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Aviation History
1937
1937 - 0556.PDF
b FLIGHT. power at 14,000 ft. The combined Townend and exhaust ring may be assumed to play its part in the general reduction of drag, and the efficiency of the machine is indicated by the fact that the top speed is 253 m.p.h., while the speed range, when using the trailing-edge flaps, reaches the very good value of 4^: 1. In spite of the growing popularity of the monoplane there are still many people, including a number of fighter pilots, who believe that, provided the speed of the fighter is sufficiently greater than the speed of the bomber against which it is being used, the biplane has much to recom mend it, its smaller overall dimensions and lower moments of inertia making it more nimble in manoeuvres than the heavier and larger monoplane. While that view per sists there is no cause for regretting that the Air Ministry is still taking delivery of biplane fighters. Structurally, the Gladiator is a quite simple and straightforward aeroplane. The fuselage is built on the well-tried Hawker system, the rear portion having tubular longerons of circular section, with fiats formed at the points where the struts are attached. The forward fuselage por tion is built up of square-section tubes, the joints being of the fiat-plate type. In the wing construction also one finds Hawker influence, the main spars being of "dumb- Most of the structural features of the Gladiator fuselage are shown in the sketch on the right. Circular- section tubes are used in the rear portion and square-section tubes in front. The lower wing roots are integral with the fuselage. The undercarriage struts are canti levers tapering to each end ; their attachment to the lower longeron is shown at a in the smaller sketch below.
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