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Aviation History
1946
1946 - 1565.PDF
andAIRCRAFT ENGINEER Editorial D/rector G. GEOFFREY SMITH, M.B.E. Editor - -CM. POULSEN Assistant Editor - MAURICE A. SMITH, D.F.C. (WING COR, R.A.F.V.A.) Art Ed/tor - - JOHN YOXALL FIRST AERONAUTICAL WEEKLY IN THE WORLD .• FOUNDED 1909 Editorial, Advertising and Publishing Offices: DORSET Telegrams : Flightpres, Sedist, London. BIRMINGHAM, 2: KING EDWARD HOUSE, NEW STREET. Telegrams : Autopress, Birmingham. Telephone: Midland 7191 (7 lines). COVENTRY : 8-10, CORPORATION ST. Telegrams : Autocar, Coventry, Telephone : Coventry 5210. HOUSE, STAMFORD STREET, LONDON, S.E.1 Telephone: Waterloo 3333 (SO lines.) MANCHESTER, 3: 260, DEANSGATE. Telegrams: Iliffe, Manchester. Telephone: Blackfriafs 4412. GLASGOW, C.2i 26B, RENFIELD ST. Telegrams: Iliffe, Glasgow. Telephone: Central 4857. No. 1964. Vol. L. SUBSCRIPTION RATES : Home and Abroad : Year, £3 I 0. Registered at the G.P.O. as a Newspaper August 15th, 1946 * months, £1 10 6. Thursdays, One Shilling. Outlook The Record AttemptW HEN, within a few days it is hoped, the R.A.F. High-Speed Flight makes its attempt to raise the world's speed record from the 606 m.p.h., established at Herne Bay last year by Group Capt. Wilson, to the coveted 1,000 km/hr. (621 m.p.h.) it will do so with confidence. That confidence is partly based upon the Flight's own tests and practice on "hack" machines (which a year ago would have been acclaimed as world beaters), but much more so upon the long, painstaking work put into the development of the record machines by the Gloster test team under Mr. Eric Greenwood. While the glory will go to the R.A.F. High-Speed Flight if the attempt is successful—as there is every reason to expect that it will be—the part played by the Gloster pilots should not be forgotten. It is no ex- aggeration to say, and the R.A.F. pilots would be the first to admit the fact, that without the weeding-out of snags done by the Gloster test team, the-attempt could not have been undertaken with the confidence which the latest results have established. It is thus fitting that the man chosen to appear in this week's instalment of our series: "Britain's Test Pilots" should be Eric Greenwood, whose inspiring leadership and courage as a pilot have done so much wards giving Mr. Carter, the designer of the Meteor, e information which has enabled his technical team to "groom" the machines to the point where they can make effective use of the thrust given by the Rolls- Royce jet units. The attempt is in all ways a team effort, and every man in all the teams deserves the highest praise. All has been done that can be done, and everything fore- seen which it was humanly possible to foresee. The rest is in the lap of the gods. And so "Good Luck" to Group Captain Donaldson and his pilots when the great day comes. Cause and "Effect"T HIS might be described as the "flow-conscious age." Aerodynamiscists and, before them, hydrodynamiseists, have pondered the intricacies of fluid and gaseous flow for generations, but the speeds attained, and those in sight, have lent a particular im- portance to the subject. This week we publish an article on the so-called "Coanda Effect" which, by something of an over-sim- plification, might be described as the effect which arises when a high-speed jet through a narrow slot emerges into a divergent passage which has only one wall. The effect is to deflect the stream, increasing its velocity and adding to its mass by entraining additional air. M. Coanda is a man whose experience dates back tc several years before the first World War, and his views thus merit attention. He then exhibited, at a Paris Aero Show, a propulsion system which was scarcely a jet but might rather be called fan propulsion. He sub- sequently became technical director of the Bristol Aero- plane Co. and designed some unusual monoplanes. From results hitherto made public, the Coanda slot appears to have several modern applications, but it would be well to await further developments before be- coming too enthusiastic. Let it not be forgotten that in aviation we have had a goodly number of inventions and ideas which the cold light of subsequent greater knowledge proved to be of small practical value, There was, for instance, tl\2 Flettner rotor about which many became excited. Ships were built with large rotors in place of sails, driven by small engines. As for "effects," we have had them before. There was the so-called " Casaux Effect," and there was the "Magnus Effect," the latter being virtually the basic principle underlying the fonrrr as well as the Flettner rotor. So, while paying all due attention, merited by long experience, to this invention, do not let us become unduly excited about this latest " effect."
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