IMPROVEMENTS IN SUBMARINE TORPEDOES, AND IN APPARATUS TO BE USED IN CONNECTION THEREWITH
Year: 1874

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by George Wightwick Rendel at
the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on
the 30th December 1874.
I, GEORGE WIGHTWICK RENDEL, of Elswick Works, Newcastle-upon-
Tyne, Civil Engineer, do hereby, declare the nature of the said Invention
for "IMPROVEMENTS IN SUBMARINE TORPEDOES, AND IN APPARATUS TO BE USED IN
CONNECTION THEREWITH," to be as follows:-
This Invention has for its object improvements in submarine torpedoes,
and in apparatus to be used in connection therewith.
The Invention has reference to the making of torpedoes and apparatus
for their discharge in such manner that the torpedo may be projected
under water with velocity sufficient to reach the object which it is
desired to strike, avoiding thereby the necessity of providing the torpedo
with the means of locomotion.
I make the torpedo of the same specific gravity as water or thereabout,
so that when discharged in water gravitation may have little or no
influence on its flight. I make the torpedo of an elongated form, and
regulate its flight either by tail resistance on the principle of the arrow,
or by communicating to it a motion of rotation.
To project the torpedo I employ gascous pressure generated by
burning gun cotton or other such like material. The gases are retained

page_text: in a reservoir and stored under high pressure until they are required for
use.
The torpedo is discharged from a tube placed below the surface of tho
water; it is inserted either from the front or the rear, and projected by
admitting the gas behind it through a breech plug or valve. Behind the
plug or valve is a chamber to which the gas has access by a narrow
channel, so that the pressure may retain the plug or valve in its scat
until the moment when it is desired to discharge tho torpedo. A portion
of the front face of the plug or valve of smaller aron than the back is also
exposed to the pressure of the gas.
When it is desired to launch the torpedo the pressure in the chamber
behind the breech plug or valve is relieved by opening an air cock, and
the plug or valve at once leaves its seat and the gas rushes from the
reservoir, the plug or valve receding from its scat sufficiently to allow it
a perfectly free flow. The breech plug when it has moved back a certain :
distance closes the passage by which the gas can escape from the
chamber behind it, and then the face of the plug or valve being relievod
from pressure the reduced pressure behind it suffices to stop it without
shock, and to return it to its scat.
In order that the escape of the gas from the mouth of the tube behind
the torpedo may not derange its flight I provide sido openings just
behind the mouth, so that tho torpedo may be mechanically guided
after the pressure behind it has ceased or been considerably reduced.
The water may, if desired, be excluded from the torpedo tubo by
suitable covers on the mouth and side apertures, or such precautions:
may be omitted.
Each torpedo tube is provided with its own reservoir, and the pressure
may either be generated in this reservoir or it may be fed from a separate
main reservoir, or the gases may be drawn for use direct from the main
reservoir.
Air or other oriform fluid under pressure may be used in place of
gases obtained by combustion.