Balance and Power

Dallas Museum of Flight Supports the Popular Image of the Wrights and Their Cycling Company

This post is, more or less, a book review. Recently I read again about the effort that the Wright Brothers expended in order to make the first sustained human controlled flight in history. This book, by David McCullough, entitled "The Wright Brothers, recounts their journey. My loyal reader may recall the Wright Brothers as bicycle mechanics, but that serves only to minimize their accomplishments. In truth, their accomplishments were made possible by their cycling background, combined with the love of reading instilled in them by their parents. McCullough makes this point, but fails to emphasize some of the groundbreaking accomplishments these two brothers from Dayton, Ohio accomplished.

• As cyclists, they realized that proper balance was essential to controlled flight. Any cyclist knows that balance is a prerequisite to movement. The Wrights realized early on that balance was even trickier for powered flight than it was for cycling.
• Their learning led them to absorb virtually every book written on human flight. One of their sources was Samual Langley, the head of the Smithsonian Institution and an erstwhile competitor to be first in flight with his "Aerodrome." More on this later.
• They realized that scientific research, whether peer reviewed or not, was sadly lacking. One example was the absence of any serious research into the principles behind propeller operation despite their having been used in ships for a half century. They had to develop the principles themselves. They achieved far better efficiency than the best ship propellers of the time.
• Similarly, stability and control laws were lacking; this led them to build their own, homemade wind tunnel. One of their first conclusions is that the big problem in flight was the learning of how to control the aircraft, not in the basic principles.
• The Wrights were far more than sinple mechanics. According to McCullough, before the turn of the century, they were turning out close to 200 machines a year when they started working on building a flying machine. The photos above make it look like they were a couple of country hicks working with tools one might have seen in the American Revolution. They don't look like an outfit that had a wind tunnel in the back room.
• As they developed the scientific principles needed for flight, they asked all the auto manufacturers of the day to provide them with an engine. They asked for an engine that could develop at least 8Hp and weighed less than 200Lb. Nobody offered to meet their specifications. So they put one of their employees, Charlie Taylor to work. He built one that weighed 150Lb and put out 12Hp. Score another for the cyclists. For comparison, the 1912 Model T engine weighed around 300Lb without transmission and put out 20Hp.
• Their choice of Kill Devil Hill was also not accidental. They researched all the potential

  

  From Wikipedia

  locales, looking for one that was relatively unpopulated, with consistent wind, and with lots of level and hilly locales for launch/recovery sites.
• Somewhat strangely, considering the almost instant spread of news today, the first accurate eyewitness account of the Wright Brothers flights didn't come out until January 1905; more than a year after their first flight. The publication: "Gleanings in Bee Culture."
• The editor of the first accurate article on human flight (the same "Bee Culture" guy) sent a copy to Scientific American with an offer of free republication. Far from taking him up on the offer, Scientific American ignored it and, instead, a full year later, ridiculed the notion that the Wrights were capable of something they'd been doing for over two years. Wilbur Wright opined: "If they will not take our word and the word of many witnesses, ... we do not think they will be convinced until they see a flight with their own eyes." By that time, the Wrights were negotiating the sale of the Wright Flyer III to the French Government after receiving no interest from the US Government. Three years later, they were making their famous flight over the Statue of Liberty.
• Oddly, even long after this, in 1928, the Smithsonian turned down a Wright offer to donate the original Flyer. Instead, the Smithsonian falsely claimed that Langley produced the first machine capable of flight. They even had Glenn Curtiss modify it so it COULD fly. As a result, the original Wright Flyer was sent to England to reside in the London Science Museum. It stayed there until after Orville's death in 1948. I guess we're lucky it wasn't hit by the Germans in the Blitz.

I guess the US Government has reconsidered. After the Flyer went to England, the Smithsonian board recanted their denial of the Wrights being the first to fly. Perhaps final vindication came in 1969 when a piece of the original Wright Flyer went to the Moon with Neil Armstrong. One Giant Step indeed!