Undersea glider challenge

[Pds314]

Construct a vessel who's only means of propulsion is it's weight or bouyancy and hydrodynamic lift. Once you enter the water, go as far and as fast as possible. How quickly can you make it to the island runway?

[ralanboyle]

I'm gonna need to see an example of this. 

[Vanamonde]

Is this possible? It sounded interesting so I tried it, and the minimal parts required to control craft imposed so much buoyancy that I couldn't get the thing to sink even with 5 full ore tanks as ballast. 

[camacju]

I bet a plane with a buoyancy thing in the nose would work really well. Then you can push the nose up/down and glide on that force

[RoninFrog]

Here's a working prototype, for proof that it is possible.  Its top speed is about 10 m/s at a 45° dive.  I bet it could be fine-tuned to be much more efficient.

Spoiler

I didn't have the patience to go all the way to the Island Airfield.

Edited November 21, 2020 by RoninFrog

[Pds314]

16 hours ago, RoninFrog said:

Here's a working prototype, for proof that it is possible.  Its top speed is about 10 m/s at a 45° dive.  I bet it could be fine-tuned to be much more efficient.

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I didn't have the patience to go all the way to the Island Airfield.

Nice! My attempts so far have similar glide ratio and speed. I will admit reaching the island might be a tad optimistic if we can't get much better speed and glide ratio.

Edited November 22, 2020 by Pds314