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Aviation History
1956
1956 - 1835.PDF
FLIGHT, 28 December 1956 999 S/iort 784 with 250 h.p. Rolls-Royce engine. THE SHORT SEAPLANES HISTORIC MILITARY AIRCRAFT No. 14 THE first Short 184 appeared early in 1915. Its structure wastypical of the period: the fuselage was a wire-braced woodenbox-girder covered with fabric, and the wings were also of fabric-covered wood. The tail unit embodied the charac-teristic large fin which had appeared on the earlier Folder and Types 135, 166, 827 and 830, and a balanced rudder wasfitted. The main floats were large wooden pontoons, transversely connected by arched cross-bars which held the torpedo crutches;the tail float was likewise of wooden construction and had a water rudder; there were stabilizing floats at the lower wing-tips. Theengine was fully cowled and a large box-like radiator was mounted above it. The wings could be folded, and in their folded position thetailplane lay in the outermost bay of the mainplanes. This fact accounts for the peculiar arrangement of the landing wires inthat bay: they were caught up by other cables from the upper ends of the outer interplane struts so that they did not foul thetailplane when the wings were folded. A short horizontal strut projected on either side of the fuselage just in front of the forwardtail-float attachment strut; this strut engaged the base of the centre rear interplane strut on each side when the wings werefolded. In its original form No. 184 had ailerons on the upper wing only; these were single-acting surfaces, and hung downlimply in the absence of any supporting airstream. They were later fitted with a balancing cable but apparently proved to beinadequate for maintaining lateral control, for ailerons were fitted to the lower wing also. All the production Short 184s had aileronson upper and lower wings. Production was ordered on a fairly large scale. After the firstsmall batch of ten (841-850) had been ordered from Short Brothers, other contracts were placed with S. E. Saunders, Ltd.(8001-8030), Short Bros. (8031-8105), Mann, Egerton and Co., Ltd. (8344-8355), the Westland Aircraft Works (8356-8367), thePhoenix Dynamo Manufacturing Co., Ltd. (8368-8379) and PART 3 By J. M. BRUCE, M.A. THIS article continues Mr. Brace's study of the classic series of Shortseaplanes. Part 1 was published in our issue of December 14, and Part 2 last week. The author acknowledges his indebtedness toMr. Bruce Robertson, who provided much of the information relating to serial numbers, and to Mr. H. H. Russell for some of the factson which the history is based. Frederick Sage and Co., Ltd. (8380-8391). With the exception ofthe Saunders company, the orders for Short 184s marked the entry into the aircraft industry of the firms concerned, all ofwhom had been asked by the Admiralty in the spring of 1915 to undertake the manufacture of aircraft. Fortunately the Short 184was not a complicated aircraft and its manufacture was relatively easy; nevertheless it was no mean feat for firms such as Mann,Egerton and Frederick Sage, who had no aircraft experience, to complete their first Short 184s within three months of signingthe contracts: the first Sage-built machine was completed late in September 1915 and the first Mann, Egerton Short emerged inNovember. Westland commenced deliveries in January 1916, Phoenix in the following month. On May 21, 1915, the seaplane carrier Ben-my-Chree sailedfrom England under Sqn. Cdr. C. J. L'Estrange Malone, bound for the Dardanelles "with the unofficial intention of torpedoingthe Goeben and the Breslau." The Ben-my-Chree had been a passenger vessel on the Liverpool-Isle of Man service before herconversion into a seaplane carrier. She had a speed of 22 kt (though Cdr. Samson claimed 26 kt) and could accommodatethree Shorts and two Sopwith Schneiders. When she arrived at Iero Bay, Mitylene, on June 12, 1915, she had on board the firsttwo Short 184s to be built. Exactly two months later one of the Ben-my-Chree's Shorts made history as the first aircraft to sinkan enemy vessel with a torpedo. On August 12, 1915, the Ben-my-Chree was in the Gulf ofXeros, and a Short 184, piloted by Fit. Cdr. C. H. K. Edmonds was sent off across the Isthmus of Bulair to attack an enemysupply ship which had been observed off Injeh Burnu. Edmonds flew without an observer; his Short carried fuel for only 45minutes flight, yet he could get it to climb no higher than 800ft. Gliding down to within 15ft of the water, Edmonds released historpedo at a range of 350 yd and hit his target amidships; as he flew away he could see the Turkish vessel settling by the stern. Edmonds' achievement was robbed of some of its lustre when,after study of reports from British submarines, it was learned that the ship had been torpedoed and shelled four days pre-viously by the submarine E.14 and had been left beached in Short 184 Type D (single-seat bomber version).
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