. They ) have tolerabIy roomy quarters to sup l in and move about in. The machin-