Frédéric Sauvage was a French

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 boat builder who carried out early tests of screw-type marine propeller

Propeller

A propeller is a type of fan that transmits power by converting rotational motion into thrust. A pressure difference is produced between the forward and rear surfaces of the airfoil-shaped blade, and a fluid is accelerated behind the blade. Propeller dynamics can be modeled by both Bernoulli's...

s.

Sauvage was born at Boulogne-sur-Mer

Boulogne-sur-Mer

-Road:* Metropolitan bus services are operated by the TCRB* Coach services to Calais and Dunkerque* A16 motorway-Rail:* The main railway station is Gare de Boulogne-Ville and located in the south of the city....

. In a public demonstration with a small boat on January 15, 1832 in Honfleur

Honfleur

Honfleur is a commune in the Calvados department in northwestern France. It is located on the southern bank of the estuary of the Seine across from le Havre and very close to the exit of the Pont de Normandie...

, he was able to show that a propeller is more efficient than the then standard paddle-wheels located on the sides of the boat. However, he was not able to interest the French Navy

French Navy

The French Navy, officially the Marine nationale and often called La Royale is the maritime arm of the French military. It includes a full range of fighting vessels, from patrol boats to a nuclear powered aircraft carrier and 10 nuclear-powered submarines, four of which are capable of launching...

 in his idea and when he tried to develop it commercially on his own he was not successful, went bankrupt and landed in debtor’s prison for a time. Today, the practical development of propellers is generally credited to Francis Pettit Smith

Francis Pettit Smith

Sir Francis Pettit Smith was an English inventor and, along with Frédéric Sauvage and John Ericsson, one of a number of people with a claim to having been the inventor of the screw propeller...

 in England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 and to Captain John Ericsson

John Ericsson

John Ericsson was a Swedish-American inventor and mechanical engineer, as was his brother Nils Ericson. He was born at Långbanshyttan in Värmland, Sweden, but primarily came to be active in England and the United States...

 (England, U.S.A) who took out patents in 1836, although Sauvage was clearly a pioneer.

External links

• Who invented the screw propeller?