DE1943789A1 - Device for launching, towing and retrieving oceanographic equipment - Google Patents

Description

Fathom Oceanology Limited, Tort Credit, Ontario / Canada

Deployment device. Hauling and hauling in ozeoanographic equipment,

The present invention relates to an apparatus for launching, towing and retrieving one on one Cable attached body from a ship.

Research work for scientific and military Purposes that are carried out underwater, particularly in the sea, have increasingly led to use of hydrodynamic, towed floats to accommodate various devices. In many cases they are These devices are intended for acoustic experiments, so that the towed support body is designed to be sound-permeable have to be. For this reason, the support body must be a very

There are already various devices for the Handling of underwater sound meters designed, that are used in various navies. In general, the cultivation of this dichotomous or lifting devices on the carrier ships are essential structural measures.

The devices known to date are of extremely complicated construction and contain one or more hydraulic winches and additional hydraulic devices for controlling towing devices. The one from it resulting mutual relationship between the various hydraulic components, especially during the Launch and recovery maneuvers reached a critical stage and led to the development of high-level hydraulic ones Control circuits whose maintenance requires well-trained specialists.

During the years of development of these towing devices, it became clear ₅ that a tension stabilizer for the towing cables was necessary, and one thing . To avoid loss of the towed body, which can result from the intermittent relief or shock loads caused by stormy seas. One of these towing devices is provided with a tension stabilizer for the towing cable, which, however, due to the special embodiment of this system, has to be put out of operation during the recovery maneuver. However, the use of a voltage stabilizer is particularly important at this point in time, since the greatest risk of pressure or tearing is when driving slowly and with a relatively short cable length.

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Another problem that arose with the conventional Towing devices provided, concerns the control of the cable position while turning the ship, being horizontal Forces are exerted on the cable and there is a risk that the towed cable will lead out of the pulley.

The aim of the present invention is to provide a device for deploying, towing and retrieving a towed vehicle Support body created, with only a single hydraulic Actuating device is used, so that the maintenance of the device is extremely easy.

Another object of the present invention is to provide a towing device that can be self-contained in its own frame is designed, which can be easily mounted on a ship's deck without any structural Changes to the carrier ship are necessary.

Another object of the present invention is to provide a tension stabilizer for tow cables, which can be kept in operation during the entire recovery maneuver of the towed body until it is Body is on board. Another object of the present invention is to provide an apparatus that simultaneously as a transport device for the body to be towed between storage and deposition of the same as well as a drain cradle for the towed body and contains a form-fitting device with which the rope is prevented from slipping out of the pulley.

The present invention will be explained in the following by means of one Exemplary embodiment explained and described in more detail, reference being made to the accompanying drawings.

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Show it:

1 shows a side view of a towing device according to the invention;

Figure 2 is an end view of the outer end of the towing device of the present invention;

Figure 3 is an end view of the inner end of the invention Towing device with the tension stabilizer for the towing cables; and

Fig. 4 is a partial side view of the protruding overboard Section of the towing device according to the invention during high towing speeds.

The towing device shown in FIG. 1 contains a frame 1 which can be mounted on a ship deck 2 Winch 3, a device for launching and retrieving the Towed body, on the outside of the frame and a tension stabilizer 5 at the inner end of the frame. The to towing body 6 is connected to the winch 3 by means of a cable 7, the cable via a compensation mechanism 4 and a shock absorbing device 5 leads.

The winch 3 shown in Figures 1 and 2 consists from a drum 8 which is supported between two axle bearings 9. A drive 10 can consist of an electrical one or hydraulic motor with gearbox and automatic brakes to transmit power to a drive shaft 11, which is provided with a sprocket 12. A

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large sprocket 13 is attached to the side wall of the drum 8 and a roller chain I ^ connects via this Sprocket the drum with the sprocket 12. A conventional means of control is for a reversible drive the winch provided.

The guide device k shown in Figures 1 and 2 contains a freely rotatable pulley 15 'and a cradle 16 fastened on a common shaft 17. The cradle is rotatably fastened to this shaft and is under spring pressure by means of a tension spring 18, the spring between a first suspension pin 19 is attached to the cradle and a second suspension pin is attached to a strut 20. The springs 18 are selected so that they have sufficient force to raise the cradle to a central position between the movement limits. However, the spring force is not sufficient to lift the cradle when it is carrying the towed body 6.

The cradle contains a pair of forming rollers 21 freely rotatable on the axes 22. A roller 23 is arranged between the frame parts 2k of the cradle in such a way that a line running vertically tangential to the roller is also tangential to the circumference of the groove of the pulley 15 when the Cradle is in its lowest position.

The device shown in Figures 1 and 3 for constant maintenance of the tension of the tow ropes contains a pulley 25 which is freely rotatable and laterally movable on a shaft 26, wherein the shaft 26 is supported by a pair of struts 27. These are firmly connected to a transverse shaft 28, which by means of the

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1343789

inner end of the frame 1 arranged pins 29 are attached. Two hydraulic cylinders 30 connect in the middle on the struts 27 the same with the hanging tab 31 ani frame 1. A gas / oil collector connects the Head ends of cylinder 30 via lines 33. It is a device for regulating the gas pressure is provided, so that the cylinders can compensate for the force transmitted to the arms 27 by the cable tension.

The operation of the device is divided into three work processes, these are the launching maneuver, the towing and the recovery maneuver. These are described in more detail below. At the beginning of the launching maneuver, the towed body 6 is in its storage position represented by position Jk in FIG. At this point in time the tension stabilizer 5 is in such a position that the rope pulley is in position 35. The body 6 is in contact with the forming rollers 21 of the cradle by the cable tension generated by the winch 3 and is held in this position by the automatic brake connected to the drive.

The deployment maneuver begins when the operator lets the cable unroll from the winch 3. The towed body and the cradle device k rotate together around the pivot point on the shaft 17 until the towed body reaches the position 36 shown in FIG. 3, which is largely under water.

When the cable is also removed, the pulley 25 of the tension stabilizer swings on the struts

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until the cable tension is reduced enough so that the weight of the submerged towed body 6 is balanced accordingly. When this tension is reached, an additional unwinding of the cable causes the floating body to be pushed out or lowered from the cradle rollers 21, after which the floating body 3 Bm cable end 27 is dragged freely.

If, at the drag operation, the depth of the towed body and the speed of the vessel increases, the angle of the submerged, the water surface by breaking the cable is changed by an angle of 90 °, as shown in Figure k. Due to the action of the springs 18, the cradle 4 swings upwards so that the forming rollers 23 remain in constant contact with the cable. It is obvious that because of this mode of operation, the cable cannot leave the guiding area of the cradle. This is an extremely important feature because when the ship turns, the cable will be subjected to starboard or port pressure in addition to the towing tension so that some means of preventing the cable from popping out of the pulley is necessary. This is best achieved with the device for achieving spring tension. The guide plates 37 limit the lateral shearing of the cable and distribute the load that occurs, _so that a concentrated load acting on the rollers 21 is avoided.

During the towing process, the movements transmitted to the ship by the waves cause a varying one Cable tension. In extreme cases there is a risk that

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the rope is relaxed and calibrated in a loose state which can be relieved by a sudden subsequent tensile load causing the loss of the cable or the towed body β could mean. This is going through prevents the voltage stabilizer according to the invention. When the ship lifts off on a wave, there is an increasing one Cable tension counteracted by contracting the cylinders 30. These cylinders are through a constant pressure feed fed from the accumulator 32. At the When the ship enters a wave trough, the resulting cable relaxation is also affected by a Counteracted cylinder expansion. A substantially constant supply of oil pressure is between the cylinder and the collector 32 back and forth and stops with the wave motions of the ship's towed body at a constant depth.

In practice, because of the space allotted for the gas has only a certain size in the collector 32, the pressure increases when oil is pressed into the collector and the Pressure drops as soon as oil is pumped back into the cylinder 30 will. If the fastening points for the Rods formed by cylinders 30 are carefully selected, the gain in work of the cylinder force around the pivot point 28 of the struts 27 varies with the position of these struts such that the gain in work is less than when the gas pressure rises and vice versa. To this In this way, the rotational force generated by the cylinder 30 about the pivot point 28 remains constant, with a constant one as well Cable tension is maintained

It is common to provide the cable drum with guide grooves for a cable layer, so that the arrangement of the

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Cable turns controlled by the shape of the cable drum and no additional winder is required. Due to the small distance of the pulley 25 to Drum of the winch, it is necessary that the pulley is relatively accurate with the cable position when leaving of the cable is aligned by the drum. This is easily achieved by using the pulley is laterally freely displaceable on the shaft 26, as shown in Figure 3, so that the pulley at their rotation responds to common misalignments of the cable in the lateral direction.

The hauling in maneuver begins with hauling in the rope. When the towed body 6 approaches the surface of the water, the cradle 4 remains aligned in the appropriate position with the cable, since the cradle is under spring pressure is pushed forward against the cable, the roller 23 with remains in contact with the cable. Therefore, when the float reaches the surface of the water, it is immediately below the cradle.

When contact is made between the floating body 6 and the forming rollers 21, the tension stabilizer becomes 5 swiveled out, whereby the cable tension is built up. When the cable tension is high enough to To overcome the weight of the float 6, the The floating body and the cradle 4 are pivoted together about the shaft 17 until the floating body reaches the position 34 and the cradle 4 is firmly supported against suitable stops. When the stop between the floating body 6 and the Cradle 7, the energy of the impact is dampened by the tension stabilizer over a period of several seconds.

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Claims (1)

- ίο - Claims ■ ν l.yDevice for launching, towing and retrieving a body attached to a cable from a ship, characterized in that the cable (?) be wound on a driven winch (3) can that a device (1, l6) for launching a first pulley (15) on the outside of the winch contains, that the cable (?) runs over this first pulley, and that a cradle (16) can be pivoted about the first Pulley is arranged to maintain the towed body above the water level. 2. Device according to claim 1, characterized in that the cradle contains frame elements (l6, 2h) arranged at a distance from one another on each side of the first rope pulley, that a roller (21, 21) is arranged on each frame part, that each roller in a plane running essentially parallel to the first pulley is arranged, that the cable runs between these rollers and that the towed body is designed to be received on the rollers during launching and retrieving. 3. Apparatus according to claim 1, characterized in that g e k β η η ζ e i without t that springs (Iß) for pivoting the Cradles are provided upward with respect to the first pulley when the towed body is submerged. H. Device according to claim 2, daäureli geke η η - ζ e ic h η et, that a second pulley {25) is asgesränefc in the vicinity and above the rollers, and that the cable runs over the second pulley. 0Q9811 / 0441 - 11 - 5. Device according to claim 1, characterized in that pivotable device (26, 31) is arranged at a distance from the driven winch, that the cable runs around this device, that a device (30-3 ² ) for moving this pivotable device with respect to of the winch it is provided that the movement of the device with respect to the winch takes place in response to an increase and decrease in the tension of the towed cable. 6. Apparatus according to claim 5 »characterized in that the pulley (25) on the side a shaft (26) is displaceable. 7 «device according to claim 5, characterized in that the device for moving the Rope pulley (25) a cylinder (30) and a cooperating therewith Contains piston, the free end of which is connected to the pulley, that a collector (32) with the piston-cylinder device is in communication, that the device is designed such that a substantially constant pressure of a fluid exists between the cylinder, and that the collector is the towed Maintaining the body at a constant depth 8. Apparatus according to claim 6, characterized in that the shaft (26) fixed to the free End of a strut (27) is mounted that the other end of the strut can be pivoted about one arranged on the ship Pivot point (28, 29) is attached that the free end of the piston is attached to the strut that the gain in work around the pivot point is lower when the pressure in the cylinder increases. 009811/0447