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Aviation History
1948
1948 - 0663.PDF
MAY I3TH, 1948 FLIGHT BANANA AERODYNAMICS : Box-car fuselage lines and beer-barrel wing engines, but cleaner than the Martin 2-0-2. Additional thrust from aug- mentor-type engine cowl, but original thermal anti-icing sys- tem supplied by hot-air from exhaust gas now abandoned in favour of more conventional installation employing a hot-air muff encircling the augmentor tube. Development of the 240 has put Convair some 32 million dollars m the red for 1947. (One would think that lower half of vertical control surface completely worthless, due to rear fuselage shape— ?) against a couple of British hens still sitting on the nest in the shape of the Bristol Brabazon and the more lengendary de Havilland Comet. Proceeding down the score-tally, and ticking off the Constellation and the DC-6 as undisputed king and queen of the airways for some time to come, we can next put a big question mark against the Republic Rainbow, a highly distinguished aspirant still in the military prototype stage, as the XF-12 photo-recon. aircraft. (The latter AMERICAN Aircraft Douglas : DC-6 Lockheed : Constellation Republic : Rainbow Boeing : Stratocruis«p ;.. Lockh2ed : Constitution Canvsir : XC-99 Seat- ing capa- city 52-58 46-50 40 60-80 168 204 HEAVYWEIGHTS Gross weight(Ib) 93,200 102,000 116,500 135,000 184,000 265,000 Wing area(sq ft) 1,453 1,650 1,640 1,720 3,610 4,772 Take- off power (b.h.p.) 9,600 10,000 14,000 14,000 14,000 21,000 Wingloadg (Ib/fl2) 63.7 61.8 71.1 78.5 51.0 55.5 Power toadg (lb/h.p.) 9.7 10.2 8.3 9.6 13.1 12.6 Note.—Take-off power of last four aircraft assumes 3.500 h.p./engine with water injection. Seating capacity of Constitution and XC-99 is based on use as Service, not Civil, transports. specification, by the way, has all the airmarks of a polar telescope.) The projected civil version is a super-high- altitude (40,000ft) transatlantic transport carrying only 40 passengers and, despite some classic design features, does not seem to have attracted any definite nibbles by domestic airline operators—which is not surprising with most of them operating in the red and, therefore, not likely to be keen on the low revenue-earning capacity. Purely from the engineering viewpoint, however, it will be a pity if this rainbow vision does not materialize in the market place because the design conception is first-class; aerodynami- cally, at any rate, it is easily the best of the bunch. The next bird on the list, the Boeing Stratocruiser (which looks more like a porpoise than a bird), is of more than ' engineering interest on the Home Front, in view of the trial six on order for B.O.A.C. Apparently these are promised by the end of the current year, but Pan American and certain other U.S. air carriers have prior claims ori the order book—and this aircraft is not yet over its C.A.&^'y hurdles; inched, it is rumoured that numerous costly changes are being incorporated. On top of all this, the Boeing Seattle plant, em-' ploying nearly 15,000 men, has just downed tools and is now on strike AESTHETIC AERODYNAMICS : The ocme of elegance. A feeouteous blend of faired feminine curves and slim of manly aspect. Six wheels, three small fins. The merest suggestion of zoot suit in a Saville Row creation—the Airspeed Ambas- sador. for the first time in its 32-year history. The betting, therefore, looks as if B.O.A.C. will be lucky to have them in fare-paying service by the following summer; meanwhile the Constellations and DC-6s arrive and depart with mono- tonous regularity. The more one looks at this 8-million hard-dollar deal, the more one is puzzled. It seems to us that it would have been a sounder revenue-earning and maintenance proposition to have bought additional certified Connies, instead of inflicting six more strange cuckoos upon an already overtaxed maintenance nest. Here was a chance to cut in on this summer's traffic by getting some 8 to 10 well-tried birds in the air, in place of the half-dozen not yet in the hand—indeed, still in the C.A.A. bushes. There is no doubt whatever that the Stratocruiser will be a good, sound, engineering job by the time it does become certi- ficated, and for the very simple reason that Boeings have had a pretty long experience in the ^business of building big aircraft, including a full decade of pressurization tech- nique. The Boeing dictum that "it's what you don't see that counts" can be accepted without quibbling. Never- theless, in the modern aerodynamic sense it is something of a mixed baggage, for it clearly suffers from what you do see; e.g., the fuselage and engine-cowl lines are strikingly ugly. ••"•* -: , : - Parting1 of the Roads On the other hand, the combined hydraulic power-boost and spring tab mechanism for rudder control, especially under asymmetric thrust conditions, is an ingenious bit of engineering worth studying by British designers. The ex- ternal aerodynamics of the Stratocruiser owe their concep- tion to the XC-97 military cargo-transport (also known as the Stratofreighter) and it is no more logical to expect a freighter to be a top-notch civil transport than it would be in the analogous cases of rail and sea transport. Eventually, and inevitably, the two quite different functional require- ments diverge along different lines. At this point in our table, the engi "Power Loading" column, begins of the large piston-engine. The weight of 135,000 1b, is proba" " looking at th the df3E
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