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Aviation History
1948
1948 - 0076.PDF
66 F LIGH 1" SR/45 / N this fine impression of the SR 45 Max Millar has captured theextraordinary sense of spaciousness afforded by the accommodation planning, and has given scale to the boat as a whole relative, for example, to a chair or a berth. One of the more interesting refinements in design found in this hull is the step shape, for the planform of the break profile is well curved: it is the most advanced of its kind we have yet seen. MARINE COMPARTMENT engineers facing their instrument control panel; this is an impressively comprehensive unit which is offset from the wall so that access is provided to the rear of the panel for instrument and control maintenance. Conventionally, the captain and first "officer sit in the extreme nose of the aircraft, one on each side of a central control pedestal. Although each pilot is faced by a standard blind-flying instrument panel, the facias are re- markable for a reduction in the number of instruments fitted by comparison with the glut which has grown almost to the stature of a tradition. This paucity of instrumenta- tion is paralleled by the few ancilliary controls: master indications and master controls only are given to the pilots, the individual controls being operated by the flight engineers. At the moment we can deal structurally only with the hull of the SR/45, but it is at once apparent that this reflects the well-established tradition of Saunders-Roe con- structional practice. Working from the bottom up, the keel is (appropriately) an anchor-section extrusion with the plating of the planing bottom picking up to the flukes of the " anchor " and the profile members of the diaphragm bulkheads riding across the "stock" of the anchor. The space between the skin plating and the bulkhead profile is occupied by Z-section extruded stringers pitched at an average of approximately seven inches. The bulkhead profiles are formed with beaded I-section extrusions, whilst the diaphragms are stabilized with rolled bowler-hat and extruded angle-section vertical members riveted on both faces. Every third bulkhead- -although there are occasional exceptions-—is made watertight, the limber holes formed by inter-stringer spaces being, to this end, blocked by rubber filler-pieces set in Bostik. At the chine a heavy-gauge, rolled, angle-section butt-strap unites the topside and planing-bottom skins, the sectional angle of the butt-strap varying, of course, from one hull station to the next. High Quality Plating The skin plating of the planing bottom is made with joggled longitudinal joints and butt lateral joints, the latter naturally having internal butt-straps. Throughout the whole of the hull structure skin riveting is " flush " and the general quality is considerably higher than that usually en- countered ; certainly, the skin gauge is low but, never- theless, it is good to see the sort of results which can. be obtained with flush riveting when the plating is thick enough to resist '' quilting." It is no exaggeration to state that, if the SR/45 hull were given even but one very thin coat of paint the riveting would be imperceptible. All mating faces below lower deck level are coated with
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