IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MODE OF AND APPARATUS FOR RAISING SUNKEN SHIPS AND OTHER SUNKEN BODIES, AND ALSO IN STRUCTURES OR APPARATUS INTENDED FOR BEING PURPOSELY SUNK AND RAISED
Year: 1861

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Charles Audouy at the Office of
the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 28th October
1861.
I, CHARLES AUDOUY, of Paris, in the French Empire, Gentleman, do
hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE
MODE OF AND APPARATUS FOR RAISING SUNKEN SHIPS AND OTHER SUNKEN BODIES,
AND ALSO IN STRUCTURES OR APPARATUS INTENDED FOR BEING PURPOSELY SUNK
AND RAISED," to be as follows:-
The chief object of my Invention is to raise sunken ships and other bodies.
For this purpose I construct apparatus in which is a chamber or space, or
chambers or spaces, from which I exhaust or extract the air, or in which I
produce a vacuum, or what is practically so called, and bring the same into
communication with the interior of the sunken body, so as to draw out a
quantity of water therefrom, whereby the body is lightened and raised, or its
rising facilitated. This I prefer to effect by constructing a vessel or structure
propelled by steam, or otherwise, having chambers or compartments in its hold
or body in which the vacuum is produced, and whence flexible tubes com-
municate with the interior of the sunken body. The chambers or compart-
ments, which I call "vacuum chambers," are best exhausted by first forcing
water therein till they are quite full, and the water spirts out of a small tap
left open and fitted on a larger tap with which each chamber is furnished.
then close this small tap, and pump or draw out the water through discharge
openings leading direct out from the bottom of the compartments. The
interior of the sunken body communicates with the atmosphere by a pipe or
I

page_text: pipes. The leaks or apertures whereby it is open to the water should be
closed or plugged if very large. When the vacuum chambers are. exhausted,
and the interior of the sunken body caused to communicate with them, a
quantity of water will be drawn out of it into them through the flexible pipes
as fast as their diameters will allow. Portions of the partitions between the
vacuum chambers I generally form perforated, and prefer to construct the
flexible pipes by winding over a frame or skeleton of galvanized wire wound
spirally a number of layers of linen, cloth, or like material, laid on spirally
in alternate directions, with gutta percha wrappings interposed between
some of them, and with galvanized wire wound spirally outside the whole. To
assist in lifting, I sometimes fix chains on board the raising vessels, in that case
using two such vessels, the chains from each being led aboard the other after
passing against and under the sunken body. I prefer to arrange the chains
delivered from the deck, starboard, and larboard alternately, so also as to those
received on it.
My raising apparatus may among other uses be applied for lifting structures
purposely sunk for several purposes, and especially for strategical objects.
And my Invention further relates to a mode of constructing or arranging
structures to adapt them for being thus sunk and raised. For this purpose I
construct a structure, or take one already or partially built, and having made
it sufficiently stanch or tight, I construct in the between decks, or in the upper
or other part of the body what I call a "water space," or "water spaces," con-
sisting of one or more chambers, compartments, or spaces partitioned or
divided off from the rest of the structure (and from such ballast as may be
therein), and made properly water-tight or stanch, and also furnished with
arrangements, some for causing the interior to communicate with my raising
apparatus when required, and others for the interior to communicate with the
atmospheric air, for which purposes I generally fit on the deck or top of the
water spaces connections or junctions for attaching my flexible pipes; and I
also have arrangements for filling the spaces with water, for which taps or slide
valves operated from above, or other contrivances may be used. The structure
is sunk by filling the water spaces, and raised by lightening it by my raising
apparatus. The deck or other part of the structure may be furnished with
various fittings or apparatus for obstructive or other purposes. I prefer to use
as ballast a substance that will lose weight in water...