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Aviation History
1925
1925 - 0394.PDF
"*™ •" * k JUNE 25, 1925 NATIONAL PHYSICAL LABORATORY Annual Inspection THE official opening of the new entrance gates to the National Physical Laboratory at Teddington was made the occasion, on June 23, of a reception and inspection of the various buildings by the General Board of the N.P.L., and invited guests. From the new entrance a broad avenue leads to a large circle laid out as a flower bed, and from this new roads radiate to different parts of the grounds, the two main roads being known as Kelvin Road and Lord Rayleigh Road. Speeches were made by Sir Charles Sherrington, President of the Royal Society, and by Lord Rayleigh, after which Sir Lionel Earle, Secretary to His Majesty's Office of Works, handed a special key to Sir Charles Sherrington, who unlocked the gates and declared the new entrance and roads to be opened. Guests were then received in the new aerodynamics building by Sir Joseph Petavel, Director of the "N.P.L., Sir Charles Sherrington, O.M., President of the Royal Society and Chairman of the Board, and Sir Arthur Schuster, F.R.S. When we state that no less than 181 different experimental and measuring apparatus were referred to in the official programme some idea of the magnitude of the work being carried out at the N.P.L. may be formed. It is obviously impossible for us to spare the space to refer in detail to all the subjects of interest which visitors had an opportunity to see, and we must content ourselves with a brief reference to the subjects which may be assumed to be of particular interest to readers of FLIGHT. In the aerodynamics department the subjects of special interest were experiments with a model of the auto-giro, by General Board Re- invented by the Spanish engineer, de la Cierva, and which has been described and illustrated in FLIGHT. This machine it will be recollected, has its lifting surfaces in the form of a large four-bladed propeller which is not driven by the engine but is set in motion, when the machine gathers speed, by the air forces acting upon it. A considerable measure of success has been obtained in Spain with this machine. The model of the auto-giro was shown in No. 3 7-ft. wind tunnel. In the Duplex wind tunnel was shown a model of a Bristol fighter being tested for aerodynamic damping in yawing motion, while No. 1 4-it.-wind tunnel were seen measurements of fluctuating wind velocities by the hot-wire method. In the 7-ft. No. 1 wind-tunnel experiments were being carried out on the performance of air screws fitted with spinners in front of a tractor aeroplane body. Always of great interest is the William Froude tank for testing models of ships' floats and flying-boat hulls. On this occasion the apparatus was shown for testing flying boat hulls for resistance, running angle, etc. Of great interest were a series of tests of a wax model of Nelson's flag-ship Victory- In the metallurgy building, visitors had an opportunity of seeing the micro-structure of metals and alloys seen under the microscope and projected and micro-structures shown as transparencies, while there was also an interesting exhibi- tion of stainless steel in comparison with ordinary mild steel, samples of both being shown after immersion for different periods in sea water. BRISTOLS" IN THE RUNDFLUG IN our account of the Round-Germany Flight reference has been made on various occasions to the " Bristol Lucifer " engines fitted in some of the machines. Certain further iateresting facts relating to these engines have now become available and may, we think, be found of interest to readers of FLIGHT. It will be recollected that the Heinkel H.D.32 (No. 678), piloted by Lorenz, completed the whole Rundflug and was credited with the full distance of 5,324 kms. (3,300 miles). It is worthy of note that throughout the whole flight not a single replacement of any kind was made on this engine. Not only this, but, actually, the machine covered an extra 400 miles or so with which it was not credited, this extra distance being flown because of a return from an aerodrome which the pilot considered unsuitable for landing, so that actually the Heinkel machine with Bristol " Lucifer " engine covered something like 3,700 miles without anything whatever having to be changed. It is very much to be doubted whether the same can be said of any other engine in the competition, and, fine as this performance was, it did not represent the maximum of which the " Lucifer " was capable, as is shown by the fact that after the competition the engine was removed imme- diately after the race for stripping and examination, when it was found that every part of the engine was in perfect condition, and that not a single replacement of even a minor character was found to be necessary. This is surely high testimony to the quality of Bristol design and workmanship. That the question of cost is not everything is strikingly shown by a letter received by the Bristol Aeroplane Co., in which the writer states that he had heard complaints of the cost of the " Lucifer " engine before the competition, but that after the competition several of the people who had made the complaints came along and told him what they could have done had they had a " Lucifer," and what they would have saved had they had a " Lucifer." Thus we have another case illustrating the truth of the old saying that " the best is the cheapest in the long run." Reference has already been made to the fact that another Bristol " Lucifer " fitted in Albatros L.69 did not get an opportunity of showing what it really could do, owing to the fact that the machine was finished late. A third "Lucifer" was, however, fitted in the Caspar C.26, and although this machine was 24 hours late in starting, the pilot covered the whole course except a few miles. FAIREY SEAPLANES FOR HOLLAND : As previously reported in " Flight," the Fairey Aviation Co., Ltd.,of Hayes, recently delivered to the Dutch Government a batch of Series III seaplanes (Napier " Lion " engines). The above photograph shows the machines anchored at Hamble, from which place they were flown to Hollandby Dutch pilots. 394
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