FlightGlobal.com
Home
Premium
Archive
Video
Images
Forum
Atlas
Blogs
Jobs
Shop
RSS
Email Newsletters
You are in:
Home
Aviation History
1956
1956 - 1634.PDF
796 FLIGHT. 16 November 1956 CORRESPONDENCE The Editor of "Flight" is not necessarily in agreement with the views expressed by correspondents in these columns; the names and addresses of the writers, not for publication in detail, must in all cases accompany letters. Varsity VariantH AVING read the article about the Royal Varsity in the Octo-ber 19 issue of Flight, the idea struck me that the makers, Eagle Aircraft Services, Ltd., have built, with this aircraft, the firstVickers-Armstrongs V.C.3. The V.C.3 was proposed around 1950 as a civil variant of theVarsity, to succeed the Viking on the production lines. The only mention I have ever found of this aircraft was in an Americanmagazine, also around 1950. If my memory serves me well, the British Press never paid major attention to it [Flight published anartist's impression of this project, in the issue of June 22, 1950.—Ed.]. It would be interesting to know, taking in mind the fact thatthe Royal Varsity was modified to airliner standard, how this air- craft compares with the V.C.3 proposal. Rhenen, Netherlands. • CH. H. PARIS. Terminology of Propulsion ALTHOUGH I cannot claim expert knowledge of terminology,• either aeronautical or otherwise, I feel urged to comment on the leading article in the October 26 issue on the relative meritsof the terms "airscrew" and "propeller." Surely, if a choice has to be made between the two, the moredescriptive word "airscrew" is the better. This is exactly what it does, whether it is placed in front of or behind the aircraft.Apart from this, as modern jet aircraft are undoubtedly pro- pelled, should we not, to be completely logical, include the gasturbine engine under the generic term "propeller"? Weymouth, Dorset. W. O. DOYLEND. I WAS sorry to see, in a leading article on October 26, that youintend to use "propeller" in preference to "airscrew." I have never subscribed with much enthusiasm to the alleged need fordrawing a fastidious distinction between propellers and airscrews, but I prefer the latter term. Nor am I alone in that, because mostother nations do too—in France an airscrew is une helice, in Germany eine Luftschraube (a most literal translation of "air-screw") and Italian, like French, favours its own version of helixelica. I think you'll also find that Dutch, Danish and Spanishall have words derived from screw or helix. I know that there are French and Spanish alternatives in propulseur and propulsorrespectively, but they are rarely used. Now, I suppose, somebody will tell me that no one could everspeak of such things as turbo-airscrew or airscrew-jet types, rather than turboprops or propjet! But I shall continue to prefer tospeak of the airscrew shaft rather than the propeller shaft; the latter inevitably conjures up visions of engine-room telegraphsand other nautical appurtenances. Manchester. HELIX. The Sopwith H-Strutter IN the history of the Sopwith l|-Strutter [Flight, September 28and October 5] I am afraid I unintentionally perpetuated some erroneous beliefs (which I had accepted as facts) relating to aircraftarmament. That eminent authority, Mr. A. R. Weyl, A.F.R.Ae.S., A.F.I.A.S., F.B.I.S., has kindly—and necessarily—written to meabout these matters, and I think it is essential that readers should have details of the corrections. Mr. Weyl tells me that August Euler's patent (D.R.P. 248,601,dated July 23, 1910) was no more than a proposal to mount a fixed, forward-firing gun on an aeroplane, and that he envisagedinstallation in a pusher aircraft. This clearly means that Euler had no connection with synchronizing mechanisms. His idea wasbriefly exhibited at the 1912 DELA Show in Berlin but, at the request of the Germany military authorities, the gun was removedafter only a few hours. Fokker and Schneider did not at any time collaborate in thedesign of a machine-gun synchronizing device: the reverse was the case. Some time before the outbreak of war Schneider con-ceived the idea of firing a machine-gun through the hollow air- screw shaft (or propeller shaft, as Flight would now have us call it)of an aero-engine. This was an impossibility on contemporary rotary engines, so he approached Daimler with a proposal thatan in-line engine should be inverted and an offset geared drive to the propeller fitted in order that the installation of the gun mightbe facilitated. The early inverted engine suffered from oiling-up of the plugs, and the idea was apparently abandoned after dis-agreement had arisen between Schneider and Daimler; no instal- lation or firing tests were made. In 1913 Schneider obtained patent D.R.P. 276,396 for a means of coupling the mechanism of a machine-gun to the propellershaft. This was probably the earliest patent granted anywhere for a form of synchronizing mechanism, but unfortunately forSchneider it was taken out in the name of the firm employing him, the Luft-Verkehrs-Gesellschaft. Additional patents coverednon-rigid installations of the gun. After Schneider found that Fokker had succeeded in making an interrupter gear, legal battlewas joined; the L.V.G.—not Schneider—emerged victorious to the tune of 7,500,000 marks indemnification, paid to them by theGerman Government and Fokker for infringement of patent rights. The Schneider story leads naturally to the truth about theprimitive deflector-plate device used by Gilbert and Garros. Schneider's patent had been published in the pre-war aeronauticaljournals and no doubt came to the attention of L. Saulnier, designer of the Morane-Saulnier monoplanes. Mr. Weyl believesthat Saulnier may have been the first to conduct actual firing trials with a gun-synchronizing gear: that was in June 1914. Justas early British experiments had proved unsuccessful because an unsuitable gun (the Lewis) was used, so did Saulnier fail toproduce a workable synchronizing gear. This was because he used the Hotchkiss gun, from which synchronized fire would havebeen possible at only one given engine speed, owing to the system on which the gun functioned. Saulnier therefore abandoned hisexperiments and resorted to armouring the propeller blades—the idea which has always been wrongly attributed to Gilbert. Mr. Weyl confirms a hazy memory that I had of reading some-where a note of a Russian synchronizing gear. That gear existed early in 1915, before the Fokker device, and was a cam-operatedmechanism applied to a Maxim gun. The installation was made in a Sikorski S.16, but was not developed. Another correction of a different kind is called for on page 542of Flight for September 28. There I referred to a Sopwith seaplane Type 806. That is wrong, for Sopwith Type 806 (i.e., AdmiraltyType 806) was the Sunbeam-powered Gun Bus. Type 807 was the Monosoupape-powered seaplane widi folding wings. Birmingham, 32. J. M. BRUCE. Hendon Memento " T SEND you herewith a special envelope prepared in Hendon toA celebrate the recent 45th anniversary of the first United Kingdom airmail. This cover was designed by the writer and anartist colleague, and only one printing was made: 200 blue, 300 sepia, and 500 black. In the first edition there was an error inthe spelling of the name of Twiss; this is being rectified soon by the issue of another small printing. Originally designed with the Flying at Hendon exhibition [heldat Church Farm House Museum, Hendon, and described in Flight of June 1st this year] in mind, the envelope became purely aprivate issue by two enthusiastic artists interested in the history of Hendon Aerodrome. Two envelopes are known to have beenautographed by Claude Grahame-White, and another was auto- graphed by several pioneers named on the cover who attended theopening of the Exhibition. London, N.W.7. F. G. FOLEY. The "Hendon" envelope referred to by Mr. Foley.
Sign up to
Flight Digital Magazine
Flight Print Magazine
Airline Business Magazine
E-newsletters
RSS
Events
