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Aviation History
1952
1952 - 0853.PDF
FLIGHT, 4 April 1952 373 SUPER PRIORITY Expediting the Vital Tasks: Aircraft Head the List THE Government's plans for accelerating the rearma ment programme, the subject of a preliminary statement in last week's issue of Flight, were announced in London on March 26th by Mr. F. C. Musgrave, C.B., Deputy Secretary, Ministry of Supply. Mr. Musgrave is adminis tratively responsible within the Ministry for the development and production of aircraft. Known officially as the Super Priorities Scheme, the plan is intended to enable contractors engaged on "a small range of vital tasks" to fulfil their contracts without delay. Super priority, said Mr. Musgrave, will be given to the following: the latest types of aircraft, i.e. the Hawker Hunter, Vickers-Supermarine Swift, one all-weather fighter [either the Gloster G.A.5 or de Havilland no, according to the decision of the R.A.F.], English Electric Canberra, Vickers Valiant and Fairey Gannet; ammunition for aircraft; equipment for the radar chain; Centurion tanks; guided weapons; and certain items of the anti-mine programme. The items named represent only i\ per cent of the output of the engineering, metal-using industries. Priority in their manufacture will be effective over all other work, whether for exports, defence or home production, but it must interfere as little as possible with exports. If the scheme is not abused (spot checks will be made by the Ministry to ensure it is not), the effect on export trade is not expected to be serious. • Main contractors will be notified by the Minister of Supply, Mr. Duncan Sandys, of the contracts to which the priority applies. When it is necessary to ensure prompt delivery of components or materials, they should quote to sub-contractors the contract number, preceded by the full words "Super Priority," sending at the same time a copy of the Minister's letter. Sub-contractors will follow the same procedure when it is necessary. The trade associations principally concerned in the scheme are being informed of its significance, with the object of securing shop-floor priority of approved items. The Ministry adds a warning that abuse of the scheme might cause industrial dislocation; it must not be used to procure quicker or larger deliveries than are really necessary. "Super Priority" contracts may be quoted (to employment exchanges) to recruit more labour and, if necessary, and after reference to the Ministry, to expedite completion or delivery of buildings and plant. Contractors will keep lists of firms which they authorize to use the symbol, enabling the Ministry to check the working of the system (which is in tended to be voluntary, although legal sanctions exist). At a meeting with leaders of the aircraft industry on the previous day (March 26th), Mr. Sandys asked them to extend sub-contracting as far as possible. In this respect, it was- stated that many small firms are anxious to acquire super- priority defence contracts, but the majority lack the machine- shop facilities essential to modern aircraft production. The machine-tool problem is not, of course, confined to- small manufacturers. Some 23 per cent of the machine-tools ordered for the current defence programme (from the U.S.A., the Continent and in Britain) have been delivered, and deliveries are, on the whole, expected to keep pace with expanding production. Certain important machine-tools, however, are being operated on a 150-hour-week basis, at the Government's request; others may not be delivered for some months, and manufacturers are being urged to use all their ingenuity in finding alternative machining methods pending arrival of the vital equipment. A problem of parallel urgency is the recruitment of 75,000 extra workers for the aircraft industry; skilled workers are required most urgently, for in many cases semi- or un-skilled labour is already available for work which cannot begin until skilled operatives are recruited. The Government is unwilling to forecast in terms of months or years the hoped-for effect on production of the priority scheme. It is admitted that only one type [the Canberra] of the six named in the priority list is actually in production. To improve this situation is clearly an aim which deserves the support of the entire industry. Concurrently with the Ministry of Supply announcement, the S.B.A.C. issued the following statement:— "The Society warmly welcomes the decision the Govern ment has now made to end the uncertainties which have so> far impeded the achievements of the aircraft defence pro gramme. Super priority . . . will run right down the produc tion lines from the main contractors through equipment suppliers and sub-contractors to the material producers . . . and will equally apply to those Government agencies whose functions are an essential link in the specified jobs. The air craft industry now joins in fullest co-operation with its official and industrial partners whose combined efforts are needed to make the scheme work. . . . "There are other types of aircraft vital for the defence programme itself which the Government has not included in the super priority list, and there are exports of Service and merchant aircraft which add greatly to our security and our solvency as a nation. The aircraft industry will use every means to draw in extra men, materials and sub-contractors for this work, as they are freed from less essential activities. . . . The Government attaches the highest importance to exports of aircraft of all types, in which the British aircraft industry has an opportunity that must not be missed." COLD AND DRY WITH high-altitude flight becoming literally an everyday occurrence, intensive efforts are being made to develop equipment which will operate efficiently in the stratosphere. The stratosphere may be defined as the part of the atmosphere in which temperature does not vary with height, remaining fairly steady at between —40 and —60 deg C at any given position; paradoxically, the lowest temperature recorded (—9: deg C) was over the equator. Such values can result in a reduction in the electrical conductivity of metals, upsetting the design-conditions for numerous electrical circuits. Strength considerations are not usually affected, since cold metals have good tensile strengths. On the other hand, the temperature coefficient of expansion of a material may be sufficient to set up undue stress, particularly if dissimilar metals are rigidly joined together; a fuselage with a nominal length of 80ft can, on a tropical airfield, reach 80ft 2in, while a shrinkage to less than 79ft 9"i can occur at high altitude. On the fastest aircraft, the additional problem of aerodynamic heating has to be borne in mind; typical figures for a high-flying aircraft might be skin temperatures of —13 deg C at 660 m.p.h., + 118 deg C at 1,320 m.p.h. and +335 deg C at 1,980 m.p.h. The outer atmosphere is also characterized by an almost com plete absence of water vapour. While this eliminates the possi bility of icing—temperatures, also, are too low for this to occur— it can produce severe discomfort to aircraft crews. Not only does the human throat suffer from breathing such dry air but the exhaled air acquires peculiarly corrosive qualities; it can even cause damage and corrosion to the metal structure of the aircraft. A possibly more immediate problem stemming from the absence of moisture is a great increase in the rate of wear of carbon brushes in electrical machinery. Such brushes have been developed to last for years at ground level, but the same patterns can actually erode by over half-an-inch per hour in the stratosphere. It is hardly practicable either to provide very large brushes or to change them in the air; the result, at present, can only be to limit the high-altitude duration of aircraft employing carbon brushes or contacts, the recent Canberra flights probably representing some thing near the limit with present apparatus. An obvious solution is to supply water to the commutator or brush, but it has been calculated that a turbojet heavy bomber would require at least 750 lb of water to do this effectively.
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