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Aviation History
1951
1951 - 1617.PDF
22O FLIGHT FLIGHT-TESTING at FARNBOROUGH The Day-to-day Work of an Important Section of the R.A.E. APART from subsequent references in lectures when resultshave been analysed, flight-research work at the Royal Aircraft Establishment, Farnborough, naturally receives little publicity.This brief review of the day-to-day work of what is known as the Aero Flight gives some measure of the responsible andvaluable duties of the pilots and scientists concerned. We reprint it, with acknowledgment and in slightly abbreviatedform, from the July " R.A.E. News." The author is Mr. Handel Davies, M.Sc, F.R.Ae.S., I.Ae.S., who is in charge of the work.Readers may recall his R.Ae.S. lecture, " Some Aspects of Flight Research," (see " Flight," February 23rd and March 2nd.) IT is now almost half a century since aircraft first began tobe tested in flight on Farnborough Common. In thoseearly pioneering days flight testing consisted largely of attempts to determine whether the aircraft would leave the ground. We have advanced <a long way since then, but in aeronautics, perhaps more than in any other branch of engineering, the more knowledge we gain the more remains to be learnt; and, in spite of all the developments which have taken place in wind tunnels and other research techniques, there are still many questions which can be answered only by making measurements and observations in flight. This has become even more evident during the last few years whilst we have been probing into the unknown and hazardous regions near the speed of sound, since flight at these speeds has brought many new problems which can only be fully investigated in flight, and the effort to penetrate the so-called "sonic barrier" has led to many unorthodox trends in design. The investigation of such problems in flight and the testing of advanced aircraft at the R.A.E. is mainly the responsibility of the Flight Section of the Aero Department. Perhaps the best example which can be taken to illustrate the nature of this work is provided by the tests which are frequently made to investigate and improve the stability and control characteristics of an aircraft, i.e., the way in which the aircraft handles and behaves under all conditions of flight. For this purpose measurements are made of elevator, aileron, rudder and corresponding trimmer angles, and of the force which the pilot exerts on the control column, under different conditions of flight and during various manoeuvres. The speed, altitude, and the amount of g to which the aircraft is subjected are measured at the same time, as well as, perhaps, rates of roll and yaw, and any other quantities which it may be necessary to determine in the particular test concerned. These measurements are usually made by means of an auto- matic observer, i.e., by photographing a panel of instruments mounted somewhere inside the aircraft, or by recording the measurements directly as a continuous trace in a multi- channel electronic recorder. The correlation of these meas- urements, with the pilot's impressions of the behaviour of the aircraft, forms, of course, an important part of the work. In most cases it is necessary to extend such measurements to the highest speeds which can be attained in steep dives and speeds in the neighbourhood of the speed of sound are often reached in this way. Under these conditions shock waves form on the wings, fuselage and tailplane of the air- craft, often resulting in highly dangerous behaviour, such as a tendency rapidly to increase the angle of the dive and for the controls to become completely ineffective. One of the main objectives of these tests is to try to understand the precise reasons for these effects so that they can be eliminated or at least reduced on future designs. The shock waves them- selves are sometimes "photographed" in flight as part of the effort to understand their nature and characteristics. Similar tests are also made to measure the drag of aircraft at high speeds and to investigate the very rapid increase on drag which occurs on all aircraft as the speed of sound is approached. At the other end of the speed range tests are made to investigate the spinning and stalling characteristics of air- craft. Measurements may also be made of take-off and landing runs, and the effect of different types of landing flaps and other devices investigated. Going even further down the speed range, a considerable amount of flight testing is done on helicopters. The Westland- Sikorsky S-51, the Bristol 171 and the Bell 47 are among the helicopters which have been tested during the last few years. Some standard aircraft such as Meteors and Vampires, and even Lancasters, modified in some way to investigate a par- ticular development, are still used in the course of the work of Aero Flight, but there has been an increasing tendency to concentrate on special experimental aircraft built specifically for research purposes. 'The Hawker 1052, the Supermarinfc Swift, the Boulton Paul Delta, and the all-wing Armstrong • Whitworth 52 are typical examples of such aircraft, and they have all undergone test in Aero Flight. Sometimes standard aircraft are used in order to provide a means of doing more or less fundamental research. For example, a Vampire is at present being used to measure the forces on small models mounted in the region of transonic and supersonic flow on the wing surface, thus providing an alternative to a transonic wind tunnel. Vampires have also been used to develop methods of photographing shock waves in flight, and to investigate the characteristics of .the boundary layer on the wing at high speeds. [Mr. Handel Davies concludes with a tribute to the skill of thepilots, mentioning the award of the Air Force Cross to the Flight Commander, S/L. Smyth, who made the first flight in the BoultonPaul Delta; he also names Lt. Elliott, R.N., the only other pilot to have flown this particular aircraft, who has carried out muchof the R.A.E.'s high-speed testing during recent years. He praises, too, the aircraft-maintenance staffs, and particularly th8>personnel of "C" Shed under Mr. Froud.—Ed.] INTERPLANETARY CONGRESS ARRANGEMENTS for the Second International Congress on**• Astronautics are now complete and the main proceedings will be held in Caxton Hall, Caxton Street, London, S.W.I, fromSeptember 3rd to 8th. Working sessions will form the first part of the Congress and will be open to delegates only. The technicalsession, which forms the second part, will be open to the public and the following papers will be presented: Thursday, September 6th (10 a.m. to 1 p.m.).—Importance ofSatellite Vehicles in Interplanetary Flight, by Dr. W. von Braun; Applications of Satellite Vehicles, by Birch Andersen; lecture, title notspecified, by Ing. G. von Pirquet. From 2.30 p.m. to 5.30 p.m.: Ascent of Satellite Vehicles, by D. F. Lawden, M.A.; Descent from SatelliteOrbits using Aerodynamic Braking, by T. R. F. Nonweiler, B.Sc; Ascent of an Earth-Satellite Vehicle, by.Ing. Janzon; Start, Return, andLanding of an Optimum Satellite Step Rocket,* by Dipl. Ing. H. Kuhmc.Friday, September .7th (10 a.m. to 1 p.m.).—Optimum Satellite Freight Rocket,* by Ing. H. Hoeppner; Meteor Hazards to SpaceStations, by M. W. Ovenden, B.Sc; Design Problems of Space Stations, by H. H. Koelle; Optimum Orbit of a Space Station for Radar Tracking,*by Dr. R. Mertcn; Landing of Space Craft, by E. V. Sawyer. From 2.30 p.m. to 5.30 p.m.: How the Space Station may be Constructed, by Dipl. Ing. R. Nebel; Orbital Rendezvous Problems, by R. A. Smith;Minimum Satellite Vehicles, by K. W. Gatland; Construction—Propo- sition Space Station,* by Ing. A. Pullenberg.Saturday, September 8th (3 p.m. to 6 p.m.).—Technical Sym- posium. * These papers will be read in German. R.Ae.S. ASSOCIATE FELLOWSHIP EXAMINATION THE Royal Aeronautical Society announces the followingnames of candidates successful in the associate-fellowship examination held last May:— Part I.—W. J. Avis, D. S. Bliss, R. Bocock, I. F. Burns, H. A,Buchholdt, F. J. Butters, R. P. Francis. L. J. Geering, J. F. G. Hart. I. Harwood, R. H. Hayward, A. J. Heath, R. Lewis, C. Mullen, C. L-Munro, J. M. O'Connell, N. H. Simmonds, W. A. Page, F/O. D. ws Scott, M. D. Bernard-Smith, P. C. G. Stalkartt, M. K. Thein, D. RossTurner, E. C. Turner, J. D. Watkins, D. Wood; P. Krishna-Tver (examination taken in India). Part II J. A. H. Bailie, G. H. A. Fenton, J. D. Mann, K F- Nicholls, R. C. L. Sample, M. J. Taylor, D. W. Wall, E. G. Wilkinson.
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