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Aviation History
1962
1962 - 1070.PDF
22 Letters The Editor of "Flight International" is not necessarily in agreement with the views expressed by correspondents in these columns. Names and addresses of writers, not for publication in detail, must in all cases accompany letters. Escape Capsules SIR,—We note with interest the small news-item on page 599 of your April 19 issue headed "Who's Been Sitting in my Chair?" and announcing an ejection of a live bear in an escape capsule. We would point out that the capsule is designed and manufactured by the Stanley Aviation Corporation. Par from being the first of a test programme, as implied by your announcement, it was the ninth ejection from a B-58 air craft at speeds and heights varying from lOOkt taxying on the runway to Mach 1.6 at 45,000ft. The seventh test of this series contained a human occupant. He was ejected at Mach 0.8 at 20,000ft and landed in his capsule quite safely. In addition, over 40 ejections were made from rocket sleds at speeds from lOOkt to 700kt, the tests being at Ed wards Air Force Base or at the Hurricane Mesa test facility in Utah. A live chimpanzee was used in one high-speed ejection and a live bear was used in another. It would appear that little is known in England of this important development in high-speed escape from aircraft. Briefly, its purpose is to provide complete protection for each member of the crew of an aircraft during high-speed ejection, during descent to ground and on ground landing. Broadly speaking, the operation of our escape capsule is as follows: Operation of the "pre-ejection" handles retracts the occupant's legs, tightens his shoulder harness, closes and locks the capsule doors, and pressurizes the capsule. The pilot's capsule is equipped with a control column which allows the aircraft to be flown down to a more amenable altitude if the conditions permit. Operation of the "ejection" handles ejects the capsule from the aircraft, after which the stabilization, recovery, and ground landing systems operate automatically. The occupant only emerges after landing. If the capsule lands in water, it will float. It can be used as a habitation whether on land or water and it contains survival gear enough to feed a man for 72 hours and to provide hunting and fishing equipment to maintain life thereafter. We at Stanley Aviation will be pleased to provide further information should you or your readers so desire. Inciden tally, a demonstration capsule with a Stanley representative will be at RAE Farnborough from July 16 for examination by the RAF and such branches of the industry as might be concerned. Denver, Col STANLBY AVIATION CORPORATION F. I. Tallentire Accident Recorders Sm,—I was most interested to read Mr Dobson's long letter on his competitor's accident recorder, and am sure he would appreciate the correction of a few inaccuracies that seem to have crept in and are threatening his aim of clearing up the confusion he thinks exists on this matter. Briefly, these are:— (1) The speech-recorder spools which Mr Dobson cites as producing tangled wire in a crash were unprotected. In the accident recorder he mentions, however, die take-up spool (which, incidentally, is layer and not "scramble" wound) is enclosed in a glass-fibre cassette; and a number of tests, including free dropping under a 501b weight from several thousand feet, failed to tangle the wire. (2) Should the wire break, the normal method of repairing it is the simple one of knotting the ends together. If this wastes 0.3in of wire, a recording time of a tenth of a second is lost on the slowest speed of 3in/sec—not the "several seconds" mentioned. (3) The multi-sweep method of increasing accuracy utilizes FLIGHT International, 5 July 1962 two and not five channels. If this accuracy was required on all parameters of a 50-channel recorder it could therefore accept 25 parameters; but, as in practice this accuracy is not required when monitoring control surface positions, etc, effective capacity is greater than this figure. (4) Regarding the fitting of additional multi-sweep trans ducers, the parameters where multi-sweep accuracy is required (such as those for airspeed, altitude, etc) are often those where it is in any case more practical to install trans ducers which are independent of existing aircraft systems. There are several other points in Mr Dobson's letter which might cause confusion, but I feel that this is not really the place for us to indulge in a detailed technical discussion about particular recorders—the engineers faced with having to choose one will do that. However, the compulsory introduction of accident recorders is producing some problems of more general interest, and these might well be mentioned. One of the most important is probably the question of where to compromise between the largely con flicting demands of accuracy and reliability, when the latter is at present closely tied to simplicity. The attitude of the airlines during the introductory phase will probably be to fit the simplest equipment that achieves the accuracies laid down in the statutory requirement. Later—perhaps coin ciding with the introduction of maintenance recording—the change to more sophisticated recorders, using digital techniques for ease of data processing, may take place. Another point is the desirability or otherwise of making the accident recorder ejectable and packing with it a dye marker and radio beacon. Since such a large proportion of airliner flying time is spent over water there seems to be a case for this, but the operators would probably be reluctant to fit ejectable equipment, for a variety of reasons. The overriding consideration must, of course, be the eventual increase in safety which might result from each possible feature, and enough statistical information should already be available to ensure that the right decisions are reached. Baginton, WHTTWORTH GLOSTER AIRCRAFT LTD. nr Coventry J. M. Stephens, Deputy Sales Manager, Armstrong Whitworth Equipment Not-so-crowded Airspace? Sm,—I quote from Flight International of June 14: ". . . The maximum count of civil aircraft airborne in UK airspace at any hour during the census week was 151." To the ob server of aviation affairs this fact seems to indicate that much wool has been pulled over many eyes, for in recent times the Ministry of Aviation has justified many things (e.g., the closure of airfields) by pleas of crowded airspace. The figure of 151 was recorded on a Sunday—a day when much of the flying was being done by club aircraft outside controlled areas; but even supposing that 151 aircraft were travelling in the air corridors of this country, could it really be said that this constituted crowding? The time has come, I feel, for rethinking and expansion. There will have to be some mighty aircraft built if 151 of them are going to fill the UK airspace. Edinburgh 5 R. w. SIMPSON Publicity-unconscious? SIR,—Roger Bacon's experience at the hands of Julian Washbrain and his PR chaps (June 7) makes me as livid as it must have made him, because I have had the same thing. Why can't these manufacturers let us publish descriptions of their new aircraft early! Don't they want publicity? They say that when they are in the lead they don't want to give away technical information to competitors too soon. That is all very well, but such articles would be impressive in our journal, now part of a big and powerful group. If manufacturers insist on keeping their technical know- how to themselves and their customers, well, why should we mention their aircraft along with competitive types when we are writing articles about the world markets? London EC4 TVOR scoop
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