Aeronautics before the Airplane ‘The desire to fly is an ancient one, indeed. The famous myth of Daeda- lus and Icarus, kites in ancient China, medieval birdmen donning makeshift wings and leaping from towers, and the renowned work of Leonardo da Vinci are just a few of the more notable examples that re- lect the long-standing human aspiration to exiufate the birds. By the close of the eighteenth century, the thrilling sensation of flight could be experienced in free balloons. These initial ascents into the air were followed in the nineteenth century by a rapidly increasing number of attempts to build heavier-than-air flying machines. With their first suc cessful airplane fights in 1903, the Wright brothers conchuded a quest for wings that had spanned centuries." In light of this long preoccupation with flight, it is surprising to note that little technical progress was made in aeronauties prior to the nine- teenth century. The reason for this, in large measure, lies in the com- plexity of the airplane, Although on the surface it would seem a simple matter to fashion a pair of homemade wings and launch oneself sky- ward, in fact, a practical flying machine presented enormous conceptual and technical challenges. ‘The first obvious requirement of a successful airplane is a lifting sur- face of some kind. The development of a suitable wing involves not only determining the size and planform of the surface, but also the shape ‘of the wing profile, known as the airfoil. An additional aerodynamic sur- face or device that acts in conjunetion with the wing to maintain stabil- ity in flight is also needed. Beyond these rudimentary aerodynamic ele- ments, an airplane must have an effective means of control. Mechanical flight presents special structural demands as well. Unlike a stationary 19structure or most other forms of land or water transportation, building a lightweight airframe without sacrificing strength is a primary concern ‘of aircraft design. Further, there is, of eourse, the question of propul- sion. This includes not only the development of a light yet powerful engine, but also an efficient propeller and transmission system to con- vert horsepower into thrust to move the eraft through the air. Each of these basic aspects of the airplane presented its own set of complicated challenges. To resolve the problems associated with any one of these general elements was an extremely involved undertaking, Creating a successful airplane, however, necessitated finding solutions tall of them. So comples an array of tasks demanded 9 sustained and concerted effort. Isolated attempts at imitating winged creatures would not be enough. Organized programs of research through which individ- ual contributions could be shared and incorporated into a usable corpus of aeronautical knowledge were required. ‘The refusal of trained scientists to take a serious interest in fight was ‘one of the major reasons why such programs did not materialize more quickly than they did. Few considered the airplane a realistic possibil- ity. Fora long period, the absence of leadership from the scientific com- munity relegated the dream of fight to the realm of absurd impractical- ity. Those professional scientists who had expressed formal interest in the airplane found themselves in a lamentable situation. The feeling of frustration is evident from the following comment, which appeared in the fifth annual report of the Aeronautical Society of Great Britain in 1870: [Now lot us consider the wature of the mud in which we are stuck, The emsse of ‘ont standstill, briefly stated, seems to be this: men do not consider the subject of ‘aecastation’ oF “acation’ to be a real science, bt bring forward wild, immpract cable, wamechanical, and unmathematical schemes, wasting the time of the Soci- ‘ety, and causing 6s & be Yooked upon asa langhing stock by an incredulous and skeptical public." Without broader acceptance of aeronauties as a legitimate feld of inves- tigation, the necessary community of theorists, technicians, and experi ‘menters that could identify the basic questions and develop viable ave nues for research would be slow to evalve. Itwas only in the nineteenth century that such a set of circumstances came about, and that is why the origins of the prectical airplane are comparatively recent. The Aeronautics bejore the Aurpiane — 6. Sir George Cayley’ first whirling.arm apparatus, used in 1804 t0 collect aero- dynamic data on model wing surfaces. y original chi eight brothers’ invention of the airplane was a highly origi TE a cnc made sronais dig the preceding century provided an important beginning foundation for their work? : “The eritical turning point in the history of aviation was marked by the career of an English baronet from Yorkshire, Sir George o Working hroushout the ist haath nineteenth contr, Caley was the fiat to mount a well-conceived, systematic program of aeronautical research, grounded in scientific method. He was among the first to “tay bed igh eyo cal obser. He took nate of te cura rey binds’ wings an measured their weight, body surice, and ve- Tocity, Cayley was also the Gist to apply @ whifling-arm apparates to soeyautial expevimentation. He attached a one-square-foot wing to aera of # horizontally rotating arm anda series of weights to the ‘other. He then observed Thow much weight was lifted as. the wing carved through the air at various speeds and angles. The inventor ofof the rudimen ‘ments of the airplane, » and other predecessors of Cayley 9 measure the effects of air resistance Cayley recognized that p findings was just as important as perforr ing the research. In a gi undbreaking three. in Nicholion’s Journal of Natural Philoyophy, m }og and 1810 entitled “On Aerial Naviga. m, Cayley Jaid out the basic foundations ‘aerodynamics and flight Dh ithe whole problem,” he wrote, “is confined withis there ort a given weight by the application of } ower to the resistance of air.”> It is evident from this article that a bey bad 4 sound understanding of the essential pring A frst to grasp and articulate these idews, Ca Fist Rasp and articulate these ides, Caley sta Although he never achieved his see the Wrigl ! of powered flight, nor lived to , Cayley set down several fundamental concepts present-day form. He fixed wins this may seem selFevident and’ simp 8. The obverse of the Cayley disk, showing a basic aerodynamic force diagram illustrating the lift and drag forces on a wing surface server, it was a major intellectual leap over all that had come before. Cayley commemorated his important breakthrough by striking a silver disk in 1799 with an image of the airplane as he conceived it. On the obverse, he inscribed an aerodynamic force-diagram showi and drag vectors with respect to a lifting surface, further how clearly he understood the basic requirements for flight. But Cayley did more than theorize, He built and flew the world’ first successful model glider in 1804 and, later, two full-size gliders capable of brief flights with a pilot on board. He made the all-important first from the fanciful notions of ly linked to the success of Wilbur and Orville Wright in December of 1903. For these seminal steps toward the inven- tion of mechanical flight, Cayley is identified as the Father of Aerial 1 breakthroughs during the first decades of the nineteenth century, a number of experimenters took up the study of flight. But they made few significant technical contribu- tions. The absence of an organized drive focused on the goal of creating 4 successful airplane continued to thwart progress. The disparate mid-Henson and Jobn king appearance influenced many subse- al ens serious researchers to the field. The most noted prac riety were the Engl Contemporaries of Cayl ineers and other ioners of this va- liam Henson and John Stringfellow. at the end of his career, they designed sev- reraft based on the fixed-wing configuration. Although never ‘most famous and influential of these we Carriage, designed in 1842. It was quite modern its fixed single wing, Props traying the Aerial Steam appearance with d fuselage, and steam engine driving two aircraft were circulated widely, usually por- wer faraway places though Henson and ‘ory of aeronautics from a of view, the Aerial Steam Carriage offered a compelling irplane should look like for many future experimenters. between the pio- ted, serious researchers cs after 1860, zanized comm ‘was in part due to a slowly growing ~ally feasible. Equally important was ering. AS the Industrial Revolution dis- ined mechanics in industrial dev chnology emanated from an ex- panding pool of trained engineers, In time, these engineers began to see themselves as an identifiahle professional group. They possessed an ever-increasing body of esoteric knowledge based on specialized training, and they began appl methods successfully to a wide variety of complex technical problems uered the difficult challenges of the day. As a r among engineers concerning their responsi lel that of scientists. Developments in- -aining and other basic qualifications, the perhaps most importantly, of journals in which research could be published and di 1e base of general engineering knowl- Jayley and others and the emergence of the modern engineer were the critical factors that set the stage for sig- nificant progress toward a practical airplane in the last decades of the 'y. The airplane now became just one more in a series ical challenges through which engineers could demon- wes. They approached it in the same manner as any other mechanical problem, often finding elements of their previous professional experience directly applicable to aeronautics, For example, was able to transfer structural features of bridges to the co of biplane- wing designs. By 1860, the development of a professional methodology20 Aeronautics before the Airplane important phase ics progressed, flight research became increasingly more active and -tter organized. arose, three in particular. Some experi- ch was known of aerodynamics for a a It and flown wit Another group of researchers suggested th: hers chose to experi Powered aircraft, saw the development of a is the only remaining ‘signifi- le preparatory work, e best approach was to ightweight aeronautical engine a cant barrier to human flight. The most pro i Hiram Maxim, an expatriated more than a complex engine test-rig, borate track equipped with guardrails to prevent rials, on J indred feet down the track an er hour, the airplane rose sligh from the guardrails, and crashed. Maxim had indeed shown that, with enough power, a winged craft could be coaxed into the air for a brief hop. experimenter who chose to build cred airplanes with little preliminary work with models Aeronautics before the Airplane 27 1s four-ton, behemoth flying machi Clément Ader, a distinguished French electrical engineer who was a the Maxim's later ef- we than get his aircraft aloft with brute power. Th was hardly flying. The work of Maxim and Ader demonstrated that aerodynamic problems were far from resolved, or even complet derstood, and that it would tke 4 great deal more than the develop- ment of a suitable power plant before humans would be able to fly A second major approach to aeronautical research pursued by nineteenth-century experimenters was the study of flight using modeled the value of models with his classic id adjustable cru for stax suc certain ideas, aircraft be- low cost, and rapid construction. IF large model could be made to fly would only be necessary to scale the model up to as ed more than a it led to the most ling and flying a se- powered models, Samuel P rent astronomer and secretary of the Smi tion, attempted in late 1993 to fly an enlarged, man-carrying version ly publicized trials ted in disaster and made Langley cious ridicule for the remaining three years of his life.” Such failures i, the model aircraft approach made a far greater contri to the growing corpus of aeronautical knowledge than that which resulted from the avenue taken by Maxim and Ader. Ofthe many reseat ‘models througho century, by far the most influential was Alphonse Pén rine engineer ata young age because of a debilitating hip disease, He introduced the use of twisted strands of rubber to power small models, a development that has no doubt helped stimulate childhood interest in aviation in every genera, ee." Pénaud's most significant contribution to aeronautics was his se work on inherent rubber-powered monoplane tained lateral inherent ive angle with respect will be addressed at ith it, Pénaud correetly theorized and dem- important concept of aircraft stability that understand, in his original 1.799 con- and the modem airplane. Wi13. Langley’s man-carrying Great Aerodrome ‘pon itself immediately after takeoff on De ine days before the Wright b Hawk, Pénaud tragical 1850 at the youthful age of thirty.” But besides nant figure in aeronautics red those who later ion of the airplane, including the credited him as one of ir most important predecessors. The third and most fruitful approa ith century was the bi 14. Alphonse Pénaud’s 3871 rubber: Planophore. evolutionary path to powered flight. Careful study of aerodynamics Having gained a feel for handling a craft in the icated, powered glider, oped into a true airplane capable of sustained, cont Here again, as with so many aspeets of George Cayley played a pior bea more soy I wish to give notice. I was hired to drive, and not to fly. Cayley’s gliding efforts did not produce any startling results, his aircraft849 Boy Carrier glider, were based on his many years of aeronautical study. Unlike brave but reckless tower jumpers, who merely attempted to emulate birds wi \y fashioned wings, Cayley established a methodology for fight research that consisted of a thorough rodynamies fol- lowed by the construction of aircraft to test the results of that research, Virtually all experimenters who were making genuine progress in aero- ies toward the end of the nineteenth century worked in this Several experimenters made brief fights in unpowered aircraft dure ing the second half of the ni lider pioneers was Ot ‘Anklam, Pomerat 1848, he was in the highly regarded German technical education system. Following he military during the Franco-Prussian War, he went on to asa talented engineer. By 1880 he was operating his if plant near Berlin, producing small steam engines oghorns, among other things. f aeronautics in began a series of aerodynamic exper A decade of imaginative research and experimentation by Lilient produced the best and most complete body of aerodynamic data of the day. He also established definitively the widely held belief that a curved wing section produces optimum lift.= Us step necessary in the design of any airplane. important aerodynamic research in Der Vogelflug als Grundlage der Pliegekunst (Birdflight as the Basis of Aviation) in 1889, and in severaltandard monoplanes, using weight shifting to followed up 'e construction and the Between 1891 program series of elegant, ions. Most were monop! mounted at + or Normal- produced the Robert Wood, iastically, but by ‘@ machine not made to look at, but to fly @ Boston-based news correspondent, ct “Here was a flying mack The gliders had split willow frames covered with cotton- sealed with collodion to mal di and ether that dries to form a to area from ten to t is avi ing ige of Rhinow, miles from Berlin. His best efforts with these gliders covered 1 thousand feet and were twelve to fifteen seconds in tion, -al experiments came soaring in one of his standard ‘monoplane gliders, a strong gust of wind caused the cra a broken spine and died the following day in a Berl Itis, of course, hard to say what Lilienthal w had he not been killed, but in all of his contribution to solving the though he made great strides in aerodynat committed to two dead-en Wvancement. “The first of these was his meth: of shifting body weight as a means for a control syst vealed in his fatal crash, Timi shifting as a means of control placed a severe restriction on the aircraft's size. Because control was e aircraft's center of gravity as a result of reposi- ing the pilot's body weight, the weight of the aireraft had to be kept comparatively low. This presented a great problem in the design of let alone any sort of a payload, would be of a size so large shifting would be tothenthal did build two powered aircraft were equipped with a carbonic-acid gas motor driving flapping wing tips. Neither was successful, and they dems sign were the most sig- ice Cayley’s work. He approached the engineering approach, as well as flying experience in ides appeared in new: Papers and magazines the world over, making him quite a se1 an age when, for most, hum: While the three approaches to flight research focused upon here were by no means the only ones rection in which aeronautical ex ‘aerodynamics, propulsion, and control was had for the of their neer who remarkably similar to German predecessor.)® It w Pénaud had But, as the century drew to a close, the freedom of movement ity fight research and make the provide a genu rier to ‘The Wright brothers, of course, fulfilled this role. They entered the field at a time when aeronautics had moved beyond blind, daring at- tempts to get into the air by would-be birdmen but was still lacking ‘clear definition of the many remaining obstacles to mechanical flight. With uncommon insight and wring acumen, the Wrights raised the field of aeronautics to an entirely new level and brought the inven- tion of a practical airplane to fruition. They were able to analyze cally what had preceded them, reduce the remi most basic elements, and desi of these problems. Theaur unuunes vejore ine aurplane tant to recognize that a foundation of basic knowledge and experience had been set down during the nineteenth century by a growing com- munity of dedicated and ly unlikely that the Wright airplane would have emerged in the form it did, when did. The Wrights’ genius lay as much in their insi adaptation of what had come before them as creativity lid in their own innate