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Aviation History
1960
1960 - 0194.PDF
FLIGHT, 5 February 1960 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 The names and addresses of the writers, not for publication in detail, must in all cases accompany letters. Interior Industry TT was encouraging to see in Flight for January 22 that aircraft-*• interiors are now considered of sufficient importance to warrant "special feature" treatment. Undoubtedly there is now much closer co-operation betweenindustrial designers, operators and manufacturers on the interior design of passenger aircraft; but the tendency in papers andmagazines to glamorize the industrial designer without giving due credit to the manufacturer is disturbing. With particular regard to the Comet 4, in order to correct anyfalse impression it should be pointed out that the de Havilland Aircraft Co design office, in co-operation with BOAC, wereresponsible for the interior design and styling of this aircraft. The industrial designer's contribution to the styling was confinedto furnishing materials and colour. Stevenage, Hens ARTHUR CARLTON SMITH S.E.5 ArmamentI N his description of discussions with a First World War pilotabout S.E.5 armament (Flight, January 15) J. Andrews has demonstrated the unreliability of human memory as a source ofhistorical fact. One hesitates to deny absolutely the existence of a British S.E.5 or 5a with twin Vickers guns, but it seems unlikely.Perhaps Mr Andrews' friend was confusing the armament of the S.E.5a with that of the Sopwith F.I Camel. The S.E.5as that Mr Andrews saw in The Irene and VernonCastle Story were genuine enough, but that film was made during a' period when on every wartime fighter appearing in Americanfilms two very obvious machine guns were de rigueur, regardless The S.E.Sa in the film "Hell's Angels" of authenticity. An example appears in the enclosed photograph[reproduced above—Ed.], which shows an S.E.Sa used in Hell's Angels. It has two prominent guns of some kind in front of thecockpit but no Lewis gun. In the course of fairly intensive research I have never foundany reference to an S.E.5a with twin Vickers. However, it appears that B4885, built at the Royal Aircraft Factory late in September1917, had twin Lewis guns in addition to the usual Vickers: the starboard Lewis was No 28743 and the port No 47202, but I havenot been able to establish the nature of the mounting on which they were carried. In October 1917 another non-standard arma-ment installation was made in B4875, also a Factory-built S.E.5a. Although originally completed with the standard Vickers andLewis, this machine was fitted with the Eeman gun mounting, which carried three Lewis guns. All the guns were in the fuselageand pointed upwards at an angle of about 45°. A modified centre section was fitted: it had three slots through which the bulletspassed. It would be interesting to know what happened to this S.E.5a and how its armament fared. It was still at Farnboroughon January 10, 1918, when it had a new engine fitted; but its subsequent activities are unknown to me. In a letter you published last year (October 23) Mr BruceRobertson gave some interesting details of the modified armament on Captain Ball's S.E.5, A4850. Arising therefrom, Mr Lambenonof Shrewsbury has drawn my attention to an illustration in the book Captain Ball, V.C., by Briscoe and Stannard. The originalphotograph, said to be the last taken of Ball, was poor; but it seems to show the Vickers gun mounted wholly outside and abovethe fuselage. The photographs of A4850 at London Colney indicate that it must have been fitted with a special main tankwhen the Vickers gun was first removed: the standard S.E. tank had a recessed portion to accommodate the barrel of the Vickers, but the tank on A4850 had no such recess. Perhaps Bailpreferred to retain this larger tank, and had his Vickers replaced centrally on top of the fuselage. Can Mr Vousden or any othersurvivor of No 56 Sqn confirm or correct that theory? A point that arises out of Mr E. Vousden's letter (also in Flightfor October 23, 1959) is the fact that Ball's was not the only S.E.5 to have its greenhouse removed before No 56 Sqn went toFrance. Capt Henderson's aircraft, A4853, was similarly modified and served as the model for the official Royal Aircraft Factorydrawing that recorded the squadron's modifications. This drawing is dated April 7, 1917. Birmingham 32 J. M. BRUCE Bridging that Gap T READ with interest the article Bridging that Gap, by D. A.*- Whybrow, manager of the Channel Air Bridge Division of Air Charter Ltd, in your issue of December 11. I would pointout, however, that the expected basic cost quoted at £650,000 for the AW.670 is presumably Mr Whybrow's own estimate anddoes not necessarily bear relation to what the cost is likely to be. London SW1 J. A. R. KAY, Joint Managing Director, Hawker Siddeley Aviation Ltd [Asked if he would care to comment, Mr Whybrow replied: "Iexchanged letters with Armstrong Whitworth at the beginning of January and pointed out that £650,000 was the figure quoted to Mr Laker(managing director of Air Charter Ltd) and myself early in 1959 when we were invited to visit the Armstrong Whitworth factory to see thedstailcd project for the AW.670."—Ed.] Airline SafetyY OUR comments on the relative safety factors of the corpora-tions and the independent airlines (Britain's Airline Safety Record, January 22) gave a number of valid reasons for the latter'sapparent lower safety record; but one important aspect was entirely overlooked—that of the stage-lengths of routes operated. BOAC, for example, have no really short-haul services, andonce one of their machines is airborne for a 3,000-mile flight there can be little cause for accident. In 3,000 miles the pilot makes onetake-off and one landing, but on many of the shorter routes flown by the independents, one aircraft over the same mileage possiblycompletes ten or more arrivals and departures, often into and out of aerodromes (I use the word specifically, instead of "airports")that would cause many a corporation captain to lose his night's sleep. After all, when accidents do occur (fortunately, very rarely) theyare usually associated with the take-off, climb-out, let-down, approach or landing; so if, therefore, we measure our accidentrate in terms of scheduled flights successfully completed, then the tables are turned and the much-maligned independent companiescome to the fore with a safety record that must be the envy of any nationalized airline. Elstree, Herts DAVID F. OGILVY,Manager, Derby Aviation Ltd FORTHCOMING EVENTS Feb. 5. RAes Rotorcraft Section: "Vertical Transport Business," by R. L. Cummings. Feb. 6. "Conquest of Space," by Mrs A. Masevich, Royal Festival Hall, London (and at Birmingham on 8th, Bristol on 9th and Manchester on 12th). Feb. 8. Institute of Transport: Brancker Memorial Lecture, "RAF Transport Command," by Air Chief Marshal Sir Denis Barnett. Feb. 9. RAeS: "Model Testing in the Aircraft Research Association Co-operative Wind Tunnels," by E. C. Carter. Feb. 10. British Institution of Radio Engineers (Newcastle-upon- Tyne Branch): "Instrumentation in Rocket Propulsion," by Raymond E. Ross. Feb. 12. RAeS Agricultural Aviation Group: "Choice of Aerial Vehicle," by F. R. J. Britten and D. F. Myres. Feb. 16. Photogrammetric Society: "The Re-survey of the High- lands by Photogrammetric Methods," by Maj A. J. D. Halliday. Feb. 17. RAeS (Main Lecture at Bristol Branch): "Firestreak," by G. H, f. Brown. Feb. 18. RAeS Astronautics and Guided Flight Section: "Missile Control Problems," by D. Best. Feb. 19. Institute of Navigation: Discussion on Space Navigation, introduced by Dr J. G. Porter. Feb. 22. RAeS: Trenchard Memorial Lecture (at Halton Branch), "A Dip into the Future . . .," by Sir George Edwards. Feb. 23. RAeS: "Theory and Practice in Structural Problems," by A. J. Troughton. RAeS Branch Fixtures (to Feb. 12): Feb. 10, Chester (Joint meeting with Stonlow Branch of the Institute of Petroleum), "Bitumen and its Application to Runways," by G. P. Jackson.
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