"Subhuman Project" Human Powered Submarine 103
"Inventor Ted Ciamillo and marine biologist Frank Fish (yes, that's his real name) are at work on a human-powered sub designed to cross the Atlantic. What's interesting is the highly efficient propulsion system which uses a 'tail' modeled after CAT scans of a dolphin's. From the article: 'Ciamillo and Fish say they knew they were onto something when the first prototype Lunocet, a piece of sculpted foam sandwiched between two pieces of carbon fiber, essentially swam by itself. When they released it at the bottom of a test pool, its buoyancy combined with its cambered shape generated a forward thrust that made it scoot across the tank.'"
Interesting (Score:2, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Bob Dobbs couldn't have designed a better sub himself.
If you want to know marine mammal hydrodynamics... (Score:3, Interesting)
If you want to know about marine mammal hydrodynamics, Dr. Frank E. Fish is the guy to go to. Take a look at some of his papers available for free download from Google Scholar:
http://scholar.google.co.th/scholar?hl=en&lr=&safe=off&q=FE+Fish&btnG=Search [google.co.th]
This guy has been at it for ages. He was my primary source of information for a research paper on the subject of hydrodynamics and energetics back in 2000 for a marine mammalogy class in my final year of university. Glad to see he is still at
Diving Depth (Score:2)
Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
Out of curiosity, how deep does a submersible have to be able to dive before you'd classify it as a submarine? Every dictionary I've checked only defines it, more or less, as a vessel capable of operating submerged; there is no mention whatsoever of a depth requirement to classify it as such.
Re:Huh? (Score:4, Informative)
Wipedia says:
"A submarine is a watercraft capable of independent operation below water. It differs from a submersible, which has only limited underwater capability." I don't believe depth comes into play, either.
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Re:Diving Depth (Score:5, Informative)
From the article, he's going to dive to 20 meters for about 45 minutes periodically (full article link: http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20126936.900-across-the-ocean-in-a-pedalpowered-submarine.html?full=true [newscientist.com] scrollbar about 1/2 way).
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http://www.submarine-history.com/NOVAone.htm [submarine-history.com]
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From the story, there's a link that says "2 more pictures". http://www.newscientist.com/articleimages/mg20126936.900/1-across-the-ocean-in-a-pedalpowered-submarine.html [newscientist.com] (total of 3). Picture 1 can be seen in the article. Picture 2 is a drawing. Picture 3 is a blue-line.
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IE brings it right up though.
probably adblock/flashblock/noscript or another one of my addons causing it...sigh
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I doesn't squish the person inside, the person inside is basically a SCUBA diver. The effects of depth on SCUBA divers is well known.
I'm not sure how long you can stay down at 2 meters without decompressing, it's not on the dive tables since most divers dive further. I would guess you could stay a 2 meters all day without having to decompress on the way up.
All day at more than 5 or 10 meters, or for any time at more than 10 meters, you'd have to start paying attention to decompression.
At more than 30 meters
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
US Navy Diver Charts say something to the effect of 'don't worry about decompression until you spend time below 32 feet (about 10 meters.)' Your tanks will run out of air before you've been down long enough (at 10 meters) to even consider decompression.
For the record, 32 feet is roughly 1 atmosphere of pressure. If I recall correctly (which means 'maybe'.)
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Actually, 32ft is 2 atmospheres. One at surface.
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If he is breathing via a snorkel (I suspect a 2m long snorkel is going to be very hard work) then he won't get bends as he will be at atmospheric pressure, internally. He also says he's going to surface every night, so his maximum exposure is only one day.
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If they're going to call it a submarine, I'd like to see it able to operate underwater without a snorkel.
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Seth
And then the DHS... (Score:2)
It should be interesting to see if the DHS chases this thing down as one of those evil drug running semi-submersibles, as they are now illegal (by U.S. law) to operate in international waters...
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one of those evil drug running semi-submersibles, as they are now illegal (by U.S. law) to operate in international waters...
No, operating a "stateless" vessel is what will get you arrested. So long as they flag this thing, they'll be fine.
I also doubt that they will scuttle the sub if intercepted by the navy.
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I didn't say the law was "right"... hell, I'm in favor of ending the "War on Drugs".
I was simply pointing out that these guys have nothing to fear from some overreaching drug law and claiming that they do is hogwash.
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If they are on validly foreign-flagged ships, they are prohibited from doing so under international law (e.g., the Convention on the High Seas, 1958).
Stateless vessels are not protected in the same way.
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I don't know how the US hopes to enforce it's laws in INTERNATIONAL waters. In their own territory, sure but since the US didn't ratify the UN Conventions on the Law of the Sea they (should) still abide by the olden laws of the high seas which allowed for everybody to do whatever they want except for 'enemies of mankind' which are mainly pirates and slave traders. Even under the new conventions they would have to abide by the laws of or deliver them to the country which flag the vessel flies under.
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Since when does the U.S. respect foreign laws on foreign territory ? What... you think the rest of the world hates the U.S. just because it's trendy ? No! They hate because the U.S. government is an obnoxious self-righteous bully that still acts like it owns the damned planet.
The fact that they often get away with it, however, is an international failure. The "victims" deserve full blame for not holding U.S. envoys responsible for their actions.
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They hate because the U.S. government is an obnoxious self-righteous bully that still acts like it owns the damned planet.
To be fair, the US only acts like it owns the bioshpere.
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Umh, have you seen the US' attitude in space?
Yes, but they soon won't be able to get there anymore.
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Yes. For every complaint made about the US, there are about a dozen countries which do the same or worse. Global opinions are like a large-scale version of your highschool social dynamics - it's not so much what you do that matters, as what your reputation currently happens to be.
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I'm assuming that their argument(not that I agree with it) would be that it is inter national waters, not inter personal . If you are operating under the authority of a recognized nation, they won't mess with you, otherwise you are a pirate. I believe it's always been legal to pursue pirates (with said pirates (I assume) being identified by some means other than parrots, peg legs, and Jolly Rogers)
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The US considers almost the entirety of UNCLOS to be binding as declarative of customary international law; its objection to ratification centers pretty much entirely on the parts related to undersea mining in internationa
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From the GP:
I don't know how the US hopes to enforce it's laws in INTERNATIONAL waters.
It's called a carrier battle group.
But will it have laser beams on the bow? (Score:3, Funny)
Can't Wait For the Next Headline ... (Score:4, Funny)
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"Tasted just like Flipper!" - JAWS II
And at (Score:5, Funny)
Overheard at Frank's (yes, that's his real name) retirement: "So long, and thanks for all, Fish."
Uh oh. (Score:1)
"uses a 'tail' modeled after CAT scans of a dolphin's"
Let's hope it doesn't get caught by a trawler fishing for tuna.
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What I first thought of, looking at the pix, was that we'd use this to scientifically test for the presence of really big sharks. Good luck out there, buddy.
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Actually, I would be more worried about the fact that the motion of the tail has to have a corresponding motion of the body of the sub... Rocking back and forth like that could cause "under the sea sickness"... *urp* which could be really bad when you are wearing scuba equipment.
Then again, even if you managed not to fill your regulator with chicken sandwich while getting sick, you would be chumming the waters... attracting those sharks you were talking about.
full article (Score:5, Informative)
STOP posting multipage versions of articles !!!
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I'm sure by now some submitters must have posted full page versions to the main story.
My guess is that the editors replaced it with a multipage version because they didn't want to piss off the people running the sites. After all, couldn't they make it more difficult for Slashdot to view articles if they wanted to (redirects for incoming URLs from Slashdot's IP(s))?
Considering how often it happens and how much most of us hate it, it's probably SlashPolicy.
Foam? Carbon? (Score:1)
Carbon and sculpted foam? What the hell? I've been wasting freaking decades and tens of thousands of dollars on DeLoreans for my time machine. Guess I'll head out to Walmart in my ADD-enhanced attempt to break fundamental laws of physics.
Nominative determinism at work. (Score:1)
And he's not the only Mr Fish in Marine Biology.
Re:A Subhuman Project, eh? (Score:4, Funny)
Better than Hunley.
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Mad scientist: Mein Führer! I announce Project Untermensch.
Crowd: stunned silence
Mad scientist: (looks confused for a while, and then realises his mistake)Mr President! I announce Project Subhuman.
Crowd: enthusiastic applause
Sounds fun (Score:3, Interesting)
But is it really any use? If it moves in a direction when started from the bottom of the tank is it actually of any practical use? presumably it's only the buoyancy action combined with it's shape that thrust it forward such that if you start it near the surface it wont do anything.
Effectively rather than forward motion, does this only offer diagonal upwards motion? i.e. can it work without being started some distance below the surface?
I'm not sure crossing the atlantic would be that fun if you have to be dragged to the ocean floor repeatedly and launched diagonally upwards in the general direction.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Sounds fun (Score:4, Informative)
The point is that the buoyancy allowed it to float up a bit, causing water to flow over the propulsion surfaces. That flow, however slight, moved the sub forward. That's actually rather impressive, considering most subs sink like a freaking rock or bob like a log (depending on their buoyancy) instead of moving forward while bobbing slightly. The speed of said forward motion wasn't stated that I saw but it speaks to the fact that it ought to work. Now to see if ti works as well as they think it will.
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Except that's not what happened. They're talking about just the propulsion mechanism / fin, which has already been marketed as a separate product - the Lunocet [lunocet.com].
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And while that sounds impressive - it's meaningless and trivial to accomplish. Nor is it a breakthrough, as diving/gliding submarines like this are rediscovered every couple of years for a couple of decades now. They turn out not to work in practice because they either take a lot of energy to submerge against the buoyancy required, or they requir
A "sub" that goes 2 meters down, and stays there? (Score:4, Insightful)
This is not a submarine. This is a boat that happens to float two meters below the surface of the water.
Depth control consists of him swimming to the surface, filling a bladder with air, and then attaching it to the sub.
And I'm not impressed with his claims that it practically "swam by itself." Getting something to move horizontally when provided with vertical buoyancy and travel is not exactly what one would call difficult, and it has nothing to do with how efficient the boat is or isn't under power.
SirWired
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Depth control consists of him swimming to the surface, filling a bladder with air, and then attaching it to the sub
I didn't see that stated in the article. My impression was more that they'd use some of the compressed air in the scuba tanks, or perhaps a different dedicated tank, to accomplish this. The fact is that wet subs aren't all that uncommon.
Personally, I'd call this one a submersible, rather than a submarine. A submarine is typically much more autonomous than this thing would be (TFA states he'd have a chase boat for air tanks, etc).
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Wet subs aren't that uncommon, but they are generally propelled by electric motors, etc. They don't usually use human power. He's going to be working against the resistance of the water he's surrounded in. He'd have to do a LOT less work in a transoceanic journey if he was only fighting air resistance and not water resistance.
Re:A "sub" that goes 2 meters down, and stays ther (Score:3, Interesting)
When I was a kid I used to buy these little delta winged Styrofoam airplanes at the dime store. The were meant to be launched via a rubber band and a small tab on their underside. However I used to play with them in my grandfather's pool instead. I'd go down to the bottom in the deep end, flip the "plane" upside down, and release. Result? It traveled nearly the length of the pool straight as a string and fairly quickly before surfacing. It was a pretty neat discovery for me as a small child :-)
So, I too am
Not Entirely Human (Score:5, Interesting)
So, it looks like they'll be supplementing human power with wind power. That's kind of disappointing.
'Ciamillo and Fish say they knew they were onto something when the first prototype Lunocet, a piece of sculpted foam sandwiched between two pieces of carbon fiber, essentially swam by itself.
Yes, that's called gliding. It happens whenever a thin flat surface moves freely through a fluid. Aeroplanes and gliders use this all the time. The keel on a sailboat and the rudder on a ship use the same principle. Many autonomous underwater vehicles use buoyancy gliding as a method of propulsion. Increase the density of the robot by compressing an air bladder, and the robot sinks. Fins convert the vertical drop into a forward glide. Expand the air bladder, the robot gets less dense and rises. Again the fins convert the vertical motion into forward motion.
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So, it looks like they'll be supplementing human power with wind power. That's kind of disappointing.
Maybe for you, but I'm glad they've finally found a use for my uncontrollable flatulence. (You insensitive clod!)
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Something smells... (Score:1, Insightful)
...fishy here. (I'm sorry I had to do it) But won't he get tired to death before leaving the first 200 miles off-shore? Fishes give up migrations all the time, can't you?
Too difficult to be submerged for that long (Score:1)
ogligatory (Score:2)
We all live in a human-powered submarine,
human-powered submarine,
human-powered submarine!
Yes, the drugs are responsible for this album,
responsible for this album,
responsible for this album.
Re:obligatory (Score:1)
Dolphin's tail is my
plan for submarine
plan for submarine
plan for submarine
Using foam is
the way to keep it cheap
the way to keep it cheap
the way to keep it cheap
And our friends love making tails
There's no way
That we can fail
And there's air inside our tanks
(HORN SECTION GO!)
Who designed this thing? (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
RTFA
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
What I'm curious about is how he's going to keep his skin from dissolving after being in salt water for almost two months.
Oblig. Terry Pratchett reference (Score:2)
Patent infringement! (Score:4, Funny)
They tried this in Germany (Score:2)
But the "untermensch u-boot" wasn't a big success.
I bought a hman powered submarine last year (Score:2)
Self Contained Underwater Breathing Aparatus.
It was air tight, contained an airsupply, and was powered by my moving my legs.
Hope better than this one (Score:1, Informative)
Hope they have better luck than the human-powered Hunley, a Confederate sub that sank a US ship then itself sank on the way back in. First sub to sink a warship!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.L._Hunley
Efficiency (Score:2)
A wet sub?? (Score:2)
Isn't it very unhealthy for your skin to spend that much time submerged in sea water.
Not to mention it can't be that comfortable, hypothermia issues?
He has to be submerged for more than a month (Score:1)
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Being underwater while in a submarine is nothing like a zero-g environment. Just ask any number of men who have served in submarines around the world. Several countries have missile subs that spent 3+ months at a time submerged.
Astronauts use water tanks for training because they allow a greater range of movement, but the only reason it works is because everything that needs those degrees of freedom is adjusted to be neutrally buoyant, but they are not experiencing zero-g.
Normal subs don't require the person to be in wate (Score:1)
Re:Normal subs don't require the person to be in w (Score:2)
The fact that its a wet sub STILL doesn't matter. He's on earth. There's gravity. Being in the water, wet, doesn't magically mean that gravity no longer applies. Even being neutrally buoyant, his heart still has to pump blood against gravity.
Ciamillo's History (Score:2)
I'm fortunate enough to have a pair of his Zero Gravity (0G-Ti) brakes on my road bike, and they're insanely light (the pair weighs less than a Dura-Ace front caliper) and have been pleasant to work on, and require very little maintenance.
Must ask first: (Score:1, Funny)
Does his middle name begin with "N"?
Seems bogus to me (Score:1)
"When they released it at the bottom of a test pool, its buoyancy combined with its cambered shape generated a forward thrust that made it scoot across the tank."
OK--I'll bet it stopped going forward right around the time it got to the surface of the water.
How time flies... (Score:3, Interesting)
It's interesting to compare this latest reincarnation of the human-powered sub to the eight-man, candle-lit Hunley [wikipedia.org] that (briefly) prowled the waters off the coast of South Carolina during the (U.S.) Civil War.
I just hope... (Score:1)
Should any disaster strike, or shark bite the fin off, I wonder, if the sub, would plummet to the bottom of the ocean as a real fish would without its fin, did they think to come up with possible alternative plan in case, cuz' it ain't like stepping out and changing a flat tire!!!
Frank Fish (Score:1)
A guy named Frank Fish decided to be a marine biologist? How original.
When I was a kid, the comic book... (Score:2)
had an ad in them for a submarine human powered...
PRIOR ART!!!
On a similar note... (Score:2)
On a similar and yet much cooler note, I encourage everyone to visit www.Expedition360.com , a most awesome site about a brits attempt to circumnavigate the globe only via unsuplemented human power. Read through the entire diary and you'll feel like you've read a great and fufilling book. Highly, highly recommended.
The SubHuman. One ugly customer. (Score:2)
I remember seeing an analysis of what this is on TV. No anchor links, but just do a find on "Subhuman".
http://www.thetick.ws/tvvillains.html [thetick.ws]
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