SUBMARINE BOATS. 



657 



and injuring 5 of her crew. The boat had be- 

 haved splendidly throughout the trip, making 

 several dives and proving herself entirely sea- 

 worthy. The explosion was caused, as deter- 

 mined by the examining board, by hydrogen gas 

 from the storage-batteries that collected in the 

 battery compartments and there ignited. The 

 boat was brought back to New York, and it is 

 the intention of the company to refit her as soon 

 as the regular Government work is completed. 



The Adder was the first of the new boats to be 

 completed. In the early part of May, 1902, she 

 was towed, by the way of the Delaware capes, 

 and Norfolk, to Washington, and received her 

 first trials in the Potomac below that city. The 

 Moccasin was completed soon aiterward, the 

 Grampus made her first trip at San Francisco, 

 Nov. 3, 1902, and the other boats are all nearing 

 completion. The Adder and the Moccasin re- 

 ceived their official trials in Peconic Bay, Long 

 Island, from Nov. 11 to Nov. 19, 1902, by a spe- 

 cially appointed Inspection Board, consisting 

 of Capt. Charles J. Train (senior member), Capt. 

 Charles R. Roelker, Commander W. C. Cowles 

 (recorder), Naval-Constructor Joseph J. Wood- 

 ward, Naval-Constructor S. F. Smith, and Lieuts. 

 W. C. Herbert, W. R. White, and H. H. Caldwell. 

 Capt. Frank T. Cable, with a picked crew, was 

 in command of the boats. For the army Major 

 Arthur Murray, commandant of the school of 

 submarine defense, Capt. C. J. Bailey, of the 

 submarine depot, and Capt. G. F. Landers, in- 

 structor in the depot of electricity, mechanism, 

 and mines, all of Fort Totten, watched the tests, 

 which were the severest ever given any battle- 

 ship intended for the United States navy, with 

 interest in view of the possibilities of the use 

 of the submarine boat as a means of harbor 

 defense. The boats were required to make 12 

 runs on the surface, under the gas-engine only, 

 over a 1-mile course, half the runs with the 

 tide and half against it. The average speed of 8 

 knots an hour must be attained on these runs. 

 Awash the boats make 6 runs of a mile with 

 the tide, and an equal number against it, the 

 average speed to equal 7 knots, the gas-engine 

 only being used. In- a completely submerged 

 condition the boat carries the crew and 2 observ- 

 ers from the trial board, and no portion of the 

 boat is exposed, but a light mast is carried to 

 show above the surface, so the trial board 

 can observe the times of passing the ranges. On 

 these trials the boats make 4 runs for each of the 

 3 different speeds over a course of half a nautical 

 mile, 2 with and 2 against the tide, the averaging 

 speed to equal 7 knots. Over a -course of 10 

 knots the vessels were required to make 8 knots 

 an hour on the surface and 7 knots an hour 

 awash. In the torpedo trials the vessels were 

 required to run 2 miles under water and at the 

 finish discharge a torpedo which shall strike a 

 target 150 feet long by 15 feet deep, placed across 

 the course, representing the vitals of a battle- 

 ship. The vessel was not to rise for observa- 

 tions more than 3 times from the time of start- 

 ing until the discharge of the torpedo for the 

 duration of each period of observation not to 

 exceed one minute. The endurance trials consist- 

 ed of a surface run of twelve hours' duration at 

 full speed of 8 knots under the gasoline-engine, and 

 1 of three hours hermetically sealed under the 

 electric motor at 7 knots an hour. 



The Adder made an average speed on the sur- 

 face of 8.5 knots an hour when running in the 

 light condition, in the awash condition she 

 made an average speed of 8 knots an hour, and 

 when totally submerged her speed was 7.23 knots, 



VOL. XLII. 42 A 



and thereby she exceeded her contract speeds by 

 half a knot on the surface, by 1 knot when awash, 

 and by 0.23 knot when completely submerged. 

 In her trial on Nov. 14 the Adder, after taking 

 position on the. course and getting under way, 

 ran for a mile submerged, then turned and re- 

 turned to the starting-point and fired her tor- 

 pedo at a mark 150 feet long and 15 feet deep rep- 

 resenting the vital part of a battle-ship. The turn 

 was made when she was completely submerged, 

 and in the home run only two observations, last- 

 ing thirty seconds each, were taken, one of them 

 soon after the turn, and the other between the 

 half and the quarter-mile flags. After the second 

 observation she remained invisible, with no indi- 

 cation of her whereabouts, except when she fired 

 her torpedo, the course of the torpedo being 

 indicated, as it always is, by the trail of bubbles 

 of compressed air from her engine rising to the 

 surface. The torpedo went a few feet wide of 

 the mark, but it was asserted that the divergence 

 was due to the swerving of the torpedo, and not 

 to faulty aiming from the Adder. In any case, 

 had it been in actual warfare the torpedo would 

 have struck a ship in the same position well 

 within the bow or the stern and would have 

 proved effective. On Nov. 17 the Adder made a 

 submerged run of three hours, and the distance 

 traveled nearly 21 knots. Naval-Constructor 

 Woodward, one of the officers of the Inspection 

 Board, stated that the air, excepting during the 

 last twenty minutes of the run, was perfectly 

 fresh, and even in the latter period it was as fresh 

 as the air on the berth-deck of a battle-ship. 

 Subsequently the engines passed satisfactorily 

 the test of a continuous run of twelve hours' 

 duration. The run was made entirely under the 

 electric motor. The batteries were charged to 

 their capacity of 1,900 ampere-hours, and about 

 500 amperes an hour were used. At the end of 

 the run the batteries showed a further capacity 

 of about 400 ampere-hours, and the voltage had 

 been reduced from 120 to about 100. Although 

 she was required to run but three hours sub- 

 merged, it is estimated she could have run almost 

 another hour before exhausting the capacity of 

 her batteries. Reducing the consumption of 

 power, it is estimated that the Adder could have 

 made 125 knots under her electric motor at 3 

 knots an hour. 



At the request of the board a periscope was 

 attached to the boat in some of these tests to 

 try its efficiency. This device, used with much 

 success in the boats of the French navy for 

 ascertaining the position of objects on the sur- 

 face when the boat carrying it is submerged, con- 

 sists of a mirror at the top of an iron tube about 

 15 feet above the deck amidships, its lower end 

 being in the hold of the boat, where the observer 

 stands. The reflection of objects on the surface 

 is conveyed to him by a system of lenses. This 

 iron tube interfered with the trial, for its local 

 attraction threw the compass out of adjustment, 

 and it also retarded the speed of the boat suffi- 

 ciently to upset slightly the calculations of Capt. 

 Cable* while steering under water. In the final 

 report the board recommended invention toward 

 the improvement of this device. 



The tests of the Moccasin were equally suc- 

 cessful. She exceeded the required speed in both 

 the surface and awash tests, and in her speed 

 trial when submerged she made the remarkable 

 record of 7.28 knots, making her the fastest sub- 

 marine boat in the world. At her torpedo trial 

 a heavy sea was running, driven by a stiff east- 

 erly gale, and the conning-tower looked like a 

 rock awash. Going at full speed, the Moccasin 



