A SELF-MOVING SHIP.

Bruce Herald, Volume VI, Issue 399, 27 December 1871, Page 7

A SELF-MOVING SHIP.

From the ' Scientific American' of July 1, we take the following- : — " One of our correspondents at Nashua, N.H., sends us the subjoined diagram ol the mechanism of a new self-moVing vessel now building on the stocks at '.hat place, and which is to be launched and tried on the 4th July. The '• Telegraph ' tbu< Ascribes the vessel and its machinery : — For some days public curiosity has beer, excited by the sudden appearance of n miniature ship-yard on an open lot, just north of the South Common. Within ten days the hull of a small ship h*s gradually assumed shape under the saw and hammer of two industrious workmen, who ply their tools with an earnestness that admits, neither of flagging nor any inteiTuptioa At present the thin" 1 looks very much like the skeleton of a fossil megatherium. The extreme 'length is 32ft, beam 6ff, and the depth of {hold Bft. The propelling 1 power is to l)e r turbine wheel, set at the bottom of a flume rising sft from the ship's bottom ; the Water enters the flume from the ship's sides just below the <vater line This opening* is provided with a valve to prevent the water from returning", when the ship lurches in a rough sea. ' How is rhe water to leave the ship? ' everyone n*ks. Prom the bottom of the flume, near the turbine wheel, & tunnel JBin. in diameter extends along the ship's bottom to the extreme stern. The tunnel is to Me so constructed as to constitute a vacuum, and is to be supplied with a "s-jt of revolvling fans to accelerate the egress of the j wafer, and with the valves to prevent the 'inflowing of the water from the stern. The ' Jwate/in the flume will*' have a head of oft, a power of nine- horse. Now, I'the inventor, who is. or*e of the workmen; 'expects to secure 100 revolutions of the ?crew before the outer valve ia the tunnel is reached bp the outflowing current of water, or a rate of speed equal to five miles an hour. Once in motion the "ship is ex : pected to attain a rate of speed only equalled by the power nf rh* MiHiine."