The Beginnings of Flight

Wright 1909 Military Flier

I have been watching the Military Channel which has a program called "Warplane"  There are four in the serious and they cover the history of aviation from the beginning until the present.  I was surprised to learn that the 1903 flier, the first to fly, is not available.  I don't know what happened to it.  There is or was a group building a full sized replica using the technology the Wrights wrote down.  They have even created a replica of the 1901 wind tunnel.  I am amazed at the professional, scientific approach the Wrights used to invent the flying machine.  

There was another wind tunnel, the 1916 Wind Tunnel.  I saw both this one and the 1901 one in the Early Years Exhibit at the National Museum of the United States Air-force.  

My shots of the 1901 Wind Tunnel did not turn out and I could not find a satisfactory perspective for the 1916 one. 

McCook Field 1918 Wind Tunnel

The Wright Brothers impressed me with their research related to flight.  The successive wind tunnels were each capable of faster air speeds.  The McCook Field Wind Tunnel, 1918, pictured above, was capable of air speeds in the mid 400's.  Planes were not flying that fast at the end of WWI but they were during WWII.

I wanted, also, to mention that the Wrights built their own engine for the 1903 flier.  They could not find an engine with enough horse power that was light enough so they make their own.  They calculated that they needed at least 8 horsepower for the plane.  The engine they built put out 12 horsepower.  

Their propeller was correctly conceived as a rotating wing not a paddle.  Today's wooden propellers are 85% efficient.  Theirs was 81% efficient.  

 

Some think that their most important contribution was the invention of flying.  They designed control in all three major areas, pitch, yaw and roll.  The first plane they designed had all these controls. 

 

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