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Aviation History
1946
1946 - 1943.PDF
SEPTEMBER 26TH, IO.46 26 SW FLIGHT 347 Typical of the later Hurricanes in the long series—thecannon-armed IIC. Other variants of the II carried tank- busting cannons, twelve machine guns, and/or rockets, withoverload tankage to taste. down and said: "Four inches on the port aileron," or "Seven inches on the starboard aileron," as the case may be, and we learnt to be right first time. The earlier Hurricanes had no means of manual rudder- trim adjustment, and during test flights it was necessary to organize a nice compromise in directional trim. Since in the dive it was hardly possible to move the rudder to any appreciable extent, a badly out-of-trim Hurricane would tend to travel crabwise, so the rudder was trimmed to give straight flying at the highest speeds and almost regardless of take-off conditions. In fact, during take-off it was perfectly easy to hold any resultant torque-reaction swing. Retraction Troubles At one stage, at least in some production Series ol the type, minor trouble was experienced with undercarriage retraction. The legs were directed into the finally correct " up " position by means of fibre guides. There was neces- sarily a certain amount of fore-and-aft play at the under- carriage hinge points, and the legs would not always pass the guides and so permit the stirrup to be locked home. The whole thing seemed to be very much a matter of hydraulic urge, and if the filter in the system was re moved, the undercarriage legs snapped up sufficiently rapidly to overcome all resistance. But we had to adjust matters so that they would snap up with the decelerating effect, of the filter. On one occasion, i remember, new slotted plates had been fitted to cover the " up "-lock catches and the aircraft was accidentally flown without a retraction test. It hapr pened that the slots in these plates did not quite register with the undercarriage stirrups, and when the legs were retracted one went fully home aftei breaking through the plate, while the other one remained comfortably unlocked Consequently, whe : "down " was duly selected, only one leg would move and the other just remained up, since its stirrup had jammed in the cracked plate. After prepar- ing for a belly-landing, one final attempt was made to release the leg by means of the hand pump. In order to obtain the maximum pump purchase, I undid my Sutton harness, opened the hood and practically stood up in the cockpit. By virtue of the immense latent power of hydraulics, the leg released itself. Amongst the more pleasant and entertaining trips made in Hurricanes were those involved in cannon and fuel con- sumption testing—both of which were often done at the same time. Apparently, an early attempt to deliver long- range Hurricanes from the deck of a carrier was not too successful; for various reasons the aircraft were flown off rather before the originally estimated time, but with a theoretically ample margin, and a number of Hurricanes failed to reach land. Thereafter, many Middle East Hurri- canes were given consumption tests at recommended figures which were, at one time, 2,000 r.p.m., and zero boost at 2,000ft. The aircraft were flown for an hour by stop- watch on the main tanks only—after the take-off, climb and any other necessary testing had been completed on the fuel in the fuselage tank. The mains were then topped up and the amount needed was measured. Which sounds a fairly primitive method, but it worked well. Constant-level Mountaineering As far as I was concerned, these consumption tests were made for the most part in the North Wales area, and we soon discovered ways and means of flying safely through Snowdonia without ueing forced to exceed the stipulated altitude. Some reasonable navigational care was neces- sary, since, obviously, if the time of the trip exceeded by a very great margin the hour's flying, one ran out of fuel in the top tank, and it was necessary then to return to the mains—thus ruining the test. But we found that we could fly comfortably from the Chester area to Braich- y-pwll and back. Although the use of jettison tanks involved quite a con- siderable increase in take-off weight, and the addition of a fair amount of drag, these tanks made little or no differ- ence either to the take-off run or to the normal flying characteristics. Occasionally one of them would fall off, through maladjustment of the release gear, during the final pre-take-off bounce, or during a heavy landing, but even this was not particularly disturbing—except to the fire- tender crews who raced towards the wrecked tank and covered it with foam. The early wing tanks fed their fuel by means of im- mersed electric pumps. Since electricity can sometimes be a doubtful quantity in any machine as vibration-worthy as an aircraft, the supply occasionally failed. There was then, of course, no means of obtaining the life-saving fuel, which sat uselessly in its tank under the wing and almost within reach. Later systems were organized in which the pressure side of the vacuum pump was used to transler the fuel. During the more critical stages of the preparations foi the North African campaign, the priority labels on our long-range Hurricanes were such that we were very often flying these consumption tests until near night landings had to be made on a very rough-and-ready flare path. It always seemed a pity to spoil a test when another five minutes would enable one to complete it ; yet, even though it might appear to be moderately light at 2,000ft, it was disturbing to realize that the ground would be in almost total darkness. Once again, it is interesting to remember how an air- craft, which at one time we considered to be most "ad- vanced" and even difficult, could eventually be treated with the utmost abandon In the end we were using Hurricanes for weather tests and for any other odd jobs—• including the collection and delivery of urgent stores items which were packed in the gun bays One found, too, that with regular day-to-day flying it was possible to put them down in small spaces with the accuracy and ease of Tiger Moths and other biplane types. Sic transit gloria mundi.
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