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How Navy’s New Tricks Concealed Ships

Based on established and reliable optical laws, the Navy’s World War II camouflage used black and white ! painted patterns on vessels, producing startling visual deception that was confounding even at a 50-foot range. Strongly contrasted stripes in the designs made accurate observation virtually impossible. False, shadows created most deceiving illusions of shape. Sterns were “shortened,” gear was “hidden,” and entire ships were “heeled” through the scientific use of paint. The ineffective battleship gray and Dazzle System of camouflage (left) were rendered obsolete.

Those are some pretty awesome models but that second article is a very scary idea. I’d be pretty pissed if my doctor tried to brand me..

Young Shipbuilders Take Cruise in Their Giant Models
ALL honors for constructing real boat models go to a couple of Berlin youths who have turned out in their own workshops the two amazing creations shown in the photo above. Perfect duplicates of the training frigate “Preussen” and the cruiser “Hindenburg,” the two models are large enough to carry real sailor passengers, as you can see in the photo. The model of the “Hindenburg” has full fighting equipment, and an anchor that actually anchors.

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Skin Brands to Prevent Frauds
INDELIBLE messages tattooed on the skins of patients who have had surgical operations or have suffered injuries were urged recently in England to prevent fraud. Such a course would prevent duplication of claims by persons who try to collect many times for physical deficiencies which they have had since birth. Often they deliberately undergo an accident to collect damages.

NEW LIFE PRESERVER HAS TWO PROPELLERS
Timid of sea travel because of his inability to swim, a Japanese lawyer of Los Angeles, Calif., has invented and patented a mobile life preserver. Hand cranks at the sides of the device turn a pair of diminutive propellers, enabling the wearer to advance at fair speed while remaining erect in the water. Thus a non-swimmer may reach a nearby shore without waiting to be picked up. The photograph above shows the inventor wearing his odd life preserver. Note the propellers and the hand crank that operates them.

Air Bubbles to Save Life at Sea

FOR more than two thousand years, sailors have known that a little oil, poured on the raging billows, will quiet them almost magically. In many rescues from a distressed ship during a storm, we read that oil has been used. A method, more efficient than simply pouring it over the ship’s side, is to put the oil into cloth bags, through which it will leak gradually, and tow them at the end of ropes, so that the oil is distributed very thinly. It is necessary only to have a thin film, to break the “surface tension” of the water; and the waves are no longer able to hold their height so readily.
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Strange PERILS of Making MOVIES Beneath the Sea

Hollywood’s most intrepid cameraman relates startling adventures he has encountered making undersea movies which chill your blood.

by HOMER SCOTT – Pioneer Underwater Cameraman

IN 14 years I probably have gazed into the cold eyes of more curious fish and looked on the bodies of more actors and actresses beneath the sea than any other man. From the shores of Southern California to the rocky coast of the Socorro islands, far south in the Pacific, and even off the shores of New Zealand I have descended many times in one of my half-bells, my legs dangling puppet-like in the cold water, to photograph dramas that sometimes thrilled me more than were the audiences that viewed the results on the screen. ] When the editors of Modern Mechanix and Inventions asked me to write of the thrills and tell you how these scenes are filmed, I said to myself, “Gosh, there’s nothing very interesting about undersea picture-taking.”
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Splicing a Cable in Mid-Atlantic

The author of this article went as a member of the crew of the cable ship in order to get this vivid, first-hand story for you.

By BURT M. McCONNELL
Photos by Author

TORN and twisted, an ocean cable last winter lay buried under a layer of clay two miles beneath the gray-green, foam-capped waves of the Atlantic, three hundred miles east of Halifax. It was shattered by the terrific earthquake that shook the Atlantic seaboard for a distance of 1,000 miles and put out of commission about half of the underwater communications between the United States and Europe.
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English Ferry Wades Through Ocean Waves
NOT a boat, but a caterpillar-tractor car, is this public utility, located at an English seaside resort. As shown, it holds its passengers above the waves, while picking its way over the bottom. A 24-horsepower engine operates it.

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Water-Mobile

By Everett H. Clark

When the water calls you cruising… when the road beckons you go rolling… always snug inside your traveling home.

THE millions of ex-GI’s who watched wartime amphibious craft climb dripping up the beachheads will recognize the substance of dreams of their own in the “Vacationer,” an amphibious luxury cruiser proposed by industrial designer Robert Zeidman for practical peacetime use. The new civilian amphibian is a descendant of some of the Navy’s experimental vehicles, not the Army’s familiar DUCK. It promises a sustained highway speed of 55 mph and a respectable 10 to 12 knots afloat. Efficient land speed was the first consideration in specifying power; the excellent showing on water is due to improved lines and to the twin screws in tunnels, driven by the twin motors in the stern. Twin rudders give maximum maneuverability.
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Floating garage
When the USS Essex moved its base from Mayport, Fla., to Quonset Point, R.I., officers and men who owned cars received permission to transport them on the carrier’s flight deck. One catch—a warning: If war broke out while they were at sea, the cars would be dumped. The ship carried no planes, as a new flying group will be attached in Rhode Island.

FISHING IN THE OCEAN WITH HORSE AND WAGON

One of the most unusual methods of catching ocean fish is said to have been developed in New England. While the use of huge nets a few miles from shore is common, this particular trap is different because of the fact that all the conveying of workmen and catch is done by horse and wagon—and the trap is more than two miles out at sea. Along this strip of Cape Cod shore the tides completely cover the ocean bottom but, on receding, the water is not more than a few feet deep for several miles out. As a result, the fishermen can start out with horse and wagon after the tide starts to ebb, gather in the fish and return to shore before the water is deep.

Freak Boat Can’t Sink or Tip Over

THE latest in freak boats is the non-sink-able and non-tippable craft shown in the photo above, in which a German inven tor will attempt to cross the Atlantic this winter, to prove that his boat can stand up in the roughest weather.

Its hull is divided into six watertight compartments and has mounted on it an equally water tight cabin, which is protected from spray by a shield around the base.

Sea Waves to Drive Ocean Liner

German engineer plans to build novel “whale mouth” ship using water as propelling medium.

RESEMBLING a ferocious monster of the deep, an ocean liner is being designed in Germany to make use of the sea’s unlimited energy as a propelling medium.

The ship will have an opening in its bow that will give it the appearance of a giant whale swimming over the water with its jaws ready to devour anything in its path. This opening will gather up the ocean waves and pass them through the ship. The water will be ejected by means of spouts along the sides of the liner. The water, forced out under pressure, is expected to drive the ship forward at great speed. As a result the expense of operating a liner is expected to be reduced. Read the rest of this entry »