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Aviation History
1947
1947 - 1281.PDF
Editorial Director G GEOFfREY SMITH, M.B.E. and AIRCRAFT ENGINEER Editor Assistant Editor Art Editor - C. M POULSEN MAURICE A. SMITH, D.F.C. (VV/NG CDR., R.A.F.V.R.) JOHN YOXALL FIRST AERONAUTICAL WEEKLY IN THE W^RLD >• FOUNDED WOQ Editorial, Advertising and Publishing Offices: DORSET HOUSE, STAMFORD STREET, LONDON, S.E.I Telegrams : Flightpres, Sedist, London. BIRMINGHAM, 2: Telephone • Waterloo 3333 (50 lines.) COVENTRY: BIRMINGHAM MANCHESTER. 3 : GLASGOW, C.2: 8-10, CORPORATION ST. N'^Gw E D V%Aj DR e^'P' 260' DEANSGATE 26B. RENFIELD ST. Telegrams : Autotar, Coventry. Telegrams : Autopress, Birmingham! Telegrams: Iliffe, Manchester. Telegrams : Iliffe, Glasgow. Telephone : Coventry S2I0. Telephone: Midland 7191 (7 lines). Telephone : Blackfriars 4412. Telephone : Central 4857 SUBSCRIPTION RATES : Home and Abroad ; Year, £3 I 0. Registered at the C.P.O. as a Newspaper 6 months, £1 10 6. No. 2015. Vol. LI I. August 7th, 1947 "We Outlook Thursdays, One Shilling. Rumour-MongeringD URING the war, when all manner of things were treated as secret—often for no very obvious reason—the number of rumours which gained currency every time a new aircraft or engine went into service was legion. The stories usually started with a somewhat grudging praise of the new type, and this was in most cases followed by a " but." The machine swung badly on take-off, or it had unpleasant characteristics near the stall, or the undercarriage stuck in the half- retracted position, and so on and so forth. The new engine was fine, it gave a lot of urge—but it was very rough, or it cut out, or did something else. Usually there was, of course, some basis for the rumours, such as, for instance, the case of one type which became famous, but which did have a certain amount of teething troubles with its undercarriage. In a short while these were cured (actually before the air- craft became operational), and when a member of the technical staff was later asked about this undercarriage, his reply was "It is fine now ; it works nearly every time." But the inevitable result of the secrecy regula- jjpns was that, in being passed from mouth to mouth, ts became, like the death of Mark Twain, greatly exaggerated. In peacetime there is far less excuse for rumour-mon- gering, but the evil is by no means dead, even if its causes and origin are different. Recent aviation history has not been without examples. The remedy is very largely in the hands of manufacturers themselves. It has been the custom, almost since flying began, to pre- tend that after the first test flight the pilot reported everything perfect. Yet the percentage of cases in which that was true must be very small indeed. There is nearly always something which requires to be improved. Air- craft design is still a long way from being an exact science, and in the long run there is nothing to be gained by trying to hush things up. The only result is that minor faults and troubles are magnified into major ones, and once a new type has been besmirched by rumour it takes a very long time to get rid of the general notion that "there must be something seriously wrong with it; no smoke without a fire, you know." There can be very few firms in all countries which have not suffered from the effects of such talk. Curing the Evil \ LTHOUGH most of the designing firms at home /"A have taken the technical Press into their confidence by stating frankly what their troubles have been, it has remained for the de Havilland Aircraft Co., Ltd., to take a step which, in our view, might well be followed by other firms. We have just received a copy of a bulletin, issued to all de Havilland representatives, which sets forth simply and clearly in opposite columns the faults encountered and the remedies adopted or sug- gested in the case of the Dove and its Gipsy Queen 70 engines. There is, of course, nothing unusual in that ; what is unusual is that a covering letter from the com- pany informs us that we are at liberty to make any de- sired use of the information. In other words, this is the first time a firm has given the technical Press carte? blanche to publish its trouble sheet. Unfortunately, the pressure on our space is so great that we cannot publish the bulletin this week, but a careful perusal of it shows that, in the main, the faults have been of a fairly trivial •nature, and in many cases the remedy appears to have been well within the normal range of maintenance. To obtain a proper background to the troubles and their remedies it is necessary to recall that deliveries of the Dove, because of urgent demands from operators all over the world, began only ten months after the first flight, and that consequently the type had less develop- ment work behind it than it would have had in more normal circumstances. To make up for this fact, de Havilland engineers were sent out with every Dove de-
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