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Aviation History
1928
1928 - 0011.PDF
JANUARY 5, 1923 AIRSHIP DEVELOPMENT ON Friday, December 16, Capt. C. F. M. Chambers, D.S.C.. S.M.A.E., delivered a highly-informative and interesting lecture on Airship Development before the Society of Model Aeronautical Engineers at the Y.M.C.A., Tottenham Court Road. Commencing from the earliest efforts of the brothers Robert, in France, in 1784, he narrated how their first ship (which was built to the order of the Duke of Chartres) ascended very successfully. But no gas blow-off valve had been fitted, and consequently the envelope was on the point of bursting when, with great presence of mind, the Duke bayonetted the fabric with om of the spare landing stakes, and so they came down in the park of Meudon, near St. Cloud. The French revolution occurred nine years later, and it is to be hoped that the Duke managed to escape the guillotine with the same skill as he had previously shown in avoiding a bad landing ! Since that time, however, nothing of importance was done until the end of the 19th century, when Santos Dumont evolved a number of ships for pleasure purposes. Capt. Chambers then traced through the evolution of the Zeppelin, and showed up its strong and more particularly its weak points. His chief criticism was that the system of suspending power eggs—cars—and perhaps (as in the case of an aircraft carrier) aeroplanes—as a number of vibrating pendulum weights, is not a sound engineering job. Particularly so, when the machine is turning in the air. He also went through the evolution of the non-rigid ships— finishing as they did in this country with the highly-successful ships of the Coastal Star and North Sea types, and the S.S. or " Blimp." The evolution of the semi-rigid was then detailed out—the beginning being the Parseval, in 1916—a German ship and a very creditable piece of work. It seems as though we might have had a service of Parsevals running between Berlin and London by now, had not the peace treaty held up the German designers. This presented an admirable opportunity to outside enter- prise, and the Italians therefore commenced their successful programme of semi-rigids, among which is the " Norge." An account was then given of the famous flight to the North Pole and back, under command of Capt. Amundsen, and also of other famous airship flights, including the east and west crossing of the Atlantic by R.34, under Major Scott, in 1919. The question of the safety of airships was then gone into, and Capt. Chambers gave short summaries of the accidents to R. 38, Shenandoah, and Dixmude, as given by the various Courts of inquiry. He showed that in each case these were not commercial ships, but were built for special fighting purposes, and under the influence of design of the war period. Commercial airships of the future will have a much higher factor of safety, and design is being revolutionised. The actual casualties of various forms of transit were next gone into, and some very interesting figures for 1926 were given, as follows, which show that the air is by no means as dangerous as is generally supposed, but rather to the contrary. From the Home Office :—Street casualties, 1926 (all road vehicles) : Killed and injured, 138,774. From B.O.T. Returns, 1926 :—(On British registered ships) : Deaths from disease and injury, etc., to passengersand crew, 2,229. F"rom Ministry of Transport, 1926 :—(On British Railways) :Killed and injured, 23,807. From Air Ministry Department of Civil Aviation :— Acci- Miles Year. dents. Killed. Injured. Total. Flown. 1919 1 1 2 3 104,000 1920 ..1 2 2 4 644,0001921 — — — — 225,000 1922 — 1 1 717,000 1923 1 3 — 3 943,0001924 . . 1 7 — 7 936,000 1925 .. — — — — 862,000 1926 .. — — _ — 840,0001927* .. — — — — 485,000 18 5,756,0004 13 5 * End of August.On these figures—- The percentage of casualties per million miles travelledper train on railways is 62-9 and the corresponding figure for the air is 3 14. He did not deduce, however, from thisthat air transport is safer than any other—-but he pointed out this salient fact : That railways have been in operationin this country for over 100 years, and the percentage of casualties suffered is likely by now to be a stable quantity.Aircraft for commercial purposes has not been in use for 10 years and, as the tables show, the casualties are dropping,while the mileage is steadily increasing, and it is reasonable to assume that as time goes on the air will prove safer thanit is today. So much, then, for the history of the airship, and gettingdown to its commercial possibilities, Capt. Chambers answered the question as to whether or no the airship is a business pro-position, and introduced at this point the designs for B.S.R.I., which is the first semi-rigid to be built for British Airships,Ltd. This coming machine is already familiar to readers of FLIGHT, and after describing all the main, technical features,the lecturer showed that the performance and paying load would be much better than an airliner of approximately thesame cost. One example given was the Imperial Air liner " Argosy,"costing ^22,500. It was found that B.S.R.I., costing ^25,000, would have a capacity anything between five and nine timesas large. He therefore deduced- that the small semi-rigid of 1,000,000 cub. ft. displacement, was essentially a usefulunit, and in the great air routes of the future from this country to America—or to Australia—would be used in con-junction with the aeroplane and the big rigid, at any rate for a start. He prophesied that 1928 will be essentially an airshipyear—and in conclusion he pointed out that whether or no the airship in its present form is the solution of the airtransport problem, it is at all events going to have its day. He then spoke on the great possibilities of the flying wing,and is inclined to the opinion that we shall in the long run arrive at this as a final solution of the best form of airtransit. A New ZeppelinTHE new Zeppelin, L.Z.127, which has been under con- struction for the past year at Friedrichshafcn, will probabl rbe ready next summer. This will be the largest airship ever produced by Germany, and capable of a 6,250 miles' range in100 hours' flying. The engine power will be five 530 h.p. May bach's, the passengers will number 20, and the crew 26.The intended maiden flight of the ship will be a voyage round the world with Dr. Eckener, technical director of the ZeppelinCompany, in command. If the trials are successful the ship will be flown on a passenger service between Spain and SouthAmerica, organised by a Spanish-Argentine company. New Club Changes its Name THE Easfr Kent Flying Club has changed its name to thepicturesque title of Cinque Ports Flying Club in honour of the Rt. Hon. Earl Beauchamp, K.G., P.C., K.C.M.G., T.D.,Warden of the Cinque Ports, who has kindly consented to become the president. He has generously contributed^100 towards the purchase of shares in the company now being formed, which, up to date, has over ^200 worth of shares applied for. At the beginning of the new year a prospectus will be issued. Preparing the Way A SOUTH AFRICAN report states that early in 1929 flights will be carried out between England and South Africa to test the possibility of an airship service. Irish Civil Aviation A REPORT states that the Free State Government proposes to establish a Department of Civil Aviation of which Col. Charles Russell, formerly in command of the Free State Air Force, will be in charge. Steps may be taken with the collaboration of Imperial Airways to arrange air services between England and the Free State. New London Air Lines AN air service between London and Cannes will begin on March 1, when passengers will be able to leave Croydon at 8 a.m. and reach Cannes at 4 p.m. In the summer of this year the air lines between London and Cologne will be doubled, for in addition to ths established services a Bslgian line will operate over the same route. 11
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