South Bend news-times. (South Bend, Ind.) 1913-1938, 1917-09-29
CannonbalI Submarines toRecover
2 Wars Sunken Treasures
Am American Inventors Unique Plan to Raise the
Billions of Dollars Worth of Ships and Cargoes
Sunk by U-BOats and to Put Them to Use Again

within each one is mechanism to pump out the
water and thus cause them to rise to the top.
Each pontOon has two powerful electro-mag-
nets fed by cable from the surface. These large
fat magnets hold the pontoon firmly against the
side of the ship. From the pontoOn rise twelve TO
twenty strong steel cables, which are kept upright
under water by air-flled buoys on their upper
ends. The cables lie close against the side Of the
ship Inserted in each cable is a two-inch expan-
sion bolt with broad head
The submarine maneuvres into position until
she is over one of these cables She attaches her
self to the side of the ship by four electro magnets
running on carriers which are worked by shafts
from the interior of the submarine They operate in
pairs, two enabling her to sideways along
the side of the ship and two to move up and down.
Projecting through the front of the submarine
are a two-inch drill and alongside it, six inches
away, thrust-bar The submarine having at
tached itself by sucker-like magnets to the side
of the ship in the position already described, the
drill is thrust out toward the broad-headed bolt on
the first cable. 1t pushes the bolt little to one
side and then under the direction of the skilled
operators in the submarine quickly drills a two
inch hole in the steel plate of the ship.
Then the submarine crawls six inches sideways
on its magnet carriers until the push bar is just
over the hole drilled The push-bar then gets hold
of the bolt head fixed in the cable The push-bar is
fitted with cOncave magnet, while the bolt head
is convex. The bolt head while the current is on is
therefore held firmly against the pushbar which
thrustS the bolt into the two-inch hole already
drilled This bolt is fitted with expansion wings
which open slightly after it IS pushed through the
hole and make withdrawal impossible The ships
side is now attached firmly by the steel cable TO
the pOntoon
The submarine continues to travel along the
side of the ship drilling holes and pushing in bolts.
The bolts are about eighteen inches apart.
1t has been calculated the inventor that it
would require hundred pontoons to lift the
Lusitania from the bottom of the The
largest pontoon used is about forty feet long and
fifteen feet in diameter, and has lifting power
of 800 tons when the water is driven out. The
Lusitania weighed approximately $4,000 tons,
but her weight in the water would be only equiva-
lent to 10000 tons. 1t would therefore require
one hundred pontoOns lifting 800 tons apiece TO
raise her
A working model of the submarine was first
built and then tested in a tank. A fu-sized ma
chine is nearly completed in the workshop of
the American Salvage Co, of New York which is
conducting this enterprise 1t IS planned that this
machine shall be used without delay 10 raise a
steamship which has been lying at the bottom of
Lake Huron for two years with 81 100000 o. cop
per III her
arine" During Construction. and Con the Lef) Design.
Nitrogen Lamps. B, B, B, B, Electro Magnets That
n Tank D, d, Lookout Lenses. E, Push-Bar F, Drill