History of the creation of submarines. Best submarine

Submarines in the modern sense are formidable weapons, but when did they become so? Who created the first submarine exclusively for military purposes, what weapons did they carry and what did they look like? We will try to answer these questions in this article.

The first inventor and creator of the first military submarine is considered to be the French engineer Denis Papin, who created his boat in 1691 in Germany. His invention was an all-metal underwater vessel in the shape of a rectangle, having a length of 1.68 m, a height of 1.76 m and a width of 76 cm. This invention, described by the creator in 1695 in the almanac “A Collection of Various Discourses Concerning Certain Machines,” was equipped a frame made of steel rods, a hatch closed with several bolts, and holes for oars, which, according to the author, could be used to attack an enemy ship. Thus, we can safely say that Papen was not only the creator of the first metal submarine, but also the first military submarine.

Papen's boat

At the same time, a similar idea was born in the minds of Russian inventors. So, in 1718, shipyard worker Ivan Nikonov came to Emperor Peter I and offered to build an underwater vessel for the emperor. Peter, as a true enthusiast, immediately became interested in the idea of ​​​​creating a submarine, and already in August 1720, Nikonov’s first submarine, which left the shipyard in 1721, was laid down in the galley yard of St. Petersburg. This boat underwent a number of successful tests, as a result of which it was decided to create a new submarine. Nikonov’s second project, called the “fiery ship,” was launched in the fall of 1724, but the boat was damaged. Unfortunately, the boats have not survived, as have their drawings, but it is assumed that both of them were made in the form of barrels with oar traction.

Nikonov submarine (reconstruction of the first sample)

There was also a third boat created by Nikonov. Its inventor created it by order of Catherine I. Perhaps it was a repaired and improved second boat. The new ship was successfully launched in 1726. To the design of this vessel, Nikonov added weapons such as small-caliber guns, a tube for throwing incendiary cocktails, and mechanical devices for destroying ships (presumably a drill). An amazing fact is the assumption that the diver on board could get out of the boat, which was under water. For this purpose, Nikonov created a special capsule cabin, which can be considered a prototype of modern airlock chambers. This project was expensive for the state and, according to officials, did not pay for itself. As a result of this, the inventor was exiled to the remote Astrakhan port.

Despite these developments, the most famous "early" submarine is the invention of David Tower, built in 1773 in the USA. Tower's boat was an oak barrel secured with steel hoops, on which was located a copper cap with portholes and a hermetically sealed lid. The hood was also equipped with two tubes with valves for supplying fresh air and removing used air. The boat sank when the tank located at the bottom of the boat was filled with water. To ascend, it was necessary to pump water out of it using a pump. For an emergency ascent, the boat commander could disconnect the lead weights that were also attached to the bottom of the vessel. The movement of the boat was carried out using two screws using muscle traction. Tower's boat, named Turtle, weighed about 2 tons and had a hull length of 2.3 meters and a width of 1.8 meters. This boat could stay under water for up to 30 minutes, which was enough to use its only weapon - a mine. This weapon was attached to a drill located on the hood of the boat, and was a powder keg weighing 45 kg with a clock mechanism. According to the author's idea, the boat commander had to swim to the bottom of the ship, drill through it and, having disconnected the drill, start the clock mechanism.

Tower submarine

It is known that this boat took part in the American Revolutionary War. In 1776, Tower's boat, captained by Sergeant Ezra Lee, attempted to attack one of the British ships blockading the port of Boston. However, the bottom of the British frigate Eagle, which tried to attack Lee, was sheathed in metal, and the attack failed.

Tower's invention was perhaps the first and last hand-drawn military submarine. After it, ships powered by steam engines and internal combustion engines appeared.

Turtle submarine diagram

Capable of autonomous actions under water and on the surface. They can both carry weapons and perform specialized operations (from research to repair and entertainment) under water, depending on the design. In some sources, submarines are also called remote-controlled unmanned robotic underwater vehicles.

History of appearance

Antiquity and the Middle Ages

The first mention of a ship capable of submersion dates back to 1190. In the German legend (author unknown) “Salman and Morolf”, the main character (Morolf) built a boat made of leather and hid on it from hostile ships at the bottom of the sea. At the same time, the boat was under water for 14 days, the air supply was provided by an external intake through a long pipe. Unfortunately, no drawings or at least drawings of this vessel have been preserved, so the reality of its existence is neither possible to confirm nor to refute.

Sketch of a submarine by Leonardo Da Vinci

The “genius of the Renaissance” Leonardo Da Vinci also worked on a device capable of diving under water. However, his submarine does not have a detailed description and drawings, which were destroyed by the inventor himself.

Only a small sketch of an oval-shaped vessel has survived, with a ram and a small wheelhouse, in the center of which there is a hatch. It is impossible to make out any design features on it.

The scientific foundations of scuba diving were first outlined in 1578, in the work of William Bouin, “Inventions or Devices Absolutely Necessary for All Generals and Captains, or Commanders, Men, Both at Sea and on Land.” In this work, using Archimedes' law, he was the first to scientifically substantiate methods of reversible immersion/ascent by changing the buoyancy of the vessel when its displacement changes.

In 1580, William Brun and in 1605, Magnus Petilius, both Englishmen, built submersible ships. However, these objects could not be called submarines, since they were not capable of moving under water, but could only dive and emerge in a given place.

1620 Van Drebbel submarine.

The first submarine capable of moving underwater in any direction and having indisputable evidence of its existence was the project of Cornelius Van Drebel. This vessel was made of wood and leather, and was capable of diving to a depth of 4 meters using the filling/emptying of leather bellows. The first experimental model was built in 1620 and used a pole pushing off the bottom for propulsion, and already in 1624, on a new model with an oar propeller (the holes in the oar body were sealed with leather inserts), King James I of England made an underwater trip along the Thames.

According to written evidence, the depth of immersion was determined by a mercury barometer. In addition, there is unconfirmed information about his use of the decomposition of nitrate when heated to produce oxygen.

Denis Papin (1647 - 1712)

For more than 10 years, this ship was used by the English nobility for travel between Griewich and Westminster.

The idea of ​​building an underwater ship made of metal was first expressed in 1633 by French monastic scientists Georges Fournier and Marin Mersenne in their work “Technological, Physical, Moral and Mathematical Problems.”

In this work, for the first time, an attempt was made to improve the streamlining and controllability of an underwater vessel following the example of fish (the hull of the vessel was proposed to be made of copper sheets with its formation in the shape of a fish, with pointed ends and fins at the ends for better controllability).

The first metal underwater vessel was a rectangular submarine made by Denis Papin in 1691, 1.68 meters long, 1.76 meters high and 0.78 meters wide.

The material used was tin reinforced with metal rods. On the top of the vessel there was a hole “... of such a size that a person could easily enter it,” which was closed with a sealed hatch. According to the author, the ship also had “other openings through which the crew of the ship could interact with the enemy ship, destroying it.”

What specific actions were supposed to be taken against the enemy is unknown, just as the method of diving/surfacing and moving the Papen vessel is unknown.

XVIII-XIX centuries

The modern era was characterized by rapid scientific and technological progress, which could not but affect the design of submarines.

Estimated appearance of the “hidden” ship

In 1720, the first initially military submarine was secretly laid down in St. Petersburg, according to the design of Efim Nikonov. The boat was developed by him since 1718 under the patronage of Peter 1. In 1721, the first version of the vessel was launched and successfully passed tests.

The inventor continued his work and already in 1724 the second model of the submarine was tested on the water. Unfortunately, they ended unsuccessfully - a leak arose from hitting the bottom, and only at the cost of great efforts was the ship and the inventor saved.

From 1725 to 1726, the inventor worked on the third model of his ship, already under the auspices of Catherine 1. The designer was accused of embezzlement of 400 rubles and in 1728 he was demoted and sent to the Admiralty of Arkhangelsk.

Accurate data on the design of Nikonov’s vessel has not been preserved. There is only general information about the shape of the vessel (barrel-shaped), materials (boards reinforced with hoops and trimmed with leather), and the immersion/ascent system - a water box equipped with a hand pump. The boat was moving on an oar drive. The most varied weapons were offered, from “fire pipes” (the prototype of modern flamethrowers) to conventional guns and a diver exiting through an airlock chamber to manually destroy the hull of enemy ships.

Submarine "Turtle"

50 years later, the first boat that took part in hostilities was built in the United States. In 1773, David Tower designed Turtle. The hull of the vessel was lenticular in shape and consisted of two halves connected at the flanges by a leather insert. On the roof of the ship there was a copper hemisphere with a hatch for entering the boat and portholes for observing the situation outside. The boat had a ballast compartment, filled and emptied using pumps, and emergency lead ballast, which could be easily dumped. The propulsion system was oared, the armament consisted of a 45-kilogram mine located in the stern, equipped with a clock mechanism. It was assumed that the mine would be attached to the ship's hull using a drill.

On September 6, 1776, for the first time in the world, an attempt was made to attack an enemy ship with a submarine. Submarine Turtle, under the command of Sergeant Ezra Lee, attacked the British frigate HMS Eagle. However, the attack failed - the ship was sheathed in copper sheets, which the drill could not cope with. Several subsequent attempts to attack British ships also failed, and during the last one the boat towing Turtle was discovered by an English ship and sunk by artillery fire along with the submarine.

Nautil 2 R. Fulton

The end of the 18th century was marked by the construction in France of a submarine by the American engineer Robert Fulton in 1800. Nautil 1. The first model was made of wood, had an ellipsoidal shape, and was driven by muscular force through a mechanical transmission by rotating first the Archimedes, and later the 4-blade propellers.

Second model ( Nautil 2) had very significant changes compared to the prototype. Firstly, the ship's hull was built from copper, retaining the shape of an ellipse in cross-section. Secondly, the boat received two separate propulsors: for underwater and surface movement. When on the surface, the boat moved under a folding umbrella sail (laid underwater on the deck along with the mast). While submerged, the boat still moved with the help of a propeller rotated through a gear by people sitting inside the boat. The boat was armed with a mine made from two copper barrels - the attached mine was detonated through wires using an electric current.

In 1801, a submarine Nautil 2 The world's first (though only a demonstration) successful attack was carried out on the roadstead of Brest. The sloop was blown up by a mine. The French government did not appreciate the invention, considering it “dishonest,” and the inventor moved to England. The Lords of the Admiralty, having examined the project, came to the conclusion that it was undoubtedly dangerous, first of all, for England itself - since this type of ship called into question the power of any surface fleet. The inventor was offered a lifelong pension with the condition that he “forget” about his project.

Drawing of the submarine K.A. Schilder

In 1834, the world's first submarine missile carrier was built. Developed by Adjutant General K.A. Schilder's submarine had an oblong, egg-shaped hull made of iron up to 5 mm thick. To enter the boat there were two cabins on the upper deck up to 1 meter high and up to 0.8 meters in diameter. The vessel had an original manually driven rowing propulsion unit: specially shaped paddles (2 on each side) folded when moving forward, and straightened out when rowing, creating a driving push. This type of movement gave the boat fairly good controllability, provided by adjusting the angle and stroke force of each “foot”.

The armament consisted of a mine detonated by wires, mounted on a special harpoon, driven into the hull of the enemy vessel, and 6 guides for launching powder rockets, located in groups of 3 along the sides. According to some reports, launching missiles was also possible from an underwater position.

The first test of the vessel ended in failure (the details are not known due to the high secrecy of the project) and further work was curtailed.

The first attempt to get away from muscle power in the movement of submarines was made in 1854. The ship was built by the French inventor Prosper Peyern Paerhydrostate with a steam engine of original design. A mixture of saltpeter and coal was burned in a special firebox, while water was simultaneously supplied to the firebox. The combustion products were fed into a steam engine, from where the excess was vented overboard. The main disadvantage of this design was the formation of nitric acid in the boiler, which destroyed the structure of the vessel.

Aleksandrovsky submarine

In 1863, the first underwater vessel using a pneumatic engine was laid down in Russia. The submarine designed by I. F. Aleksandrovsky used pneumatic engines powered by 200 cast-iron air cylinders under a pressure of 100 atmospheres.

The submarine with a displacement of 352 tons (surface)/365 tons (underwater) had a rationally shaped hull, with a wall thickness of 9 to 12 millimeters, a glazed deckhouse, two pneumatic engines with a power of up to 117 horsepower, and vertical and horizontal rudders. The available supply of compressed air was also used to blow through the main ballast tank.

The armament consisted of two positively buoyant mines connected by an elastic ligament. The detonation was carried out via wires.

It is noteworthy that it was Aleksandrovsky who developed the first self-propelled mine in 1865 (a year before the invention of the self-propelled mine by Whitehead), which he called “torpedo”. The torpedo proposed to the naval department was authorized for production “at its own expense” only in 1868. Despite the fact that in 1875 Aleksandrovsky’s torpedo was successfully tested and had a number of important advantages over Whitehead’s product, it was the latter that were assigned for purchase, due to their lower weight and size.

In 1864, a submarine was built in France Plongeur, as well as Aleksandrovsky’s boat, which had pneumatic engines. The boat was armed with a pole mine and could reach an underwater speed of up to 4 knots for 2 hours. However, the submarine was characterized by great instability in maintaining depth and was considered unsuitable for military use.

Submarine H. Hanley

In 1863, a series of submarines was built in the United States under the general name David. The boat's designer was Southerner Horace L. Hanley. The crew of the boats consisted of 9 people, 8 of whom turned the propeller drive to move the boat. The armament consisted of one pole mine with an electric fuse fired from the boat. First attack David occurred October 5, 1863 on the battleship USS Ironside. The attack was unsuccessful - the mine was detonated too early and the boat and its entire crew were lost. On February 17, 1864, a submarine of this type, which had the name H. L. Hunley, the ship was attacked USS Housatonic. The attack was successful, but after the attack the submarine went missing. According to modern data, the submarine sank not far from its victim due to mechanical damage. In 2000, it was raised, restored and is located in the Charleston Museum.

Djavetsky's submarine

The first truly serial submarines were S.K. Dzhevetsy, which were accepted for production in a series of 50 pieces, despite their extremely primitive design for those years. The first model had a pedal drive; the mine was attached to the hull of the enemy vessel through a rubber sleeve. Subsequently, Dzhavetsky improved his ships, first installing pneumatic and then electric engines. The boats were built between 1882 and 1883, some of them remained in some Russian ports until the Russian-Japanese War of 1905.

The first submarine powered by electric engines was the design of the French shipbuilder Claude Goubet, later developed by Dupuy de Lom and Gustav Zede. The submarine named Gymnote, was launched in 1888. It had a displacement of 31 tons, had a hull with pointed ends, and used for movement an electric motor with a capacity of 50 horsepower, powered by a battery weighing up to 9.5 tons.

Then built in 1898, based on this design, the submarine Siren was able to develop underwater speed up to 10 knots. After the death of G. Zede, the submarine received his name. In 1901, during maneuvers, a submarine Gustave Zedé secretly penetrated the roadstead and, surfacing 200 meters from the battleship, carried out a successful training torpedo attack.

In 1900, a submarine entered service in France Narwhal, designs by Max Loboeuf. The submarine used a steam engine for propulsion on the surface and electric motors for propulsion underwater. A unique feature of this submarine was the use of a steam engine not only to move the ship on the surface, but also to recharge the batteries with its help. This opportunity led to a significant increase in the autonomy of the submarine, which no longer needed to return to base to recharge its batteries. In addition, the design used a two-hull design.

PL Holland, 1901

In 1899, the long-term constructive research of the American John Holland ended in success.

His submarine Holland IX received a gasoline engine, just like Narwhal, not only providing surface movement, but also recharging batteries for the underwater electric motor.

The boat was armed with 2 torpedo tubes and successfully carried out several attacks during testing. Thanks to a wide advertising campaign, submarines of this design (though significantly modernized over time) began to be purchased by other countries besides the United States, in particular Russia and England.

XX-XXI centuries

Submarine M-35, Black Sea Fleet

By the beginning of the twentieth century, the main design features of submarines had already been studied, the destructive potential was properly assessed, and the design of submarines began to reach the state level. Development of methods for using submarines in large-scale combat operations began.

First USS nuclear submarine Nautilus

Further development of this class of vessels went towards achieving several main points: increasing the speed of movement both on the surface and underwater (with a maximum reduction in noise), increasing autonomy and range, increasing the achievable diving depth.

The development of new types of submarines proceeded in parallel in many countries. During the development process, the submarines received diesel-electric power plants, periscope surveillance systems, and torpedo and artillery weapons. Submarines were first widely used in the First and then Second World Wars.

The next important stage in the design of submarines was the introduction of a nuclear power plant, which brought steam turbines back into operation. For the first time this type of power plant was used on USS Nautilus in 1955. Then atomicins appeared in the fleets of the USSR, Great Britain and other countries.

At the moment, submarines are one of the most widespread and multi-purpose classes of ships. Submarines perform a wide range of missions from patrol to nuclear deterrence.

Main structural elements

In the design of any submarine, a number of common mandatory structural elements can be identified.

Boat design

Frame

The main function of the hull is to ensure the constancy of the internal environment for the crew and the mechanisms of the boat during immersion (provided by a durable hull) and to ensure the maximum possible speed of movement of the vessel under water (provided by a light hull). Submarines in which one single hull performs both of these functions are called single-hull. In such boats, the main ballast tanks are located inside the submarine’s hull, which naturally reduces the useful internal volume and requires increased strength of their walls. However, boats of this design significantly benefit in weight, required engine power and maneuverability.

Half-hull boats have a strong hull partially covered by a light hull. The main ballast tanks are also partially moved outside, between the light and durable hulls. The advantages are the same as for single-hull submarines: good maneuverability and fast diving. At the same time, they also have, although to a lesser extent, the disadvantages of single-hull submarines - small internal space, low autonomy.

Boats of a classic double-hull structure have a durable hull, covered along the entire length by a light hull. The main ballast tanks are located in the space between the hulls, as are some of the elements of the set. Advantages - high survivability, greater autonomy, greater volume of internal space. Disadvantages - relatively long immersion, large size, low maneuverability, complex systems for filling ballast systems.

Subarina, type Los Angeles in dry dock, classic cigar-shaped hull

Multihull submarines (with several durable hulls) are very rare, do not have significant advantages and are not widely used.

Modern approaches to the shape of a submarine's hull are determined by the functioning of submarines in two different environments - underwater and on the surface. These environments dictate different optimal contour shapes for submarines. The evolution of body shape was closely related to the evolution of propulsion systems. In the first half of the twentieth century, the priority environment for submarines was surface movement, with brief dives to carry out combat missions. Accordingly, the hulls of boats of those times had a classic bow design with a pointed bow for better seaworthiness. Considering the low underwater speed, the high hydrodynamic resistance of such contours under water did not play a special role.

In modern boats, with an increase in autonomy and underwater speed, the question arose of reducing the hydrodynamic resistance and noise of the submarine in a submerged position, which led to the use of the so-called “drop-shaped” hull, which is optimal for movement under water.

The hull of modern submarines is often coated with a special rubber layer to improve streamlining, reduce noise, and reduce visibility for active acoustic sensors.

Power plant and engines

In the history of the development of submarines, several types of power plants can be distinguished

PL series David in section

• Muscular strength - directly or through mechanical transmission
• pneumatic motors - using compressed air or steam
• steam engines - both used independently as an engine and for recharging boat batteries
• electric motors - using electricity stored in batteries
• diesel-electric engines - using diesel for surface propulsion, or only for powering electric motors
• nuclear power plants - which are actually steam turbines, where steam is generated by a nuclear reactor.
• electric motors using fuel cells

Nuclear reactor submarine "Murena"

There are also engines that were used in single copies and were not widely used, such as the closed-cycle diesel engine (used in the Soviet Project 615 submarines, nicknamed “lighters”), the Stirling engine, the Walter engine and others.

Oars were initially used as propulsion, which were replaced by propellers of various designs that are still used today. The number of screws can vary from 1 to 3.

The only submarine to use 4 propellers was the Japanese experimental submarine No. 44, built in 1924. But later, 2 propellers and two engines were removed from it, turning it into an ordinary two-screw submarine.

An alternative to the propeller is water-jet propulsion, used in several types of submarines, of various designs, which are not widely used due to their significant technical complexity and cumbersomeness.

Dive/ascend and control systems

All surface ships, as well as submarines on the surface, have positive buoyancy, displacing a volume of water less than the volume of water they displace if completely submerged. For hydrostatic immersion, the submarine must have negative buoyancy, which can be achieved in two ways: by increasing the actual weight or decreasing the displacement. To change their own weight, all submarines have ballast tanks that can be filled with both water and air.

For general diving or ascent, submarines use bow and stern tanks called main ballast tanks (MBTs), which are filled with water to submerge or with air for ascent. In a submerged position, the CGBs, as a rule, remain filled, which greatly simplifies their design and allows them to be placed in the inter-hull space, outside the durable hull.

To control depth more accurately and quickly, submarine designs use depth control tanks, DCTs, also called pressure tanks because of their ability to withstand high pressure. By changing the volume of water in the CCG, it is possible to control changes in depth or maintain a constant depth of immersion when external conditions change (mainly salinity and density of water), varying in different places and depths).

Emergency ascent of the submarine

Submarines located under water with zero buoyancy tend to undergo longitudinal and transverse vibrations, called trim. To eliminate such fluctuations, trim tanks are used, by pumping water into which the relative stability of the submarine's position in a submerged state is achieved.

In addition, to control the depth of the boat, so-called depth rudders are used, located at the stern end, at the propellers (mainly to control immersion/ascent), on the wheelhouse and at the bow end (used mainly to control trim). The use of depth rudders is limited to the minimum required speed of the submarine.

For an emergency ascent, all methods of depth control are used simultaneously, which can lead to the effect of the submarine “jumping” to the surface.

To control the direction of movement of the boat, vertical rudders are also used, which on modern boats reach a very large area due to the large displacement of submarines.

Surveillance and detection systems

Having a shallow diving depth, the first submarines were able to be controlled by viewing through ordinary windows, most often installed in the wheelhouse. The illumination and transparency of the water were quite enough for confident navigation and control. However, even then the question of observing the surface arose and various attempts were made to construct instruments for observing it.

Double periscope HMS Ocelot

There was a project to rebuild the Project 940 submarine for transport needs, for year-round delivery of goods to the Far North. The project did not reach the metal level due to financial difficulties.

The world's fastest postal delivery (recorded in the Guinness Book of Records) was carried out on June 7, 1995, by the Russian submarine K-44 Ryazan. The Volna rocket, the descent module with equipment and mail, was delivered from the Barents Sea to Kamchatka.

Mesoscaphe "Augustus Picard" in the museum

First tourist boat Mésoscaphe PX-8 "Auguste Piccard" developed since 1953 by Auguste Piccard. The idea was realized by Jacques Piccard, and in 1964 the submarine was launched.

The submarine was used for underwater travel on Lake Geneva. During its operation, Mezoskaf made about 700 dives and carried up to 33,000 passengers.

fiberglass narco-sub

As of 1997, there were 45 tourist submarines in the world. They are capable of diving to a depth of 37 meters and carrying up to 50 passengers.

The criminal use of submarines deserves special mention. Currently, drug traffickers from South America periodically use submarines to smuggle drugs into the United States.

Both homemade structures and vessels manufactured at shipyards on special order are used.

Military applications

Submarines before World War I Submarine "Sudak"

The Empire of Japan almost did not use submarines in this conflict, limiting itself to patrolling the approaches to some bases.

In 1905, the world's first submarine squadron was formed in Vladivostok, which included 7 combat-ready submarines.

The boats of this squadron went on their first patrol on January 1, 1905. And the first military clash with Japanese forces took place on April 29, 1905, when Japanese destroyers fired at the submarine Som, which then managed to evade.

Despite the hopes placed on the submarines, they did not achieve great success during this war. This was due to both design flaws and lack of experience in the combat use of this class of ships - no one knew how to use them correctly. However, the experience of this war made it possible to formulate concepts for their use and identify bottlenecks in the characteristics.

When the concept of “unrestricted submarine warfare” was first announced, in which all enemy ships, both military and civilian, were sunk regardless of the nature of the cargo.

22 September 1914 by submarine U-9, under the command of Otto Weddigen, 3 cruisers were successively destroyed within an hour and a half Cruiser Force C: HMS Hogue , HMS Aboukir And HMS Cressy .

During the First World War, submarines of the warring countries destroyed 160 warships, from battleships to destroyers, merchant ships with a total cargo tonnage of up to 19 million registered tons. The actions of German submarines brought England to the brink of defeat.

One of the main official reasons for the US entry into World War I was the death of May 7, 1915. RMS Lusitania, on board which were US citizens.

Submarines in World War II

Based on the results of the First World War, conclusions were drawn about the need for closer interaction between submarines and surface ships, which required improving surface tactical and technical characteristics.

Despite the modifications carried out and the use of new solutions, the submarines remained mostly diving. That is, capable of diving only for a short period of time to attack or evade pursuit, with the subsequent need to surface to charge the batteries. Often, especially at night, submarines attacked from the surface, including using deck guns.

The most striking episode of submarine activity in World War II was the “Second Battle of the Atlantic”, in 1939-1941. The actions of the “wolf packs” of “Father Dönitz” called into question any shipping in the Atlantic.

The most successful and widespread submarine project of the Second World War was the German Type VII submarine. A total of 1,050 boats of this series were ordered, of which 703 boats of various modifications entered service.

Since 1944, it was on the German Type VII submarines that the snorkel, a pipe for taking air from the surface in a submerged position, began to be used on a large scale for the first time.

At the end of World War II, the first Type XXI boats were developed and built by Germany. These were the world's first submarines more adapted to underwater combat than to surface combat. They had a diving depth of 330 meters, which was prohibitive for those times, record low noise and great autonomy.

During the fighting, submarines of all warring countries destroyed 4,430 transport ships with a total carrying capacity of up to 22.1 million registered tons, 395 warships (including 75 submarines).

Post-war period

First launch of a cruise missile from the deck of a diesel submarine USS Tunny occurred in July 1953.

INS Khukri, attacked by a Pakistani submarine Hangor, during the Indo-Pakistani conflict in 1971.

In 1982, during the Falkland Islands War, a British nuclear submarine HMS Conqueror An Argentine light cruiser was sunk General Belgrano, which became the first ship sunk by a nuclear submarine.

Currently, submarines are in service in 33 countries around the world, performing a variety of combat missions from patrolling and nuclear deterrence to landing sabotage groups and shelling coastal targets.

• The record diving depth of a submarine, 1027 meters, was set by the USSR Navy submarine K-278 “Komsomolets”, the only submarine of Project 685 “Plavnik”
• The record surface speed of 44.7 knots was achieved by the USSR Navy submarine K-222, Project 661 Anchar.
• The largest submarines in the world are the Project 941 Akula submarines of the USSR Navy, with a displacement of 23,200 tons surface/48,000 tons underwater.

Literature

• Showell, Jak The U-Boat Century:German Submarine Warfare 1906–2006. - Great Britain: Chatham Publishing, 2006. - ISBN 978-1-86176-241-2
• Watts, Anthony J. The Imperial Russian Navy. - London: Arms and Armor Press, 1990. - ISBN 978-0-85368-912-6
• Prasolov S.N., Amitin M.B. Submarine design. - Moscow: Voenizdat, 1973.
• Shunkov V. N. Submarines. - Minsk: Potpouri, 2004.
• Taras A. E. Diesel submarines 1950-2005. - Moscow: AST, 2006. - 272 p. - ISBN 5-17-036930-1
• Taras A. E. Nuclear submarine fleet 1955-2005. - Moscow: AST, 2006. - 216 p. - ISBN 985-13-8436-4
• Ilyin V., Kolesnikov A. Russian submarines. - Moscow: AST, 2002. - 286 p. - ISBN 5-17-008106-5
• Trusov G.M. "Submarines in the Russian and Soviet fleets". - Leningrad: Sudpromizdat, 1963. - 440 p.
• Naval Dictionary/Ch. ed. V. N. Chernavin. Ed. collegium V. I. Aleksin, G. A. Bondarenko, S. A. Butov and others - M.: Voenizdat, 1990. - 511 pp., 20 sheets of illustrations, p. 197

Links

The very first

Observing sea inhabitants, man tried to imitate them. Relatively quickly, he learned to build structures capable of floating on water and moving along its surface, but under water... Beliefs and legends mention individual attempts made by people in this direction, but it took centuries to more or less correctly imagine and express it in the design drawings of the underwater vessel. One of the first to do this was the great creator of the Renaissance, the Italian scientist Leonardo da Vinci. They say that Leonardo destroyed the drawings of his submarine, justifying it as follows: “People are so evil that they would be ready to kill each other even at the bottom of the sea.”

The surviving sketch shows an oval-shaped vessel with a ram in the bow and a low deckhouse, in the middle part of which there is a hatch. It is impossible to make out other design details.

The first to realize the idea of ​​an underwater vessel were the Englishmen William Brun (1580) and Magnus Petilius (1605). However, their structures cannot be considered ships, since they could not move under water, but only sank and surfaced like a diving bell.

In the 20s of the 17th century. The English court nobility had the opportunity to tickle their nerves by taking an underwater trip along the Thames. The unusual ship was built in 1620 by a scientist - physicist and mechanic, court physician of the English King James I, the Dutchman Cornelius van Drebbel. The vessel was made of wood, covered with oiled leather for water resistance, could dive to a depth of about 4 m and remain under water for several hours. Immersion and ascent were accomplished by filling and emptying leather bellows. The inventor used a pole as a propulsion device, which was supposed to push off from the river bottom while inside the vessel. Convinced of the insufficient effectiveness of such a device, Drebbel equipped the next underwater vessel (its speed was about 1 knot) with 12 ordinary roller oars, each of which was controlled by one oarsman. To prevent water from getting inside the vessel, the holes in the hull for the passage of oars were sealed with leather cuffs.

In 1634, the French monk P. Mersen, a student of R. Descartes, first proposed a project for a submarine intended for military purposes. At the same time, he expressed the idea of ​​​​making its body from metal. The shape of the body with pointed ends resembled a fish. The weapons on the boat included drills to destroy the hull of enemy ships below the waterline and two underwater guns located on each side with non-return valves that prevented water from entering the boat through the barrels when fired. The project remained a project.

In 1718, a peasant from the village of Pokrovskoye near Moscow, Efim Prokopyevich Nikonov, who worked as a carpenter at a state-owned shipyard, wrote in a petition to Peter I that he was undertaking to make a ship that could sail “hiddenly” in the water and approach enemy ships “to the very bottom,” and also “to use a shell to destroy ships.” Peter I appreciated the proposal and ordered, “hidden from prying eyes,” to begin work, and the Admiralty Collegiums to promote Nikonov to “master of hidden ships.” First, a model was built that successfully stayed afloat, sank and moved underwater. In August 1720, in St. Petersburg at the Galerny Dvor, the world's first submarine was secretly laid down without unnecessary publicity.

What was Nikonov's submarine like? Unfortunately, it has not yet been possible to find its drawings, but some indirect information from archival documents suggests that it had a wooden body about 6 m long and about 2 m wide, sheathed on the outside with sheets of tin. The original immersion system consisted of several tin plates with many capillary holes, which were mounted in the bottom of the boat. During the ascent, water taken into a special tank through holes in the plates was removed overboard using a piston pump. At first, Nikonov intended to arm the boat with guns, but then he decided to install an airlock chamber through which, when the ship was underwater, a diver dressed in a spacesuit (designed by the inventor himself) could emerge and, using tools, destroy the bottom of the enemy ship. Later, Nikonov retrofitted the boat with “fiery copper pipes,” information about the principle of operation of which has not reached us.

Nikonov spent several years building and rebuilding his submarine. Finally, in the autumn of 1724, in the presence of Peter I and the royal retinue, she was launched into the water, but in doing so she hit the ground and damaged the bottom. With great difficulty, the ship was pulled out of the water and Nikonov himself was saved. The tsar ordered the hull of the boat to be strengthened with iron hoops, encouraged the inventor and warned the officials so that “no one would blame him for the embarrassment.” After the death of Peter I in 1725, people stopped being interested in the “hidden” ship. Nikonov's demands for labor and materials were not met or were deliberately delayed. It is not surprising that the next test of the submarine ended unsuccessfully. In the end, the Admiralty Board decided to curtail the work, and the inventor was accused of “invalid buildings,” demoted to “simple Admiralty workers,” and in 1728 exiled to the distant Astrakhan Admiralty.

In 1773 (almost 50 years after Nikonov’s “hidden ship”) the first submarine was built in the United States, the inventor of which, David Bushnell, was dubbed by the Americans “the father of scuba diving.” The hull of the boat was a shell made of oak planks, fastened with iron hoops and caulked with tarred hemp. At the top of the hull there was a small copper turret with a sealed hatch and portholes, through which the commander, who combined the entire crew in one person, could observe the situation. In appearance, the boat resembled a turtle shell, which is reflected in its name. At the bottom of the Turtle there was a ballast tank, when filled, it sank. During the ascent, water was pumped out of the tank using a pump. In addition, emergency ballast was provided - a lead weight, which, if necessary, can be easily detached from the hull. The boat was moved and controlled along the course using oars. The weapon was a powder mine with a clock mechanism (attached to the hull of an enemy ship using a drill).

D. Bushnell's submarine: a - front view; b - side view

In 1776, during the Revolutionary War, the Turtle was used in action. The target of the attack was the English 64-gun frigate Eagle. But the attack failed. To protect against fouling, the bottom of the frigate turned out to be covered with copper sheets, against which the drill was powerless.

Nautilus and others

At the end of the 18th century. The ranks of submarine inventors were joined by Robert Fulton, who later became famous for creating the world's first steamship, a native of America, the son of a poor Irish emigrant. The young man, who was interested in painting, went to England, where he soon took up shipbuilding, to which he devoted his future life. To succeed in such a complex undertaking, serious engineering knowledge was needed, to acquire which Fulton went to France.

The young shipbuilder made several interesting proposals in the field of underwater weapons. With the maximalism characteristic of his youth, he wrote: “Warships, in my opinion, are the remnants of outdated military habits, a political disease for which no remedy has yet been found; my firm conviction is that these habits must be eradicated and the most effective means for this is underwater mine-armed boats."

Fulton's mind was not only inquisitive, but also practical. In 1797, he turned to the government of the French Republic with a proposal: “Keeping in mind the enormous importance of reducing the power of the British fleet, I was thinking about building a mechanical Nautilus - a machine that gives me a lot of hope for the possibility of destroying their fleet...”

The proposal was rejected, but the persistent inventor obtained an audience with the first consul Napoleon Bonaparte and interested him in the idea of ​​a submarine ship.

In 1800, Fulton built a submarine and, with two assistants, dived to a depth of 7.5 m. A year later, he launched the improved Nautilus, whose hull, 6.5 m long and 2.2 m wide, was shaped like a cigar blunted at the bow. For its time, the boat had a decent diving depth - about 30 m. In the bow there was a small pilothouse with portholes. Nautilus became the first submarine in history to have separate propulsion systems for surface and underwater travel. A manually rotated four-bladed propeller was used as an underwater propulsion device, which made it possible to reach a speed of about 1.5 knots. On the surface, the boat moved under sail at a speed of 3-4 knots. The mast for the sail was hinged. Before diving, it was quickly removed and placed in a special chute on the hull. After the mast was raised, the sail unfurled and the ship became like a nautilus shell. This is where the name Fulton gave his submarine came from, and 70 years later borrowed by Jules Verne for the fantastic ship of Captain Nemo.

An innovation was a horizontal rudder, with the help of which the boat had to be kept at a given depth when moving underwater. Immersion and ascent were carried out by filling and draining the ballast tank. The Nautilus was armed with a mine, which consisted of two copper barrels of gunpowder connected by an elastic bridge. The mine was towed on a cable, brought under the bottom of the enemy ship and exploded using an electric current.

The ship's combat capability was tested at the Brest roadstead, where the old sloop was taken out and anchored. Nautilus came to the raid under sail. Having removed the mast, the boat sank 200 m from the sloop, and a few minutes later an explosion occurred and a column of water and debris shot up in the place of the sloop.

True, shortcomings also emerged, the most significant of which was the low efficiency of the horizontal rudder due to the very low speed in the submerged position, and therefore the boat was poorly maintained at a given depth. To eliminate this drawback, Fulton used a screw on the vertical axis.

The inventor abandoned the combat use of the Nautilus due to the fact that the French Minister of the Navy did not satisfy his demand to assign military ranks to the crew members of the boat, without which the British, if captured, would hang them as pirates. The minister formulated the reason for the refusal in a style characteristic of the professional conservatism of sailing admirals: “People who use such a barbaric means to destroy the enemy cannot be considered in military service.” In such a formulation, it is difficult to draw the line between chivalry and a lack of understanding of the merits of the new weapon.

Fulton headed to England, where he was warmly received by Prime Minister W. Pitt. Successful experiments with ship explosions did not so much inspire as they confused the British Admiralty. After all, the “mistress of the seas” at that time had the most powerful fleet in the world, since in her maritime policy she was guided by the principle of the double superiority of her fleet over the fleet of the next most powerful naval power. Fulton said that after another demonstration of the combat capabilities of a submarine, when the brig Dorothea was blown up, one of the most authoritative sailors of the English fleet, Lord Jervis, said: “Pitt is the greatest fool in the world, encouraging a method of warfare that gives nothing to a people who already have supremacy at sea and which, if successful, can deprive him of this supremacy."

But Pitt was by no means a simpleton. On his initiative, the Admiralty offered Fulton a lifelong pension with the condition... to forget about his invention. Fulton indignantly rejected the offer and returned to his homeland in America, where he built the first paddle steamer suitable for practical use, the Claremont, which immortalized his name.

In the first half of the 19th century. there was no shortage of attempts to create a submarine. The submarines, which turned out to be unsuccessful, were built by the French Maugery, Caster, Jean Petit and the Spaniard Severi, the latter two died during testing.

The original design of the submarine was developed in 1829 in Russia by Kazimir Chernovsky, who was imprisoned in Shlisselburgskaya. fortresses As a propulsion device, he proposed blade rods - pushers, when pulled into the ship, the blades folded, and when extended, they opened like umbrellas with emphasis on the water. But despite a number of bold technical solutions, the War Ministry was not interested in the project, since the inventor was a political criminal.

A noticeable mark in underwater shipbuilding was left by an active participant in the Patriotic War of 1812, the famous Russian engineer Adjutant General Karl Andreevich Schilder. He was the author of a number of projects and improvements. In the 30s of the 19th century. Schilder developed an electrical method for controlling underwater mines, successful experiments with which gave him the idea of ​​a submarine.

In 1834, in St. Petersburg, at the Aleksandrovsky Foundry (now the Proletarsky Plant association), a submarine with a displacement of about 16 tons was built according to Schilder’s design, which is considered to be the first-born of the Russian submarine fleet and the world’s first metal submarine. Its body, 6 m long, 2.3 m wide and about 2 m high, was made of five-millimeter boiler iron. The propulsion system used were paddles made like the paws of waterfowl and located in pairs on each side. When moving forward, the strokes folded, and when moving backward, they opened, providing support. Each stroke was driven by swinging the drive handle from inside the ship. The design of the drive made it possible, by changing the angle of the swing of the paddles, not only to ensure the straight motion of the boat, but also to ensure its ascent or submergence. The innovation was the “optical tube” - the prototype of the modern periscope, which Schilder designed using the idea of ​​\u200b\u200bthe “horizontoscope” by M.V. Lomonosov.

The boat was armed with an electric mine designed to operate at a close distance from enemy ships, as well as missiles, which were launched from two three-pipe missile launchers located on the side. The rockets were ignited by electric fuses, the current to which was supplied from galvanic cells. The boat could fire salvo missiles from surface and submerged positions. This was the first missile weapon in the history of shipbuilding, which in our time has become the main one in the strategy and tactics of war at sea.

Schilder's submarine with a crew of eight led by midshipman Shmelev set out for testing on August 29, 1834. The first underwater voyage in Russian history began. The boat maneuvered under. water and stopped submerged using an anchor of an original design. The missile launchers were successfully tested. Schilder is allocated additional funds and develops a project for a new submarine. Its hull was also made of iron and had a regular cylindrical shape with a pointed bow ending in a long bowsprit and a metal harpoon with a suspended mine inserted into it. Having thrust a harpoon into the side of the enemy ship, the boat reversed to a safe distance. The mine exploded with an electric fuse, the current to which was supplied from a galvanic element through a wire. Tests of the submarine ended at the Kronstadt roadstead on July 24, 1838 with a demonstration of the explosion of the target vessel.

Schilder's submarines had a very significant drawback: their speed did not exceed 0.3 knots. The inventor understood that such a low speed was unacceptable for a warship, but he was also aware that using a “muscular” engine would not be able to increase the speed of the submarines he created.

Unfulfilled hope

In 1836, Russian academician Boris Semenovich Jacobi created the world's first electric boat with paddle wheels, which were rotated by an electric motor powered by a battery of galvanic cells. The commission that conducted the tests, noting the enormous importance of the invention, but drew attention to the very low speed of the vessel - less than 1.5 knots. The idea of ​​an electric ship was jeopardized. Members of the commission came to Jacobi’s aid - engineer Lieutenant General A.A. Sablukov and shipbuilder Staff Captain S.O. Burachek, who argued that the problem is not in electric propulsion, but in the low efficiency of the wheel propulsion. At the commission meeting, Burachek, supported by Sablukov, proposed replacing the paddle wheels on the electric ship with a water-jet propulsion device, which he called a “through water flow.” The commission members approved the proposal, but it was never implemented.

A water jet, like a paddle wheel and a propeller, is a jet propulsion device. The working body of the water cannon (pump, propeller) imparts high speed to the water, with which it is thrown into the stern through the nozzle in the form of a jet stream and creates a thrust that moves the ship.

The first patent for a water-jet propulsion device was received in 1661 by the Englishmen Toogood and Hayes, but the invention remained on paper. In 1722, their compatriot Allen proposed “to use water for the movement of ships, which would be thrown from the stern with a certain force through a mechanism.” But where could one get such a mechanism at that time? In the 1830s, while in exile, the Decembrist sailor M.A. drew attention to the water-jet propulsion system. Bestuzhev and even developed an original design...

Having failed to convert the Jacobi electric ship to a water-jet propulsion system, A.A. Sablukov, who took an active part in testing Schilder’s submarines, proposed, in order to increase the speed, to equip his second boat with a water-jet propulsion device of his own design, which consisted of two receiving and draining channels inside the boat’s hull with a centrifugal pump in the form of a horizontally located impeller driven by a steam engine. Schilder accepted the offer, and by the autumn of 1840 the boat was re-equipped. But due to a lack of funds, the mechanical drive of the pump had to be abandoned, replacing it with a manual one.

Tests of the world's first water-jet submarine were carried out in Kronstadt and ended in failure. The speed of the boat did not increase, and it could not have been otherwise when the pump was rotated manually. However, the Chief of the Main Naval Staff, Admiral A.S., who was present at the tests. Menshikov did not even want to hear about further work on finishing the ship. The Maritime Department stopped subsidizing the work. Not finding support in the highest spheres of the fleet, knowing about the ridicule of the courtiers, who nicknamed him “eccentric general” for his numerous projects that were ahead of his time, K.A. Schilder stopped technical research in the field of naval weapons and devoted himself entirely to his career in the engineering forces, which he headed towards the end of his life.

One of the diving enthusiasts, Bavarian Wilhelm Bauer, and two assistants, on February 1, 1851, tested the first Brandtaucher submarine in Kiel harbor with a displacement of 38.5 tons, driven by a manually rotated propeller. The tests almost ended in disaster. At a depth of 18 m, the boat was crushed, and the crew escaped through the side neck with great difficulty. Both companions were forever cured of even the thought of scuba diving, but not Bauer himself, who had not yet created a more or less suitable boat, predicted with pathos: “...Monitors, battleships, etc. are now only the funeral horns of an obsolete fleet.”

Everything turned out to be much more complicated, which the inventor apparently thought about more than once while getting out of the sunken Brandtaucher, but Bauer was persistent. After the Bavarian government refused to build a new submarine, he offered his services to Austria, England and the United States, but did not meet with support there either. And only the Russian government, concerned about the technical backwardness of the fleet that emerged during the Crimean War, reacted favorably to the Bavarian’s proposal, concluding a contract with him in 1885 for the construction of a submarine. Four months later the ship was built, but Bauer avoided demonstrating its combat qualities, although there was a practically unlimited opportunity to attack the Anglo-French fleet blockading Kronstadt. Moreover, he achieved the postponement of the tests to the spring of 1856, that is, to the time when hostilities ceased. The reason for the delay became clear when the tests began. The submarine covered about 25 meters in 17 minutes and... stopped due to “complete exhaustion of the people driving the propeller.” Later she sank, and Bauer’s next proposal to build an underwater corvette for the Russian fleet was decisively rejected. Returning to his homeland, Bauer continued his inventive activities, but, like his predecessors, he never created a suitable submarine.

Steam and air

The low-power “muscular” engine stood as an insurmountable barrier to the inventors of submarines. And although at the end of the 18th century. Glasgow mechanic James Watt invented the steam engine; its use on a submarine was delayed for many years due to a number of problems, the main one being the supply of air for combustion of fuel in the furnace of a steam boiler when the boat was submerged. The main one, but not the only one. Thus, when the machine was operating, fuel was consumed and, accordingly, the mass of the submarine changed, but it must always be ready to dive. The crew's stay in the boat was hampered by heat generation and toxic gases.

The design of a submarine with a steam engine was first developed by the French revolutionary Armand Mézières in 1795, but such a ship was built only 50 years later in 1846 by his compatriot Dr. Prosper Peyern. In the original power plant of the boat, called Hydrostat, steam was supplied to the machine from a boiler, in a hermetically sealed firebox in which specially prepared fuel was burned - compressed briquettes of a mixture of nitrate and coal, which released the necessary oxygen when burned. At the same time, water was supplied to the firebox. Water vapor and fuel combustion products were sent to the steam engine, from where, having completed the work, they were discharged overboard through a non-return valve. Everything seemed fine. But in the presence of moisture, nitric acid was formed from nitrate (nitric oxide) - a very aggressive compound that destroyed the metal parts of the boiler and machine. In addition, controlling the combustion process with the simultaneous supply of water to the firebox turned out to be very difficult, and the removal of the steam-gas mixture at depth overboard was an intractable problem. In addition, the bubbles of the mixture did not dissolve in the sea water and unmasked the submarine.

Peyern's failure did not deter his followers. Already in 1851, the American Philippe Laudner built a submarine with a steam engine power plant. But the inventor did not have time to finish the job. During one of the dives on Lake Erie, the boat exceeded the permissible depth and was crushed, burying the crew along with Philipps at the bottom of the lake.

Faced with the problem of using a steam engine in a submarine, some inventors took the path of creating structures that occupy an intermediate position between a submarine and a surface ship. Such semi-submarines with a hermetically sealed hull and a pipe rising above it could be located at a depth limited by the height of the pipe, in which two channels were located - for the supply of atmospheric air to the boiler firebox and for the removal of combustion products. A similar submarine was built in 1855 by the inventor of the steam hammer, the Englishman James Nesmith, but due to a number of major shortcomings it turned out to be unsuitable for use.

Many original submarine projects were received by the Russian Naval Ministry during the Crimean War of 1853-1856, when patriotic enthusiasm served as an impetus for the creative initiative of specialists in many areas of military technology. In 1855, fleet mechanical engineer N.N. Spiridonov presented to the Marine Scientific Committee a project for a submarine with a crew of 60 people, equipped with a water-jet propulsion unit, the piston pumps of which were driven by compressed air. Air to the two pneumatic motors was to be supplied through a hose from an air pump installed on the surface escort vessel. The project was considered difficult to implement and ineffective.

In an attempt to solve the problem of an underwater engine using compressed air, the talented Russian inventor Ivan Fedorovich Aleksandrovsky turned out to be more successful. In June 1863, in the boathouse of the St. Petersburg Carr and McPherson shipyard (now the Baltic shipyard named after Sergo Ordzhonikidze), the usual activity was observed that accompanied the laying of the ship, but it was noteworthy that a guard was posted at the entrance to the boathouse, blocking access to it to outsiders. By autumn, an outlandish ship, unlike any of the many built by the plant, was already towering there. The spindle-like hull had neither deck nor masts. This was the second submarine designed by I. F. Aleksandrovsky. The first one was not built...

Ivan Fedorovich Alexandrovsky

In his youth, Aleksandrovsky was interested in painting and was not unsuccessful. In 1837, the Academy of Arts awarded him the title of “non-class artist” and Aleksandrovsky began his independent working life as a teacher of drawing and drawing at the gymnasium. Meanwhile, the young artist was irresistibly drawn to the technical sciences and, with his characteristic tenacity, independently acquired knowledge, especially in the field of colloid chemistry, optics and mechanics.

In the middle of the 19th century. In Europe, the newly emerging photography became fashionable, and Aleksandrovsky became interested in the new business. In the early 50s, he finally left teaching and opened a photo studio. From now on, his business card read: Ivan Fedorovich Aleksandrovsky, artist-photographer, own studio, St. Petersburg, Nevsky Prospect, 22, apt. 45. Deep knowledge not only in the field of photography, but also in related chemistry and optics allowed Aleksandrovsky to achieve great success in his new business and made his photo studio the best in the capital, which turned into a very profitable enterprise. But this man did not live by bread alone. Aleksandrovsky continues to study science and is interested in various fields of technology and especially shipbuilding. The turning point in his fate came in 1853, when in the summer, shortly before the start of the Crimean War, Aleksandrovsky visited London on business at his photographic studio, where he not only saw an armada of formidable steam ships, but also heard more than once that the squadron being prepared was intended to sail to the shores of the Crimea in order to " teach the Russians a lesson." Knowing the low technical level of the Russian Black Sea Fleet, which consisted mainly of sailing ships, Ivan Fedorovich could not remain indifferent and decided to create a submarine.

The project was almost completed when Aleksandrovsky learned that the construction of the previously mentioned Bauer submarine had begun under a contract with the Russian Navy Ministry. Despite the efforts and resources expended by this time, Aleksandrovsky is developing a new project for an original submarine with engines running on compressed air, for which he involves in the project a prominent specialist in the field of pneumatic engines S.I. Baranovsky.

In 1862, the Marine Scientific Committee approved the project, and in 1863 the ship was laid down.

The submarine with a displacement of 352/362 tons was equipped with a single two-shaft power plant for surface and underwater travel, consisting of two pneumatic engines with a power of 117 hp. With. each with a drive to its own propeller. The supply of air, compressed to a pressure of 60-100 kg/cm2, was stored in 200 cylinders with a capacity of about 6 m3, which were thick-walled steel pipes with a diameter of 60 mm, and according to the inventor’s calculations, it was supposed to ensure the boat floats underwater at a speed of 6 knots for 3 h. To replenish the supply of compressed air, a high-pressure compressor was provided on the boat. The air exhausted in the pneumatic engines partially entered the boat for breathing by the crew members, and was partially removed overboard through a pipe with a non-return valve that prevented water from entering the engines if they were stopped when the boat was in a submerged position.

In addition to the original power plant, Aleksandrovsky implemented a number of other progressive technical solutions in the project. Particularly noteworthy is the first use of blowing water ballast with compressed air for ascent, which has been used to this day for more than a hundred years on submarines of all countries. In general, this happens as follows.

To fill the ballast tank with sea water, there are seacocks, or simply holes, in its lower part, and ventilation valves in the upper part. With the seacocks and ventilation valves open, air from the tank freely escapes into the atmosphere, seawater fills the tank and the submarine submerges. When ascending, compressed air is supplied to the ballast tanks with the ventilation valves closed, which squeezes water out of the tank through the open seacocks.

The weapons on Aleksandrovsky's submarine were two buoyant mines connected by an elastic bridge. The mines were placed outside the boat's hull. Being fired from inside the boat, the mines floated up and covered the bottom of the enemy ship on both sides. The explosion was carried out by electric current from a battery of galvanic cells after the boat moved to a safe distance from the target of attack.

In the summer of 1866, the submarine was transferred to Kronstadt for testing. Due to the shortcomings identified during their course, it was tested for several years, during which significant changes were made to the design. But some shortcomings could not be eliminated. The speed of the boat in a submerged position did not exceed 1.5 knots, and the cruising range was about 3 miles. At such a low speed, horizontal rudders turned out to be ineffective. All submarines of that time, equipped with horizontal rudders, starting with the Nautilus, had this drawback (horizontal rudders, the effectiveness of which is approximately proportional to the square of the speed, did not ensure that the boat was kept at a given depth).

Aleksandrovsky’s submarine was accepted into the treasury and enrolled in the mine detachment. However, a decision was made that it was unsuitable for military purposes and that it was inappropriate to carry out further work to eliminate the shortcomings. If we can agree with the first part of the decision, then the second was controversial, and one can understand the inventor who, recalling the indifference to his ship of the Navy Ministry, wrote with bitterness: “To my extreme regret, I must say that since then I have not only “I did not meet with the sympathy and support of the Navy Ministry, but even all work to fix the boat was completely stopped.”

David crushes Goliath

Meanwhile, fundamental research by S.I. Baranovsky in the field of practical use of compressed air for power plants did not go unnoticed abroad. In 1862, in France, according to the project of Captain 1st Rank Bourgeois and engineer Brun, the submarine "Plonger" with a displacement of 420 tons was built with a single pneumatic engine with a power of 68 hp for surface and underwater travel. s., in many ways reminiscent of Aleksandrovsky’s ship. The test results turned out to be even less favorable than those of Aleksandrovsky’s boat. Low speed, ineffective horizontal rudders, traces of air bubbles...

An engineer from Russia, Major General O.B., was present and took part in the Plonger tests. Gern, who, being interested in issues of underwater diving, designed three submarines for the order of the military engineering department. Two of them were driven by a manually rotated propeller, and the third by a gas engine. But none of the boats lived up to expectations, and Gern, using Plonger’s testing experience, developed a design for an original submarine with a displacement of about 25 tons. The ship’s power plant consisted of a two-cylinder steam engine with a capacity of 6 liters. s., receiving steam at a pressure of 30 kgf/cm2 from a boiler adapted to operate on solid and liquid fuels. When the boat was in the surface position, the machine worked on steam coming from a boiler heated with wood or charcoal, and underwater - on compressed air in the pneumatic engine mode or from the boiler, for which purpose, before diving, the firebox was sealed and slow-burning fuel briquettes were burned in it , releasing oxygen during combustion. In addition, as a backup option, in a submerged position the boiler could be heated with turpentine, which was sprayed into the firebox with compressed air or oxygen.

For its time, the submarine O.B. Gerna was a significant step forward. Its metal spindle-shaped body was divided into three compartments by two bulkheads. The boat was equipped with an air regeneration system, consisting of a lime tank located in the hold of the middle compartment; a fan pumping air through the tank; three cylinders with oxygen periodically added to the purified air.

The submarine was built in 1867 at the Alexander Foundry in St. Petersburg. However, the tests of the ship, carried out in the Italian pond of Kronstadt, dragged on for nine years. During this time, Gern made a number of improvements. But the boat could float underwater only with a pneumatic engine, since it was not possible to seal the boiler furnace. To eliminate this and some other shortcomings, funds were required, which the military engineering department cut in every possible way.

Meanwhile, a significant event occurred in the history of diving. Before the Civil War 1861-1865. In the United States, virtually no attention was paid to submarine shipbuilding. With the start of the war, the southerners announced an open competition for the best submarine design. Of the presented projects, preference was given to the submarine of engineer Aunley, under whose leadership a series of small cylindrical iron boats with pointed ends, about 10 m long and about 2 m wide, was built. The first boat was named David after the biblical young David, who defeated the giant Goliath . Goliaths, of course, meant the surface ships of the northerners. David was armed with a pole mine with an electric fuse that exploded from inside the boat. The crew consisted of nine people, eight of whom rotated the crankshaft with the propeller. The immersion depth was maintained by horizontal rudders. In essence, these were semi-submersible ships, which, when moving underwater, left a flat deck above the surface of the water.

Schematic representation of a David-class submarine

In October 1863, a boat of this series attacked a Northern battleship at anchor, but the explosion was carried out prematurely and she was lost. Four months later, the Hanley boat made a similar attempt, but from the waves of a steamer passing nearby, it tilted sharply, scooped up water and sank. The boat was raised and repaired. But evil fate pursued her. The David type boats had insufficient stability, as a result of which the Hanley, which was anchored at night, suddenly capsized. The boat was restored again. To determine the causes of accidents involving Aunley, extensive tests were carried out, during which Hunley sank again with the entire crew and the inventor. Another recovery and repair followed, after which on February 17, 1864, Hanley became the hero of an event about which it is written in the “Naval History of the Civil War”:

"On January 14, the Secretary of the Navy wrote to Vice Admiral Dalgorn, commander of the fleet at Charleston, that, according to information he had received, the Confederates had launched a new ship capable of destroying his entire fleet ... on the night of February 17, the newly built beautiful ship Housatonic with a displacement of 1200 tons, stood anchored in front of Charleston, was destroyed under the following circumstances: at about 8:15 in the evening, some suspicious object was noticed 50 fathoms from the ship. It looked like a board floating towards the ship. Two minutes later it was already near the ship. The officers were were warned in advance and had a description of the new "hellish" machines with information about the best way to get rid of them. The watch commander ordered the anchor ropes to be loosened, the machine to be set in motion and everyone to be called up. But, unfortunately, it was too late... One hundred pounds of gunpowder at the end the pole was sufficient to destroy the strongest armadillo." True, the boat itself did not escape the fate of its victim. As it turned out later, Hanley did not have time to move to a safe distance and was pulled inside the battleship along with the water gushing through the hole. But David crushed Goliath. The death of Housatonic caused a stir in the naval departments of different countries and drew attention to weapons, which until recently were not taken seriously by many.

Under the enemy ship, use a drill to attach a mine to its bottom, and then set the clock mechanism into action and retreat to a safe distance. In domestic and foreign books on the history of the development of scuba diving, images of a Buchnel boat with two types of propulsors are usually given. Let's look at these drawings in more detail. In the top drawing (probably from an original drawing) roughly...

Lieutenant Beklemishev. They were allowed to settle in the Experimental Shipbuilding Basin, where they developed the project for “destroyer No. 113” - this was the first name of the submarine “Dolphin” (the class of submarines did not yet exist in the Russian fleet). On May 3, 1901, the commission in the above-mentioned composition presented the project they had developed to the chief inspector of shipbuilding. In July 1901...

The history of the creation of submarines in Russia must be counted from 1718, when carpenter Efim Nikonov from the village of Pokrovskoye near Moscow submitted a petition to Tsar Peter I, in which he proposed a project for the “Hidden Vessel,” which was actually a project for the first domestic submarine. A few years later, in 1724, on the Neva, Nikonov’s creation was tested, but unsuccessfully, because “during the descent, the bottom of that ship was damaged.” At the same time, Nikonov almost died in a flooded boat and was saved with the personal participation of Peter himself.

The tsar ordered not to reproach the inventor for his failure, but to give him the opportunity to correct the shortcomings. But soon Peter I died, and in 1728 the Admiralty Board, after yet another unsuccessful test, ordered work on the “hidden ship” to be stopped. The illiterate inventor himself was exiled to work as a carpenter at a shipyard in Astrakhan. Well, what happened next?

For the next hundred years, no submarines were built in Russia. However, interest in them in Russian society remained, and the archives still contain many projects of submarines created by people of different classes. Archivists counted as many as 135 of them! And this is only what has survived to this day. Of the actually implemented structures, we note the following.

In 1834, the submarine K.A. was built. Schilder. She was the first streamlined vessel in Russia with an all-metal hull, the cross section of which was an irregular ellipse. The casing was made of boiler sheet iron about 5 mm thick and was supported by five frames. Two towers with portholes protruded above the hull; between the towers there was a hatch for loading large equipment. Interestingly, the boat had to be propelled by... 4 oarsmen with paddle oars, like crow's feet. But it was planned to arm the submarine with completely modern weapons - incendiary rockets and mines.

To freshen the air in the boat there was a fan connected to a pipe that went to the surface, but the lighting of the interior was supposed to be candlelight. This combination of antediluvian times and the latest technological advances of that time led to the fact that the submarine was tested with varying degrees of success. And in the end it was rejected, although the inventor had already proposed in further modifications of his design to replace the rowers with a newly appeared electric motor or even install water-jet propulsion on the boat. Schilder was asked to correct the identified design flaws at his own expense, which he was unable to do, since he had already poured all the resources he had into his invention.

A similar fate befell the submarine designed by I.F. Alexandrovsky, the tests of which began on June 19, 1866 in Kronstadt. It was also metal, shaped like a fish. To carry out sabotage by divers, the boat had a special chamber with two hatches, which made it possible to land people from an underwater position. The engine was a pneumatic machine, and to blow up enemy ships the submarine was equipped with special mines.

Testing and improvements of the submarine continued until 1901 and were stopped due to the complete ruin of the inventor, who carried out most of the work at his own expense.

Inventor S.K. also paid all expenses out of his own pocket. Dzhevetsky, who in 1876 developed a project for a single-seat small submarine. The commission, along with positive qualities, noted the low speed and short stay under water. Subsequently, Stepan Karlovich improved the design and created 3 more versions of the submarine. The latest modification was accepted for serial production. It was planned to build as many as 50 submarines. However, due to the outbreak of hostilities, it was not possible to fully implement the plan.

However, Stepan Karlovich still built one such submarine. When I saw her in the hall of the Central Naval Museum in St. Petersburg, I was completely dumbfounded. In front of me was Captain Nemo’s “Nautilus,” straight out of the pages of Jules Verne’s famous novel: the same swift, streamlined lines, a pointed, polished hull made of shiny metal, convex portholes....

But who is Drzewiecki? Why does the Russian inventor have such a strange surname?.. It turns out that Stepan Karlovich Dzhevetsky, also known as Stefan Kazimirovich Drzhevetsky, comes from a rich and noble Polish family. But since Poland was part of the Russian Empire in the 19th century, Stefan, born in 1843, began to be listed as a Russian citizen.

However, he spent the first years of his childhood, adolescence and youth with his family in Paris. Here he graduated from the Lyceum, and then entered the Central Engineering School, where, by the way, he studied with Alexander Eiffel - the one who later designed the world-famous Eiffel Tower.

Following the example of his school comrades, Stefan Drzhevetsky also began to invent something. And not without success. In 1873, at the Vienna World Exhibition, his inventions were given a special stand.

Among other things, it contained drawings of an automatic course plotter for the ship. And when the exhibition was visited by Admiral General, Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolaevich, he became so interested in this invention that soon the Russian Maritime Department entered into an agreement with the inventor to manufacture an automatic plotter according to his own drawings.

Drzhevetsky moved to St. Petersburg. Soon the device was created and performed so well that in 1876 it was again sent to the World Exhibition in Philadelphia.

In the 70s of the 19th century, Drzhevetsky became interested in the possibility of creating a submarine. It is very likely that Jules Verne and his novel played a significant role in arousing this interest. In 1869, a magazine version of “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea” began to be published in Paris, and Drzhevetsky, as we know, spoke French as fluently as he spoke Russian.

One way or another, in 1876 he prepared the first design of a small submarine. However, the following year the Russian-Turkish war began, and the implementation of the idea had to be postponed until better times.

Drzhevetsky volunteered for the navy. And in order not to irritate his eminent relatives, he signed up as a volunteer sailor in the engine crew of the armed steamer Vesta under the name of Stepan Dzhevetsky. He took part in battles with Turkish ships and even received the soldier's St. George's Cross for personal courage.

During the battles, the idea of ​​​​attacking enemy battleships with the help of small submarines only grew stronger. And since the Maritime Department did not provide money for the project, after the war Drzewiecki decided to follow the path of Captain Nemo. And he built the submarine at Blanchard’s private plant in Odessa with his own money.

By August 1878, a single-seat submarine made of sheet steel with streamlined shapes unprecedented at that time was built. In the autumn of the same year, Dzhevetsky demonstrated the capabilities of his invention to a group of officers at the roadstead of the Odessa port. He approached the barge underwater, planted a mine under its bottom, and then, moving to a safe distance, detonated it.

The commission expressed the wish that a larger boat be built "for practical military purposes" in the future. But again, no money was given for the project.

But Drzewiecki decided not to retreat. He interested Lieutenant General M.M. with his ideas. Boreskov, a famous engineer and inventor. And together they managed to ensure that at the end of 1879, in an atmosphere of deep secrecy, the “underwater mine apparatus” was launched into the water.

With a displacement of 11.5 tons, it had a length of 5.7, a width of 1.2 and a height of 1.7 meters. The four crew members drove two rotary propellers, which provided both forward and backward movement and assisted in controlling ascent and descent, as well as turning left and right.

Two pyroxylin mines, located in special nests at the bow and stern, served as weapons. When approaching the bottom of an enemy ship, one of these mines or both were immediately unhooked and then detonated from a distance by electric fuses.

The ranks of the Military Engineering Department liked the boat, and it was even presented to Tsar Alexander III. The Emperor instructed the Minister of War to pay Dzhevetsky 100,000 rubles for the original development and to organize the construction of another 50 of the same boats for naval defense of ports on the Baltic and Black Seas.

In less than a year, the boats were built and accepted by the Engineering Department. Half of the required quantity was produced in St. Petersburg, and the other half in France, at the Platto machine-building plant. And here, it seems, there was a case of industrial espionage. The brother of the famous French engineer Goubet worked as a draftsman for Platteau. And after some time, Gube filed a patent application, which described a similar underwater vehicle.

Meanwhile, our point of view on the use of submarines during military operations has changed. From weapons of defense of coastal fortresses, they began to turn into weapons of attack against enemy transports and warships on the high seas. But Drzewiecki’s small submarines were no longer suitable for such purposes. They were removed from service, and the inventor himself was asked to develop a design for a larger submarine. He coped with the task and in 1887 presented the required project.

To reduce resistance to movement, Drzewiecki again made the boat streamlined and even designed the wheelhouse to be retractable. The submarine could dive to a depth of 20 meters, had a cruising range above water of 500 miles, under water - 300 miles, and was capable of staying under water for 3-5 hours. Its crew consisted of 8-12 people. For the first time, the submarine was armed with torpedo tubes developed by Drzewiecki.

The boat was tested and showed good seaworthiness. However, before diving, the crew had to extinguish the firebox of the steam engine, which did not allow the boat to quickly dive in emergency cases, and Vice Admiral Pilkin did not approve of the project.

Then Dzhevetsky slightly reworked the project and in 1896 proposed it to the French Maritime Ministry. As a result, at the “Surface and Underwater Destroyer” competition, Drzewiecki, with a displacement of 120 tons, received the first prize of 5,000 francs, and after testing, the torpedo tubes entered service with the French submarine Surcouf.

The inventor proposed a new submarine to the Russian government, using a gasoline engine for both surface and underwater travel. The project was soon approved. And in 1905, the St. Petersburg Metal Plant was given an order to build an experimental ship, the Postal Ship. In the fall of 1907, testing of the submarine began, and in 1909, the only ship in the world that had a single engine for underwater and surface sailing went to sea.

The boat was in many ways superior to foreign designs of its time. However, the gasoline vapors that spread inside when the engine was running had a poisonous effect on the sailors. In addition, the engine made a fair amount of noise, and the air bubbles that constantly accompanied the movement of the Pochtovaya made it impossible to use the boat as a combat boat.

Then Drzewiecki proposed replacing gasoline engines with diesel engines. Moreover, at great depths, when it was difficult to remove exhaust gases, a small electric motor with a battery had to work. Dzhevetsky expected that the surface speed would be 12-13 knots, and the underwater speed - 5 knots.

In addition, back in 1905, the inventor proposed removing the crew from the submarine altogether and controlling it remotely, via wires. This is how the idea was formulated for the first time, the practical implementation of which began only a century later.

However, the First World War and then the revolution prevented him from putting his ideas into practice. Soviet power S.K. Dzhevetsky did not accept, went abroad, again to Paris. He died in April 1938, just shy of 95 years old.

And the only copy of Dzhevetsky’s boat has survived to this day. The same one that now stands in the hall of the Central Naval Museum in St. Petersburg.

Inventor: David Bushnell
A country: USA
Time of invention: 1776

The creation of a submarine is a remarkable achievement of the human mind and a significant event in the history of military technology. A submarine, as you know, has the ability to act covertly, invisibly, and therefore suddenly. Stealth is achieved, first of all, by the ability to dive, swim at a certain depth without giving away one’s presence, and unexpectedly strike the enemy.

Like any physical body, a submarine obeys Archimedes' law, which states that any body immersed in a liquid is subject to a buoyant force directed upward and equal to the weight of the liquid displaced by the body.

To simplify this law, we can formulate this law as follows: “A body immersed in water loses as much weight as the volume of water displaced by the body weighs.”

It is on this law that one of the main properties of any ship is based - its buoyancy, that is, the ability to stay on the surface of the water. This is possible when the weight of water displaced part of the hull submerged in water is equal to the weight of the vessel. In this position it has positive buoyancy. If the weight of the displaced water is less than the weight of the ship, then the ship will sink. In this case, the ship is considered to have negative buoyancy.

For a submarine, buoyancy is determined by its ability to be both submerged and surfaced. Obviously, the boat will float on the surface if it has positive buoyancy. Receiving negative buoyancy, the boat will sink until it hits the bottom.

To prevent it from trying to either float or sink, it is necessary to equalize the weight of the submarine and the weight of the volume of water it displaces. In this case, the boat without moving will take an unstable, indifferent position in the water and will “hang” at any depth. This means that the boat has zero buoyancy.

In order for a submarine to dive, surface, or stay underwater, it must have the ability to change its buoyancy. This is achieved in a very simple way - by taking water ballast onto the boat: special tanks located in the boat's hull are either filled with sea water or emptied again. When they are completely filled, the boat acquires zero buoyancy. In order for the submarine to surface, the tanks must be emptied of water.

However, immersion adjustment using tanks can never be accurate. Maneuvering in the vertical plane is achieved by shifting the horizontal rudders. Like in the air is able to change the flight altitude using elevators, and the submarine operates with horizontal rudders or depth rudders without changing buoyancy.

If the leading edge of the rudder blade is higher than the trailing edge, the oncoming water flow will create an upward lifting force. Conversely, if the leading edge of the rudder is lower than the rear, the oncoming flow will press down on the working surface of the feather. Changing the direction of movement of a submarine in a horizontal position is carried out in submarines, as in surface ships, by changing the angle of rotation of the vertical rudder.

The first submarine to be put into practical use was the Tartu (Turtle) by the French inventor David Bushnell, built in 1776 in the USA. Despite its primitiveness, it already had all the elements of a real submarine. The egg-shaped body with a diameter of about 2.5 m was made of copper, and the lower part was covered with a layer of lead. The boat's crew consisted of one person.

Immersion was achieved by filling a special tank located at the very bottom with ballast water. The immersion was adjusted using a vertical screw. The ascent was carried out by pumping out ballast water with two pumps, which were also manually operated.

Movement along a horizontal line occurred using a horizontal screw. To change direction there was a steering wheel located behind the person's seat. The armament of this vessel, intended for military purposes, consisted of a mine weighing 70 kg, placed in a special box under the steering wheel.

At the moment of the attack, “Tortyu”, having submerged, tried to approach the keel of the enemy ship. There's a mine was released from the box and, since it was given some buoyancy, floated up, hit the keel of the ship and exploded. This was, in general terms, the first submarine, the creator of which received the honorary name “father of the submarine” in the United States.

Bushnell's boat became famous after its successful attack against the English 50-gun frigate Eagle in August 1776 during the American Revolutionary War. In general, it was a good start to the history of the submarine fleet. Its next pages were already connected with Europe.

In 1800, the American Robert Fulton built the Nautilus submarine in France. It had a streamlined cigar-shaped shape with a length of 6.5 m and a diameter of 2 m. Otherwise, the Nautilus was very similar in design to the Tartu.

Immersion was achieved by filling the ballast chamber located at the bottom of the ship. The source of the submerged movement was the strength of the three-person team. The rotation of the handle was transmitted to a two-bladed propeller, which provided the boat with forward motion.

For movement on the surface, it was used, mounted on a folding mast. The speed on the surface was 5-7 km/h, and when submerged it was about 2.5 km/h. Instead of the vertical Bushnell propeller, Fulton pioneered the use of two horizontal rudders located behind the hull, as on modern submarines. On board the Nautilus there was a cylinder of compressed air, which made it possible to stay under water for several hours.

After several preliminary tests, Fulton's ship descended the Seine to Le Havre, where it took place first trip to sea. The tests were satisfactory: for 5 hours the boat with the entire crew was under water at a depth of 7 m. Other indicators were also quite good - the boat covered a distance of 450 m under water in 7 minutes.

In August 1801, Fulton demonstrated the combat capabilities of his ship. For this purpose, the old brig was brought out to the roadstead. The Nautilus approached it underwater and blew it up with a mine. However, the further fate of the Nautilus did not live up to the hopes that the inventor had placed on it. During the passage from Le Havre to Cherbourg, she was overtaken by a storm and sank. All of Fulton's attempts to build a new submarine (he proposed his project not only to the French, but also to their enemies the British) were unsuccessful.

A new stage in the development of a submarine was represented by the submarine “Submariner” by Bourgeois and Brun, built in 1860. Its dimensions significantly exceeded all submarines built before: length 42.5 m, width - 6 m, height - 3 m, displacement - 420 tons. This boat was the first to have a motor running on compressed air, which allowed it at the moment of attack, reach a speed of about 9 km/h on the surface and 7 km/h under water.

Other features of this ship include its weapons, which are more serious and practical than those of its predecessors. The Submariner had a mine attached to the end of a 10 m long rod on the bow of the ship. This gave serious advantages, as it made it possible to attack the enemy on the move, which was completely impossible for previous boats.

Firstly, due to its low speed, it was difficult for the underwater ship to approach the bottom of the attacked ship, and secondly, even if this could be done, then in the time required for the launched mine to surface, the enemy would have managed to leave. The “submariner” had the opportunity, going across the moving ship, to hit it on the side with a mine suspended at the end of the rod. The mine should have exploded on impact.

However, the Submariner itself, located at a safe distance of 10 m, should not have been harmed. For To dive their ship, Bourgeois and Brun used a combination of several methods. The submarine had tanks for ballast water, a vertical propeller and two horizontal rudders. The Podvodnik was also the first to provide for purging tanks with compressed air, which significantly reduced the ascent time.

Submarines were first used during the American Civil War of 1861-1865. At this time, the southerners had several David submarines in service. These boats, however, did not submerge completely under water - part of the wheelhouse protruded above the surface of the sea, but still, they could secretly sneak up on the ships of the northerners.

The David was 20 m long and 3 m wide. The boat was equipped with a steam engine and a diving rudder located in the front of the hull. In February 1864, one of these submarines, under the command of Lieutenant Dixon, sank the Northern corvette Guzatanik, hitting it on the side with its mine. “Guzatanik” became the first victim of a submarine war in history, and submarines after that ceased to be an object of pure invention and won the right to exist on an equal basis with other warships.

The next step in the history of underwater shipbuilding was the boats of the Russian inventor Dzhevetsky. The first model he created in 1879 had a pedal motor. A crew of four turned the propeller. Water and pneumatic pumps also operated from a foot drive. The first of them served to purify the air inside the ship. With its help, air was forced through a cylinder of caustic sodium, which absorbed carbon dioxide. The missing amount of oxygen was replenished from a spare cylinder. A water pump was used to pump water out of the ballast tanks. The length of the boat was 4 m, width - 1.5 m.

The boat was equipped with a periscope - a device for observing the surface from an underwater position. A periscope of the simplest design is a pipe, the upper end of which extends above the surface of the water, and the lower end is located inside the boat. Two inclined ones were installed in the pipe: one at the upper end of the tube, the other at the lower end. Rays of light, first reflected from the upper mirror, then hit the lower one and were reflected from it towards the observer's eye.

The boat's armament consisted of a mine with special rubber suction cups and a fuse that was ignited by current from a galvanic battery (the mine was attached to the bottom of a stationary ship; then the boat sailed, unwinding the wire, to a safe distance; at the right moment the circuit closed and an explosion occurred).

During testing, the boat showed excellent maneuverability. She was the first production boat adopted by the Russian army (a total of 50 such boats were manufactured). In 1884, Drzewiecki for the first time equipped his boat with an electric motor powered by a power source, which ensured the boat moved for 10 hours at a speed of about 7 km/h. This was an important innovation.

In the same year, the Swede Nordenfeld installed a steam engine on his submarine. Before diving, two boilers were filled with high-pressure steam, which allowed the submersible vessel to swim for four hours under water with speed 7.5 km/h. Nordenfeld also installed torpedoes on his boat for the first time. A torpedo (self-propelled mine) was a miniature submarine.

The first self-propelled mine was created by the English engineer Whitehead and his Austrian collaborator Luppi. The first tests took place in the city of Fiume in 1864. Then the mine traveled 650 m at a speed of 13 km/h. The movement was carried out by a pneumatic engine, to which compressed air was supplied from a cylinder. Subsequently, until the First World War, the design of torpedoes did not undergo major changes. They were cigar-shaped. The front part housed the detonator and charge. Next is a tank with compressed air, a regulator, an engine, a propeller and a steering wheel.

Armed with torpedoes, the submarine became an exceptionally formidable enemy for all surface vessels. Torpedoes were fired using torpedo tubes. The torpedo was fed along rails to the hatch. The hatch opened and the torpedo was placed inside the apparatus. After this, the outer hatch was opened and the apparatus was filled with water. Compressed air was supplied from the cylinder through a connection into the barrel of the apparatus. Then the torpedo with the engine, propellers and rudders running was released outside. The outer hatch was closed, and water flowed out of it through a tube.

In subsequent years, submarines began to be equipped with gasoline internal combustion engines for surface navigation and electric motors (battery powered) for moving underwater. Submarine vessels were rapidly improving. They could quickly emerge and disappear under water.

This was achieved through the thoughtful design of ballast tanks, which were now divided according to their purpose into two main types: main ballast tanks and auxiliary ballast tanks. The first tanks were intended to absorb the buoyancy of a submarine during its transition from surface to underwater (they were divided into bow, stern and middle).

The auxiliary ballast tanks included those located at opposite ends hull trim tanks (bow and stern), surge tank and rapid submersion tank. Each of them had a special purpose. As the rapid-dive tank filled, the submarine acquired negative buoyancy and quickly sank under the water.

Trim tanks served to level the trim, that is, the angle of inclination of the hull of a submarine ship and bring it to an “even keel.” With their help, it was possible to balance the bow and stern of the submarine, so that its hull occupied a strictly horizontal position. Such a submarine could be easily controlled underwater.

An important event for submarines was the invention of the marine diesel engine. The fact is that swimming underwater with a gasoline engine was very dangerous. Despite all the precautions, volatile gasoline vapors accumulated inside the boat and could ignite from the slightest spark. As a result, explosions occurred quite often, accompanied by casualties.

The world's first diesel submarine, Lamprey, was built in Russia. It was designed by Ivan Bubnov, the chief designer at the Baltic shipyard. The diesel boat project was developed by Bubnov at the beginning of 1905. Construction began the following year. Two diesel engines for the Lamprey were manufactured at the Nobel plant in St. Petersburg.

The construction of the Lamprey was accompanied by several acts of sabotage (in March 1908, there was a fire in the battery compartment; in October 1909, someone poured emery into the bearings of the main engines). However, it was not possible to find the perpetrators of these crimes. Launching took place in 1908.

The Lamprey's power plant consisted of two diesel engines, an electric motor and a battery. Diesels and an electric motor were installed in one line and operated on one propeller. All motors were connected to the propeller shaft using disconnecting couplings, so that, at the captain’s request, the shaft could be connected to one or two diesel engines or an electric motor.

One of the diesel engines could be connected to an electric motor and cause it to rotate. In this case, the electric motor worked as a generator and charged the batteries. The battery consisted of two groups of 33 batteries each with a corridor between them for maintenance. The length of the "Lamprey" is 32 m. The speed on the surface is about 20 km/h, under water - 8.5 km/h. Armament: two bow torpedo tubes.