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Aviation History
1955
1955 - 0540.PDF
540 FLIGHT FROM ALL QUARTERS Queen Mother Visits Her Squadron LAST Saturday Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, as their' Honorary Air Commodore, visited Nos. 600 and 2600 (City of London) Squadrons at Biggin Hill. She flew from Smith'sLawn, Windsor Great Park, to Biggin Hill in an S-55 of the Fleet Air Arm, making her first helicopter flight.Her Majesty was received by A. V-M. H. L. Patch, A.O.C. No. 11 Group. Later she reviewed a parade of both squadrons andwatched a formation fly-past of No. 600 Sqn. aircraft and a demon- stration of Bofors gun-drill by No. 2600 Sqn. • She then took teawith the squadrons and afterwards visited the station's Chapel of Remembrance, where she inspected the Battle of Britain Roll ofHonour. Returning in the S-55, Her Majesty was back at Windsor three hours after leaving there. Helicopters for the Queen's Flight RECENT weeks—and news of events to come—have demon-strated unmistakably that helicopter travel has received the approval of the Royal Family. Though no official announcementhas yet been made, it is understood that a trio of rotating-wing aircraft are shortly to be added to the Queen's Flight (which atpresent consists of three Vikings, about to be joined by a Heron; and it is believed that a requirement has been written for a RoyalViscount—the first official step towards obtaining this type for the Queen's Flight). No information is available as to the types of helicopter, butit is said that one will be a WS-55 Whirlwind and another a Dragonfly. Various machines are under evaluation at the moment. Two days after her S-55 flight, referred to above, the QueenMother flew in an S-51, this time to Tidworth for a Colour presentation ceremony. The Duke of Edinburgh, as is well known,has been using one of these aircraft regularly during the past few months; last week (as related on page 542) he travelled to Duxford,from Windsor, to visit Aero Research, Ltd. On Monday last he flew from Windsor to Portland. On June 4th he will travel byhelicopter to Eastbourne for the annual conference of the R.A.F.A., of which he is president. It will be recalled that Princess Margaret flew in a Whirlwindduring her recent tour of Western Germany and that the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester have also used helicopters. C.P.A. and the Comet PRESIDENT of the first overseas airline to order Comets,Mr. W. G. Grant McConachie still believes firmly in the future of the type. He stated last Friday that his company, Canadian Pacific Airlines, are considering a multi-million-dollar order forCornet 4s. For delivery in 1958 (a "satisfactory" date, said Mr. McConachie),the aircraft would be used on C.P.A.'s new Polar route between Vancouver and London and on the westward extension to Tokyo.The C.P.A. president said that Comets would reduce journey-time between Vancouver and London to ten hours. Mr. McConachie added: "We are thoroughly convinced thatthe Comet will fly again, and that from its difficulties and from research that never stopped, it will be a far better aircraft." Hewas speaking in London shortly before the return to Vancouver of the C.P.A. DC-6B chartered by a Canadian trade delegationfor a preview of the Polar route. Scheduled services will begin in June. It can now be confirmed that de Havillands have reached anadvanced stage of progress with the Comet 4; the work of engineer- ing the design for production is already under way. Estimatedperformance data for the Series 4, based on the measured per- formance of the Comet 3, are being supplied to airline operators,and it is expected that the figures will shortly be available for publication. The Comet 3, incidentally, is being regularly andintensively test-flown from Hatfield. A test-fuselage of the strengthened "Transport Command" Comet 2 is now being pre-pared for tank-testing—probably at Hatfield in a tank of D.H. construction. Igor Sikorsky Here ^\NE for whom the claim is made that he is the only man to have^'pioneered in the three different aeronautical fields of multi- engined aircraft, trans-oceanic flying-boats and helicopters arrivedin England last Saturday. He is Igor I. Sikorsky, engineering manager of the Sikorsky Aircraft division of United Aircraft, andhe is here to receive the James Watt Medal of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, to be presented today, April 29th. In a statement made at a London meeting shortly after hisarrival, Mr. Sikorsky stressed that the helicopter was "a universal transport with which no other vehicle could compete." It hadno limitations as to terrain or the bulk of goods it could lift, but it was never likely to be very fast, or suitable for long-range work.Big helicopters were already fully feasible, but a job that might take one day on a small helicopter must be expected to take a weekon a large one. Speaking of helicopter power units, Mr. Sikorsky said that, forthree to five years yet, piston engines with mechanical transmission would continue to offer the most advantages. Gas turbines, alsowith mechanical transmission, would be better still; they would be lighter and smoother and for such a short-range vehicle highfuel consumption was less of a problem. Configurations were unlimited, but the single-rotor type would predominate and be theequivalent of the monoplane (as compared with biplanes and triplanes), and for essentially the same reasons. The first characteristic of a good helicopter was excellenthovering—and for this condition wings and additional power sources were all dead weight. The pure helicopter probably neverwould fly faster than 200 m.p.h., because the retreating blade stalled at high speed; and for this same reason extra support forthe aircraft was sought in some designs. Mr. Sikorsky thought that such machines with greater speed still had only limited appli-cations—mainly military—and that the convertiplane had poor hovering characteristics as compared with the pure helicopter. He agreed that the question of interference between the rotorblades and fixed-wing surfaces in their downwash was a problem, and a specific means for its solution must be found. The fixedwings might even require to be folded or turned to a position of minimum resistance, i.e., feathered in the downwash for hovering. On an historical note, in answer to a question, Mr. Sikorsky saidthat he believed that Breguet made the first helicopter which could become airborne; this was in 1907. His own machines in 1909and 1910 were "very fine except for one thing—they couldn't fly." The first really practical helicopter, in his opinion, wasthe German Focke-Achgelis of 1937. His own design of 1939 was, he believed, the first successful single-rotor helicopter and thefirst machine to fly successfully in the Western Hemisphere. The R.N.L.I, and Helicopters XJELICOPTERS were very much in the news last week. They-*-*- were, for example, discussed in Glasgow by Col. Burnett Brown, secretary of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution. Hewas replying to a suggestion by Admiral Sir Frederick H. G. Dalrymple-Hamilton, made at a Glasgow Council meeting of the ROYAL ARRIVAL: Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother arrives at Biggin Hill from Windsor in a Naval S-55 (see first news item above). This was her first experience of helicopter flying.
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