Hydrodynamic configuration for towed submersible body

摘要

A towed submersible body is utilized for housing underwater instrumentation, particularly a scanning type of sonar, the housing constituting a sphere which is attached at its top to a cable towed by a helicopter or by a surface vessel. The spherical housing of acoustically transparent material has hatches and ports top and bottom to aid in flooding and draining the interior. Ballast weights are fastened to the bottom of the housing near the lower hatch to control the location of the wet center of gravity of the body such that it is significantly below and slightly forward of the geometrical center of the sphere to provide stability during towing. A small projection on the housing in the form of a small diameter wire rope fastened to a meridian passing through the tow point or a point approximately 10° aft of the tow point provides for stable towing at speeds up to approximately eight knots with the tow cable at an angle not more than about 10° from the vertical.