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Aviation History
1920
1920 - 0971.PDF
SEPTEMBER 9, 1920 of the general lay-out, the excellence of the detail -work,or the courage of Mr. Saunders in sanctioning the building of a machine which is such a radical departure from orthodoxpractice. In almost every respect the " Kittiwake " differs from what one has become accustomed to regard as standardpractice. This applies not only to the general arrangement, T?ut equally to the majority of constructional details. And•when a closer inspection is made it is at once realised that "the originality of the design is not due to a desire on thepart of the designer to produce " something different from •everybody else's," but is the result of a serious attempt tomeet the requirements of commercial aviation. Thus the passengers have been placed where they may be assumedto be as safe as possible in an aircraft—well above the water line and well aft of the nose, without any engines or otherheavy weights behind and above them. The view obtained is excellent, and the cabin is roomy with plenty of headToom. The question of fire has been carefully considered,and in order to reduce to a minimum any possibility of the •cabin catching fire in case of a crash, the tanks have beenplaced on the top plane, above thfeir respective engines. This not only gets all petrol away from the hull and cabin,T>ut means in addition direct gravity feed to the carburettors from the main tanks, reducing the length of piping to a mini-mum and doing away with all petrol systems as the term is usually understood. The Cabins The general arrangement drawings of the " Kittiwake "published herewith will give a good idea of the lay-out and proportions of the machine. Fundamentally, it will be seenthe machine is a flying-boat, with a superstructure added -which forms the passengers' cabin. This cabin is reachedthrough doors in the side in line with the trailing edge of the bottom plane. For use on the sea short steps are providedon the sides of the boat, so that a small boat will simply run up just behind the trailing edge of the lower plane andthe passengers enter by way of the steps and doors. Being aft of the planes the passengers are well away from theairscrews, so that even with the engines running the machine may be boarded.without danger to the passengers. Insidethe cabin seats are arranged in the form of " settees " along the sides, and six passengers can be very comfortably seated,while it is possible to get in seven without undue crowding. Should 'it be decided to provide parachutes as a standardequipment of passenger machines, these could be stowed in lockers along the sides of the aft portion of the fuselage,and as the doors in the cabin are just above the trailing •edge of the lower plane, the passengers could easily jumpclear. From the passengers' cabin steps lead down into the pilot's cabin in front, which is on a slightly lower level soas to provide a forward view for the passengers. The pilot sits on the starboard side and controls the machine by means "Flight" Copyright THE SAUNDERS " KITTIWAKE ". : Mounting and cowling of the A.B.C. "Wasp, Mark II " engine. of the usual controls, while on his left are two wheels for operating the variable camber and the tail trimming re- spectively. An ordinary crank handle is also provided for raising and lowering the land under-carriage, the two wheels of which are housed in slots in the boat hull, the water being kept out by spring-loaded doors in the bottom. The engineer is normally housed in the pilot's cabin, and can if necessary walk through the cabin and out on the wings to the engines. •For anchor handling a small hatch is provided near the nose of the boat hull, while the pilot's cabin has another hatch in the roof. SfWi 68-S LENGTH AS-8" HEIGHT .14'-3" MAIN PLANES 864 SO F"f SAUNDERS AMPHIBIAN KITTIWAKE 2-20O.H.&A&CWASPII ENGINES 973 " Flight" Copyright. D
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