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Aviation History
1955
1955 - 0606.PDF
606 FLIGHT, 13 May 1955 FROM ALL QUARTERS . . . advance of the annual general meeting to be held on May 27th.This statement reports a net profit for the year of £798,588, compared with £582,661 for the previous year, an increase of£215,927. In a detailed review of the company's activities mention is madeof the steps taken to overcome difficulties caused by shortage of labour. Helicopter production has been transplanted to theWeston-super-Mare factory; the engine division has branched out on the North-east coast; nearly the whole of the componentsfor the Freighter and many of those for the Britannia have been sub-contracted; even the Sabre repair line undertaken for theR.C.A.F. in Europe has now been sub-contracted (to Scottish Aviation, Ltd., at Renfrew); and branches of the design officeshave been opened in London. Despite these measures, continues the statement, the prospectof establishing a major production line of large transport aircraft at Filton had continued to be a problem, and the company there-fore welcomed the opportunity of being able to take a share in the business of Short Brothers and Harland, Ltd., at Belfast. Other points from the statement are as follows: — Of the Britannia: "... the results promise to exceed our highesthopes and we can now say that our original confidence in the Britannia aircraft at the design stage has received renewed con-firmation at each successive stage of development." "The helicopter section . . . went ahead well. Increasing pro-duction orders for the single-rotor Sycamore absorbed our avail- able capacity, and development of the experimental twin-engined,twin-rotor type proceeded urgently for the Royal Navy and Royal Air Force." Sir William Verdon Smith. Sir Reginald Verdon Smith "The growing range of work undertaken by our aircraft divi-sion has included the development and manufacture of rocket- motor tubes for various guided weapons and of plastic drop tanksfor fitting to a number of military aircraft." Of the Orpheus engine: "Its attractive power/weight ratiomay well have a considerable influence upon the trend of aircraft design, and it is scheduled for installation in the Folland Gnatand in a number of aircraft now being developed for NATO use. It is our hope that its simplicity and ease of manufacture will makeit especially suitable for licensed manufacture overseas." LOUIS BREGUET M. Breguet BY the death of Louis Breguet the world loses almost the lastof the legendary figures of the pioneer days of aviation in France. Seventy-five years of age, the managing director andchief engineer of the Breguet company died at his Paris homeon May 4th. Few if any men in the aero-nautical industries of any country can have maintained such an un-broken record of inventive and productive ingenuity. Born in1880, the son of a manufacturing electrical engineer, he began hisaeronautical experiments while he was in his early twenties. Ameasure of success crowned his efforts in 1907 with, remarkablyenough, a helicopter. In Flight's predecessor, The AutomotorJournal, for September 21st, 1907, we read of the experimentwhich was made by Louis Breguet in collaboration with hisbrother, Jacques, and a man named Richet: "The apparatusconsists of four propellers in a nearly horizontal plane driven by a 40-h.p. engine and, as the framework was incomplete, anarmchair was harnessed up for trial purposes. Although weigh- ing about half-a-ton it is stated that the machine lifted itselfand the aeronaut easily into the air—'four men being required to hold it down'." It was not long before Louis Breguet achieved success with afixed-wing aeroplane; and it was a machine which, both in design and construction, was considerably in advance of con-temporary thought. The most striking departure in this biplane was the use throughout of a tubular-steel structure and of thickwings formed from tubular spars and aluminium ribs; fabric covered, the wings had sheet-metal leading edges. Though ofthe then-conventional four-tail-boom configuration it had its engine and airscrew mounted in the nose and was, in fact, oneof the first successful tractor aircraft. A number of other biplane designs followed, and only two yearslater, in August 1910, Breguet succeeded in taking five passengers aloft. He also broke a number of distance and load-carryingrecords. In 1911 he began what was for that period large-scale manu-facture of aircraft and during the next two years he produced a seaplane, together with a number of aircraft that before longwere to prove their value for military purposes. Outstanding among these was the Br6guet 14 reconnaissance biplane, which invarious sub-types was produced in large quantities. Louis Brdguet himself served for a time as a pilot in the French Air Force andwas awarded the Croix de Guerre. In the immediate post-war period, and still remaining faithfulto all-steel construction, he designed the Breguet 19; manufac- tured in large numbers, it secured many records for long-distanceflying. In the late 1920s he turned his attention to the cleaning- up of structures to reduce drag, the result being a series of biplanesand sesquiplanes (biplanes with a very small lower wing) in which inter-wing bracing wires were entirely eliminated. The 1930s saw the progressive development by Breguet ofsingle- and twin-engined military multi-purpose aircraft, three- engined commercial machines and—after the acquisition of aShort Brothers licence—civil and military flying-boats. For new types of multi-seat fighter and commercial machines, he turnedto the low-wing monoplane. In 1936 his factories were absorbed into France's nationalized aircraft industry, but three years laterthe company acquired three plants from the Latecoere organization. In post-war years the Breguet company has built large militaryflying boats, twin-engined commercial aircraft, a four-engined bomber, helicopters, sailplanes, naval strike aircraft and—mostsuccessfully—four-engined freighters of the Deux Ponts type. On page 610 of this issue reference is made to the latest develop-ments by a company which, inspired by the originality of its leader, has always been noted for its technical ingenuity. ENGLISH ELECTRIC APPOINTMENTS THE English Electric Co., Ltd., announce that Mr. JamesWilliam Adderley, M.B.E., B.A., A.F.R.Ae.S., has been appointed sales manager of their aircraft division. He joined thetechnical sales side of that division in October, 1952. After leaving Cambridge with a first class honours degree Mr.Adderley joined the R.A.F. in 1941 and later worked in the Ministry of Aircraft Production on gas-turbine development.Before joining English Electric Mr. Adderley was technical repre- sentative in England of A. V. Roe (Canada), Ltd. Turning to another aspect of current English Electric activities,it will be remembered that last week, in reproducing an air-to- air photograph of the English Electric P.I we mentioned thatPeter Hillwood was carrying part of the load of testing. Though Mr. Hillwood has flown the P.I on more than one occasion—he was, in fact, the second pilot to fly it—his main work is in connection with the Canberra. The chief experimental test pilotunder W/C. Roland Beamont (manager of flight operations and chief test pilot) is now S/L. Desmond de Villiers—who, as re-corded in Flight of March 25th, recently joined English Electric. In future he will share in the P.I development flying. RolandBeamont has so far done most of the flying in the new fighter.
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