AN IMPROVED SELFREGULATING TORPEDO, OR SEA-MINE
Year: 1883

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Alfred Julius Boult at the Office of
the Commissioners of Patents on the 5th December 1883. A communication
from Eugène de Taund and Wilhelm de Szígyártó both of Vienna in the
Empire of Austria.
ALFRED JULIUS BOULT of the firm of W. P. Thompson & Boult of 323 High
Holborn in the County of Middlesex, Engineer, "AN IMPROVED SELFREGULATING
TORPEDO, OR SEA-MINE [a communication from Eugène de Taund and Wilhelm
de Szígyártó both of Vienna in the Empire of Austria]
"
This invention relates to an improved system of self-regulating torpedoes or
sea-mines of a peculiar construction allowing of their being maintained at a
certain constant depth below the water level notwithstanding the different
variations of this level whereby these improved torpedoes are particularly appro-
priate to be applied in waters subject to great differences of tide as for instance
in sea ports, at river-mouths, for blocading harbours, &c.
This system consists substantially of a torpedo of any desired construction
moored in the sea-bottom and provided with a regulating device by means of which
the torpedo is automatically rising or descending according to the rising or falling
of the water level and is thus maintained at a constant depth below the water
level.
The torpedo may be, as above mentioned, of any desired construction, but in all
cases it ought to have a constant buoyancy so as to float in water, It is connected
with a regulating pulley by means of two wire cables fastened to two eyelets or
rings fixed on the bottom of the torpedo, The regulating pulley serving to transmit
the movement of the regulator to the torpedo is free to turn in a hoop or bow
fastened by means of a double hook to an anchor and is composed of a cylindrical
sheave or drum connected on each side with a conical sheave both cylindrical
and conical sheaves being fitted upon the same axis or spindle The regulator
consists in a hollow cylindrical vessel the top cover of which is made to close
tightly whilst its bottom is provided with an aperture through which the water
may enter the regulator or flow out of it.
The hollow interior of the regulator is divided by hermetical horizontal
diaphragm in two chambers. The upper chamber forms a hermetically closed
space the buoyancy of which is equal to the dead weight of the regulator.

page_text: The wire cables connecting the torpedo with the pulley pass through tubes
traversing the regulator and fitted air-tight in the top cover of the regulator and
its diaphragm. These cables are wound upon the cylindrical part of the sheave or
drum whilst upon the conical parts of the same other wire cables are wound and
the latter are fastened by means of eyelets or rings to the bottom of the regulator.
The cylindrical part of the drum is composed of two cylindrical sheaves serving
for rolling up upon the same the cables of the torpedo and of two conical sheaves
for the cables of the regulator.
Each of the cylindrical pulleys is rigidly connected with the conical sheave
next to it, so that both halves of the pulley, ie. each cylindrical sheave with its
corresponding conical sheave revolve together round the spindle fitted inside the
hoop or bow above referred to.
In order to explain the working of this improved torpedo, the whole apparatus
is supposed to be entirely immersed in water. The buoyancy of the torpedo is
always constant whilst the buoyancy of the regulator is variable according to the
depth of the same because the volume of the air contained in the lower chamber of
the regulator increases or diminishes in an inverse ratio to the increase or
diminution of the water pressure upon this air, the result of these variations of
the volume of the air contained in the lower chamber is an increase or dimminution
of the buoyancy of the regulator. On supposing further that the tractions of the
torpedo and of the regulators (working in opposite directions). upon the drum
counterbalance each other, and that the water level rises suddenly, the buoyancy
of the torpedo remains the same whilst that of the regulator is diminished because
the water-column above the regulator, being now increased effects a surplus
pressure upon the air contained in the lower chamber of the regulator and causes a
dimminution of its volume. The apparatus is out of balance and the traction
exerted upon the pulley by the cables of the torpedo becomes greater than that
exerted upon it by the cables of the regulator. The torpedo rises and causes the
torpedo cables to be wound off from the cylindrical sheaves, and the rotation of
the pulley. The rotatory movement of the pulley causes at the same time the
regulator-cables to be rolled up upon the conical sheaves of the pulley and the
regulator descends. The frising of the torpedo and the lowering of the regulator
goes on until the equilibrium is re-established which takes place when the tractions
are in the inverse ratio of the lever-arms.
In order to dispose the described torpedo-system in the desired place the wire
cables of the torpedo are rolled up upon the whole length of the spiral groove of
the cylindrical portion of the pulley whilst the other cables are rolled up upon the
grooves of the conical sheaves of the said pulley only to a suitably chosen point.
The apparatus is then submerged in the water. In order to effect this submersion
the top of the torpedo is provided with a movable shackle by means of which the
apparatus is suspended to a crane-chain or otherwise. This shackle terminates
below in two small-books upon which are hooked two thin rods the bottom ends
of these rods being attached to the regulator. These two rods bear the regulator
up to the moment when the anchor has touched the bottom of the water, at this
moment the chain of the crane &c is unhooked from the shackle; this shackle tips
over and changes its vertical position into a horizontal one, the rods slide off from
the hooks of the shackle and the unhooking of the apparatus is thus effected in an
automatical and precise manner