Supercavitation wasRe: Wet Navy in the future was Re:

This is all IIRC.

Supercavitation is where you have a non-hydrodynamic projectile which is
propelled very rapidly underwater.  The shape of the projectile and the
high thrust combine to create a full air cavity surrounding the
projectile.
Basically the projectile is pushed so fast that it creates a "bubble"
around the projectile.	This cuts drag down to almost nothing because
there's no contact  with the water, which allows ridiculously high
speeds..
The problems with this type of propulsion are numerous.  One is
initiating
the supercavitation.  Another is propulsion, as conventional propulsion
is
out (since they require water to work).  I think most of the current
experiments with it use rocket motors.	The final hurdle for practical
application of supercavitation is how to steer the bloody thing.
Conventional control surfaces won't work because they either a) can't
get
sufficient "bite" to change the course of the projectile or b) create so
much drag that they collapse the "bubble".

I think this has come up around here before and I read some of the
articles
that had links posted, which is where this came from.	IIRC this was
talked about in relation to the sinking of the Kursk since it was
speculated that they were testing one of these torpedoes when it
exploded.

Bill
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		    Jaime Tiampo					
				       
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		    11/30/01 02:20 PM					
				       
		    Please respond to gzg-l				 

Brian Bilderback wrote:
>
> Along these lines, I just ran across a discussion of a technology I'd
never
> hear of before, and I was pretty impressed with it.  Also very very
> disappointed in myself for not having encountered it before.	The
technology
> is Supercavitation.  Makes for some interesting designs, if anyone
ever
ran
> a naval sci-fi game.

What is supercavitation. I know what regular cavitation is, is super
cavitation where you get sucked backwards by the bubbles? :)

Jaime