THE GYROSCOPE FOR MARINE PURPOSES. 147 



each pound of weight is enabled to do the work of only one pound and the 

 weights and auxiliary machinery required have been thought to be prohibi- 

 tive; and furthermore, the weight, when on one side or the other, constitutes 

 a persistent unbalancing or listing force, whereas the gyroscope is enabled 

 to deliver stresses pure and simple without disturbing the balance of the 

 boat or introducing any such list whatever. The problem of preventing 

 rolling of ships at sea has been attacked by a great many engineers. 



Last year, while in Hamburg, I saw the latest arrangement of Engi- 

 neer Frahm — some large naval vessels for the Russian Government now 

 being built with his arrangement for steadying, involving enormous 

 tanks amidships, which will contain from 350 to 400 tons of water 

 through the rushing of which, back and forth, a part of the true periodic 

 roll will be extinguished, but only a part and only when periodic. The 

 eminent authority. Dr. Schhck, states with reference [to this arrangement 

 that it will become a positive menace and cause excessive rolling 

 when the ship's oscillation falls out of period, which it invariably does 

 in a storm. This, however, is interesting, as showing the great desire 

 to prevent rolling of ships and especially war vessels. 



The gyroscope, on the other hand, is not limited to any particular 

 period of the boat; it simply responds to whatever motion the ship has, 

 synchronous or non-synchronous. The question is often asked: Why is 

 the gyroscope better than a moving weight in a ship for roll quenching? 

 Barring the matter of list produced by the changes of center of gravity 

 of the ship by the moving weight, the reason is perfectly apparent when 

 you recall the magnitude of the stresses obtainable from a small machine. 

 Every pound in the rotating mass of the gyroscope can easily be made to 

 do the work of from 150 to 200 pounds, and directed in any desired line 

 or plane, whereas, when we use water or any other form of moving weight, 

 each pound represents a pound only, and can do the work of only a pound, 

 and only in a vertical direction. 



The gyroscope is probably the only device in the world by means of 

 which stresses and also energy may be transferred "around a corner," so 

 to speak. With the gyroscope it is possible to create and maintain a very 

 powerful fulcrum in space effective for the heaviest kind of mechanical duty. 



Now on board ship there is one factor that is stiff and is now avail- 

 able, and that is the fore-and-aft stability of the ship. In the gyroscope, 

 for the first time, we have the means of rendering it possible to reach out 

 and transfer this stability around a comer, so to speak, to the athwart- 

 ships plane and thus hold the ship against rolling. We can do this with 

 a surprisingly small mass, because, as I have said, every pound in that 



