I was thinking it might be nice to make a watercraft, preferably a submarine, with very long legs several hundred feet). This would enable it to keep from sinking to the bottom in the event of an accident, thus facilitating rescue.
The legs themselves need not be used for mobility, but rather might be deployed in an unfolding or telescopic fashion in the event of an emergency.
This obviously would only be helpful for saving human life in relatively shallow waters (near coastlines, mainly). However, it may help facilitate location and retrieval of the craft after a disaster, even if it is in very deep water.
It might be nice if the legs had some sort of "self-levelling" system which would adjust the length of each leg to keep the sub as upright as possible when standing upon slopes.
It is *possible* that these could be used for mobility as well, since the weight of the submarine would be offset by its ballast, which would allow for a relatively weak propulsion system to move the legs(though I can't see it making very fast headway).-- Size_Mick, Nov 06 2003 A walking submarine idea was baked in the popular console game series "Metal Gear: Solid" ... and the sequels aswell ... as a matter of fact, it was the focal point of the plot of the games ... "Metal Gear" being a cool super-weapon
On another note, modern submarines as well as earlier WW2 models are build to withstand landfall ... good examples are submarines purposley being 'beached' in order to rescue downed pilots and other people in need ...-- Letsbuildafort, Nov 06 2003 I would think that this would take up alot of space on a sub, but then to put engines and shit on these legs too...-- dickity, Nov 06 2003 So I've got these huge telescoping legs holding me off the seafloor, then a current comes along and tips my a** over, or picks me up and drags me along the bottem like a tumbleweed. Now what?
//Sorry couldn't get my ASCII art to work with the autoformatting of these anotations//-- Reverend_Cobol, Nov 06 2003 Zowie, Reverend ... can I get a 3D rendering of that for my desktop background?-- Letsbuildafort, Nov 06 2003 "So I've got these huge telescoping legs holding me off the seafloor, then a current comes along and tips my a** over, or picks me up and drags me along the bottem like a tumbleweed. Now what?"
Yow, didn't think about that one. Didn't know about the Metal Gear thing either. In any case, hey at least it's good enough for a sci-fi game.-- Size_Mick, Nov 06 2003 How to stop them legs getting stuck on the mud? What about fragile coral reefs?-- Pellepeloton, Sep 23 2006 And how about airplanes with legs?-- ldischler, Sep 23 2006 random, halfbakery