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Aviation History
1937
1937 - 1488.PDF
564 FLIGHT. JUNE 3, 1937. THE WILBUR WRIGHT LECTURE THE Wilbur Wright Lecture, the most important of the year, was read before the Royal Aeronautical Society at the lecture hall of the Institute of Electrical Engineers last Thurs day, with the president, Mr. Wimperis, in the chair. The lecturer, Professor von Karman, dealt with the subject of '' Turbulence,'' and gave a most interesting, but highly tech nical discussion of the subject. He was not able to read the whole of his paper in the time available, but, with the aid of numerous slides he was able to give a general idea of its scope. The paper itself is an extremely valuable contribution to our knowledge of this subject, but is too highly technical to permit of a useful resume. However, those portions which deal with the effects of turbulence in influencing the lift of aerofoils, and the comparison of the turbulence in wind tunnels with the turbulence 01 a natural wind are of immediate prac tical importance. In this discussion the lecturer emphasised the effect of the scale of the turbulence in influencing con ditions in the boundary layer, pointing out that small-scale turbulence occurred in wind tunnels while large-scale turbu lence was a characteristic of natural winds. The lecturer also said that some of the increased lift given by aeroplane wings a short distance above the ground may be due to the smaller scale turbulence present in this portion of the atmosphere. The paper was followed by a film showing atmospheric tur bulence made manifest by the movement of clouds. For this purpose the film had been accelerated, and it was possible to see clearly the formation of clouds, and the swirling and eddying of the cloud wisps. A portion of the film which was taken on a mountain from a position above the cloud layer showed the clouds flowing along a valley and eddying and billowing over obstacles exactly like a river in flood. The technique of taking cloud films in this way should not be difficult, and it is to be hoped that someone will experiment with the method in this country as it seems to be unequalled in providing a definite picture of atmospheric movements. The lecture was followed by the annual Council dinner, at which the following were the guests : Sir Frank Smith; Sir Henry Tizard, Professor von Karman, Sir ^Alexander Gibb, Professor Bairstow, Professor Southwell, Col. Mackintosh, M. Devereux, Major Williams, Mr. O. Short, Major Scanlon, Cdr. Harrell and Major Baden-Powell. The New Under-Secretary SIR PHILIP SASSOON has been Under-Secretary of State for Air for so many years that it seems hard to realise that he has now left the Air Ministry for the Office of Works. He has had to introduce a great number of Air Estimates into the House of Commons, and his polished and in teresting speeches on those occasions have been on the highest grade of parlia mentary oratory. He has also shown himself very adept at answering ques tions. Flight wishes him all good fortune in his new sphere of activity. The new Under-Secre tary, Brevet Lieut.-Col. Anthony John Muirhead, M.C., is a stranger to us, but in a short time he has made a name for himself in official life, and it is a compliment to him to be giv^n a post in the Minis try which, more than any other, looks to the future and offers opportunities to Muirhead was born in 1890, at at Eton and Magdalen College, Oxford. During the Great War he served with the Oxfordshire Yeomanry and on the Staff, and was awarded the Military Cross. After the war he served for over a year with the Lithuanian Army. In 1929 he entered Parliament as Conserva tive member for the Wells division of Somerset, and two years later was appointed parliamentary private secretary to the Minister for Agriculture. In 1935 he became parliamentary secretary to the Ministry of Labour. To the outside, both these posts sound rather depressing. We hope that he will find the Air Ministry considerably more exhilarating. Lt.-Col. Muirhead. young men of ability. Col. Henley, and was educated R.Ae.C. Official Notices 5 UPPRESSI0N of Landing and Housing Charges.—Holders of the F.A.I. Identity Card are advised that they are exempt from landing and take-off fees and will be given free garage for their aircraft for a period of forty-eight hours when visiting Sweden. The same facilities will be given in Czechoslovakia, but landings must be made at the following aerodromes: Praha, Brno, Bratislava, Uzhorod, Mar-Lazne, Karlovy, Vary. The Royal Aero Club, through the F.A.I., has now com pleted reciprocal arrangements with the following countries: Germany, Austria, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, France, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Japan, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Holland, Poland, Roumania, Sweden, Switzerland, Yugoslavia. F.A.I. Identity Cards are issued free to the members of the Royal Aero Club, to whom application should be made, enclos ing passport-size photograph and particulars of date and place of Lirth. Capital-to-Capital Record.—The Federation Aeronautique Internationale has granted a capital-to-capital record to H. L'. Brook in connection with his flight from Cape Town to London on May 1-5, 1937. The total distance measured on the arc of the great circle is 9,677.078 km., and the time occupied was 96 hours 20 minutes. The record is granted on the speed of the flight at 100.454 km/hr. H. E. PERRIN, Secretary. AT THE BRUSSELS SHOW (Continued from page 558). 490 kg. (1,080 lb.). A cruising speed of 135 km./hr. (83 m.p.h.) is claimed, and the price is in the neighbourhood of £380. A small twin-engined pusher monoplane is on the way from the same factory. Thirdly, Le Chevalier Jean d'Oplinter, previously a designer at the Belgian Fairey factory, has constructed a very pretty little cabin side-by-side-seatex with a Cirrus Minor engine. It has not yet flown, but, as can be seen from the photograph, it certainly " looks right." An ingenious detail feature is a swing-over control which, by means of Bowden cables, simultaneously swings over the com plete rudder bar to the side of the cockpit required. Belgian aircraft exhibits are completed by an unfinished cabin six-seater, the S.E.A.I. with two Genet Majors, a welded-steel-tube fuselage and wooden wings; a small parasol monoplane with Sarolea flat-twin engine, built by the S.A.B.C.A. concern, whose main mission is the building of foreign aircraft under licence, and the Stampe of Vertongen two-seater military trainer, shown in stripped form; this last is of orthodox but sound layout, and the engine is a 350 h.p. Armstrong Siddeley Cheetah. A one-machine national exhibit, Holland is represented by a Koolhoven F.K.51. "Aviquipo" (Aviation Equipment and Export, Inc., of New York), with the enthusiastic co-operation of Surrey Fly ing Services, brought over two American types at the last moment—the latter's Porterfield (70 h.p. Le Blond) and a Beechcraft C. 17R (420 h.p. Wright with Lear radio compass). The Beechcraft, for which a British Board of Trade export licence was demanded, could not be ferried until the day after the show opened. Mr. Frank Ten Bos, of Aviquipo, left Croydon at 3 p.m. and reached Brussels 75 min. later. The Beech was dismantled, transported, and reassembled in the show by 4 a.m. on Friday—a process which entailed moving all the aircraft between the entrance and the stand by electric torchlight! The Belgian Air Force and Air Defence Organisation have a fine exhibit, the former including a stripped and indexed Fairey Fox, and the latter an array of guns, searchlights and ranging apparatus, among which is a Vickers predictor. j MODELS i Owing to the coincidence of several important events, and j j the consequent pressure on our space the monthly Models ; f feature is unavoidably held over until next week.
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