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Aviation History
1956
1956 - 1102.PDF
248 FLIGHT, 17 August 1956 HANDLING THE SPANISH HEINKEL . . . ing the gun-mount is, incidentally, offset to Starboard, giving thepilot a clear view through a side panel which is sharply enough inclined to the airstream not to require the ministrations of awindshield wiper. I called for the raising of the flaps and applied power for a simulated overshoot. There was a pronounced nose-up trim change which made me reach quickly for the trim wheel, but there was ample travel available to cope and response wasimmediate. I climbed to about 1,100 m and spent some time looking directly past my feet at Seville. The inland port on theedge of the city can take quite large ships and there are three airfields quite close by. Tablada was our base, and apart fromhousing a wing of Heinkel bombers, it served as the test airfield for the C.A.S.A. factory, with which it was connected by a shorttaxi-track. The aircraft are assembled and wheeled out on to a small grass plot, where they have their first engine runs. Thenthey are towed to the airfield for test flying. Another grass air- field was until recently used as a Spanish Air Force advancedflying training base. The third field is San Pablo, which has a full complement of runways and is the main civil airport forSeville. It is frequently served by both Iberia and Aviacion y Comercio, using respectively Bristol Freighters and S.N.C.A.S.E.Languedocs. At San Pablo too is the flight test hangar of Hispano Aviacion—a place full of sleek grey MelO9s (HA-1112s)carrying eight rocket rails and two 20 mm Hispano cannons apiece. These have now been relegated to the task of advancedflying- and weapon-training in the Spanish Air Force. The C.A.S.A.-buiit Heinkel III is almost indistinguishable from its German counterpart. The broad-bladed airscrews in these views have been replaced by British units and—as stated overleaf—Merlins are now also progressively replacing the Jumos. Camouflage is pale grey underneath and rather bright red-brown and green on upper surfaces. Roundels are red, yellow and red and the fin carries a black X on white. By now I had grown quite accustomed to the snarl of theHeinkel's two Jumos as they ran smoothly on either side of the cabin at about the level of my feet. I indicated by signs (thenoise level being too high for comfortable speech, especially when I had so few words of Spanish at my command) that I wanted toreturn and try some circuits and bumps. But Santa Cruz put his own interpretation on this request and pushed the Heinkelinto a steep dive. The speed built up till the air hissed loudly round the nose cone and we went into a vertically banked turnwith liberal use of the trim wheel. Swooping down over the airfield on the QDM we broke hard on to the downwind legalmost over the landing run. Another steep turn brought us on to "finals" with plenty of height to lose, and wheels were thenlowered. We were coming down really steeply towards the land- ing path when Santa Cruz put the Heinkel into two successivefull-blooded level side-slips, with the controls crossed to their full extent. As we came over the hedge he selected flaps and heldoff as the speed fell off to about 140 km/hr (87 m.p.h.), and touched the main wheels very gently on the grass. We rolled on across the airfield without any sign of trying tolower the tail or slow down, until I thought that there was not enough room left between us and a stone aqueduct to go roundagain, nor overmuch room in which to stop. At that point Santa Cruz began to manipulate throttles and brakes to take the Heinkelround in a wide sweeping turn, past lines of parked aircraft and other obstacles, rolling round the airfield with the tail still high inthe air. He arrived finally opposite the place where he wanted to park and, raising flaps, turned smartly through 180 deg, put thetail down and cut both engines. We swept up to our place in line with other Heinkels and, as the airscrews stopped turning,drew up smartly with our wing-tip a few feet from that of the next aircraft in line. At that moment the flight engineer saidtersely "todo cortado" ("everything switched off") and the flight was considered terminated. Santa Cruz said not a word. I had missed the opportunity to do some circuits and bumps ofmy own, but had been treated to an exhibition of skill and dash the equal of which I must admit I had not contemplated even inwilder dreams. And that landing was no mad bravado, for Santa Cruz had apparently worked hard to perfect the evolution. Heknew the Heinkel inside out, had a great and varied flying experi- ence, mostly test flying, was an acknowledged artist in a Messer-schmitt and had flown with a Spanish Me 109 squadron with the Germans in Russia during World War 2. With characteristicSpanish modesty he refused, a little later, to listen to any compli- ments, but talked willingly and enthusiastically about theHeinkel's excellent flying qualities. But for the moment he sat silently in his seat and let someone else explain to me that hewished me to leave the aircraft first, because he had hurt his leg a few days before while wrestling and needed as much room aspossible to extricate himself from his seat. C.A.S.A. 2.111 (Two Junkers Jumo 211-F engines of 1,340 h.p. each).—Span, 73ft llin; length, 53ft 6in; wing area, 931 sq ft; aspect ratio, 5.85; maximum weight, 30,800 lb; empty equipped weight, 19,200 lb;maximum load, 11,600 lb; maximum wing loading, 33 lb/sq ft; maximum speed at 19,700ft, 270 m.p.h.; cruising speed at 16,400£t, 223 m.p.h.;service ceiling, 22,000ft; radius of action, according to load, between 675 statute miles and 1,090 statute miles; crew of five. BRITAIN WINS WORLD MODEL CHAMPIONSHIPS TNTERMITTENT rain during the first two rounds of the-*• contest failed to dampen the spirits of the 57 competitors, representing 16 countries, who took part in the 1956 WorldModel Power Championships at the College of Aeronautics, Cranfield, on August Bank Holiday. Great Britain gained aneven greater success than last year, retaining the Franjo Kluz Trophy—the team award—by a considerable margin, and takingfirst and second in the individual placings. Winner of the Victor Tatin Cup was Ronald Draper, a 28-year-old architecturalassistant from Coventry, on his first appearance in a British Team. The Power Championships are for models powered by minia-ture internal-combustion engines with a capacity of up to 2.5 ex., and built to a strict F.A.I, specification. Each contestant makesfive flights during the contest, and tries to gain the greatest possible duration on each flight, the motor run being limited to15 sec. However, flights of more than three minutes count as three minutes only, so that a perfect score would be five three-minute flights. As at Wiesbaden last year, three competitors (Ronald Draper and David Posner for Great Britain, and SilvioLanfranchi flying proxy for Lawrence Conover of the United States) had a total of fifteen minutes after five flights, and a "fly- off" (with no limit) was therefore necessary to decide the out-right winner. Draper's fly-off time was 5 min 20 sec, with Posner at 4 min 52 sec and Conover at 4 min 15 sec. In earlier rounds, which began in rain but finished in sunshine,the field had narrowed rapidly. No fewer than twenty-four contestants gained "maximums" in the first round, but only elevenof these repeated the feat in the second round to stay in the running. Michael Gaster (Great Britain), last year's worldchampion, had a motor over-run of three seconds in Round 2 and, flying again in the brief time before the end of the round,was unlucky to obtain only 1 min 18 sec for this flight. All his other flights were maximums, and he therefore helped Britain toa team victory in which only one flight was less than the maxi- mum possible.Silvio Lanfranchi, who proxy-flew Conover's model into third place, is a Swiss businessman who lives in Bradford. He actuallyplaced third in the British Trials, but was naturally ineligible for the British team. However, in 1952 he won the contest forBritain, proxy-flying for Barry Wheeler in the United States! The expected Russian team failed to put in an appearance,claiming commitments "at national contests."
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