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Transportation Science Technology

Aiming For a Commercially Available Submersible 66

Posted by Soulskill from the bond-villains-take-notice dept.
Zothecula writes "In three years, if you happen to be 3,000 meters (9,800 ft) beneath the surface of the ocean, keep an eye out for the Cyclops. No, not the hairy giant, but the 5-passenger submersible. Once it's commercially available in 2016, it should be 'the only privately owned deep-water manned submersible available for contracts.' 'That 7-inch-thick hull will be made of carbon fiber, in which individual strips of pre-impregnated fiber are individually placed within the carbon fiber matrix. Developed by Boeing, this technique is said to offer finer production control than the more traditional filament winding process, and should allow the Cyclops to withstand the 4,300 psi (300 bar) of water pressure it will encounter at its maximum diving depth – the earlier-mentioned 3,000 meters.' As for why it's called the Cyclops, just check out its one-big-eye-like 180-degree borosilicate glass observation dome."
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Aiming For a Commercially Available Submersible More

Aiming For a Commercially Available Submersible

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  • 5 Passengers? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by idontgno ( 624372 ) on Friday August 23, 2013 @12:38PM (#44656461) Journal

    How many kilos of high-value cargo would that be?

    Will buying one of these put you on a watch list in one of the Wars on <noun>?

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by ackthpt ( 218170 )

      How many kilos of high-value cargo would that be?

      Will buying one of these put you on a watch list in one of the Wars on <noun>?

      The real question is: How many seasons could they get out of it before it dives under the shark?

    • Re:5 Passengers? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by CanHasDIY ( 1672858 ) on Friday August 23, 2013 @12:49PM (#44656605) Homepage Journal

      Assuming a weight capacity of 200 lb/passenger (doesn't seem an unreasonable estimate), minus the weight of the driver, you'd be able to fit about 363 Kilos of coca... I mean, 'supplies,' for an 8 hour journey. Maybe a little longer since there'd only be 1 oxygen-user on board.

      Will buying one of these put you on a watch list in one of the Wars on ?

      Are you kidding? Just talking about it probably got us both added to a watchlist or two.

      Side note, OT: How the hell do you escape greater/less than signs???

      • Re:5 Passengers? (Score:4, Informative)

        by Chris Mattern ( 191822 ) on Friday August 23, 2013 @01:04PM (#44656793)

        Side note, OT: How the hell do you escape greater/less than signs???

        Slashdot uses a subset of HTML tags and codes. &lt; and &gt; does it, <see?> although you don't have to put in a escape sequence for a greater than that doesn't match a previous less than; Slashdot doesn't swallow those.

      • I'm on the 'watch list' at this point, been verified by my recent trips through airports and encounters with security ... slashdot posts are the only reason for me to be there as I never really say shit or post anywhere else. Started immediately after I pointed out that I had been through many TSA checkpoints where the stupid fucks didn't even catch my pocket knife in pat downs, metal detectors both wand and full body, and of course body scanner bullshit. I never took my pocket knife on intentionally, it

        • Congratulations Mr BitZtream, you are now a second class citizen, who get shat on at every check point. If HS actually found the said knife on you, then you would probably have become a third class citizen on the No Fly list, so count your blessings.
    • Don't worry about the Wars on <noun>.

      Don't even worry about the Wars on <verb>.

      Shit's gonna get real when they begin the Wars on <adverb>. And, worse, the Wars on <preposition>.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by cod3r_ ( 2031620 )
      HAHAHA first thing i thought of too.. First order will be big and by the Mexican Mafia.

    • How many kilos of high-value cargo would that be?

      You don't need a deep-diving submersible for that, now do you?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by slick7 ( 1703596 )

      How many kilos of high-value cargo would that be?

      Will buying one of these put you on a watch list in one of the Wars on <noun>?

      How will the Navy determine the CIA subs from the ordinary drug running types?

  • One up (Score:3)

    by stewsters ( 1406737 ) on Friday August 23, 2013 @12:45PM (#44656553)
    As long as we are showing off design concepts, howabout more luxury:
    http://mashable.com/2013/06/06/migaloo-submarine/ [mashable.com]

  • How about something not a concept (Score:3)

    by HuguesT ( 84078 ) on Friday August 23, 2013 @12:51PM (#44656635)

    AFAIK you can buy this one [ussubmarines.com]...

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by HuguesT ( 84078 )

      Sorry replying to myself, actually this is only a nice and expensive concept.

    • That has an operational depth of only 300m. It's an entirely different class of vehicle.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by HuguesT ( 84078 )

        I agree, but a 300 m depth is huge already. This is basically the operational depth of most nuclear subs. Military sub of WWII never went below 200m.

  • How much is that in Rosanne Barr?

  • Yes, the hairy giant. (Score:3)

    by pspahn ( 1175617 ) on Friday August 23, 2013 @12:57PM (#44656717)
    When I think of Cyclops, the first adjective that comes to mind is 'hairy'.

  • For the uninitiated (Score:5, Informative)

    by Skiron ( 735617 ) on Friday August 23, 2013 @01:00PM (#44656753)
    Every 10 metres from the surface, divide by ten and add 1. i.e. at 60 metres depth, that will be 7 bar (105 psi), at 300 metres that will be 31 bar (465 psi).

    • Second the thanks. Lot easier than messing with 33ft. per.; when I started having the occasional use for this conversion, tho, in this neck of the woods all the working measurements were still in English.

  • gosh, my schedule is full then (Score:3)

    by swschrad ( 312009 ) on Friday August 23, 2013 @01:02PM (#44656775) Homepage Journal

    thanks anyway, I can't make it to 3000 meters deep that year. unless I make enemies in Joisey...

  • Some people have too much money.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ackthpt ( 218170 )

      Some people have too much money.

      And some of us don't have enough. )_:

      It would certainly bring new capacity to underwater geocaching (c:

  • I don't see a price anywhere. What is the estimated cost of this thing?

    • Like most other things, the backs of the working class and the destruction of the environment.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      RTFS... it won't be for sale, it'll be for rent.

      • Yeah, I noticed that but the article doesn't mention the cost to rent or the cost to manufacture either.

  • I heartily endorse drowning rich fools.
  • If well space is the final one, the colonization of the sea could be the next wave, plenty of space, food, resources, and even energy that can be obtained there, at a fraction of the cost of going to orbit or other planets. It have more sense to do an ocean race instead of a space one, and anything that help in that direction could get a big market in a middle term future.
    • I think you underestimate the difficulty of dealing with pressure.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by gmuslera ( 3436 )
        As someone that learned programming using pascal, im pretty used to pressure. But anyway, current culture still focus in stars, space and so on, while there are problems not yet fully solved like gravity, radiation and being self sustained. Compared to them, pressure is an easier problem, and a shorter term alternative for another habitat (at least, while we don't contaminate too much oceans) for living, exploring and/or gathering resources.

        • Not to mention space travel has the exact same pressure issue, but in the other direction, and not as large as deep under the ocean but none the less, spacecraft do have to cope with abnormal pressure differentials.

    • Living under the sea has been tried 50 years ago already. The problems are pressure, damp, mold, rust and barnacles. NASA still has a deep water habitat: http://gcmd.nasa.gov/records/GCMD_dgomb.html [nasa.gov]

  • Not the first (Score:4, Informative)

    by Maudib ( 223520 ) on Friday August 23, 2013 @01:32PM (#44657127)

    http://www.stanleysubmarines.com/ [stanleysubmarines.com]

    Though he doesn't go as deep.

  • US Subs [ussubs.com] does this - from smaller ones (for one or two people) to yacht style 200' long ones that you can park a Smart Car in.

  • Triton Submarines [tritonsubs.com] makes 2-man and 3-man subs designed for 1000 or 3300 foot depths. "The 3300/3 played a major role in the expedition to capture the first ever footage of the Giant Squid" which a few of you probably saw on the Discovery Channel. They are one of a handful of companies designing models capable of visiting the Challenger Deep (repeating the feats of the Trieste in 1960 and James Cameron in 2012).

  • I mean whats a super villain without a submersible?

    How does one even enter their volcano lair without one?

  • What definition of 'privately owned' are the using to try to claim to be the only one available for contracts? There are all sorts of companies out there that rent or lease out vehicles for things like research, filming, and salvage.

  • Mir (Score:3)

    by vuo ( 156163 ) on Friday August 23, 2013 @06:31PM (#44660257) Homepage
    Mir. [wikipedia.org] The interesting thing is that the CIA killed this project, leaving only the two pieces already produced. They feared that the technology was too advanced to be sold to the Soviet Union. They promised the manufacturer compensating orders from the West, but you should never trust the U.S. government - this was of course a lie.

    • CIA did not kill the Mir project. It helps to read the article you cite and to comprehend it. From the Wikipedia article, for clarification purposes:

      "The level of technology flowing into the Soviet Union raised concern in the USA and Rauma-Repola was privately threatened with economic sanctions. For example, one concern of the Pentagon was the possibility that the Soviet Union would manufacture a pioneer submarine fleet that could clear the ocean floor of U.S. deep sea listening equipment.[1] With the pos

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by vuo ( 156163 )
        The promises of orders are not mentioned in this article, but were in a TV documentary about the case. (Whatever the case, it's not known if the Soviets would've approved of orders by other countries or private individuals, for instance Israel.)

        • Ah, thank you. I will try to find the documentary - I'd not been aware of it, or missed it. Given the situation between Finland and Russia then, it would have been interesting had they been, so to say, outbid. At any rate, I think it a sad thing they had to abandon their continuing research, as in the case of Mir they were on to an interesting line, it seems.

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