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Aviation History
1955
1955 - 0779.PDF
3 June 1955 Sabena added a tenth city to their helicopter network onMay 23rd with the introduction of daily services to Duisburg. Flights operate from Brussels via Eindhoven. Other points onthe network are Antwerp, Rotterdam, Liege, Maastricht, Cologne, Bonn and Dortmund. * * * Trans - Australia Airlines announce that registrationsVH-TVH-J inclusive have been allocated to the three Vis- count 756s ordered recently for delivery in April/May next year.The airline has also announced the following appointments at its Melbourne office: Capt. R. B. Bailey, acting director of operations;Capt. C. H. Gray, chief pilot; Mr. R. G. "Ben" Cochrane (for- merly T.A.A. manager in London), sales manager; and Mr. H.Dentry, publicity manager. Lufthansa's London office reported "several hundred" bookingswithin four days of the inauguration of the airline's Convair services to London. British passengers represent two-thirds ofthe London bookings. * * * Passengers' maps covering the Bombay-London section of theAir-India International network have been designed and pro- duced for the company by Francis Chichester. Finely printed infull colour, the maps strike an excellent balance between informa- tion and entertainment, providing an accurate reference to theterrain en route together with illustrations and marginal notes on places of interest between Bombay and London. Air-India'sfrequency of service on this route has recently been increased from four to five Super Constellation flights weekly. CLUB AND GLIDING NEWS D WILTSHIRE School of Flying, Thruxton, reports that it"never did think much of 'high utilization' of club aircraft —in spite of the fact that it apparently gains air-efficiencyawards". Instead of trying to get a lot of flying out of very few aircraft, the club believes in having a large number of machines,in order to cut down members' waiting time. Present fleet strength is four Autocrats, four Proctors and six Tiger Moths,with a further six Tigers and five Proctors in reserve. Another result of possessing a king-size fleet, apparently, is a creditabletotal of flying hours: for the year 1954-55, club flying amounted to 3,221 hours (compared with 2,700 for the previous year), inaddition to 700 hours on Army co-operation work. Among resident students at Thruxton recently were theschool's first two post-war German pilots who, after a refresher course, both obtained British P.P.L.s. The training of A.T.C.cadets continues. URING the meeting of the OSTIV Bureau in Zurich inMarch 1955, a visit was paid by Boris Cijan and Alan Yates to Birrfeld, thirty miles from Zurich, to see the latest Swiss sail-plane, Elfe III. They were accompanied by "Pirat" Gehriger, chairman of the F.A.I, gliding commission and secretary of theSwiss Aero Club. Alan Yates reports on the Elfe III: "The new machine has a span of 16 m and an aspect ratio of21. The nine-metre centre-section of the wing is placed on the fuselage in one piece; each outer wing and aileron (3.5 m) is addedlater. The wing has a full-span flap-cum-aileron which has a constant chord of only seven inches. The flaps can be loweredas a whole for slow flying, but they also act as full-span ailerons— the outer part deflecting more than the inner part. The aerofoilwas developed by the designer, Pfenninger, and is a laminar-flow section with its greatest thickness as far back as 60 per cent ofthe chord. The wing is 14 per cent thick at the root and about 12 per cent at the outer wing junction. The whole of the wing,as far back as the tiny flap/aileron, is ply-covered and magnifi- cently free from surface wayiness. Dive brakes emerge well backfrom both surfaces of the wing and are thus unlikely to upset the laminar boundary layer. "The fuselage is slender and the cockpit very shallow. Theowner, Max Schachenman, is small enough to be comfortable but Guido Schaefer, who flew it on the occasion of our visit, is tallerand looked cramped. The fuselage is very long but the tail sur- Unusual airfield in this photograph is the privately owned field of Bosworth Hall, Husbands Bosworth, venue of a rally organized recently by Mr. D. C. Maxwell, director of the Ind Coope and Allsopp brewery, and a Gemini-operator. Shown on departure is W/C. Roxburgh's Auster. faces look very small indeed. The rudder and elevator chordsdo not exceed 7in. The landing gear consists of a retractable wheel and tail skid; there is no nose skid at all. To prevent nosing overon landing, the wheel is set well forward of die centre of gravity. This results in a considerable weight on the tailskid (a trolley isneeded for ground handling) and could lead to difficulties in directional control on landing. The cockpit is comprehensivelyequipped. The controls include flaps, dive brakes, trimmer, wheel retraction, wheel brake and rudder pedal adjustment. Radio andoxygen are installed. "Guido Schaefer was aero-towed to 2,500ft on a demonstrationflight which he ended with a low pass at 140 m.p.h. The stalling speed is reported to be 45 m.p.h. with flaps down and 55 m.p.h.widi flaps neutral. The dive brakes appeared very effective and die landing was straightforward. Each wing tip clears the groundby less than three feet, however, calling for care in both take-off and landing. In flight, the rolling performance looked good, a45-deg bank reversal taking about three seconds only. Circling in thermals did not appear easy, however; corrections with therudder and aileron were frequently made, and it seems probable that a greater tail surface area would add usefully to directionaland longitudinal stability. "Over forty flights and thirty hours have so far been flown, andthe gliding ratio is said to be better dian 35:1." FROM Kuwait, Persian Gulf, S/L. E. Paul Nash, A.F.C.(previously C.F.I, of No. 15 Reserve School, Redhill, and now C.F.I, of the Kuwait Aero Club) has sent the followingclub news: — "The Kuwait Aero Club was formed about 18 months ago onthe orders of His Excellency Sheikh Abdullah Mubarak as Subah, C.I.E. Two Auster Aiglets and two Autocars were flown outfrom England in March 1954. The club offers flying training free to selected Kuwaiti students and odiers, in addition to paidflying at normal U.K. rates. "Just over 1,800 flying hours were achieved during the first 12months and eight Kuwaiti students, starting from scratch, obtained their British P.P.L.s. These students have now beensent to the U.K. for further advanced training. Many other members have achieved first solos and are now well on the wayto obtaining their licences. "An impressive ceremony was held to present the first eightKuwaitis with their licences, and it was when performing this pleasant task that His Excellency announced that he would alsopresent the Club with four more Austers. These have now been delivered, making the club fleet five Aiglets and three Autocars." May 30-June 10. June June June June June JuneJune June June June June June June June June June June Sept. 1-10. 1-11. 1-18 3-17. 4-5. 4-5.7-15. 10-19 11. 11. 11. 17-24. 18. 18. 20- July 1. 21-2222. 5-11 FORTHCOMING EVENTS Canadian International Trade Fair and Air Show, Toronto. Aluminium 1955 Exhibition: Royal Festival Hall, London. British Plastics Exhibition and Convention: Olympia, London. Royal Tournament, Earls Court, London. Aeronautical Union of Jugoslavia: Sixth Federal Gliding Contests, Jugoslavia. Ninth Rally of the Wines and Chateaux of Anjou, France. Royal Air Forces Association: Annual Conference. French Aero Club: F.A.I. 50th Anniversary Rally, Paris. Paris Aero Show. R.Ae.C.: Third National Air Races meeting, Bristol. Royal Air Forces Association: Air Display, R.N.A.S. Syden- ham, Belfast Aircraft Golfing Society: Match v. Racing Club de Paris, La Boulie, Paris. F.A.I.: General conference. R.N.A.S. Eglinton, Northern Ireland: Air Day. R.N. Electrical School, H.M.S. "Ariel," Worthy Down, Win- chester: Air Day. I.A.S. and R.Ae.S.: Fifth Anglo-American Aeronautical Conference, Los Angeles. Touring Aircraft Display, Quiberon. Women's Engineering Society: Annual general meeting. S.B.A.C. Show, Farnborough.
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