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Aviation History
1948
1948 - 1469.PDF
SEPTEMBER 9,1948 Yicker«*-Armstrongsliking: IK A WELL-ESTABLISHED, medium -sized, twin-engined civil transport aircraft, the Viking IB is available in various versions. The passenger cabin is divided into two saloons by a partition at the spar, the front saloon carrying nine passengers and the rear saloon either fifteen or eighteen. Under the floor are five large freight holds, with external doors. In common with other British civil aircraft, the Viking has a remarkably good single-engine performance; this, together with the "pull-in" windows and complete safety equipment, is one of the reasons for its popularity. Yickers-SuperiimrineSea Otter ' I \HE Sea Otter biplane amphibian was A developed from the Walrus and has increased range, a higher performance and improved accommodation, without im- pairment of seaworthiness and other qualities. With military equipment re- moved and weight suitably distributed, the machine has been effectively adapted for passenger or freight carrying. A typical layout provides for four or five seats in the sound-proofed cabin, controlled cabin heating and ventilation, and adequate luggage stowage. Side-by-side dual con- trols are available should the machine be required for training. For RESEARCH and DEVELOPMENT HpHE services rendered by the Avro A Lancaster, Lancastrian and Lincoln are not confined to the military—or, in the case of the Lancastrian, the transport —field. Considerable numbers of these excellent machines have been ingeniously adapted for use as flying test beds, as flying laboratories for studying the per- formance and behaviour of new power plants, and for accumulating flying experi- ence with these units under various con- ditions of flight. It has, in fact, become quite the fashion automatically to allocate one or more four-engined Avros for the testing of each new type of British turbo- jet or turboprop. Certain of these—the Nene- and Ghost-Lancastrians and the Theseus-Lincoln for example—may al- ready be familiar to our overseas visitors. In most instances the power plants to be tested are installed outboard, in place of two Merlin piston engines, but the smaller turboprops are mounted in the nose of the fuselage, additional to four Merlins. The Metrovick-Lancaster, differs in having a turbojet in the tail. It has been found that whereas such combinations as the foregoing provide an excellent means of proving power plants, airframes suitable for higher performance and having passenger cabins (modern air- liners, in fact) are necessary, not only for testing the turbines at higher speeds than are allowed by the bomber airframes, but for studying physiological and other prob- lems likely to arise in developing the pure- jet 500-m.p.h. airliners of the future. Thus we have the Nene-Viking and the pressurized Tudor VIII. For collecting data at higher speeds the Gloster Meteor is available, the outboard wing installation of the jet units allowing relatively easy conversion for non-standard turbojets. The Metrovick-Meteor, due to appear at Farnborough, is the best example of such an adaptation. At the extreme end of the speed scale is the D.H. 108—primarily a vehicle for research in high-speed aerodynamics, but at the same time a means of amassing data on the functioning of the Goblin turbojet at speeds of the order of 650 m.p.h. Such speeds are hardly approached by the Vampire in which the Goblin is fitted as standard. The Vampire has, however, brought new glory upon itself in the research field in being selected (in modified form, with long-span wings) for testing the more powerful Ghost at abnormal heights. It was during the course of development flights with the Ghost- Vampire that Mr. John Cunningham, on March 23, 1948, established the world's- record height of 59,492 ft. Flying: Wing-w In addition to the types mentioned above a number of machines are flying, or are under development, for investi- gations in various specialized fields of research. The two A.W-52s, for example (see below), are key instruments of Britain's policy of flying-wing develop- ment and are certainly among the most ambitious aircraft yet built for pure research. In a different class is the Youngman-Baynes machine developed for tests with the Youngman high-lift Vickers- ArmstrongsViscount TNTENDED as the successor to the A Viking, the Viscount is the first British airliner to fly with turboprop power plants (Rolls-Royce Darts). The standard version is a 32-seater, the cabin being divided into two saloons, the for- ward seating 12 and the aft 20 passengers. Between the saloons is the pantry. An alternative version is available as a 36-seater. The entire fuselage is pressur- ized (with the exception of the tail end and the nose-wheel housing) to a differen- tial of 6 y2 lb/sq in, this pressure main- taining ground level conditions up to 15,000 ft. Very complete radio and navi- gational aids are specified, and a crew of four is proposed. Mamba-Lancaster
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