GB1486976A - Submersible oil boom - Google Patents

Abstract

1486976 Floating oil booms B F GOODRICH CO 18 Feb 1975 [27 March 1974] 6879/75 Heading E1H An oil boom comprises boom sections 11 hinged together by hinge parts 40 and pins 52 and each section comprises a vertical wall 16 and two buoyancy elements 18 into whose interior water or air is introduced to selectively sink or float the boom. In one embodiment each element 18 is filled by two pieces of resilient plastics foam material 32. 33 and a flexible tube 30 into the interior of which pressurised air or water is introduced from an external source (Figure 4). The natural resiliency of the pieces 32, 33 squeezes the tube 30 in the event of a failure to expel whatever medium it contains and thereby ensures that the boom will be buoyant in such circumstances (Figure 6). Alternatively the tube 30 may not be present and the two pieces 32, 33 define a channel into which pressurised fluid is introduced. Instead of the two pieces 32, 33 each element 18 may contain either a sealed air filled tube which acts in a manner similar to pieces 32, 33 with or without a tube 30, or a tube 30 surrounded by a second tube, the space between the two tubes being filled by two pieces of resilient plastics foam and the space remaining within each element being filled by a further foam piece. The elements 18 or, if present, the tubes 30 are connected together in series for introduction and exhaustion of pressurised fluid and the end of the boom carries rollers which slide in a respective channel shaped track.