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Aviation History
1937
1937 - 1089.PDF
APRH. 29, 1937. FLIGHT. 411 the Day Auto Instruction SO far as training is concerned the Autogiro instructors are in a very difficult position. Absolute newcomers must be taught how to fly and to land in a machine which is particularly sensitive to wind direction and which is somewhat complicated in comparison with the normal aeroplane. Yet there are a surprising number of exclusive "A" licencees in this country alone, and I have met at least two who state quite firmly that they would never fly anything else if they could help it. On the other hand, confirmed fixed-wing pilots must be patiently made to forget quite a number of things which they have previously learnt and to do as they are told. Furthermore, the r~ar stick has more leverage than that in the front, so the in structor sometimes has a Samsonian struggle with any obstinate pilot who thinks he knows all about it and who is himself sound in wind and limb. . . . And Autorotation F EARFUL that the Autogiro efforts might have upset my minor fixed-wing efficiencies, I sallied forth dur ing the week-end to do battle with a club aeroplane—and, incidentally, to try a piece of navigational gadgetry in an open cockpit aeroplane. It must be admitted that there is a lot in this open machine business—provided • that the weather is reason ably good. As soon as I had screwed down the Sutton harness as tightly as it would go, so that I felt part and parcel of the machine, the long-dead aerobatic urge came over me. One day I must ask a psycho-analyst why one is straight-and-level minded in any closed machine. After reaching 2,000 feet and gaining a matter of another 500 feet in a series of Hendonesque steep turns (much to my surprise and mental comfort) I went through my little repertoire of aerobatics. Although always claim ing in a loud voice that an aeroplane is meant onlv to go from A to B and not to be flung violently about the sky, I must say that there is nothing to touch this aerobatic business for regaining self-confidence—particularly if a deserted sky and aerodrome allows one to complete the private display by an exaggerated forced-landing approach. Incidentally, I often wonder whether it is realised how much height is lost at the beginning of a spin. At 3,000 feet it all seems to be very precise and simple, but that initial stalled turn, before the stick flicks over, has killed lots of people when it occurs accidentally on a final gliding turn towards an aerodrome. Allowing for lag in the -.lti- meter reading, it seemed to me that my machine lost as much height in that first tumble as it did in one turn of the real spin. A violently stalled turn produced a toss of nearly 300 feet, while this and the two turns only showed a total loss of 600 feet. I await correction. A sensitive altimeter would help. INDICATOR. Topics of More Autogiration . . . S INCE, at the time of writing these comments, all but half an hour of my week's hying had been carried out as a somewhat stupid pupil in an Autogiro, I make no apology for returning to the subject of rotating- winged aircraft and their development. For many rt-sons it is good for one's soul to be put back in the "First Form '' and to be forced to learn and unlearn a great many things. In this case my instructor has been brought up almost exclusively on Autogiros, and it was not much good saying, '' Please, Sir, this is what I do in ordinary aeroplanes." To him the Autogiro.is an "ordinary aero plane." However, after an hour and a half's dual I feel almost ready to do a little fine-weather soloing, and I am more than ever convinced that this often-maligned machine has more than the makings of something really good. The trouble is, of course, that it has been flown by so many fixed-wing experts who have declined to unlearn anything or to admit that they did not know everything about flying; they have just gone about the place crabbing the machine. Most of my time has been spent in learning to move the right levers in the right order, and only now is my mind almost free to cope with the real business. The Autogiro people themselves admit that the C.30 is far from perfect and that it is only a stepping-stone to wards better things. To mention only one or two points: the weight could be greatly reduced and the take-off im proved by a hundred per cent. ; the mechanical effort of running up the rotor and so forth could be simplified : and the forward view made somewhat less restricted during the vertical approach process. All that with the machine as it is at present. The direct-start model, now being developed with a three-blade rotor, will provide a no-run take-off and, since the blades automatically return to a negative angle of incidence immediately after the machine has touched down, many of the landing and ground-handling difficulties will have been done away with. In the present type it is necessary to abide strictly by the rules—turning left out of wind immediately after landing, applying the rotor brake when facing down-wind, and so on—if expensive mishaps are to be prevented, and the majority of the minor accidents have been caused by carelessness in these and similar little matters. The work involved in running-up the rotor has already been experimentally done away with in a pneumatically operated system whereby the pilot merely turns a few con veniently placed knobs on the dashboard. The C.30 is very sensitive to fore and aft trim and the lever for this operation is placed on the right, but there should be little difficulty in developing a scheme whereby the work could be done quite effortlessly—or even automatically.
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