FlightGlobal.com
Home
Premium
Archive
Video
Images
Forum
Atlas
Blogs
Jobs
Shop
RSS
Email Newsletters
You are in:
Home
Aviation History
1916
1916 - 0543.PDF
JUNE 29, 1916. DIRIGIBLES FOR SPORT. (/yoHTj By SAMUEL L. COLLINS, M.Ae.S., A.M.I.A.E. MR. COLU.XS has bun personally responsible not only for the designing of dirigibles but for thtir MM****, and is, therefore, m a position to speak with some authority on this subject.—En,] ALTHOUGH opinion is still very divided as to the relative merits of the various types of airships, there is no doubt that the lighter-than-air craft have proved in this war that they have a certain amount of usefulness, and that under favourable conditions, at any rate, they are reliable enough for all practical purposes. Faults have, of course, been brought to light, and as in the case of the aeroplane, and many another invention utilised for military purposes, there will continue to be development as the result of experience which should ultimately be of benefit to the rest of the world when peace returns again. Although practically nothing has been heard of it, it is an open secret that very effective work, in several directions, has been done by small and medium-size dirigibles, and to my mind this is bound to result in a very much greater amount of attention being given in the future to such craft for pleasure and utilitarian purposes. able difficulties. In point of fact there appears to me to be no reason why suitable hangars should not be pro vided at the numerous aerodromes which will have to come into being sooner or later all over the country. In the same way, the question of the supply of hydrogen, although it might present some small difficulties at first, would soon be effectively dealt with once the commercial potentialities of the scheme were grasped. The practicability, from the technical standpoint, of airships of this type is unquestionable. They posset* the great advantage of simplicity in construction and control. They are very easy to handle, in fact almost as easy to handle as a motor car or a yacht, for, unlike the aeroplane, the dirigible calls for but comparatively simple aerodynamical knowledge, the question of balance, &c., being seen to, so to speak, by the dirigible itself. For the last-mentioned reason I think they would be " Ftt«hl " CopynfM A sporting two-seater dirigible, a detail view of the gondola. It appears to me that there are great possibilities for a small light dirigible, costing complete about ,£2,500 to ,£3,000—or even less—and so designed as to accom modate two or three persons comfortably. The idea may sound a little fantastical at first, but there is no real reason why such a craft should not become popular among the sportsmen who, for instance, used to go in for ballooning but are not attracted to the aeroplane. It would enable them to travel from place to place m com parative safety and in comfort, and they would certainly get more pleasure and enjoyment out of it than from ballooning. In order to give some tangible idea of what such a pro position means, I have prepared the outline drawings of a vessel to meet these requirements, from which it will be seen that it is less than 150 ft. long and about 45 ft. high, so that the housing of it should not offer insuper- 543 found useful by flying schools for enabling prolpective aeroplane pilots to get accustomed to controls, ascend ing, descending and turning, altitude, and other atmo spheric conditions. There also should be a good business to be done in passenger cruises at the various aerodromes, for besides being a new experience to those who have already been up in aeroplanes, there are a great many people who would not mind going up in a dirigible, but would not dream of trusting themselves in an aeroplane. Apart from this, there are also commercial possibilities in the way of exhibition work, advertising, &c, all of which could be turned to considerable profit. Referring to the drawings, it will be seen that the shape of the body is somewhat on the lines of that known as B.F. 36, a shape which experiments, carried out at the N.P.L , have shown to be one giving excellent results as r> a
Sign up to
Flight Digital Magazine
Flight Print Magazine
Airline Business Magazine
E-newsletters
RSS
Events
