Ships – Torpedo launching
Reexamination Certificate
1998-05-22
2001-12-18
Carone, Michael J. (Department: 3641)
Ships
Torpedo launching
C114S316000, C089S001801
Reexamination Certificate
active
06330866
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
(1) Field of the Invention
The invention relates to missile launch systems and is directed more particularly to a missile support and alignment assembly for use on a moving vehicle, such as a submarine, having a fixed missile launch tube.
(2) Description of the Prior Art
Submarines are provided with fixed launch tubes for torpedoes and other missiles and ordnance. The tubes penetrate the pressure hull of the vessel. The launch tubes are arranged in a manner consistent with safety, the architecture of the vessel, and watertight integrity. Proximate the tubes is disposed an arrangement of shelf or frame-like structures for storage of the missiles and/or other ordnance, and a handling system for selecting a weapon, aligning the selected weapon with a selected launch tube, and for feeding the selected weapon into the selected launch tube.
Because of the length-to-diameter ratio of the weapons, and their relative fragility, tolerance on the alignment of weapon and tube during loading is critical. Consequently, current designs for storage, handling and loading systems employ structures securely fixed to the hull, and are aligned with the launch tubes during construction. Such structures do not themselves provide significant shock and acoustic isolation from the hull. Accordingly, considerable effort and expense is devoted to design and analysis of the rigidly fixed structure and to partially isolating substructures to ensure adequate vibration and acoustic isolation. There is, accordingly, a need for a missile support assembly which is resiliently mounted in the submarine so as to “float” relative to the hull.
It is apparent that such a “floating” structure would not maintain a supported missile in alignment with a launch tube at all times. There is accordingly a further need for an alignment assembly which is operative on such a “floating” support to align a missile with a launch tube.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It is, therefore, an object of the invention to provide a missile support system for a vehicle having a fixed missile launch tube, the system including a missile support which is fixed to the vehicle by resilient mounts which permit the missile support to move relative to the vehicle.
It is a further object of the invention to provide a missile alignment system for use in conjunction with the aforementioned missile support system for aligning a missile retained by the missile support with the fixed missile launch tube, such that the missile may be pushed into the launch tube.
With the above and other objects in view, as will hereinafter appear, a feature of the present invention is the provision of a missile support assembly for use on a vehicle having a fixed missile launch tube, the assembly comprising a loading tray for supporting a missile, a storage structure for supporting the loading tray, and mounts resiliently connecting the storage structure to the vehicle.
In accordance with a further feature of the invention, there is provided a missile alignment assembly for use on a vehicle having a fixed missile launch tube, and in conjunction with a missile support assembly resiliently mounted on the vehicle, the alignment assembly comprising indicator means on the launch tube, a missile retaining tray mounted on the support assembly, at least one sensor on the missile retaining tray for reading a position of the indicator means, the sensor being adapted to send a signal indicative of the position of the tray, and thereby a missile retained by the tray, relative to the indicator means, and thereby the launch tube, a control device adapted to receive the sensor signals and compute movement of the tray necessary to align the missile with the launch tube, the control device being operative to send corrective signals, and alignment means mounted on the missile support assembly for receiving the corrective signals from the control device and operative in response thereto to move the tray widthwise of the launch tube to bring the missile on the tray into alignment with the launch tube.
The above and other features of the invention, including various novel details of construction and combinations of parts, will now be more particularly described with reference to the accompanying drawings and pointed out in the claims. It will be understood that the particular device embodying the invention is shown by way of illustration only and not as a limitation of the invention. The principles and features of this invention may be employed in various and numerous embodiments without departing from the scope of the invention.
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Buckley Denise J.
Carone Michael J.
Lall Prithvi C.
McGowan Michael J.
Oglo Michael F.
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