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Aviation History
1931
1931 - 0980.PDF
PLIGHT, SEPTEMBER 11, 1931 SWIFT FLYING ONE of the most interesting machines now availablefor the private owner, is the Comper Swift withthe Pobjoy R engine. Many people have lookedupon this little machine as a plaything since it appeared in public, and they do not realise that serious flying maybe undertaken with it. Two recent flights have thoroughly disproved this attitude. Lt. C. Byas, K.N., who has thehonour to be one of the Fleet Air Arm pilots, recently purchased a standard Swift (Pobjoy K) G-ABNH. Hisintention was to visit his parents who live near Johannes- burg, and whom he had not seen for nine years. Hetherefore proceeded to fly out in a comparatively leisurely fashion, and was not out to create a record on the tripin any way. Actually, however, due to the efficiency of the little Swift, he came very near to establishing a record,as his actual flying time from Heston to Johannesburg was only 73 hr., which as the distance was 7,320 miles giveshim an average speed of over 100 m.p.h. It is trips such as these which show what may be done on a standardaircraft like the Swift, and how economical such a trip may be. For instance, his petrol consumption only workedout at 4| gallons per hour. The route he took from Heston lay through Cologne,Nurenberg, and Vienna, which he reached on the first day, then on via Beograd, Sofia, Constantinople for thesecond day's journey, to Ramelah via Konia and Aleppo for the third day ; thence his route lay from Cairo, Assiut, Lt. C. Byas, R.N., seated in his " Swift." The comfortableposition which the cockpitallows the pilot should be noted. Asswan, Wadi-Halfa, Atbara, Khartum, Malakal, Juba,Entebbe, Kisumu, Moshi, Dodoma, Mbeya, Mpiki, Broken Hill, Livingstone, Bulawayo, Pietersburg, which was hislanding place, and was reached on the tenth day. Throughout the trip neither the aircraft or engine wereattended in any particular way other than the cursory look over which every good pilot gives his machine onsuch a flight. The only extra fitting which he had on the machine was a ten gallon tank in the fuselage, thus givinghim some 600 miles range. With this extra loading, the take-off was only increased from 5 sec. to 5£ sec. Thisis really an exceptionally good advertisement for the Pobjoy R engine, for up to date it has received very littlepublicity, which is a pity, as it is one of the most interest- ing and original of our post-war engines. Its extremelylow weight together with high h.p. have made many people think that it cannot possibly stand up to hard work, moreespecially as Mr. Pobjoy pinned his faith to high revolu- tions and relied upon a simple form of gearing to keepthe airscrew speed down to an efficient ratio. The new R type, however, has gone through all tests in an exem-plary manner. It passed its type test at the first attempt without any trouble whatever, and since then has alsosucceeded in maintaining this record by getting round both the King's Cup race, the Grosvenor Cup race,Lt. Byas's flight to Johannesburg, and Fit. Lt. Mick Comper's flight to Italy and back. Fit. Lt. Comperis, of course, the designer of the - aircraft, and this flight of his to Italy, which covered a route fromEngland through France to that country and back, again stillfurther enhances the already favourable opinion which has beengrowing up of both the Swift and Pobjoy engine. The total flyingtime for his actual trip oi 2,600 miles was 26 hr., which gives aneasy cruising speed of 100 m.p.h., particularly creditable, when it isrealised that a large part of the journey was made against some-what severe head winds. The petrol bill on this occasion wasonly some £10, which shows what an economical little aircraftthe Swift really is. THE ENGINE SHOP: AirService Training, Ltd., overhaul their own engines at Hamble, andin this shop all pupils are given a thoroughly practical training ofsuch work upon engines which are in actual use. They therefore havethe benefit of doing the job properly and so gaining more experiencethan they would do if the engines were dummies. Armstrong Siddeleyengines are standardised on the school, and pupils thereby get avery comprehensive knowledge of all aizes of these well-known air-cooled radial engines. (FLIGHT Photo.) 918
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