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Aviation History
1912
1912 - 0770.PDF
the sheds on a vacant plot and is somev> hat exposed. It consists of three platforms, two of which take a wooden girder weighing 44 lbs. for the support of the front wheels of the machine. The third platform supports the tail skid. In this way, it is necessary to make three simultaneous readings of the balances, which are contained in boxes forming part of the weighbridges. There is some slight oscillation at the best of times, but a little care is all that is required to get the sliding balance weight on to a notch that will cause the beam to rise and fall periodically, thus indicating that the weight selected is a fairly good mean between the extreme loads on the scale. Another interesting operation carried out by the officials in the absence of flying and continuance of bad weather, was the investi gation of the range of view obtained by the observer from each machine. For this purpose, the floor of the hangar was marked out like a chess-board, and the observer having been provided with a numbered chart was required to indicate thereon the squares that he could see from his appointed seat. Apart from these things, the transport test of the Hanriot No. I comprised the only real business of the competition. Monday. A private trial of the resuscitated Avro biplane at a quarter past four this morning gave those who saw it much satisfaction, but failed to belie the continued unpleasantness of the weather, which kept several anxiously-waiting competitors indoors. Even the flag did not fly at the masthead, and, in the respite from official doings, the officials themselves took the opportunity of check ing the calculations about the machines that had flown. Lieut. Parke's little journey in the air served to demonstrate the convenience of the cab-body for flying in rain, just as his unfortunate accident tended to show its security. Although it was raining hard, the pilot was conscious only of a mist, and felt nothing at all of the raindrops. That they were there to feel, however, may be judged from the fact that the edge of the propeller was quite scored by contact with them, which is not so surprising as it might seem, seeing that the peripheral speed of a modern air propeller is several hundred miles an hour. Anyone who has motored in the wet knows how uncommonly solid a rain drop can feel against the face, oven when travelling at a moderate speed. Tuesday. After another morning of rain there was an unexpected interval of comparative calm about tea-lime this afternoon, indeed it is generally when a wearied humanity, exhausted with doing nothing, sets out on the trail to the Daily Express tent—which is one of the incidental features of the meeting, and has been nothing short of a godsend as the sole source of physical sustenance in the immediate vicinity of the hangars—that someone invariably takes out his machine to do a wind test or a trial flight. The tea tent is not conveniently situated for observation, consequently you may see anxiously expectant journalists bobbing in and out whenever a buzzing from afar, which as likely as not is a motor cycle toiling up the hill, causes them to believe that a flight of some sort has just begun. On this occasion, Vedrines was quickly aloft for his climbing test, and then out came the newly constructed Handley Page monoplane, with its bird-like wings and immense body. It was flown by Petre, and from the little evidence already available it seems to be in a fair way to justifying its claim for stability, which forms the basis of its design. It is not without interest to remark that Mr. Handley Page's view of the principle of Mhe crescent-shaped wing that he affects, which is that the air near the shoulder of the wing tends to have an outward flow by virtue of its existence in a region of positive pressure. By retreating the wing tip the air thereunder does in fact have a slightly outward flow, and consequently a side gust, which ordinarily lifts a wing by producing an increased resultant relative velocity, is, in this case, compounded with a diagonal vector having an opposing direction, so that the resultant is, therefore, reduced, and the wing does not tend to lift. On the opposite side of the machine there would be, by the same argument, an increased lifting force, but for the fact that the wing is shielded so much by the body. Distant darkness of the horizon, foretold of a forthcoming storm, and long before anyone might have completed a three hours' flight it was again raining in torrents ; in fact it came down worse than ever it had done before. Wednesday. In a 15-mile-an-hour wind, Pixton, who is; really excelling himself on the Bristol monoplane No. 15, which he had never even touched before last Monday week, put up a splendid speed test of 73 m.p.h. maximum and 58 m.p.h. minimum. This is a startling performance in the light of the trial of No. 14, for it shows an increase on the slow speed of nearly 26 per cent., and is a remarkable performance for a monoplane with a value of X in the order of 220. •Flight" Copyright. AT THE ARMY COMPETITION. —The first copy of FLIGHT In camp is secured by Busteed. Mr. C. P. Pizey at the Army tests on Salisbury Plain, his headgear being reminiscent of his trip to Turkey. The centre ornament is not a Turkish Order, however, but just a barograph. 770
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