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Hi Brian.
Now Brian, you know I meant that the Hunley could
not get to the bottom ON PURPOSE without FIRST using her dive planes. I wasn't
talking about an accident like when they sunk.
How could the Hunley have submerged without using
her dive planes? If we accept that the Hunley had to keep all her interior air
and never lost any but only had it pressurized at depth by the inflow of
pressurized water into the open top ballast tanks,
then how could you fill the ballast tanks without
letting air out of them and thus letting air out of the hull? We know they did
not do this or else they would have lost air in letting water into the ballast
tanks and not had enough air afterwards when
they needed to pump out the water.
Imagine the Hunley and its ballast tanks are a
giant glass. The only difference here is that the Hunley giant glass could stop
the amount of water coming into her by closing the valve in her open top
ballast tanks when she had all the water inside she needed.
If I take a glass and turn it upside down and
push it underwater I cannot get more water to go into the glass until I either
let air out of the glass, or push it deeper underwater where water pressure will
compress the air in the glass and let in more water.
That glass would not submerge without me pushing it
underwater like a diving plane would a sub in forward motion. But if I push
that glass underwater far enough so that the air in the glass is pressurized and
does not have enough volume left to float the glass, then the
glass becomes neutral or negative. That is what the
bow planes allowed the Hunley to do.
If we accept that the Hunley never lost any
internal air and that she had open top and open to the hull interior ballast
tanks, then she would only be able to submerge by using her forward speed and
dive planes. Once she was under water, the water pressure would be
greater than the pressure inside the boat and if they opened the
ballast tank's inlet
valves then water would enter the ballast tanks under pressure from
outside. Then when the volume of air was compressed and lessened inside
the Hunley, she would become neutral or negative just like the glass.
So the only possibility for the open top ballast
tanks, interior atmosphere immediately pressurized upon submergence Hunley,
to submerge, would be to force herself under by forward motion and use of her
dive planes. Once under and pressurized she could
stay under since she is now pressurized and has a
lesser volume of air. But she could not have gotten down ON PURPOSE without
first using the dive planes and forward motion.
Brian if you know how the Hunley submerged without
using her forward speed and bow planes, and accepting that she could
not lose air from her interior to let in water into the open top ballast tanks,
please tell me how she did this?
How would you make the open bottom glass go
underwater without Letting air out (which they didn't do) or pushing it,
like with dive planes?
May we please hear from some of our forum
experts here on this subject?
Kindest Regards,
Bill Akins.
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