The Wright Stuff and The Wright Experience

John Carrier wrote:
: Over the past couple days I've watched TV stories about a couple of programs
: to celebrate the Wright Centennial (Dec 17th) with reenactments of the
: famous flight. The key ingredient to both efforts (are there more?) is a
: reproduction Wright Flyer in 1903 trim. This is trickier than it might seem
: ... the Smithsonian flyer was damaged after the fourth flight and was
: modified several times between 1903 and its presentation to the museum.
: Notes/blueprints are not extensive. It's obviously a challenge to reverse
: engineer the machine to an authentic configuration, right down to the
: engine.

: The Wright Experience is sponsored by Ford, EAA and others. They've got a
: towed glider and a flight simulator for training. Several pilots chosen.
: Scott Crossfield is a consultant (and test pilot for the glider!).

: The Wright Stuff appears to be smaller scale. Never the less, their product
: appears to be of similar quality and authenticity to the other program. The
: apparent lack of flight training (the guy is practicing in a Citabria) looks
: like a large hurdle. I suspect the flyer needs rather specialized technique
: compared to conventional aircraft.

: Anyone know of any other efforts in the reenactment effort?

: R / John

I only saw a small piece of the TV pr9ogram, and read a few snippest
in the paper, but....

Do I understand correctly that the original Wright Flyer as well as
the replicas, CANNOT fly unless there's sufficient wind?



--- Gregg
"Improvise, adapt, overcome."

Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Phone: (617) 496-1558

------------ And now a word from our sponsor ----------------------
For a quality mail server, try SurgeMail, easy to install,
fast, efficient and reliable. Run a million users on a standard
PC running NT or Unix without running out of power, use the best!
---- See http://netwinsite.com/sponsor/sponsor_surgemail.htm ----

Gregg Germain wrote:

Do I understand correctly that the original Wright Flyer as well as
the replicas, CANNOT fly unless there's sufficient wind?

It could fly w/o sufficient wind, but just didn't have the oomph to
take off by itself due to it's puny 12-hp engine tasked with getting
600 lbs. of airplane into the air.

-Mike Marron

Mike Marron wrote:
:Gregg Germain wrote:

: Do I understand correctly that the original Wright Flyer as well as
: the replicas, CANNOT fly unless there's sufficient wind?

: It could fly w/o sufficient wind, but just didn't have the oomph to
: take off by itself due to it's puny 12-hp engine tasked with getting
: 600 lbs. of airplane into the air.

: -Mike Marron

Hi Mike,

Well that's what I meant by "fly" though I didn't use precise
language.

In other words, on a calm day, the Wright Flyer would not take off.



--- Gregg
"Improvise, adapt, overcome."

Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Phone: (617) 496-1558

Gregg Germain wrote:
Mike Marron wrote:

It could fly w/o sufficient wind, but just didn't have the oomph to
take off by itself due to it's puny 12-hp engine tasked with getting
600 lbs. of airplane into the air.

Hi Mike,

Well that's what I meant by "fly" though I didn't use precise
language.

In other words, on a calm day, the Wright Flyer would not take off.

With a long enough runway it could take off in calm air. But since
Kitty Hawk is only about 500 miles from their bicycle shop in Ohio
whereas the Bonneville Salt Flats is more than 1500 miles away,
the 100 ft. dunes and onshore seabreezes at Kitty Hawk worked
out just fine for their purposes.

-Mike Marron

With a long enough runway it could take off in calm air. But since
Kitty Hawk is only about 500 miles from their bicycle shop in Ohio
whereas the Bonneville Salt Flats is more than 1500 miles away,

Given that the first flight was shorter than the wingspan of a modern
jetliner, are you sure about this? Perhaps it would have run out of
gas or fallen apart or the pilot jolted off before becoming airborne?
The temps on the salt flats would have been a hindering factor as
well, both aerodynamically and mechanically.

all the best -- Dan Ford
email: www.danford.net/letters.htm#9

see the Warbird's Forum at www.warbirdforum.com
and the Piper Cub Forum at www.pipercubforum.com

Cub Driver wrote:
Mike Marron wrote:

With a long enough runway it could take off in calm air. But since
Kitty Hawk is only about 500 miles from their bicycle shop in Ohio
whereas the Bonneville Salt Flats is more than 1500 miles away,

Given that the first flight was shorter than the wingspan of a modern
jetliner, are you sure about this? Perhaps it would have run out of
gas or fallen apart or the pilot jolted off before becoming airborne?

Perhaps. But then, neither of us can definitively state one way or
another that it would NOT have been possible to takeoff under
its own power in calm air given a long enough runway.

The temps on the salt flats would have been a hindering factor as
well, both aerodynamically and mechanically.

I just checked the mean temperatures of the Wendover UT area
(closest I could find to the salt flats) and didn't see any reason why
temps would have been a hindrance (esp. in the wintertime).

-Mike Marron

In other words, on a calm day, the Wright Flyer would not take off.

Just so.

Note that much the same was true of most carrier aircraft in WWII, at
least as the planes were arranged on deck. (Parked aircraft took up
much of the available space.) The carrier steamed into the wind at
high speed, giving 25 knots or more over the bow. The most famous
example was the launch of the Dootlittle raiders in April 1942, when
you can see a B-25 actually dipping below deck level as it took off
for Japan.

Today, there is seldom any effort to take off from carriers. Jets are
routinely catapulted.

all the best -- Dan Ford
email: www.danford.net/letters.htm#9

see the Warbird's Forum at www.warbirdforum.com
and the Piper Cub Forum at www.pipercubforum.com

om: Cub Driver lo

The most famous
example was the launch of the Dootlittle raiders in April 1942, when
you can see a B-25 actually dipping below deck level as it took off
for Japan.

That was Travis Hoover's plane. He was the second off after Doolittle.
Apparently the pitch up of the deck as he launched put the nose up too high and
he dropped down to pick up air speed. Whether that was done with conscious
intent or whether that's just the way the inert mass behaved when trundled off
the front end of a flight deck depends on whose telling the tale. Apparently
timing the launch to coincide with the correct angle of the pitching deck was
critical and it took a near miss for the navy guy waving the flag (whatever you
call him) to get the timing exactly right, the progress of a B-25 down the
flight deck not being exactly the same as that of the single-engine jobs the
navy was used to launching.


Chris Mark

Do I understand correctly that the original Wright Flyer as well as
the replicas, CANNOT fly unless there's sufficient wind?

Sure they can fly. An airplane in the air does not know whether the
wind is blowing or not.

*Taking off* however is a different matter.

The steady wind at Kill Devil Hill was also essential for the kite
trials that preceded powered flight in the Wright Flyer. Unlike an
airplane, a kite is tethered to the ground and the airstream is
provided not by a propeller but by the differential between the speed
of the air and that of the ground.


all the best -- Dan Ford
email: www.danford.net/letters.htm#9

see the Warbird's Forum at www.warbirdforum.com
and the Piper Cub Forum at www.pipercubforum.com

Cub Driver wrote:
Gregg Germain wrote:

Do I understand correctly that the original Wright Flyer as well as
the replicas, CANNOT fly unless there's sufficient wind?

Sure they can fly. An airplane in the air does not know whether the
wind is blowing or not.

Despite what you probably learned in your private pilot ground
school, this statement is not entirely true.

For all practical purposes, Ed's 55,000 lb. Thud (for example)
probably didn't know whether the wind is blowing or not. But your
700 lb. Cub certainly does.

If you still have your AC-61 23 (FAA Pilot's Handbook of
Aeronautical Knowledge) see page 114. If you don't have it
handy, here is the pertinent excerpt:

"It has been thought that wind cannot affect an aircraft once it is
flying except for drift and groundspeed. This is true with steady
winds or winds that change gradually. It isn't true, however, if the
wind changes faster than the aircraft mass can be accelerated
or decelerated."

It boils down to this: those of us who fly extremely lightweight A/C
are much more intimately acquainted with the subtle nuances of
how wind effects our planes in flight than are our he-man counterparts
who drive their heavyweights around the sky at .9 mach for the most
totally oblivious to what the wind is doing.

But then, coming from a GA background, I also didn't much care about
the wind after takeoff and my 6,000 lb. AeroCommander loaded with
1,500 lbs. of cargo didn't care either. Simply turn the required
amount of degrees into the wind to compensate for drift and be done
with it.

But since taking up flexwing aviation and having flown several
dozen different make & models of delightfully lightweight birds,
I've changed my tune a bit here.

The steady wind at Kill Devil Hill was also essential for the kite
trials that preceded powered flight in the Wright Flyer. Unlike an
airplane, a kite is tethered to the ground and the airstream is
provided not by a propeller but by the differential between the speed
of the air and that of the ground.

This is all true, but it doesn't support your contention that, "an
airplane in the air does not know whether the wind is blowing or
not."

If you don't understand this, try dragging a banner behind your Cub
someday. For maximum effect, try this little experiment by flying from
a steady state wind towards the shoreline so as to experience a
sudden change in wind direction from a tailwind to an onshore
seabreeze.

You're happily cruising along in your Cub headed straight for the
beach with the banner flapping lazily behind and slightly below
your Cub's tailfeathers.

You then fly into the onshore seabreeze airmass and suddenly all the
slack in the banner towline tightens up and the banner streaming
behind straightens out. You exclaim, "This shouldn't be, I'm part of
the airmass!"

Another good example is drifting along in a balloon. You're moving
over the ground, but not a breath of air in the balloon. You are
changing altitudes to catch a wind going another direction, and
suddenly the little flags on the balloon flutter and you feel a little
breeze.

Once again, you protest, "This shouldn't be, I'm part of the airmass!"
The balloon replies, "Yes, grazihopper, but I have inertia and once I
have adjusted to the new wind, we will be floating in silence once
more."

-Mike Marron