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Aviation History
1931
1931 - 0128.PDF
FLIGHT, FEBRUARY 6, 1931 THE "ISLAND " ABEAM : A Fairey IIIF taking off from the deck of H.M.S. " Glorious ". (FLIGHT Photograph.) There were one or two questions he would like to askthe lecturer. For instance, he wondered why no mention had b;:en made in the paper of the first landing by pre-waraircraft of the pusher type. He also thought the credit for having been the first tu fly off a vessel should be given to theAmerican, Ely. Group Captain Cave-Browne-Cave said he would like toask two questions. One referred to the remark of the lecturer that the length of the aircraft carrier was ample, butit was the narrow width which caused trouble. If that were so, why should it not be possible to reduce the speed of theaircraft carrier (as the extra length of run could be tolerated), thereby reducing the bumps set up by the speed of the vessel ?The second question dealt with the reference to making pro- vision for the pilot to escape in case he had to come down inthe sea. He would like to know in which direction this means of escape should be. Group Capt. Miley took up the defence of the use of wires.The undercarriages of early machines were weak, and when they got better undercarriages many safe landings were made.The supports for the wires were bad. One difficulty was that a pilot did not know whether or not his hooks had caught inthe wires and so he dared not risk taking off again. Mr. Roy Chadwick said it was a good many years since hehad anything to do with deck flying aircraft, and so his know- ledge was possibly somewhat out of date. His recollectionwas that it was not so much the undercarriage which suffered, but rather the tail end of the fuselage which used to gatdamaged. He agreed that the use of hooks and wires give a certain degree of security if the undercarriages were strongenough. Flight-Lieut. Hylton complained that thelecturer had concealed the fact that he (the lecturer) had instigated the early tests andhad carried out the first flying tests himself. On the question which was the best type ofship, he thought the " island " type gave the pilot a good guide as to his height, butthe flush deck showed up to advantage in rough weather. He asked whether it wouldbe possible to apply gyro-stabilisers to aircraft carriers. Rolling of the ship wasthe worst problem the pilot had to face, and if this could be reduced by some formof gyro-stabiliser he thought it might be of advantage. He agreed with the lecturerthat view was important, but he thought control, and especially directional control,was just as important. As regards the landing of float machines, it had beenfound that a float plane would land on the deck quite safely, but it had a tendencyto skid sideways. The floats had to be specially designed, the heels having to behigh in order to permit the machine to get the tail down. In conclusion, he pointed•out that there was available at the Air Ministry a vast amount of infor-mation on deck flying problems and deck flying aircraft, and anyfirm interested should make the fullest possible use of that in-formation. Squadron-Leader Tom Englandasked why it had been decided always to put the island of air-craft carriers on the starboard side. Most pilots when landinglooked over the port side, and hi would have thought that the portside would have been the logical place for the island. On thesubject of undercarriages he sug- gested that possibly the revival ofthe old Bleriot type undercarriage might be worth while. In thisundercarriage a machine could slither sideways, and the fact thatthe wheels had a castor action en- abled them to accommodate them-selves to the lateral travel without tipping the machine over. On thequestion of wires, he thought these were useful for holding the machinedown after it had touched. Mr. Duncanson pointed outthat the tendency was for the load to be carried by aircraft operating from carriers tubecome heavier as the machines improved, and this made the problems more difficult. He pleaded for research into wingsgiving a very high lift, and suggested that although there was much information dealing with older wing sections, a lotstill remained to be done in the way of research into very high lift sections, applying modern knowledge of aerodynamicsand possibly incorporating the use of such aids to high lift as slots, flaps, etc. Major Kennedy asked whether any tests had been made with the Autogiro for deck landing. Wing Commander Howe said that an essential of modernoperation of aircraft carriers and their machines was rapiditv, and this ruled out the use of wires. As regards view, theintroduction in modern machines of adjustable seats helped to enable the pilot to get a better view. Such aids to con-trollability as automatic slots were also valuable. As regards wing folding, the operation had to be carried out hurriedly,and it would be an advantage if the wing locking mechanism could be automatic, so that men did not have to climb abouton the machine. A point that should also be kept in mind was the necessity for quick starting to get the machinesaway, and anything which enabled them to get their engines started quickly would be valuable. Comm. L. C. Sharman, R.N., complained that there wasno reference in the paper to deck landing at night. The first experiment in this had been made by Wing CommanderHowe. On the subject of quick engine starting he pointed out that the water-cooled engine took longer to heat up SAFELY DOWN : A Fairey IIIF at the moment of being " caui by the deck landing crew. Note the palisades along the side cdeck. (FLIGHT Photograph.) ;ht" f the
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