FlightGlobal.com
Home
Premium
Archive
Video
Images
Forum
Atlas
Blogs
Jobs
Shop
RSS
Email Newsletters
You are in:
Home
Aviation History
1920
1920 - 0690.PDF
bogey of big-money subsidies would no longer be dangling before the public ; business men would only be asked to pay a small and perfectly reasonable extra fee for the accelera- tion of their correspondence ; and the air transport industry, in the regular carriage of such mails, would £>e provided with the backbone of its existence while it was building up and developing its passenger and goods traffic. Mr. Handley Page welcomed the report on the principle that there was nothing so bad that something might not be said in its favour. He went on to say : It is distinctly satisfactory that the principle of a State subsidy to the British aircraft industry is at last fully recognised, although much might be urged in favour of a contribution towards a development of home mail services. Considered from the purely military point of view, the attitude of Sir Hugh Trenchard would be perfectly correct if it were a fact that there is no value whatever in commercial aviation, but such is certainly not the case. There is not a merchant in the City, of London who will not readily admit the necessity for JOT.Y I, XOCO speeding up the communications between all parts of the British Empire if we are to maintain our commercial supre- macy, and this can only be ensured by special types of swift passenger and freight-carrying machines. " The practicability and reliability of the present type of civil passenger and freight-carrying aeroplanes have already been fully demonstrated, and we are on the eve of great improvements in design and capability of commercial air- craft. It is distinctly regrettable that the official Continental aerial mail service should be belittled by the deliberate state- ment that it has proved to be a failure. It is also unfortunate in the public interests that a Government committee is debarred from referring to the fact that to private enterprise was due its inauguration—in the regular Handley Page service between London and Paris and London and Brussels two months before the Treaty of Peace was signed. It has been running continuously since May i, 1919, and during that period has carried 6,100 passengers, 100,000 lbs. of freight, and covered over 142,000 miles." ROYAL AERONAUTICAL a. ••• ::;v;s:- SOCIETY NOTICES Patron.—His Royal Highness the Duke of York, K.G., has graciously consented to become a Patron of the Society. Honorary Fellows.—The Council have elected Air-Marshal Sir Hugh Trenchard, Chief of the Air Staff, and Commander J. C. Hunsaker, U.S.N. (C.C.), Assistant for Aeronautics to the Chief of the Bureau *of Construction and Repair of the U.S. Navy Department, Honorary Fellows of the Society. The list of those upon whom this distinction has been previously conferred is as follows :—Mr. P. Y. Alexander, Major B. F. S. Baden-Powell, Prof. W. H. Dines, Lieut.-Gen. Sir David Henderson, Maj.-Gen. Sir Frederick Sykes. Chairman.—Air Commodore H. R. M. Brooke-Popham was, as a result of the Council ballot, declared duly elected Chairman of the Society for the year 1920-1921 at a Council Meeting held on June 15. He will assume office in October next. Donation.—The Council desire most gratefully to acknow- ledge the gift of a sum of £50 towards the expenses of the Society from a Member of Council. Olympia Aero Show.—Arrangements have been made for a reception room for the use of Members to be available during the Aero Show which is to be held at Olympia from July 9 to 20. Stands numbered 94 and 95 have been allotted for this purpose by the Exhibition Committee, and will be found immediately on, the left of the Hammersmith Road entrance. A telephone which may be used free by Members, will be installed (No. Hammersmith 2130). The room will be fitted up as a sitting room, and current numbers of aero- nautical papers will be transferred for this period from the Library at 7, Albemarle Street. Wilbur Wright Dinner.—Through inadvertance the name of Mr. White Smith (Chairman of the S.B.A.C.) was omitted from the list issued last week of those present at the dinner before the Wilbur Wright Lecture. Col. H. T. Tizard was at the last moment prevented from attending. Technical Terms Committee.—At a meeting of the Technical Terms Committee held on June 18 the resignation of the Chairmanship was accepted with great regret. It was decided to ask Air-Commodore Brooke-Popham to act as Chairman of the Committee ex-officio on assuming the Chair- manship of the Society. Wing-Com. Cave-Browne-Cave was elected Vice-Chairman. w LOCKWOOD MARSH, 7, Albemarle Street, W. 1, June 25, 1920 ™ - ^ CORRESPONDENCE [The Editor does not hold himself responsible for opinions expressed by correspondents. The names and addresses of the writers, not necessarily for publication, must in all cases accompany letters intended for insertion in these columns.] THE SIDE-SUP LANDING [2024] I regret that my reply to Mr. Courtney's criticism of my letter is rather late, but I feel bound to reply if only to offer him an apology for causing him so much pain, and to express the hope that my letter caused him less agony than I experienced when I read his article. To boil down his summary still further:—He says that in order to assist him in judging distance, an air-brake is necessary, and he follows this up by saying, " hence the side- slip." His air-brake is, therefore, nothing but an ordinary side-slip. This being the case, why not refer to it as such, and cut out the term air-brake altogether ? We all know what a side-slip is, and an air-brake, as the name implies, is for checking forward speed. An example of the air-brake is the swing-tail landing, carried out after flattening out to land, and it is a very different thing from an ordinary side- slip to assist in reaching a definite mark. I cannot agree that commercial landing speeds will be quite as much as 100 m.p.h. in the near future. Modern design seems to have a tendency in the opposite direction. Landing speed is too often confused with the speed at which a machine is brought in. Landing speed is actually the speed at which a machine stalls, and one would have to be a very quick thinker to force-land a machine that stalls at 100 m.p.h. My efforts to picture this machine have reminded me of the remark of a pilot when the " Snipe " first came along. He said, " I used to enjoy myself floating about on " Pups," nowadays I feel like a d d projectile." June 2r. FT. J. D. NON-INFLAMMABLE DOPE [2025] You will no doubt have noticed in the Evening News of the 16th inst., some particulars of the interesting experiment carried out in the United States in regard to fireproof dope, by which two airmen—Messrs. Kerwood and Campbell—demonstrated that hooded suits painted with dope, the fabric of the aeroplane being similarly treated, could be rendered proof against the flame set up by spraying them with petrol and igniting them. No doubt many of our customers, during the early part of the War, will recollect the "stunts " we used to carry out with Titanine. when our representatives used to carry with them a frame on which a burning wax match would be laid or petrol poured and ignited, without setting fire to the fabric of the frame. We explained at the same time that, by slightly adapting our schedule, the fabric could be rendered, in every respect, proof against flame. Similar representations were made to the authorities, who, however, used to say, " Yes, but that would injure the dope skin and cause slackness." They, however, would not lay down a definite standard of tautness, though we suggested that if they would do so we would guarantee to produce an absolutely flameproof dope within anv limits they might lay down. We, of course, knew that if they did lay down a standard it would have to be a reasonable one, or some of the dopes they were using would not conform to it. To revert to the American experiment, we regard the fireproofing of aeroplane wings as an invention of our own, pending any information to the contrary, as we had already succeeded in doing this in 1914, and hold a patent in con- nection with this dating from 1917. For reasons connected with the War, it was not decided until then to patent the invention. It would be interesting to know how the Ameri- cans have been able to accomplish their object without infringing our patent. If any enterprising pilots would like to make the same attempt here, we should be very pleased to furnish the necessary materials for the experiment, and could guarantee at the same time that the dope is both practical and reason- ably durable. TITANINE LTD., T. W. H. WARD, „. ,.., »»r -r Managing Director 175, Piccadilly, W.i, June 23,1920 * * 690
Sign up to
Flight Digital Magazine
Flight Print Magazine
Airline Business Magazine
E-newsletters
RSS
Events
