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Aviation History
1928
1928 - 0216.PDF
MARCH 22, 1928 [" FLIGHT " Photograph A "MOTH " WITH AUTOMATIC SLOTS : Capt. Geoffrey de Havilland demonstrating a mistake often made by beginners : "Landing 10 ft. above the ground." Note that the elevators are hard up. In a normal machine a crash on a wing tip would almost certainly have followed. In this case the " Moth " merely bounced, and then settled quite comfortably. took the joy stick and gave a demonstration of the kind of liberties which may be taken with a machine without serious consequences to the pilot if the machine is fitted with the new Handley Page slots. The " Moth " had been but slightly altered from the standard machine. Small changes had been made in the control surfaces—since it is, of course, essential, if the best possible use is to be made of the slots, that all the controls should be in harmony. The chief alteration, however, was the substitution of a new undercarriage. One of our photo- graphs shows this, and a lengthy description should not be necessary. It will be seen that the horizontal axle has been abandoned, the other alterations being due to this fact. What is not perhaps quite so obvious is that the wheel track has been made slightly wider and, most important of all. the stroke of the telescopic leg has been considerably increased in order to give better shock-absorbing qualities. The demonstrations proved that this was no unnecessary- precaution. Capt. de Havilland's demonstrations took the form of four separate nights, each made with the object of showing some particular function of the slotted-wing machine. During the first flight Capt. de Havilland took the machine up to a couple of thousand feet, and then demonstrated that the machine cannot be made to spin. Repeatedly he so manoeuvred the machine that, had it not been fitted with slots, it would undoubtedly have gone into a spin. All that happened was that the " Moth " made some steep spirals at speeds and attitudes which were quite obviously far removed from the condition of autorotation. In the second flight Capt. de Havilland repeatedly jerked the stick back violently so as to produce a fairly violent stall. There was not the slightest lateral "wobble" or uncertainty ; but, of course, the machine stalled in the usual manner, i.e., dropped its nose suddenly and commenced a dive, as any machine inevitably must which depends for its lift upon speed in some direction or other. The point was that merely a straight dive followed the stall, and not a sign of a spin. In landing from this flight Capt. de Havilland gave a demonstration of what happens when a beginner misjudges his height and lands, as it is called, " 10 ft. above the ground," i.e., flattens out to land while Ms wheels are still about 10 ft. in the air. A beautiful " three-point " landing was made " 10 ft. up," but the machine, instead of dropping a wing tip as the normal machine would most likely do, the slotted " Moth " (by the way, we are afraid this machine will become known as the " Sloth " for short !), merely pancaked and bounced a little. An unpremeditated, but very convincing demonstration : In doing a stalled landing from 200 ft., Capt. de Havilland proved the safety of the " Moth," fitted with automatic slots. The under- carriage was intact, but the impact was too much for the fuselage. It will be seen that both cockpits are practically undamaged, and even if a passenger had been carried it is unlikely that he would [have been hurt. - , ""FLIGHT " Photograph L96
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