-/kloc-the invention of gyroscope in 0/908.
Autopilot pilots accurately fly passenger planes around the earth, ships remain relatively stable on rough seas, and submarines reach their destinations through the depths of the ocean, all thanks to a children's toy and an imaginative American named Elmer Ambrose sperry.
1One day in the summer of 905, children were playing with gyroscopes. One of sperry's children asked him, "Why can it stand up when it rotates?" The problem of children prompted sperry to think, and the final result of thinking was the birth of gyro compass and the profound change of aviation navigation technology.
Sperry borrowed a gyroscope to demonstrate the rotation of the earth for teaching, and studied it to see if its operation mode could be put into practice by engineers. Later, on a voyage to Europe, the ship was caught in a storm, and sperry was thrown out of his berth by the bumpy ship. He thought it would be nice if the gyro could be used to keep the ship balanced. After three years of experiments, he built the first stabilizer and used it on the destroyer Walden in the United States.
The basic principle of gyro as stabilizer is that its rotating shaft with constant position can compensate the ship's swing and reduce the ship's swing amplitude to some extent.
1908, sperry invented the gyro compass with the same principle. It can keep due north and is not affected by any magnetic force. Gyro compass was first put into use in 19 10. Soon, it was adopted by the US Navy as a ship's azimuth instrument.
Inventions from sperry include: autopilot, which has a compact gyro system, so that aircraft can fly in the clouds or in the dark; Direction finder for drilling; A relative inclinometer that shows the attitude of the aircraft relative to apparent gravity, and so on.
Sperry died in 1930 at the age of 69. He obtained more than 400 patents in his life.