Re: [PSUBS-MAILIST] Mini book review.

[Dan h <machine@epix.net>]

Be careful adding compressed air to a tank full of water.  If it blows, you might have
a giant sized "model rocket."  Thinking of the ones I had when I was a kid.  The ones
where you fill to the mark with water, pump in twenty pumps of air, and let it rip!

Remember when dealing with a pressure chamber, even if you have it full of water, no
air, which is barely compressible, the chamber itself acts like a gigantic spring.  It
has elasticity and will expand as you pressure it up.  It also retracts if you have a
violent rupture and flies like a rocket too.  I believe there is a story about such a
rupture in the Kittredge book.  The rupture was in a test chamber in Florida that USED
to be INSIDE a building.  As I recall they didn't use a hatch, but welded on the end
and cut it back off when the test was over.  I think it was a weld failure.

Captain Kittredge had two test chambers.  One small one and one larger one that could
fit a hull.  A small one for testing components wouldn't be expensive but for a whole
hull, it probably wouldn't be worth it for one sub.  If you had to have a hull tested
in a chamber, there are several around the country.

Dan H.

Coalbunny wrote:

> I would presume that a pressure chamber could be made by using
> compressed air to add weight to the water.  Am I wrong on that?
> Carl
>
> John Brownlee wrote:
> >
> >         This brings up an interesting point - how hard is it to built a top-side
> > chamber to test a hull? Is it even something a home-builder could consider for
> > shallower operating depths?
> >
> >                                                         John
> >
> > John Brownlee
> > Chief Systems Administrator
> > Scary Monsters Network
> > jonnie at scarymonsters dot net
>
> --
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