Underwater excavation apparatus
AssigneeUnderwater Excavation Limited
InventorNicholas V. Sills
Life of this patent
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Abstract
This disclosure relates to an underwater excavation apparatus comprising a tube in which a propeller is mounted for rotation. The tips of the propeller blades are formed with jets supplied from a high-pressure water supply through passages in the propeller blades. The jets impinge on vanes mounted on the tube wall around the propeller to cause the propeller to rotate and thereby draw water through the tube from a inlet at one end to an outlet at the other end to act on the seabed. The apparatus is particularly useful for excavating trenches on the seabed and exposing previously covered installations on the seabed.
Claims14
Underwater excavation apparatus comprising a hollow body having an inlet to receive water, an outlet for discharging water, a propeller having a plurality of blades mounted for rotation at a location in the hollow body to draw water through the inlet and deliver a stream of water through the outlet, water jet means on the propeller blades and means to supply water under pressure to the jet means to cause the propeller to rotate and thereby deliver a flow of water through the outlet for displacing material on the seabed;
- wherein the improvement comprises providing the hollow body with an encircling slit around the location of the propeller, an annular sleeve on the outer side of the hollow body with fixed vanes, means mounting the annular sleeve on the hollow body to extend on either side of said slit to define an annular chamber around the hollow body and locating said water jet means at the tip or tips of the propeller blades to project through the annular slit into said annular chamber and to face around the chamber to react on the water contained within the chamber.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.