Aircraft Engines | From Propellers To Turbojets, To Supersonic Passenger Jets | A Video Collection

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Learn about WW2 engines, and the first turbojet engines, all the way to commercial supersonic jets, like the Tupolev Tu-144, and the Aerospatiale BAC joint venture, the magnificent Concorde

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The story of how the Rolls Royce Merlin engine equipped the extraordinary P-51 Mustang and the evolution of the Focke-Wulf Fw 190’s engine, all the way to the story of the first functioning centrifugal turbojet in April 1937, Frank Whittle’s creation.

The Rolls-Royce Merlin is a British liquid-cooled V-12 piston aero engine of 27-litres (1,650 cu in) capacity. Rolls-Royce designed the engine and first ran it in 1933 as a private venture. Initially known as the PV-12, it was later called Merlin following the company convention of naming its four-stroke piston aero engines after birds of prey.

After several modifications, the first production variants of the PV-12 were completed in 1936. The first operational aircraft to enter service using the Merlin were the Fairey Battle, Hawker Hurricane, and Supermarine Spitfire. The Merlin remains most closely associated with the Spitfire and Hurricane, although the majority of the production run was for the four-engined Avro Lancaster heavy bomber. A series of rapidly-applied developments, brought about by wartime needs, markedly improved the engine’s performance and durability. Starting at 1,000 horsepower (750 kW) for the first production models, most late-war versions produced just under 1,800 horsepower (1,300 kW), and the very latest version as used in the de Havilland Hornet over 2,000 horsepower (1,500 kW).

One of the most successful aircraft engines of the World War II era, some 50 versions of the Merlin were built by Rolls-Royce in Derby, Crewe, and Glasgow, as well as by Ford of Britain at their Trafford Park factory, near Manchester. A de-rated version was also the basis of the Rolls-Royce/Rover Meteor tank engine. Post-war, the Merlin was largely superseded by the Rolls-Royce Griffon for military use, with most Merlin variants being designed and built for airliners and military transport aircraft.

The Packard V-1650 was a version of the Merlin built in the United States. Production ceased in 1950 after a total of almost 150,000 engines had been delivered. Merlin engines remain in Royal Air Force service today with the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight, and power many restored aircraft in private ownership worldwide.
During his spare time on the squadron and at CFS Frank Whittle gave much thought to the application of the internal combustion turbine as a means to drive the aeroplane propeller. As others had before him, he soon discovered that the levels of component efficiency in any suitable gas turbine engine would be dauntingly difficult to achieve. And then, as he would say in later life, “the penny dropped” and he perceived the possibility of using the high velocity/high mass flow exhaust to obtain propulsion by reaction. In doing so, he was dismissing the altitude limitations of the internal combustion engine and the speed limitations of the propeller. A practical form of turbojet was borne. An entirely new horizon for aeronautics was about to materialize.
Whittle worked on the business of the design of an engine with a potential thrust sufficient to propel a small airplane at very high speeds and at very high altitudes. He settled on an arrangement that incorporated a two-stage centrifugal compressor and a two-stage (Curtis) turbine.

He showed his idea to the station commandant, Group Captain Baldwin, who, perceiving strategic importance and a need for secrecy, sent him to be interviewed by the engine division at the Air Ministry. They in turn, arranged for him to meet Dr A A Griffith at the Royal Aircraft Establishment (RAE). Griffith had started seriously considering gas turbines for propeller-driven aircraft as early as 1926. In a meeting of considerable consequence, Griffith rejected Whittle’s proposals and convinced the Ministry that the idea did not warrant any further attention. Unfortunately, Griffith had his own agenda. He would have known full well that he would be instructed to work on the turbojet should he admit any serious practicality. Despite this setback, Whittle went ahead and applied for a patent – granted in January 1930. However, as the President of the Air Council declared that there was no need for secrecy, it was published in 1931.

#aircraft #p51mustang #fw190

The P-51 Mustang the most dominant escort fighter of World War II it helped blaze a trail from England all the way to Berlin for America’s bomber force of course the Mustang was a revelation it was the war winner its creation was sparked by a mixture of genius and

Chance the Mustang and its two-stage two-speed supercharged Merlin engine were the end result of years of technological development from World War I to World War II to each generation of aircraft went ever higher and faster but the Mustang’s marriage with the Merlin might never have happened national pride delayed the coupling of

These two great Innovations but a new deadly German adversary changed everything they [ __ ] wolf 190 this was really a topnotch fighter aircraft with the fw190 terrorizing the Skies of Europe the British and American forces swallowed their pride and joined together to create the ultimate fighting machine December 17th

1903 the right Brothers aircraft the right one successfully takes off initiating the dawn of Aviation man had already taken to the skies with gliders and balloons but this was the first time that an engine had propelled him into the air the right ones engine was a crude

Design by today’s standards and put out 12 horsepower only it was an inline engine meaning that its cylinders four in total were mounted in a straight line a layout that would Inspire some of the most advanced piston engine aircraft ever created though a simple design the right

Engine was Innovative it was the first engine to make you use of a lightweight cast aluminum crank case every pound counted with a heavier engine the rights may not have made history that Winter’s day in North Carolina aircraft weight and power would continue to be important to the evolution of

Flight World War I was approaching and the newly formed Air Forces of the world needed reliable engines with enough power to sustain flight during operations from France would come a new type of power plant to take the fight into the air the rotary engine rotary engines operated

Differently than the inline ones used by the re Brothers the cylinders were arranged in a radial pattern rather than a line when the engine was fired up the crankshaft remained stationary while the crank case and cylinders rotated around it a rotary engine had one giant advantage over the inlines of the era

It was much lighter and thus gave a pilot better performance during combat or while trying to evade an enemy however the rotary engine was not without its shortcomings it had poor fuel economy as it was often run on Full Throttle it also provided an unpleasant rine caster oil was mixed with the fuel

Mixture for lubrication with the side effect of heavy fumes smoke and an oil shower for Pilots turns with a rotary powered aircraft could prove treacherous as the whole engine rotated It produced a gyroscopic effect a turn to the right at full power and low level could end with the death of a

Pilot rotary powered aircraft remained part of Air Force inventories till Wars end but they were gradually supplanted by the inline engine inlines based on the same principles as the one found in the original right plane kept improving in terms of power and performance between the wars and across

The Atlantic a new type of aircraft engine would emerge to dominate American Aviation the US Navy was looking for aircraft to populate its fledgling aircraft carriers space on board was extremely limited but aircraft with inline engines often had lengthy noses their engines built with rows of cylinders took up too much space on

Cramped carriers rotary engines though more compact had too many other weaknesses to be serious contenders for the role there was however a third type of engine before the war there had been limited experimentation with radial engines at first glance these appear to be just like rotary

Engines it’s only when they are fired up that the difference becomes clear in a rotary engine the crank case and cylinders rotate around the crankshaft but with a radial engine the crankshaft rotates while the engine block is static radios often weren’t as powerful as inline engines but they were less

Complicated they were cooled by air rushing over the engine rather than through a liquid cooling system this made radials less vulnerable to battle damage which might rupture the coolant lines Navy pilots who might have to travel long distances over the ocean to get to a Target needed an engine that

Would be sure to get them home under any circumstance most importantly for the Navy radials were smaller than inline engines so a greater number of aircraft equipped with them could be stored on board their carriers the wri aeronautical Corporation a successor to the original Wright brothers company used their

Aviation expertise to create the first reliable radial engine for the Navy the J5 Whirlwind the J5 was put on display for the entire world to see when Charles Lindberg crossed the Atlantic in his Spirit of St Louis in 1927 his flight solidified the reputation of the J5 radial as a Dependable power [Applause] plant the budding Airlines of the world were looking for engines to power their airliners and to bring their passengers across continents and eventually across the globe safely reliable radial engin seem to be the ideal Choice radials would power many of the principal airliners in the history of

Civil aviation from the Ford Tri motor to the Boeing 247 to the Lockheed model 10 Electra both the US Navy and US Army Air corps would rely heavily on radial engines as they built up their inventories of Fighters and other aircraft in the 1930s the US had just

One inline engine in development the Allison v710 an engine that would one day power some of America’s great Fighters at the time relying on radials seemed a prudent decision but in the years to come and in the battles ahead it will leave the US playing catchup with their allies and enemies in Europe in Europe in the 1930s Air Forces and aircraft manufacturers were looking for Speed Above All Else as they design the next generation of Fighters using streamlined designs and Powerful V12 inline engines they push their aircraft to speeds over 350 m Mph their inline engines were not only more powerful they also helped to create more aerodynamic airf frames their elongated shapes allowed for more streamlined designs as compared with radials inline engines may have been more vulnerable to attack due to their complex liquid cooling systems but no matter how durable a radial engine is

Speed kills in a dog fight inline engin were built to provide just that it was from this European obsession with speed that some of the legendary fighters of World War II were born including the supermarine Spitfire the Hawker hurricane and the mmid bf109 beneath their elegant frames heard

Ever more powerful inline engines from Rolls-Royce and damler Ben respectively in the middle of 1940 the pilot of the RAF tested their medal and the endurance of their Fighting Machines in some of the most spectacular air battles of World War II Vice furer Goring had promised to

Destroy the RAF and thus facilitate the invasion of Britain Goring had at his disposal an armada of medium bombers protected by a deadly fighter Force the result of the Battle of Britain during those few vital months of 19 40 is well known there was a heavy toll in Fighters and pilots on both

Sides British and German Engineers tried to squeeze every ounce of power from their engines any tiny Advantage could be the difference between life and death with Britain in her industry under direct attack she looked to her old colony more than ever to provide her with desperately needed aircraft

Even before the Battle of Britain the British purchasing commission had already been shopping for additional aircraft the US’s initial offer of Fighters was not well suited for the High Altitude dog fights taking place over Europe This was partially due to the American engines available the US had concentrated on

Radial engine production instead of inline engines like the one so popular in European Fighters they did have the Allison engine the v710 like the British Rolls-Royce Merlin it was a 12 cylinder inline engine but it had a complex turbocharger often difficult to fit into an aircraft to boost power in the thin air

At high altitudes the Alison engine used the heat of its exhaust to power a turbine and thereby increased the air flow and power one American aircraft the lock P38 had the extra space needed to have hous the turbocharger it was a big twin engined aircraft to begin with and had space in

Its tail Booms for the extra equipment but given the size of the P38 it wouldn’t have fared well against Nimble single- engine German fighters in the dog Fight America had other smaller Fighters powered by the Allison engine the P39 Eric Cobra and the Curtis P40 Warhawk in both cases their manufacturers failed to include Allison’s turbocharger the P39 had an Innovative layout with its engine situated mid fuselage behind the pilot it was designed to house both the Allison

Engine and the turbocharger however a scoop built into the left side of the fuselage to cool the turbocharger was deemed too aerodynamically expensive both the scoop and the turbocharger were eliminated from the production design this change crippled the aeroc Cobra’s ability to fight at high altitudes in the case of the P40 Warhawk

A rugged single- engined airplane the turbocharger was excluded from the design from the get-go this limited its optimal altitude to just 15,000 ft and thus relegated the aircraft to ground attack the British purchasing commission was still interested in the Warhawk even with it limitations they saw it as more of an army support

Aircraft however the Curtis Factory was running at capacity and could not fulfill the order with no suitable aircraft readily available for purchase the Brits would turn to North American aircraft the British purchasing commission proposed that North American build the Warhawk under license from Curtis but NAA president Dutch kindleberger had a bolder plan

Plan he guaranteed that he could create an even better airplane using the same Allison engine in less time than it would take for him to retool for war Haw production the Brits said yes and the end result was an airplane that may well have changed the outcome of the second world war in Europe back in Europe Germany was looking for an aircraft to augment the BF 109 in the Battle of Britain the BF 109 and spitfire were closely matched but the BF 109 lacked the range to be highly effective in its escort role over Britain in the summer of

1940 the Luft wafa had a twin engined escort the BF 110 it had the range to be an excellent escort but it lacked the maneuverability to defend itself or its charge in a dog fight it also used two diimler Ben 605 engines making it an expensive Sitting Duck for British interceptors

Looking for a quick solution to their escort dilemma the lift wafa even considered having the 110s tow 109’s into battle to conserve fuel but in the long run using two aircraft to perform the role of a single fighter was an even more wasteful solution what the lift wafa needed was a

Dedicated single engine aircraft to fill in for the BF 109 on longer range missions and ideally something to give the decided advantage over the British fighters of the time however the lwfa wanted to have its cake and eat it too they wanted a new fighter but they didn’t want to

Sacrifice any of the precious 605 engines meant for the BF 109 to the consternation of the lift wafa most of the new submissions for fighter designs from German industry were to be built around this very same engine to solve Germany’s escort woes one man Kurt pank [ __ ] Wolf’s

Legendary designer and test pilot did what was almost Unthinkable at the time since the start of the War British and German designers had relied upon powerful 12 cylinder inline engines to power their Fighters tank dared to build Germany’s Next fighter around a bombers radial engine the aircooled BMW 801 radial

Engine had plenty of power and had proven reliable in the ju88 and do 217 but radials in a fighter were a rare site in Europe it was difficult to build this aerodynamic a fuselage to house them in as when constructing one for a slender inline Engine though an unconventional design track tank saw two reasons for encouragement firstly the national advisory committee for Aeronautics in the US had already done research on improving air flow around radial engines over time they had developed the NACA cowl which at least helped to reduce drag this was a simple ring which fitted

Snugly around the cylinders of a radial engine it not only made the engine more aerodynamic it also improved cooling secondly tank observed that the US and Japanese navies were employing several modern carrier aircraft all with radial engines aircraft like the F4F Hellcat and the Japanese A6 m0 the lightweight zero had been almost

Unstoppable in the early part of the Pacific War Tonk had continued to explore ways of improving his new radial engined aircraft and reducing the drag effect although some say his greatest task was selling the radial idea to the ministry if that was the case the bureaucrats must have been quickly won

Over by Kurt Ton’s first prototypes given the designation the ful wolf 190 and unofficially known as The Butcher bird Thea’s latest fighter was rushed into production fortunately for the Allies the fw190 arrived after the close of the battle Britain in the summer of 1941 five Mark 5 Spitfires flying over

The South Coast spotted several radial engine ERS in German markets at first glance they were mistaken for us-built Republic Lancers it was a deadly case of mistaken identity the aircraft were in reality early model fw1 190s the Spitfire pilots who survived the ensuing battle lived to tell just how quickly their comrades had

Been lost but Britain’s greatest loss that day was not Pilots or planes the battle marked the day Britain lost air superiority to the lift wafa the RAF had to do something and fast All Eyes looked to Rolls-Royce manufacturer of the Merlin engine the power plant of the Spitfire hurricane

And so many of Britain’s Great Planes although the company had the Next Generation engine the 12 cylinder Griffin in development it was well over a year away more than enough time for Britain to produce the world earlier there had been some thought given to modifying a few Merlin engines

For experimental high altitude work to be executed by a Wellington bomber it was little more than an idea at the time but in Britain’s hour of desperate need Rolls-Royce Engineers work night and day to test the concept Merlin engines were already supercharged an air compressor mechanically attached to the rotating

Cam shaft increased the air flow to the engine allowing it to burn more fuel and to boost performance Rolls-Royce Engineers had theorized that adding a second supercharger could give the engine even more punish during high altitude work might a two-stage supercharger help the RAF reclaim Air Supremacy the end result of the

Rolls-Royce experiments was breathtaking it was almost as if the two-stage two-speed Merlin was entirely different engine when in fact it was just a modification when the double supercharged aircraft dubbed the Spitfire Mark 9 finally arrived in June of 1942 the RAF had a rare opportunity to test it directly against the captured

Fw190 the test results were far different than the day a group of unlucky RAF Pilots ran into a flock of butcher Birds the two aircraft were virtual equal in terms of performance Captain Eric Brown who had flown a captured fw190 had a chance to test the new Spitfire 9 against the German aircraft

In live combat I had flown the 190 quite a bit so I wasn’t too frightened I reckoned I knew what that aircraft could do and I knew what my spit could do so I thought well can I can handle this guy hoping he was somebody just out of

Training school but no I Pi somebody who really knew what he was up to and we had I would say a twoing and flowing over France but neither could get a draw be than the other and we finally realized that both of us we’ve run out of fuel we

Waggled our wings at each other and departed and um I realized this was really a topn fighter airc the RAF had leveled the playing field with with the lwfa at least for the time being but what the RAF really needed was an aircraft to give them the upper hand the new Merlin’s greatest

Contribution to the war was still to come when it was mated with an extraordinary aircraft of American design back in the US North American aircraft had continued to work on a Warhawk substitute which met the specifications laid out by the British purchasing commission they had specified that the

Airplane be powered by an Allison engine that it cost less than $40,000 and that it be armed with 4303 in machine guns North American answered with the P-51 Mustang it featured an advanced laminer flow wing for good aerodynamic efficiency and a wide gate undercarriage for safer

Landing pleasing to the eye and to fly although mainly at lower altitudes the new arrival quickly gained respect from pilots and Grand Crews alike there were some concerns about how the Mustang would fare should it be forced to ditch while crossing the channel during a water landing its air

Scoop located beneath the fuselage might flood the aircraft or cause it to overturn water tank tests at Saunders row were initiated to perfect the techniques for ditching the aircraft around the same time that the RAF was getting the Spitfire Mark 9 ready for combat and the fw10 was dominating the skies Rolls-Royce test

Pilot Ronald Hawker was tasked with the mission of evaluating all aircraft powered by non Rolls-Royce engines he was thoroughly impressed with the p-51a save for its poor performance at high altitude like the P40 warhog it had an Allison engine and no turbocharger Hawker pondered how the aircraft might perform with the new

Merlin engine the results on paper were phenomenal according to rolls-royce’s calculations with a Merlin power plant the Mustang would not only outclass any American aircraft but even new Spitfires using the same engine oddly Hawker had to push for the mating of the Merlin 61 and the Mustang even though the double supercharged P-51

Would have outclassed the fw190 as well Hawker finally arranged for the marriage of the two great inventions and test trials confirmed his hunch the Mustang was a Warner the main challenge was to produce enough aircraft and engines to reclaim the Skies of Europe North American would tweak the

Mustang design to accommodate the Merlin 61 engine it was a much more powerful engine so the original p-51a airframe had to be reinforced as well the three bladed prop was exchanged for one with four blades the addition of Plumbing for drop tanks might have seemed a small change but it

Would have a great impact on the air battles to come Packard took up manufacturer of the Merlin 61 engines in the US they were designated the V1 1650s Packard had arranged a licensing agreement with Rolls-Royce earlier in the war Ford was originally slated to build americanmade Merlins and seemed a

Perfect Choice due to the company’s industrial might but Henry Ford was adamant that his company build defensive weapons only North American double supercharged aircraft the p-51b and p-51c first took flight in the spring in summer of 1943 air Vice Marshall Patty Harbison recalls when the Mustangs first arrived at his Spitfire Squadron of course the Mustang was a revelation it was a much more comfortable airplane than the Spitfire was and I have heard people talk about the relative merits of both they were both

War winners the Spitfire was melt an Interceptor it could out turn a Mustang and could our climb it but it didn’t have the legs the Mustang and of course if you can’t get to where the fight is you’re not you’re you’re not too effective as P-51 started to arrive in

Europe the war was changing and the Mustang was the perfect aircraft for the time the US was taking the war to Germany they were bombing the German War Industry out of business the only problem was their bombers were being shredded by Speedy German interceptors the US had hinged their

Hopes on the ability of their bombers to defend themselves by maintaining a tight box formation when this strategy failed they were in dire need of an escort fight the P38 Lightning was simply not agile enough to take on the role then there was the p47 Thunderbolt it was an awesome radial engine fighter

More than capable of taking care of itself in battle but it had two major flaws it was expensive and it lacked the range to take the bombers all the way to Berlin and back the P-51 B’s and C’s arrived just in time they had been designed to carry

Drop tanks and with the addition of a fuel tank behind the pilots they had more than enough fuel to escort American bombers to Hitler’s Lair the Mustang proved more than a match for Germany’s fw19 and me19 slowly American bombers closed in around Berlin suddenly the Germans found themselves playing

Catchup Kurt Ton’s fw190 with a radial engine found it difficult at higher altitudes where the bombers roam HK swapped its radial engine for an inline the long-nosed aircraft was nicknamed the Dora the f wolf Dora the later Dora was a magnificent fighter with an engine change not really any

Structural changes other than those to accommodate the engine but what it meant was here was an airplan that could keep up with the hunt as the years of the war progressed so from 1942 right up to the end of the war the [ __ ] 190 was in the top grade of fighter or fighter

B the P-51 Mustang also continued to evolve as mechanics and Engineers Incorporated changes based on the feedback of pilots who had tested the plane in battle its canopy went through several permutations the British swapped the original one for a sliding Malcolm Hood similar to a Spitfires for improved visibility the p-51b the definitive

Version of the Mustang had a bubble canopy which offered 360° of Clear View North American also upgraded the D’s Firepower it had 6 50 caliber machine guns compared to four in earlier models and it had solved the problem of gun jamming during hard turns the fuel tank situated behind the

Pilot may have increased range but it created other issues the plane had poor directional stability when the tank was full to counter this problem Engineers added a small dorsal fin in the D model these and other improvements would help the Mustang blaze a path to Berlin for America’s bombers Rees Marshall Herman gar

Commander of the L was quoted as saying when I saw Mustangs over Berlin I knew the jig was up when the European War had come to a close the battle still raged in the Pacific the Mustang was the best escort available but even with its incredible range it could not accompany an aircraft

Like the b29 super fortress on extended bombing missions over Japan the expanses of ocean were too large the engineers at North American struggled with the problem of stretching the Mustang’s range their solution was a zwilling or twin Mustang by fusing two Mustangs together they hope to dramatically increase the

Range of the Mustang while retaining its excellent dog fighting abilities the new Mustang the f82 had an incredible range 2,000 Mi though the prototypes were powered by Packard built Merlin engines the US Army aircore was adamant that the production version be totally americanmade unfortunately for the f82

Without Merlin engines it was not the same aircraft when fitted with the Allison v710 100 its speed dropped and high altitude performance suffered it was one of the few cases of a prototype outperforming the production model of an aircraft by the time the f82 was ready Japan had surrendered and the war was

Over after the war the P-51 continued to serve while other piston engine fighters of the era went quietly into retirement though it was the dawn of the jet age there was still a place for the Mustang in a variety of roles Colonel Ray o Roberts flew the

Mustang during its Second Life at that time I was flying what they call the F6 which is a P-51 with cameras also had guns and uh you could had the bombing and gun Gunnery capability and we participated in the post off phili mapping program we ma revised all the

Japanese Maps photographed did aerial photography in Japan and and Korea when the Korean War arrived Mustangs which had been mothballed for long-term storage were suddenly being shipped across the Pacific on carriers unable to compete with the next generation of jet fighters for the dog fighter role Mustangs returned to where

They started in Korea Mustangs made excellent ground attack aircraft they didn’t have the speed of jets but they had the endurance to make it from Japan to Korea on bombing runs in Korea the f82 also had an opportunity to taste combat for the first time f82 is flew strike escort and night fighter

Missions the marriage of the P-51 Mustang and the Merlin 61 engine produced incredible results it provided the allies with an effective escort to pound the last Nails into Germany’s coffin perhaps the most amazing thing about the P-51 Stellar career is that it might never have happened if the Merlin and Mustang had

Never been mated at the suggestion of Hawker at Rolls-Royce the P-51 might have had a humdrum career as a reliable ground attack aircraft rather than an elite dog fighter it arrived at the right time and the right place in history just when the Allies needed an escort

Fighter the P-51 was the end result of years of aircraft and engine development though jet powered aircraft would supplant it the impact of the Mustang and Merlin in military history cannot be Unwritten or Denied at the farboro air show in 1949 barely 4 years after the war ended Britain presented an impressive array of jet aircraft some were purely military others experimental and there were even some airliners converted from piston engines to the new jet technology perhaps the best crowd pleaser was the advanced deavin Comet turbojet

Airliner elsewhere in England other types of jet airliners were being developed but these were somewhat different this is The vicker’s vicount Airliner when it first came into service in the early 50s it quickly became a success one of the main reasons for the Vic Count’s ever expanding order book

Was the aircraft’s Rolls-Royce Dart Turbo prop engines however the vi count wasn’t the only Contender nor was the dart the only turbo prop engine available at the time slightly smaller than the vi count and with different turbo propop engines the Armstrong witworks of the emerging post-war airline industry with government backing British industry

They had something special to offer with the Revolutionary turboprop engines the concept of a conventional jet having its exhaust thrust converted into turning power for traditional propeller blades was brand new and it made for extremely economical and very smooth running there were two early examples the Rolls-Royce Dart and the competitive

Armstrong sidley model Mamba the Apollo’s designers favored the Mamba whereas Vickers chose the Dart construction of the Apollo started in Armstrong woodworth’s Factory at bagging airport in 1948 baggon had been bombed during the German Blitz on Coventry it was used as an RAF fighter base during the War years but now it

Would be used as part of Britain’s critical export drive to repay the war debt there were grounds for optimism as the country refocused its industry only 3 years earlier manufacturers had produced Spitfires and lancasters by the thousands and for a time most of the skilled aircraft Builders were still on

Hand one of the more notable features of the Apollo’s Mamba engines was their narrow diameter slender and aerodynamic they complemented the aircraft Aesthetics however the smaller engine housings that accompanied the Mamba did not provide for an area to store the landing gear in flight this meant that the main Wheels

Had to retract into the fuselage consuming valuable space however the Mamba still showed great promise apart from anything else it had already powered a trainer the Athena which was actually the first production aircraft to employ a turbo prop engine also early tests suggested good performance in 1948 a 500h hour test run

Confirmed the engine’s durability after this Armstrong Whitworth were sure that they had a winning combination the aw55 Apollo prototype was designed and built to accommodate a crew of three two pilots and one cabin crew passenger seating could be configured for up to 31 people however a slightly longer version for

Production had also been discussed as well as a military version for True transport construction on the Apollo progressed until its roll out in April of 1949 this Sleek fully pressurized airliner was a far cry from the utility Fighters and bombers the industry had produced just a few years

Before on the 10th of April Apollo aircraft serial number vx220 took to the air from a grass field at baggon airport its first flight lasted just half an hour and the results were less than impressive the first problem was that the Mamba asm2 engines failed to produce the 1200 plus horsepower expected which

Were indeed needed to meet the aircraft’s performance requirements the 800 horsepower that was actually recorded was Far short of what was anticipated subsequent test flights also demonstrated numerous flaws in the airframe design improvements were constantly made until a critical flight test to parison back was undertaken on the 12th of March

1951 still problems persisted with the Apollo having a flawed airframe and the Mamba engines remaining underpowered in June of 1952 all further development on the Apollo was abandoned and the only two examples ever built were used for research work at bosome down this left the Vickers VI count the

Undoubted winner and it was this type that also went on to become one of Britain’s all-time airliner export earners with 445 built the redoutable Rolls-Royce Dart Turbo prop engine was even more successful with over 7,000 engines delivered to numerous customers up until 1987 41 years after its first test

For a while the Armstrong Sidle Mamba had no such success but then again it certainly wasn’t a complete failure either rather with Improvement it morphed into several different life forms each one displaying considerable and unexpected Ingenuity at about the same time that the Apollo was under construction the

Royal Navy and fery Aviation were developing a truly remarkable anti-submarine aircraft the fery ganet shared the same problems as many carrier born aircraft it had the performance needs of two power plants but this usually meant the high risk of possibly having to land with one engine not functioning this type of asymmetric

Approach is highly dangerous for the air Crew a second consideration for Fair’s designers was the significant economy that might be achieved on Long missions if one of two engines could actually be turned off and yet still leave the plane with the same balance as a single engined aircraft Armstrong Sly thought that they might have the answer the very narrow

Diameter of the Mamba turbo prop might now prove most useful if two could be assembled side by side driving two Contra rotating propellers both able to be turned on and off independent of the other the double Mamba as it became known was a major success providing ganet Pilots with two jet

Power plants in an aircraft that had great range and at the same time was safe to land even with one engine down because of its Mamba engines the ganet became a much trusted Maritime aircraft which went on to serve in a number of other countries with nearly 350 of all types

Made it wasn’t so far off the numbers of VI counts delivered although the vicker’s plane had four turbo props as opposed to the ganet 2 Still The Versatile Mamba had much more to offer by removing the gearbox and the propeller Drive Armstrong sidley were able to present a conventional

Turbojet with a few more deletions in economies this evolved into a so-called Expendable power plant and it transpired that there actually was quite a market for a shortlife jet engine it was named the adder postwar Western governments knew that they might have to deal with Soviet forces that would include jet

Aircraft target practice on anything flying less than in the high 500 mph range would be useless equally important a Target would have to be able to fly up to a height of 50,000 ft and get there quickly since most drones only have a limited flight time in 1948 the Australian government

Aircraft Factory entered into a contract to develop an unmanned radio controlled flying Target it was given the name gind divic Aboriginal for the hunted one made in Australia many were shipped to Britain in Parts where with their experience with the Mamba engine Ferry Aviation assembled each unit that was

Powered by the Mamba descendant the adder more than 500 gind divix were built and employed by Australia Britain the United States and Sweden over time Armstrong sidley merged with the rivals Rolls-Royce although not before it had redeveloped the adder into a stronger and more reliable Turbo Jet

The end result was also much more powerful it was named the Viper and Vipers were produced in the hundreds powering the jet Provost strike Masters Hawker sidley 125 and many more what started out as a misfire with the Mamba engines on the Apollo developed over time into a successful line of engines

With the double Mamba adder and vipers that would power numerous aircraft for years to come one problem facing the designers of the next generation of turbojet engines is that of increasing turban Inlet temperatures air cooled turban blades may offer a solution solution to this problem the fabrication of a cast

Aircool turban blade that has shown promise in Prototype testing will be shown in this Film this blade was made using a modification of the Lost wax casting technique a process to provide long slender holes for cooling passages was developed by the Lewis flight propulsion laboratory of the national advisory committee for Aeronautics this development is particularly important because the super Alloys used in aircraft turbine blades

Are extremely difficult to machine ceramic tubes are used as part of the casting mold to establish cores or holes through the turban blade casting Cor core tubes of the desired outside diameter are assembled in a pattern die the core tubes are held in place by embedding them in a bar of soft

Wax using a hot wire or Knight the dyes used are made of a low melting alloy cast around a brass Master pattern a casting pattern is made by closing the dyes containing the ceramic tubes clapping the dyes in a wax injection machine and injecting Molten wax Under Pressure the wax pattern

Containing ceramic tubes is removed from the dye and excess wax is trimmed leaving a light wax film on the exposed ceramic tubes to permit freedom of movement due to expansion additional pieces of wax are assembled by welding with a hot wire these pieces will form sprew Runners and

Ingates or passages for the molten metal to reach the blade cavity in the casting mold the assembled wax is mounted on a waxed base to seal it a can type flask is placed over the assembly and it too is sealed at the bottom when the investment is Thoroughly mixed it is

Poured into the flask and around the wax pattern assembly the flask is then placed in a vacuum chamber to remove air from the mix after investing and air drying the moles are placed in a furnace here the drying is completed the wax is melted out the wax residue is burned off and

The mold is cured during this furnace cycle the temperature is gradually increased from room temperature to, 1900 de fah metal alloy for the casting is melted in an electric induction furnace when the metal reaches a temperature of 3000° f The Crucible of molten metal is placed in a centrifugal

Casting machine and the hot mold is placed over it as the casting machine is spun the molten metal is thrown into the mold the casting is removed by breaking away the mold after the casting is cleaned up the ceramic tubes used to form the cooling passages in the blade must be

Removed this is done by threading fine stainless steel wires through each ceramic tube and stretching them taut on a frame the turbine blade is then attached to a cam device designed to slide the blade up and down on the wires the lower part of the assembly is then immersed in a

Bath of molten costic this helps to remove reaction products and introduces fresh costic to the bore of the tubes and hence accelerates the solution and removal of the core tubes the rough casting is cleaned in an air water abrasive blast a suitable base configuration is then ground and the blade is ready for

Testing in a research facility the process you have just seen illustrates a principle that has been effective in producing long thin cord holes in castings this process may be useful in fabricating turbine blades to be used at very high turban Inlet temperatures the F100 is one of our primary tactical

Support weapon systems this aircraft has a proven history of outstanding performance one of the reasons for this dependability is the rugged power plant the one one a high performance aircraft is adaptable to many missions it is used for reconnaissance as a tactical fighter and as an Interceptor approximately 30,000 lb of

Crust is developed by its twin engy the f102 is the first operational Air Force Delta wi aircraft performance characteristics of this weapon system are ideally suited for intercept missions a reliable power plant is a essential for the success of any Mission the f102 101 and 100 are all

Powered by the rugged j57 engine developed by pratton Whitney the individual engines vary somewhat but for most part are the same fundamental design the j57 is a dual compressor engine the engine consists of the following components the inlet the low pressure comp compressor the high press compressor the diffuser

Case combustion chamber the first second and third stage turbin the After Burner and the exhaust nozzles the low pressure compressor referred to as N1 is driven by the second and third stage Turing the high press compressor M2 is driven by the first stage turb these two two units or spools are not mechanically

Connected the j57 operates on the same basic principle as all jet engin pressure presented in graph form below the basic engine offline and velocity are increased by a series of rotors in the compressor section a compressor bleed system prevents compressor instability when the engine is operating at reduced

Power the compressed air passes through the diffuser into the combustion chamber where the air expands thus reducing somewhat the velocity and pressure fuel is mixed with a portion of the air to form the combustible Mass when combustion occurs the gases are expelled through the turbin at this

Point power is extracted by the turbin to drive the compressor the remaining energy expell through the exhaust nozzle provides the thrust since exhaust nozzle and turban discharge pressures are relative turban discharge pressure is used as a parameter to determine the thrust frust is the measure of force developed by the engine force is

Determined by mass times acceleration mass is the weight of air and fuel passing through the engine acceleration is the difference between Inlet and turbine discharge verities of this Mass thus crust May expressed by the formula Force equals mass time acceleration the engine trim charts are based on this formula additional frust

Is obtained in the After Burner by increasing mass and acceleration at that stage the basic engine pressure ratio during After Burner operation is maintained by increasing the exhaust nozzle area addition engine operation depends on correct fuel schedule the basic components of the j57 main engine fuel system are fuel pump and fuel pump

Transfer valve fuel control and the pressurizing and dump valve the fuel pump is a dual element for gear pump one element supplies fuel to the After Burner the other to the main engine the fuel control meters the fuel required to operate the engine through its full range the pressurizing and dump valve

Supplies the main engine fuel manifold and drains the manifold at engine shut down at engine start fuel enters the pump through the impeller where the pressure is increased this provides a positive pressure head to the main stage at this stage the fuel reaches output pressure the pressurized fuel closes the

Fuel regulating transfer valve and the After Burner check valve and flows into the fuel control the main metering valve is closed at this time a portion of this fuel passes through the minimum SL orifice through the signal line through the pnv valve since the control is in bypass pressure

Does not build up enough to close this valve until the power lever moves from cut off to IDs when the power lever is moved to the idle position the fuel dump valve closes the main metering valve opens the cut off valve moves off its seat the pressure loading valve opens the p&v

Valve Inlet check valve opens and fuel is supplied to the primary side of the fuel manifold through the pressurizing and dump valve at approximately 74% RPM the fuel pressurizing valve will open to supply fuel to the secondary side of the fuel manifolds the j57 engine uses a primary

And secondary system in order to obtain the highest possible fuel flow with the shortest possible flate at low RPMs only the primary side is used when the emergency system is selected the actuator positions the pilot valve to direct pressure to the shuttle valve system the shuttle valve

Blocks off metered flow and provides a p for unmetered fuel to the emergency throttle valve this mechanical valve controls the flow of fuel the afterburner element of the fuel pump will supply fuel to the engine in the event of main element failure the primary function is to furnish fuel for the after

Burn the other components of the j57 After Burner system are the after burer fuel control exhaust nozzle control igniter valve and the mechanical shut off valve the relative position of the components varies according to engine model the afterburner fuel control meters fuel to the ab spray box the exhaust nozzle control directs

Compressor discharge air to open and close the nozzles the igniter valve injects fuel into the combustion chamber creating a streak of flame to ignite the After Burner in the event of electrical failure the mechanical shut off valve will terminate AB operation at Approximately 80% RPM rotation of this valve causes AB

Stage fuel to bypass through the ab fuel control regulator valve the fuel control unit is carefully calibrated on the test bench to assure accurate engine fuel schedule the main functions of the fuel control are to maintain acceleration schedules below compressor stall Zone to prevent over temperature during acceleration prevent lean die out during

Deceleration and to maintain any selected engine speed within operating limits regardless of altitude the fuel control senses engine RPM Inlet temperature and burner pressure to supply the correct amount of fuel for any ambient condition when celebration is been completed all external adjustments except the idle and Military trim screws

Are sealed these seals are installed to protect testbench precision calibrations and must not be removed the j57 engine will provide relatively trouble-free operation when all systems are functioning correctly however the systems must be properly rigged and adjusted one of the most critical engine adjustments is the rigging of the fuel control Lage

Full range movement is obtained only when the fuel control and afterburner mechanical shut off valve levers are correctly positioned the levers are set to predetermined angles a protractor or ET template is used to set the linkage at these angles the protractor is positioned at the oil pump and accessory housing plug

To establish a reference angle this reference angle will be used to adjust the fuel control lever with the fuel control lever in cut off position the difference between the reference angle and this reading must be the number of degrees specified in the tech manual it may be necessary to readjust

The fuel control lever to obtain the correct angle the fuel control lever and serrated spacer are ratcheted to give the desired angle the fuel control position which when all other linkage is connected will close the afterburner mechanical shut off down the power actuating Rod is then attached to the fuel control

Lever move the mechanical shut off lever to the detent position the rod connecting the cross shaft lever and mechanical shut off valve lever may have to be adjusted to the specified length the ab mechanical shut off valve is held in detent position while the lever is ratcheted to the position where

The rod which has already been adjusted to the specified length will fit then all connections are tighten either the protractor or an eted template is used to again check the angle of the fuel control lever it may be necessary to readjust the fuel control lever to obtain the correct angle

After Corrections are made all connections are then safety replacement or adjustment of most components will affect engine operation prior to aircraft installation the engine is Thoroughly inspected and tested to ensure satisfactory performance a fuel at least check is imperative before initial start of a repaired Engine with the system pressurized check

All fuel lines and connections the exhaust nozzle opening must also be rechecked before initial end start Nal diameter not within specified limits will affect engine efficiency on some engines a fail safe devic is installed to prevent total loss of power in the event of linkage failure the device will position the fuel

Control lever to a 45° angle setting which will provide approximately 90% RPM thus ensuring sufficient thrust to make maintain flight after installation in the aircraft all airframe to engine connections must be checked and adjusted and the engine retri Final Trim to compensate for aircraft installation losses is preferably accomplished with the

Aircraft headed directly into the width prevailing wind velocity and direction must be within limits specified in the tech menu the trim pad area must be free of loose objects that could damage the engine if ingested to effectively trim the engine power control settings must be coordinated throttle linkage is

Operationally tested before making fuel control control adjustments movement of the fuel control quadrant must synchronize with throttle movement power control movement is transferred to obtain predetermined fuel control settings the aircraft manual indicates the relative degree of movement throughout the entire throttle Range close attention to detail is required when trimming an engine changes

In ambient barometric pressure and temperature will affect engine performance characteristics true barometric pressure and correct temperature both recorded within 15 minutes of the trim run are used to determine Target pp7 Target pp7 is obtained by tracing the temperature and pressure coordinates on the trim chart start engine is specified in the tech

Manual and allow engine and exhaust gas temperature to stabilize [ __ ] throttle to idle setting desired idle speed is obtained by adjusting the idle trim scw as in all fuel control adjust adjustments Final Trim is always in the increased RPM Direction proceeding with the trim operations slowly Advance throttle to military power allow 5

Minutes for stabilize caution do not over speed or overt engine during runup and stabilization with throttle set at military power record RPM EGT and the turban discharge pressure cp7 if pp7 reading is low return frle to idle and readjust maximum rpm setting at the fuel control turn the adjustment clockwise to

Increase RPF in order to obtain Target pp7 advance throttles to military P [Applause] Stabilize then recheck pt7 return throttle to Idol check EGT and RPM make certain that RPM is within 2% of data plate speed indication at the completion of the trim run follow standard shutdown procedures accurate troubleshooting depends on a thorough understanding of the j57 engine and its system function

Only by correct analysis of the interrelated parameters can the malfunction be isolated provision troubleshooting is the mark of quality the tech manual outlines the common symptoms of engine malfunctions the probable causes and their remedy basic parameters used to determine engine performance must also be considered when analyzing problems these basic parameters are RPM

Ct7 and EGT one of the most detrimental engine malfunctions is overtting or high EGT perform static checks of cd7 lines and connections and the exhaust nozzle opening make sure the antiicing valves are Clos then check for instrument accuracy all static checks have been performed and found satisfactory now the

Engine must be checked for proper trip as engine approaches military power check exhaust nozzle for three check to make sure the pt7 has not exceeded Target and RPM is within data PL limits if High EGT still exists the engine must be removed and a hot section inection must be

Performed insect the burner can for cracks or hotpots check fuel nozzles for loose burned or missing air caps and evidence of seal leaks or clogged air holes check the first stage turban nozzle guide veins for excessive bow turban veins boded Beyond limits will distort the gas path causing loss of turban

Efficiency the amount of fuel required to compensate for this loss accounts for the excess temperature in conjunction with correction of the Bowe nozzle guide veins or providing they were within limits additional checks are necessary to assure the problem is corrected infect first and second stage outer air seats for cracks burned areas

And damage to Outer knife edges check clearance between outer air seals and turban blade shrouds check first stage turbine dislocating Dimensions the cause of high EGT may have been one major problem isolated at any phase of the investigation or the accumulation of minor deficiencies requiring several procedures to isolate and

Correct had RPM exceeded data plate limits during initial High EGT troubleshooting trim runs the engine would have to be feel cleaned before proceeding with other checks For this process is intended to restore compressor efficiency when this operation is completed retrimming the engine may bring all parameters within Limits when troubleshooting engine performance deficiencies it is necessary to consider all three parameters EGT RPM and pt7 as an example failure to obtain Target pt7 can be caused by many things by comparing the relationship to EGT and RPM many unnecessary troubleshooting steps can be eliminated for instance when all three

Parameters are low a fuel scheduling deficiency is indicated first check for a full travel of the power lever at the fuel control quadrant military position must not be less than 54° the next step is to remove the fuel control and check the position of the cam shaft with the cam shaft cover

Removed lever positioned at 11° and the temperature sense bulb in a 60° F bat measure the distance from the end of Cam Shaft to the cover flange this reading should coincide with that on the cam shaft depth plate tolerances and replacement instruction are included in the engine tech

Manual the engine tech manual includes Specific Instructions for maintenance procedures these manuals represent a vast accumulation of knowledge and experience through individual ability initiative and constant use of a tech manual proper maintenance and troubleshooting procedures can be achieved this is the goal of the improved maintenance program

I was quite astonished to know what it was because it had no propeller and John replied oh it’s easy old boy it just sucks itself along like a Hoover there was the awful Race Against Time there was the skull duggery she used to say oh well Daddy’s doing something very hush

Hush I thought my goodness why didn’t I think of this before and it seems so obvious Then a small English church is the last resting place of a man who didn’t just changed the face of the Earth he enabled us to see what it actually looked like his name was Frank Whitt this is the story of how he invented the jet engine he overcame all

The odds only to see the British government almost throw his idea away and miss a chance to shorten the Second World [Applause] War I was born on June the 1st 1907 in centry my parents were working class my father was a foreman in Machine Tool manufacturers I lived there in cry for 9

Years went to an elementary school there then the family moved to lemington Spa because my father bought a small very small engineering outfit called the Livington valve and Pistol ring company and I really did get my first engineering experiences there because I helped him sometimes so I think it was

About TS an hour or something like that uh um making slots in val stems in lemington Frank also won a scholarship to the town’s secondary school I was very lazy with homework and got a series of raspberries for that but at the end of term I would

Often do quite well for inst I’d come top of meths something like that I never did win a prize at school but I did an awful lot of private study I used to go down to the library in lington Spar and study all sorts of things which are not in the school

Curriculum and uh that was where I first started to learn about guas turbin I U was always attracted to flying from my earliest years almost when I was for my favorite toy and this is 1911 uh was was a tin model of aerio and my heroes were people like Captain

Albert ball and major mccon and so on the VCS of the first world war and I just wanted to fly and also I thought that boys in the uniform of aircraft apprentices look very good so I decided I’d like to wear that uniform and applied to join as

An apprentice the Royal Air Force however rejected young Whittle he was too small I uh was sunk for the time being but before I left the camp a very kindly physical training sergeant if you can imagine such a thing uh took pity on me and he gave me a diet to follow and

Series of exercises Max holding exercises I did all that for 6 months I put on 3 in on height and 3 Ines on my chest so I thought well I’ll have another shot and I wrote to the ministry they said no once you’ve been turned down you’ve been turned down forever I

Thought well I go through the whole process again as i’ never happen in the hope that the bureaucracy wouldn’t pick it up and I was lucky that time and ended up at cranell in number four Wing Whittle didn’t enjoy life as an Air Force Apprentice in that rank he would

Never get to fly what brightened whittle’s life was the model aircraft Society where he became the leading light at building working replicas so much so that uh the initials bwm which stood for boy wi model aircraft Society was most people said that meant boy W boy whittles model

Aircraft Society because we know we were known as boy Whittle Boy Smith and so forth in those days whittle’s skills at making model planes singled him out to the authorities perhaps he might be officer material there were to be uh five Cadets selected from number four Wing at

Cranwell and uh I was number six in the passing house list so when the number one boy failed because of his eyesight uh it made me eligible the founder of the royal Air Force had his doubts though Lord trenchard nearly stopped it because um I hadn’t been a

Leading boy and I hadn’t made my uh no kind of a name in sports on which a lot of weight was put in those days Whitt’s Co had a compelling reason to make trenchard think again he thought that he got a a a mathematical genius it was this natural gift that got

Whittle a Cadet Ship less than 1% of apprentices made the huge step to join the elite in the Officers Training college at Cranwell although this was next to the apprentices wing it was socially another world one that shared the culture of the public schools from where most of the cadets then Came In The Bleak linkshire Countryside Frank whittle’s life now took a new Direction Cranwell provided a very intensive education for Whittle for the cadets just as it is today the highlight of the course was the flying lessons I learned to fly on the a 504k that was a very ancient type of airplane 19 191 type and it sort with a

Toothpick Between the Wheels you know uh to prevent it tipping over on its nose which in reality it helps it to tip it over on his nose or even turn upside down Whittle was soon a daring even overconfident pilot and one who had his fair share of

Accidents I’m I have to confess I wrecked two or three airplanes three at least yeah the the first run I got lost and wanted to get back to cranell when the visibility deteriorated very badly it was the day incidentally of the cross country run at Cranwell which all

Cadets hated and they most of my fellow Cadets thought I’d done it to get out of the cross country Room in between Learning to Fly and studying at Cranwell Whittle first conceived the idea that would make him famous it all started with a student thesis orades had to write a thesis and I chose future development and aircraft design rather ambitious and rather concentrated on the engine side but the

Main thing in that thesis was that I arrived at what I now know know was the well-known Breer formula I wasn’t familiar with it at the time connecting speed range engine efficiency and so forth and to me that meant that if you wanted to go very fast and far

You would have to go very high heights of 50,000 ft that sort of thing at T where the piston engine obviously wouldn’t work and at speeds which a uh where the propeller wouldn’t work so it was I started to look for a new kind of power plant with prepared this paper during

The first half of 1928 but his findings at Cranwell were the fruit of the 5 years he had by now been training there my crl thesis um when the professor marked it he wrote on it uh in effect that he didn’t really understand it but he gave me 30 out of

30 which I thought was quite satisfactory wh envisaged flying speeds of 500 mph at a time when propeller planes struggled to reach 100 50 these machines were noisy and shook the pilot terribly that’s because their engines were actually car motors on a bigger scale with many moving Parts

Whitt felt an aesthetic dislike for such power plants the problem with the piston engine as you go up height even though you supercharge it is that the power drops off as the air gets thinner and there eventually comes a point where it won’t generate enough power to turn itself over against its own

Friction whittle’s idea would use the same Principle as a balloon filled with air when this escapes every child knows what happens but it wasn’t clear how an engine might recreate such a force I considered a piston engine driving a fan inside a hollow fuselage and then thought well why not

Throw that piston engine away up the compression ratio of the fan and substitute a turbine for the piston engine and there was the turbo by now Whittle had left Cranwell but his search for this solution had preoccupied him ever since it didn’t come to me out of the blue for the

Simple reason that I’ve been trying to find it for 18 months but just the the thought get rid of the piston engine and substitute turbing you might say that came out of the blue whether I was having a bath or what whatever at the time I couldn’t tell

You whittle’s plan proposed just one moving part this would be a shaft with a compressor driven by a turbine at the other end it would work like this the compressor spins round sucking air into combustion Chambers at many times atmospheric pressure here this air is mixed with

Vaporized Fuel and ignited the hot gas created expands through the turbine turning the shaft and escapes into the atmosphere it is this continuous Force which propels a jet airplane along the turbojet concept brought with it so many natural advantages a very big factor in favor of

A a jet engine was that when you went up high uh the air temperature was very low pretty cold and that benefited the compressor a lot it meant that you could get a uh much better conditions for the compressor and the other thing is that in a normal toone velocity coming out of

It is way wasted in the case of the jet engine that was completely used after the idea had come to me I thought my goodness why didn’t I think of this before and it seems so obvious then this was Whitt’s moment of Genius he had seen the future of powered flight

And he was a pilot officer aged just 22 I was at the central flying school at wittering uh doing the flying instructors course one of the instructors there was WP Johnson who became a very good friend and colleague in later years and he’d been trained as a patent agent and he

Became very interested in my proposal he thought it would work and he helped me to draft a patent have you ever patented anything no I don’t know anything about it does a patent both publish and protect that is the whole point of patents but one things essential file a

Patent application before touting the thing round otherwise you haven’t a hope I’ll tell you what let’s rough out a specification now oh what fine what do we do well you make a rather better sketch and I’ll get on with a clever bit the writing okay armed with his patent

Whittle offered his idea to Industry no one thought it could ever work according to the theories of the time there was this fundamental difficulty with gas turbines inefficient compressors inefficient turbines and the other big snag was the materials then existing in 1929 wouldn’t stand temperatures of more than say about 500°

Centigrade but I knew or felt pretty confident that they would evolve in the normal course of development and of course they did the positive young officer also went to London to put his revolutionary concept to the air Ministry Whitt fared no better when he met AA Griffith one of the ministry’s top

Scientists I went to see uh Dr Griffith and another scientist at South Kensington explained the idea it was very coolly received Griffith pointed out an error in my calculations and it was all rather depressing you know and then after that I got a letter from the air Ministry

Saying in effect that uh they weren’t really interested and so forth it didn’t help that um I hadn’t then received an engineering degree soon after this rejection Whitt seemed to have more bad news after I completed the flying instructors course I very nearly got posted at

Number four FTS Abu SAR in Egypt that would have been a real nail in the coffing of the jet engine if that had happened fortunately the posting was changed Whitt remained in Britain and served a year as a flying instructor these were happy times for him in May

1930 he married Dorothy Lee during this period he also got the chance to develop his exceptional flying skills he was now one of the raf’s best pilots and was chosen to fly in the henden air pageants where he thrilled Spectators with his skills at crazy flying these were the Red Arrows of the

Day and Whitt loved entertaining the public this way at this time in Germany a young scientist was eagerly looking forward to his first trip in an airplane his name was Hans Von ohine I always dreamed about the beauty of flying my first flight with a commercial airplane I believe it was a three

Engine yonus was a great disappointment it was was so noisy and so vibratory that I felt the piston engine and propeller is not the good propulsion system the Elegance of flying is destroyed by it the sight of smoke rushing from chimneys inspired Fon a to think if that Force

Could be created by a turbine maybe he could make a smoother Arrow Engine highp speed was not the primary goal to me the smoothness and low noise was more the starting point of my thinking but as I thought about it I noticed that as a matter of fact it

Will be capable of driving the airplane faster Britain’s air Ministry had declined to keep Whitt’s patents a secret freely available they quickly made their way to Germany just as the Nazis came to power these patents were widely read in German Aviation circles at the same time that Hitler was rapidly

Building a new Luft buffer whittle’s idea aroused no such interest in Great Britain and his own jet engine remained still born yet the Royal Air Force was certainly Keen to nurture its inventor after four years every General duties officer had to specialize he was given a choice between engineering

Radio navigation physical training and so on uh but I didn’t get a choice because having been pestering the administ with inventions they just said to me you will be an engineer though they stopped sending officers to Cambridge they decided that I should go so I went to Cambridge in

September 34 to take mechanical Sciences tripods once at University Whitt applied every piece of learning to to his idea for jet propulsion I had got the feeling rather that I might might be ahead of my time and with the extra knowledge I gained at Cambridge I did become rather more aware of the

Difficulties then this letter arrived in the post which says my dear Whittle this is just a hrid note to tell you that I have just met a man who is a bit of a big noise in an engineering concern and to whom I me mentioned your invention of

An airplane s’s propeller as it were and who is very interested he’s jotted a note at the top of the original letter he says this letter changed the course of my life and triggered a revolution in aviation and it did because this letter rescued the turbo jet idea in this

Country from Oblivion the writer was Ral Dudley Williams an old friend from Cranwell he visited Whittle at Cambridge with another former officer named Collingwood tinling and they approached me with the idea of forming a company and getting on with it and they succeeded a merchant bank was the Catalyst our Falcon Partners were

Approached by an intermediary an engineer named Bramson uh Williams attending got in touch with him and he got in touch with Falcon partners and Falcon Partners commissioned him to write a report on the whole project which he did and it was wholly favorable Bron’s report you might say was another

Of the big key points in the whole story he’d been very much involved with Aviation he was a pretty skillful aeronautical engineer and his report inspired Falcon Partners to go on with the job and in March 1936 they formed a company called pet Limited Whitt told his backers the project had a

1 in3 chance of success the air Ministry quickly added another obstacle one CLA said that I was not to work more than 6 hours a week on the job but of course uh that didn’t operate as a an effective control on me I worked all the practically fulltime out at

Whitt also had to fit in the task for which he’d gone to University in the first place and I very much wanted first class honors so I had to work like hell because I was designing the Jet Engine and preparing for my finals at the same time and that was um a

Very difficult thing to do I succeeded in getting my first happily and then was able to turn back to the jet Engine Whitt approached a manufacturer in rugby to build the world’s first jet engine British Thompson Houston made steam turbines Whittle drove over from Cambridge rehearsing what he’d say to persuade the huge company to accept a contract he succeeded when all he could offer them was £2,000 well below what his project

Really needed the proper scientific way to go about the job would be to build a compressor and test it build a turbine and test it build combustion Chambers and test it and then put them all together when we the results were each were satisfactory but the cost for that would have been about

£30,000 and there was no hope of getting that amount of money so the only way the only thing to do was go ahead with the complete engine what we were doing was trying to prove the engine right from the word go in a cavernous rugby Workshop Whittle set to work on this huge

Challenge the bth built the engine and I stood over it more or less while it was going on I felt that we were going to be all right as far as the simple centrifugal compressor was concerned I thought that I the turbine was going to

Be all right but I was uneasy about the combustion problem because we were aiming at 24 times the kind of Inc combustion intensity that was um obtainable in those days but the engine became ready for running proper on April the 12th of 1937 a lot of people said it wouldn’t even turn itself

Over what did happen proved the very opposite that I gave a signal with my hands to raise the speed with the electric motors 2,000 RPM and that was done and then I opened the main control and it it started [Applause] all it accelerated out of control and so

Did everyone standing around it they all went down the factory like the wind I didn’t because I was petrified with fright I just couldn’t Move it seemed like perpetual motion but of course it wasn’t the fact was that a a pool of fuel that accumulated in the combustion chamber which we didn’t know about and that was keeping it running after I switched off the control well that sort of thing happened day after day we had

About four of that kind of runaway just after the engine first ran and we submitted a report to the air Ministry this was the subject of another report by Griffith the man who turned the job down in the early days and his report damned it with faint

Praise uh he brought in all the difficulties said that no propeller meant that we wouldn’t have the slip stream to help us take off and so forth Whittle didn’t know that in Germany some people were by now far more willing to bet on his idea one of them was Ernst

Hinol a legend in his country’s resurgent aviation industry F oine had been introduced to him he was alone in his Villa in environment he explained to me that he wanted to finance the whole thing by himself if it works when he said I have the best eldes I have that

The best and best designers and uh I want you to Tomorrow to speak with them and explain your ideas I loved the Baltic Sea Coast very much I sure would think that would be a nice place to work and uh so I choose hle additionally I felt I was afraid to go to in engine companies I thought they were too much

Ingrained in their redip engines and my model didn’t work sufficiently good Hinkle’s company was attractive for another reason the whole development was very inexpensive but when we would have asked for more money we would have gotten it so money was not a problem by contrast the Power Jets

Kitty was empty as the Nazi threat grew Whittle had a war winner yet Britain was set to abandon it there were several things that hampered progress in 1937 38 the worst was the tight financial situation our financial backers began to get cold feet they had uh quite unrealistically expected that within a

Matter of a month or two we would have an engine capable of flying the stratosphere of course we had breakdown after breakdown and they began to lose heart and they did not produce the the money that they promised the air Ministry were very hesitant to help the cause with were in financial difficulty

After he’d first run the engine and shown that it at least was self-driving they did agree to um a very limited contract the ministry’s grudging help only created new problems as soon as they gave us a contract we came under the official Secrets act that meant that we couldn’t

Tell people what we wanted their money for you can’t go to someone and say look we got a damn good idea would you let us have some money uh we can’t tell you what it is uh but it’s very good no it uh we couldn’t do

It by 1939 Britain had spent just £7,000 on Whitt’s jet his very position on the project was perilous at the end of June he was actually due to leave Power Jets on his last day there Whitt had to impress an important visitor with his engine on June 30th of 1939 we managed to

Get a big breakthrough in the attitude of the administ in that uh uh Pi director of scientific research uh came up to see the engine run and we managed to keep it going for about 20 minutes in his presence and he became a complete convert so much so that he agreed that

An engine for flight should be ordered and that an airplane to use it should be ordered too when I drove him back to the station to catch his train back to London I had the Curious experience of him explained to me all the advantages of the engine that it could run on any

Fuel that it was vibrationless etc etc and I just sat quietly I was only a squadron leader at this time I thought yeah you’re telling me Oh Boy this of course was the big turning point in the whole job the turbo jet was saved for Great Britain but Germany unaware of Whitt’s

Breakthrough already had a Jet Plane I was uh very certain that it would work but of course you always feel there’s a danger and um we had made not too many pretests we run uh the engine before it flew uh perhaps several hours at the very most the support of a huge Aircraft

Company had enabled Hans Fon oine to overtake Whittle H’s h178 was ready just days before war broke out test pilot Eric vet was eager to take off he started and then he disappeared and after a while he came back and we thought oh he’s Landing he didn’t he

Made another round and we said oh my God he must like it uh but we didn’t have the airplane very filled up with gasoline he landed and stopped the airplane just where hle stood and he said everything functioned beautiful and and and the engine worked well and he

Was he was really himself very ined we had a nice Festival a jubilant hle rang General Ernst udet at the German air Ministry I learned later on he called uded and he said hey congratulation but let me sleep that’s an ungodly time by now Frank Whittle had been

Forced to move Power Jets from rugby to a SC Ry Foundry at nearby lutterworth ladywood Works was the name of the site today there’s nothing to show that history was once made here but in these buildings Britain slowly expanded its jet program in 1939 we only had just a

Handful of about half a dozen and then the beginning of 1940 we began to build up a team and I was very careful in picking um real quality know first class honors Cambridge first class honors Oxford Imperial College of science we were advertising of course we couldn’t say what we were advertising

For and when we were interviewing them we couldn’t tell them what we wanted them for though I think some can guess from the questions we asked whittle’s charm and enthusiasm at once inspired his new team to strive for the impossible the noise and lack of space at ladywood forced Whittle himself to

Work at brownsover Hall A Country House nearby here he worked through the night desperately aware that his work could shorten the war and drove himself to nervous exhaustion my memory of him really was just somebody always working and when he was at home if he took any time off say

Sunday he would sit in his chair by the fire at Broomfield and we’d be there with his slide rule which of course people used in those days to do their calculations and um Bits of Paper all over the place working and a little bit of time for myself and my brother but

Not much not much as Britain entered its most critical phase of the war the expanding team at ladywood was galvanized by a new order to prepare engines for a prototype jet fighter code named f940 we know it as the glosta meteor as a potential War winner getting it in the sky to fight

The Luft vaa now became the first focus of their work at Power Jets they did not know that Germany was by now developing its own twinjet combat planes at Messa Schmid and hanle the country’s prototype jet the h178 had not been a success but its last

Flight was exploited to the full by its maker hle invited the a Ministry to come and the highest who came was udad and somehow hle used that possibility to offer a new design of a two engine fighter aircraft and actually he got the contract about 2 months later the plane was the

H280 the Nazis wanted it in 14 months hle passed this demanding deadline to Fon oine to build its jet engines or hle wanted things very fast he was very uh um optimistic very positive but a little bit unreal and unrealistic in his time schedules in Britain the air Ministry

Still wouldn’t fund Frank quitt properly forcing Power Jets to work in impossible conditions in addition to our continuing financial problems had many others like having to use the same Parts over and over again when they ought to been scrapped and of course that was linked with the finance because we couldn’t

Afford new parts we had to make doom and Furbish up damage Parts some people continued to claim Whitt’s jet wouldn’t even fly by May 1941 his engine was ready to go in Britain’s first Jet Plane the experimental Gloucester E28 39 for its Maiden flight the top secret

Aircraft was taken to Cranwell where the jet story had begun the Power Jets team followed full of Hope on the same day a young Naval pilot Eric Brown was forced to land at Cranwell today he’s one of the few surviving Witnesses of this historic occasion when when I landed I

Was a bit astonished to find so many civilians Pleasant and uh when I went to check in the mess and asked what was going on there seemed to be almost an erir of conspiracy about the whole place and um nobody would give a straight answer to this we’ve been out the day

Before for Te some texting trials then on the May the 15th the weather looked as though it wasn’t going to work out so I went back to uh L was that morning I went the control tower to check if the weather was good enough for my own

Flight to croon but it obviously wasn’t and they said would I mind doing a weather check for them anyway I landed and um they said would I be prepared to do a further weather test in the afternoon and then we got a message to say the weather was clearing

So I rushed back to cranell again and in the evening Jer did the flight an airplane was rolled out with a shape I had well not so much the shape but the construction of which I’d never seen before because it had no propeller and an extraordinary whining noise came from

It and it taxed out to the end of the runway and after a while eventually took off and I was quite astonished to know what it was because I’d never heard at this stage in my career of a jet aircraft the various government Ministries refused to film this remarkable event luckily an unknown

Photographer grabbed it in secret gener a was sitting at the end of the runway and party was sitting just to the right and he held it on the brakes and ran out the engine to full speed released his brakes and then he he hopped off in about 600 yards quite an

Impressive takeoff and he held it down level and then Glide one of my colleagues Pat Johnson WP Johnson slapped me on the back he said Frank it flies and in the tension of the moment I rather rudely said that was Bloody well what it was designed to do isn’t

It and it landed successfully and immediately it landed it was absolutely inundated with people rushing out and congratulating the pilot so I realized something quite extraordinary taking place people in the area hadn’t heard that uh particular kind of noise before and you couldn’t hide it however secret it was supposed to

Be uh one officer was said to have asked another one how does that thing work John and John replied oh it’s easy old boy it just sucks itself along like a Hoover another story was that someone who claimed to have been an eyewitness said there was a Merlin engine inside

The hollow fuselage with a little propeller and he he’d seen it he was a a reliable witness he claimed well everybody gravitated towards officer’s Miss and so I followed on and there was quite a lot of hilarity going on in a corner of the room I asked what it was

All about but still nobody would reveal what was involved but um it was quite obvious it was something quite momentous the flight Vindicated Whitt Britain’s new jet plane was better than anybody had realized one event particularly brought the point home the ministry gave us permission to open up

To 17,000 just for one flight and at that um engine speed it did 375 or 38 anyway it was faster than the Spitfire the news reached London and Winston Churchill he ordered a thousand whittles alas the E28 could not be a war plane hence the disappointment felt behind the scenes up at

Cranwell I would have preferred it to have been the meteor which is then on the stocks because that was a combat airplane whereas the E28 was just an experimental airplane Whitt’s jet served notice on all piston engines and noticed that fast reached their manufacturers they now demanded their share of a

Product none had invented and which they’d rejected for years because of the war Whittle would have to share his secrets with them all this of course was um putting Power Jets into a weaker and weaker position from the commercial point of view and that we had to uh

Swallow because it was a wartime situation and I and several other of my team were serving officers and U we had to put um National considerations before commercial considerations that was very dominant in my mind Whitt played a selfless patriotic role in which he offered his knowledge freely to the British Aviation

Companies however they were working flat out to build engines for planes like the huracane and the Spitfire so in 1941 Great Britain turned to the United States then at peace for backup in manufacturing its jet engine the Americans had only been told about Whitt’s power plant earlier that year

Ironically their top scientists had dismissed the concept in 1940 they concluded the gas turbine engine could hardly be considered a feasible application to airplanes the British government expected to keep the rights in Whitt’s invention and did not intend to give it away to a future competitor but that’s inevitably what

Happened we shipped over the engine in Parts in the bomb Val Liberator also with the team who were horribly frightened L the pilot should pull the wrong lever and they’d all drop into the Atlantic the company selected to build the engine was General Electric All America the jet story began

The night of October 4th 1941 with the arrival of a highly secret engine assembly to Boston airport it was Britain’s now famous Whittle Turbo Jet the first jet engine successfully produced and flown by the LA gentlemen I give you the Whittle engine consult all you wish and arrive at any

Decision you please just as long as you accept a contract to build 15 of them General Electric had that engine their engine version of the w2b called the typi on test in April of 42 just rather less than 6 months which is astonishing and even better than that 6 months later

The bill Aircraft company had their twin engine jet flying it was agreed that I would go over and help them out and so I went over at the end of May I went to Lynn under an assumed name they insisted I use an assumed name I call myself

Whitely there were times when I forgot it like in the hotel I would sign waking up sign for my early morning coffee and forget that I was supposed to be using an assumed name and of course sign the real one I’m told that uh that didn’t matter really because the waiter was an

FBI man in the great Republic Whitt was treated royally and he in turn was astounded by what he found there it was most satisfying to see the work GE were doing because uh well they got on with the job so fast it was remarkable and their enthusiasm was most

Inspiring and I thought at the time if only I’d had that kind of cooperation a few years earlier what a difference it would have made in America doctors found that Whitt was by now battling with severe ill health back in Britain the problems that caused it had only got

Worse the engine that was destined to be the power plant of the meteor was a more powerful version of the experimental engine really there were no major difference it it looked quite similar from the outside the Royal Air Force eagerly awaited the meteor but Power Jets was

Not allowed to produce the engines for it that job had been contracted to a car maker Rover GLS were getting on with the job fairly well that Rovers were making an absolute nonsense of the engine they kept that they just hadn’t got the people who could do the job and they

Thought they they thought they knew what to do the uh situation became so bad that it looked as though there would be a complete hash of everything the Rover were Rover were making such a poor job of the engine that uh the order for the production of the meteor was cut right

Back Rover tried to redesign its engines and held up the meteor by two years but there was also Dirty Work We intended that the Rover company should be subcontractors and only subcontractors but unfortunately they went behind our back to the ministry and and trying to get direct contracts and eventually they

Succeeded in doing that and instead of being subcontractors to us they in effect became competitors who had the advantage of having all our information handed to them on the orders of the ministry in December 1942 a solution was at last found to the problems with Rover Rolls-Royce took

Over the job of building Whitt’s engines but the mighty company would only weaken Power Jets further Ernest he was the chief executive of Rolls-Royce he was responsible for the rollsroyce part in taking over the jet development because he he had come to realize that this was

The future of the AO engine and since Rolls-Royce then were one of the most prominent air engine firms in the world he wasn’t going to be left out I would call him an honest Rogue because when he was going to do the dirt he told you he was in advance

And one of the things he said to me on one occasion was he said we’re going to be the center of this job and nothing you you can do will stop us by 1943 uh the Rolls-Royce having made such a big difference to the prospects of the engine the ministry

Agreed to reinstate the production of the metor with Whitt’s engines the plane finally made its first flight that year yet it should have been ready 2 years earlier and had the air Ministry pursued whittle’s idea back in in 1929 a similar plane would have been available by the

Start of the war to repel the Lu buffer lives would have been saved the war even shortened at least the work of Frank rittle could now have a bearing on how that war was fought I thought that he was doing something quite important because every

Time I asked my mother what he was doing she used to say oh well Dad is doing something very hush I didn’t become aware that he was anybody out of the ordinary until 1944 in January when they um made the whole thing public and then the house became

Surrounded by reporters we we had been working in complete secrecy until uh early January 1944 at which time for reasons I don’t really know um the British and American governments decided to make an announcement about it it was like the world blew up around me the shock was very

Considerable Whitt and his engine dominated the front pages says here in the Daily Herald I knew Frank had a secret says his wife so the cat is out of the bag how strange it seems to be able to talk about it it may mean that I shall be known throughout the world in

Any case my younger son Ian is a far brighter boy than I was at his age I think he will be a success the success of the family have you seen that before no I’ve never seen that before oh dear how wrong as industry reaped the rewards of

Whitt’s genius new jet fighters joined the meteor first off the drawing board was dein’s brilliant vampire the pilots loved their new equipment although the planes remained highly secret as Eric Brown discovered when he came to fly them when I was allotted to the Jet flight at Farm of

Course it was a top secret flight and it was in a hanger at the far side of the Airfield well away from the main activity and there were um RAF regiment guards there with guard dogs that was very highly guarded at the time once inside the plane was a revelation to

Brown we into the cockpit of a j for the first time you are struck by the wonderful view um because in a tricycle under cage no propeller or large engine ahead of you it is quite remarkable and once you start up the engine although to listen to a jet if

You’re outside the cockpit it sounds thunderous when you’re in the cockpit it is incredibly quiet Frank quitt often visited farra to check how his invention was performing it was quite obvious he was itching to get his hands so I didn’t fly it but we were always alerted that he

Was coming and a little M would be passed around saying would you make sure that the E 2839 was not serviceable for flight on that particular day and um because this would save off Frank it was obvious they didn’t want this wonderful airplan and this wonderful man to be United in case

It was an accident so he twigged this pretty soon and I think he played along with it in July 1944 the glost meia became the first jet fighter to enter operational service when the Air Force allocated its initial supply of planes to 616 squadron at manston in

Kent by now the LT FAA could no longer Mount AIDS over Brit but these meteors were quickly put to work intercepting a lethal num Menace the V1 guided missile Germany’s flying bomb terrified the londoners who were its Target in the Skies over Kent the meteor Pilots sought to prevent v1’s

Reaching the capital some used their wing tips to flip the missile over so it crashed around this time Allied Pilots were startled to find themselves being attacked by a German plane with no propeller this was the message Schmid 262 Germany’s own jet program had by now Advanced to this sophisticated

Design it had been chosen instead of the h280 the Nazis never liked hle and had cancelled his promising jet fighter yet it could have been mass-produced by 1944 by contrast the 262 arrived late and was rushed into battle too soon in Britain meanwhile Frank Whitt seemed at

His Peak he was a national hero while his company now had a custombuilt factory from which to expand he had a Clear Vision for its future I always wanted to include Manufacturing in our duties in 1944 Power Jets had reached a point where they were able to produce say batches of

40 or 50 engines and we had a first class nutrius uh for proper manufacturing organization Power Jets also had some outstanding work in progress Whitt was already planning the second generation of jet engines there was the lr1 turbo fan which would have been the first turbo fan in the world there was

The um engine for the miles m52 the supersonic airplane those are our two big projects which we had in hand lr1 stood for long range one Whitt saw the scope for jets that would fly planes further as well as faster than Pistons but he would need a more efficient

Engine from the earliest days of the turbo jet engine I was bothered by the fact that it has a basically low propulsive efficiency about 50% as compared with say propeller at moderate speeds of 80% and so the answer to me was that we must gear down the jet in

Some way and that led to the concept of the turbo fan for which I took out of patent in 1936 the turbo fan is a turbo jet to which a fan has been added this fan causes air both to flow through the core of the engine and to

Bypass it this additional jet of cold air increases thrust and improves fuel economy the design had huge potential with a turbo fan you can expect propulsive efficiencies of 75% or even better if you have a very large bypass ratio as piston engine bombers approach their design limits with planes like the Lancaster Whittle

Saw a timely use for his new bypass jet as the war progressed in 1943 for example uh I came to the conclusion that it could be the answer to a long range bomber for the Pacific War we also visualized it as an engine for a transatlantic airplane Whittle was already predicting

Longrange jet airliners and the kind of engines they would need but it was the other Power Jets project that would grab people’s attention the engine for the supersonic plane the m52 was uh an R fan with after burning all tacked onto the back end of the w2700 Jet Engine and that should have

Given sufficient power for the miles m52 to do 1,000 M hour I think it would have done it despite its huge potential White Hall never felt comfortable with Power Jets it was a private company but its driving force was a serving officer and it was publicly funded the fault lines

Were clear I realized that there was a complete mess uh from the contractual point of view there was no there were no effective agreements and no one except Power Jets and risk any money except the government of course and I felt that um the government having put in 2 million

That all the camp should be nationalized forming a collective double jet establishment and of course I hoped pet would be the at the top of the pyramid with myself as chief engineer Whitt’s proposal was considered in the high levels of government s Stafford Crips the minister of aircraft production at that time used

What I’d said to get the ministry out of the mess that they created by nationalizing pets only which relieve them of all their undertakings it was expected that power jets would still continue with its Advanced engine projects but then other firms began to uh uh create difficulties they said they

Won’t going to have the government competing with private Enterprise so considerable pressure was brought to bear on the the ministry and the minister caved in to the large Aero engine companies so we the people who had pioneered the whole thing were deprived of the right to design and build engines

Sorry that was too much for myself and my leading team members and most of us resigned the supersonic plane and the turbofan project had by then been cancelled the civil servants found a reason to justify this loss believe it or not the minister said that people wouldn’t want to fly at

Speeds more than about 250 M an hour as Whittle left Power Jets he was acutely aware of the commercial opportunity that was now at stake the position in 945 and 1950 was that Britain was really ahead of the world in all forms of gas sering development

But stupidly we allowed the lead to slip away in 1945 the Allies discovered the Germans impressive range of jet planes and their designers after the capitulation of Germany I was at that time in farra the CEO of the captured enimy aircraft flight so I was sent to Germany and to look at their

Advanced aircraft and also at the same time to interrogate their designers and test pilots amongst them was F oin and naturally I wanted to know what his connection with the Whittle patent had or patent had been in Germany but he was not going to answer this question he was

Very non-committal and Sid Steed as much as he could Brown flew the various German jet planes including the messes Schmid 262 the Allies already knew that its engine the yumo 004 was a sophisticated axial Flow Design now they could compare its performance with that of the less complex British Jets thought a more

Efficient engine in many ways it was highly unreliable the yumo 004 in operational service had a scrap life of only 25 hours and the engine when I flew this engine I found it extremely sensitive and difficult to handle because it did not like Quick Throttle movements either accelerating or decelerating any Quick

Throttle movement either way could possibly cause a flame out of the engine whittle’s Jets were more reliable but he could take them no further the course of events brought anguish I think my mother was most distressed by what was happening to to Father she was most distressed I’m I could remember her

Crying about about it at times because she would tell me oh Daddy’s so unwell because of what’s happening and it is such a shame and how can they treat him like this yes it’s very sad for her he managed to Soldier on in the RAF

He was an air Commodore in 1946 but in the end by 1948 he’d been declared as unfit for flying and somehow that triggered that was the last straw and he he and the RAF both both agreed that he should retire and he did it’s been very

Sad for him oh very sad yes the Air Force was everything to him the public knew none of this and saw a war hero receiving his just rewards in 1948 Whitt went to Buckingham Palace to collect a Knighthood he also had a financial award for his invention which

Was good for the time worth nearly £3 million today it would soon become clear he was greatly under rewarded he sought a role but his stature made him hard to place in an industry he himself had founded no engine maker hired his services in many ways I paid quite heavily

For uh the the work I did there was the awful Race Against Time that dominated life on top of all the technical difficulties there were the financial difficulties there was the skull duggery of uh uh people who were uh messing things up and uh oh it was frustration

After frustration and it took its toll I began to have a series of nervous breakdowns and years it was years before I really recovered my Health Britain stole a march on the rest of the world when it launched the first jet airliner the beautiful new plane with its four engines was a fruition of all Frank Whitt’s early Visions first after he left the RAF he turned his mind to the introduction of the Comet and he

Joined boac as a consultant to help them introduce the comet into service he was very worried at the time that the thing was being rushed into service I’ve got his 1949 diary where he discusses uh the strength of the Square Windows and he was worried about that at

The time and and um was making a suggestion to deavin and how they could get over the problem Whitt’s advice was ignored the comet crashes which followed were caused in part by its Square windows with time on his hands Whittle traveled and tried to recover his health he also turned to writing his

Memoirs the jet age took off without Frank whittle but the Royal Air Force was soon re-equipped with the benefits of his invention by 1950 the Gloucester meteor provided the backbone of Britain’s air defense capability it was a fitting outcome to all the secret toil of the power Jet’s

Team in the dark days of the [Applause] war the nation did at last build its own supersonic fighter in the shape of the English electric lightning while jet engines also powered an a aome British Fleet of nuclear bombers but the country could never really afford such planes they would

Later play an important role in the Forkland campaign but were destined to become Museum pieces British civil jet planes fared little better after the comet crashes it was Boeing 707 which brought longrange jet travel to the masses by 1960 Airlines were mostly Buy their planes from America that year the bypass engine

Entered service turbo fans soon followed with their far better fuel economy they were just what the airlines needed to realize lowcost Global Travel for Frank Whittle it was the ultimate Vindication of his wartime vision and revealed the sheer Folly of cancelling his Pioneer turbo fan yet he

Never worked on jet engines again and memories began to fade of how the story had begun I think in this country they were beginning to forget all about Frank Whittle by the 60s and 70s it was all so different in the United States they were so much more gung-ho they were very good

At slapping him on the back and telling him what a good cap he was in 1976 Whittle went to live in America I think he felt more recognized over in the states than he did over here after the war Hans Fon oine had himself moved to America to work on jet repulsion for

The US Air Force fascinated by each other’s work Whittle and Fon o Hine became good friends back across the Atlantic Britain eventually rediscovered its Genius of the jet by 1986 even um the queen took a hand and ordered him the order of Merit um and other honors came along

Following that so I would say from about the early 80s onwards people began to remember who it was who was the Prime Pioneer of the Turbo Jet and also a man with a profound Legacy today we make almost 1 and a half billion air passenger Journeys a year

Cheaply and safely thanks to Frank Whitt he shrank the world but his gift to Britain is less appreciated its famous plane makers have departed but today Rolls-Royce is a world leader in building jet Engines I’m often asked how I feel about it and it’s a question I find very difficult to answer things could have been a lot better we could have had a much bigger influence in the war than uh happened but when I see what’s happened in in the way of civil aviation ation

And Military Aviation too but particularly civil aviation I can only say it’s extremely satisfying especially when you see something like the Concord and one of the things you see I never foresaw when I was working on this thing is that I would be a passenger crossing

The Atlantic in 3 and 1 half hours and incidentally another thing I didn’t foresee is that I would have a son who would be flying 747s as a captain in cath Pacific kitac Aerodrome at that Hong Kong was had a very interesting approach a curved right hand turn right

Down to almost a touchdown and uh when father came with me in the back of the in the cockpit in a Boeing 747 um he he was very startled when he saw that his son was flying an airplane at 1,000 ft straight towards the Foothills and then making a a steep

Final turn which of course was quite normal at kitech it was the way you had to do it I had I hadn’t briefed him unfortunately so he was was very white knuckled by the time we landed he was continuing to theorize in aerodynamic improvements and aeroengine improvements until the end of

His life he always took an active interest in Concord and uh looking into a second generation SST supersonic transport and making recommendations and speaking publicly and privately uh amongst uh the industry to try and encourage the uh airframe manufacturers to take the risk and embark on another generation of SuperSonic

Transports Concord is a marvelous airplane I’ve plan it many times but I’m looking forward to the next generation of SuperSonic transports which I think should be capable of uh carrying 300 passengers for distances of the order of 4,500 miles like San Francisco Tokyo at speeds of about a mark number

About 2.3 that’s we getting up to 2,000 M an hour as compared with the Concords 1350 but beyond that um I think we’re going to see even much higher speeds than that in due course unfortunately they’re going to be very expensive propositions sir Frank Whitt died in August

1996 assured of his position as the greatest Aro engineer of the 20th century the Royal Air Force paid fitting tribute to its distinguished son with the memorial service at Westminster ABY he and I had wanted the opportunity to to fly together preferably in an open cockpit biplane so that together we could Loop and spin and climb and dive this modest ambition was never realized for one reason or another the nearest we got was when I

Flew him to Hong Kong in a Boeing 747 on the last morning of his life I lent over his bed and said said Dad let’s put on our kit and go flying he opened his eyes and looked at me and smiled that evening with hazel holding his hand he died and I

Wondered I wondered if he went flying and if he did if he went on his own or did he have a [Applause] Companion he was cremated in the USA and the a atache there um brought his ashes over to this country and I went to Heath row to meet the airplane and I came home and put the ashes on the bookshelf in my study with the ashes of

My mother who died 3 weeks earlier I uh decided to put them in at the church of Cranwell and they organized a a meteor and a vampire so we flew the ashes up to Cranwell and they were in interred there with a little ceremony [Applause] [Applause] October 4th 1941 [Applause] [Applause] [Applause] [Applause] Incredible as it may seem these crates Mark the start of the development of the first jet engine in America they can contained an experimental engine which was flown to the United States from Great Britain under great secrecy in the fall of 1941 this flight was the direct result

Of a conference in the Washington office of General Arnold a few weeks earlier here was the actual beginning of the jet story in America gentlemen I give you the Whittle engine consult all you wish arrive at any decision you please just as long as General Electric accepts a contract to

Build 15 of them these were the plans of the first turbojet engine that had been successfully produced by any of the Allies they were the results of a long hard struggle by England’s group Captain Frank Whitt he had worked toward jet propulsion in the face of many difficulties and he had succeeded the

Air Corp felt the jet propulsion had tremendous possibilities and the British Air Ministry made all the information available to the United States the men of General new from there with the national advisory committee for Aeronautics that the essentials of a turbo jet were a compressor and a I cannot overemphasize the secrecy and

The importance of this work we know that both the Italians and the Germans are working on Jets I hardly need tell you that they must not win the race General given unlimited priority we will have the first unit running on test in six months six unbelievably short months in all to

Plan design and build the first American jet engine for a revolutionary new principle of flight yet these men were able to make this promise to their government in time of War because actually this problem was not new to them it really began on the campus of

Cornell University in 19 3 where a young mechanical engineer named Sanford Moss was working for his P he was engaged in research for his thesis on gas turbin he and his work had been consigned to this little building because there seemed to be a certain amount of noise connected with [Applause]

It not to mention smoke and odd smells when he had completed his work at Cornell and received his degree Moss went to to General Electric where he joined other experts and continued his work later they set up a research Department to study turbines of all kinds as well as compressors pumps

Boilers and related equipment by 1918 moss and his fellow workers had accumulated a tremendous amount of knowledge in relation to turbines and compressors and as a result he was called to Washington the there the national advisory committee for Aeronautics initiated work with Dr Moss on a practical turbo supercharger which the

Air core hoped would increase the altitude performance of its World War I Fighters a gasoline engine runs on a mixture of air and fuel which burns in a cylinder at higher altitudes the atmosphere becomes progressively thinner so that the engine cannot get enough air to burn as much gasoline as it should

For maximum power the turbo supercharger simply adds a compressor to the engine Which packs or charges the thin air into the cylinders this allows the engine to burn more fuel and deliver full power the compressor is run by a turbine which is turned by the exhaust gases of the

Engine Moss’s work on the turbo continued and his improvements had a tremendous influence on Aviation in 1920 the army established a world altitude record of 36,000 ft proving the turbo and air so rarified that the pilot became unconscious and fell almost 6 miles before pulling out General Billy Mitchell’s famous test

Which demonstrated For the First Time The tremendous importance of air power was actually made possible by Moss’s turbos Mitchell’s plane had to come in at 15,000 ft in order to avoid theoretical anti-aircraft fire to give a plane enough power to carry a 2,000lb bomb at that altitude Mitchell had

General Electric turbos installed on new twin engine Martin bombers and the results made aviation History with the beginning of World War II The Air Force’s interest in turos was greatly intensified they quickly became standard equipment on such outstanding aircraft as Republic’s Thunderbolt W’s lightning Consolidated Liberator and Old Reliable the bo Flying Fortress the High Altitude daylight strategic bombing operations which destroyed the strength of our enemy in

Europe would not have been possible without Turbos they have contributed immeasurably to the science of flight and continue to do so so they are used on some of today’s finest piston engine planes the most formidable weapon the world has ever seen was carried by a turbo supercharged Plane so in 1941 with a new but related problem it was only natural for the air core to again turned to the same organization and asked them to build the first American Turbo Jet and and build it they did at a series of secret meetings 1 month before the arrival of

The Whittle engine the project had been started with a small nucleus of Key Personnel these men picked those they wanted to work with however in most cases they did not let them know what they were to work on there were over a thousand men on the project but less

Than a 100 actually knew what they were making planning an assembly of the engine itself was segregated in an entirely separate building and heavily guarded 24 hours a day many of the parts were made in the regular supercharger department but as a further protection the project was

Called a new type of Turbo and simply given another production number Tyi all the vast resources of the company were thrown behind the project the knowledge gained in years of production and design of giant turbin of every kind the research laboratory for Special Metals the experience gained in the manufacturing operation of thousands of Turbo superchargers and the vast store of knowledge of the Consulting

Laboratories during the actual design and manufacturer under DF Warner these great resources led to the modification and Improvement of the Whitt engine for example the English had trouble with turbine bucket forgings because of the high temperatures involved but it was an old story to these men and their long experience with

Turbos hastened the solution to to this problem also the English impellers had been giving trouble because of cracking but skilled Craftsmen were already making hundreds of thousands of successful impellers for all types of superchargers American techniques of rotor balancing were very Advanced and contributed greatly to smoothness of

Operation yet in spite of the diversity and size of the operation there was not a single failure in Security today we realize even more fully than the Pioneers the almost incalculable importance of that first American jet engine the four runner of the engines that power the military

Planes of today yet those early workers seemed to sense the true value of their work and it brought them together there was a wonderful spirit of common purpose of cooperation between the people who did the work Britain our air force and the men of General Electric in this

Atmosphere the engine grew at an unbelievable rate until at last the first engine right on schedule rolled under heavy guard into the test cell now they would see the results of 6 months of round the-clock effort but they would see much more than that they

Would see the birth of the jet engine in America they would see the first really radical change in air power since the wri brothers flight so many years ago they would see the first faint beginning of a whole new era in the age of flight

That is they would see it if the engine Ran now all they needed was to see it Fly meanwhile under the same rigid secrecy the Bell aircraft Corporation had been designing laying out and building the AAC Comet to be powered by the new engine They too had performed miracles of production in a startling New

Field I can’t get used to working on a plane without a propeller neither can I I hope it flies there were a lot of other people who hoped it would fly too from Top brass to Joe average man walking along Main Street USA of course he wouldn’t hear about the this

Particular plane for two or 3 years maybe never but he’s a guy who carries deep within him a hope and conviction that any plane America bills will [Applause] fly these are the original films of the first jet plane ever to fly in [Applause] America with that first flight on October 1st

1942 less than a year from the start of the project jet Propel flight in America became a reality they had gotten off to a flying St but in a race it’s the stamina that counts so everybody kept right on working the original engine the IIA delivered 1,400 lb of thrust it was

Soon followed by another Engine with more power the i16 with, 1600 lb of thrust then came the j33 with 4,000 lb of thrust and the Jet Engine really came into its own the First Flight of the j33 was in June of 1944 in a Lockheed f80 shooting

Star again less than a year from the start of the project this outstanding planes set many records such as coast to coast in 4 and 1/2 hours and became our first operational jet PR in order to get the jet industry moving and in the interest of National

Defense GE passed along its plans to other manufacturers Allison began mass production of the j33 engine to help meet production requirements of the f80 shooting star the British Whittle engine and the first engines designed by GE used compressors of the centrifugal type in these air enters the Hub and is

Hurled radially outward however even prior to seeing the British engine work on an axial compressor had been started with the national advisory committee for Aeronautics in this compressor air flows in a straight line to the rear the axal compressor increases the engine’s efficiency and handles a greater volume

Of air without increasing the engine’s diameter long range research led to an axial flow j35 which powered the Republic Thunderbolt and the Douglas guy streak holder at that time of the world’s official speed record of 640 mph eight of these powerful new jet engines were also used in northrup’s 100ton

Flying wing and many other planes in the rapidly developing jet field during these years of progress with land-based aircraft the Navy had worked with the McDonald aircraft Corporation and Westinghouse to develop the Phantom proof that problems associated with carrier-based aircraft were not Beyond solution came with the Phantom’s first takeoff and Landing from

An aircraft carrier meanwhile a school was established at General Electric to train the people who would install operate and service their new gjet engines one of the courses given is simply a general familiarization with the principles of jet propulsion and the jet engine ever since man undertook the

Conquest of the air he has had two primary considerations first the aircraft itself and second its method of propulsion needless to say has not always been successful sometimes the airframe itself has been unsatisfactory at other times the method of propulsion has lacked the necessary power in this case for example it’s extremely

Simple while in this it’s so complex that it borders on confusion actually the early attempts at propulsion by reaction were not associated with aircraft and as in the case of most of man’s early Endeavors they led to some rather startling results The principle itself is very simple Newton’s third law of motion states that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction for example an ordinary rotary lawn sprinkler turns because of the reaction of the arm to the action of the jet of water it does not turn because the water squirted out

Pushes against the air it would spin just as well in a vacuum similarly the Jet Plane flies because of the reaction to the jet it does not fly because the jet pushes against the air behind it the engine itself consists of two main rotating elements the compressor

And the turbine which are both mounted on a single rotating shaft air is drawn in compressed and packed into the firing Chambers where fuel is injected the constantly burning fuel tremendously increases the energy of the enclosed gases which rush through the turf and out of the tail Coe the turbine

Operating like a windmill supplies the power to spin the compressor the expanding gases pushing their way out of the rear at about 1200 mph give the plane its forward thrust this then is the simple principle of propulsion which changed the whole outlook of the aviation industry by 1951 G’s production models

Were delivering more than than 5800 lb of thrust a 5-fold increase in 10 years these engines are being mass produced at both Linn Massachusetts and the great new lachland Ohio plant the Jet Center of the world laand represents more than huge production facilities it represents a new production plan thousands of suppliers and

Subcontractors contribute to the manufacturer of the jet engines which are assembled at laand thus all sources of supply down to the smallest individually owned machine shops are benefited by the program and kept mobilized for production the Lin plan is truly another Milestone just as the engines which roll

From its production lines the end product of many Milestones the result of almost 50 years of the best thought and effort of Executives Engineers scientists and skilled Craftsmen doing the work they are best fitted for in their own ways this freedom of effort is after all the

Real Heritage of all Americans and the engines are living up to that Heritage today General Electric turbo jets are doing their job powering the great new planes they were designed for such planes as the Republic xf-91 highspeed high altitude Interceptor the North American f-86d the Martin XB 51 Superfast tactical bomber the North American saber holder of the world’s official speed

Record of 671 mph and the 100 km closed course of 635 M hour the North American b45 tornado the first operational jet bomber the Boeing b47 Strat jet bomber which in 949 flew non-stop coast to coast in 3 hours and 46 minutes and the mighty conver b36 the Intercontinental bomber which is powered

By six turbo supercharged piston engines and four jets these and others are the planes which must maintain the common security of the free peoples of the world and thereby ensure peace and Main in one 6 month period three new GE engine designs were located for production powerful than the preceding

One the last of these is no larger than the model then in mass production yet it delivers so much more thrust that it is not even in the same Class even so by the time any new engine is in mass production still newer and better engines are on the way engines that will be attribute to the life work of Dr Moss who died in 1946 one year after being awarded the cola trophy aviation’s highest award Moss’s work is

Finished but there will always be others to carry on with new ideas perhaps we will travel from coast to coast in 3 or 4 hours of quiet vibrationless Comfort certainly our energetic and Progressive aircraft industry will give us commercial jetliners as soon as the time is Right even the atom May release its giant strength for aircraft the atomic energy commission the Air Force and General Electric are already cooperating on an atomic power plant for an aircraft to be built by conveyor NACA us Navy’s of Aeronautics and a number of private corporations are also making real contributions to this

[Applause] program developmental engineering moves forward with great new facilities such as ge’s aircraft gas turban laboratory here Engineers can simulate conditions for tomorrow’s aircraft here men look ahead at the requirements of the planes of the future requirements established by the product planners of the engine builders of the airframe builders and of

The aircraft users these are the molders of Aviation progress as long as imagination research design test and mass production continue year after year in a never-ending constantly improving chain there is no limit to the future of the aircraft engine and so the jet story grows in 10 years we have come from

This to this no one can foretell the tremendous strides the aircraft industry will make in the next 10 years yet we can be sure that the engines will keep Pace the engines that are keeping and will always keep America [Applause] Strong [Applause] A how indifferent we’ve become we’ve forgotten what it is to be astonished another new plane one more so what but there is something unusual about it it’s long and has a sharp snout and its head is lowered there hasn’t been any like this before and it has a delta wing folded

Back to the tail the Wing’s Leading Edge is razor sharp a powerful four engine unit is mounted below and there’s another Singularity it has no stabilizer this is the new tupo supersonic airliner take off script Anatoli agranovski Direction Vera Director of Photography kabin a central documentary film Studios

Production Andre tupelov now in his 80s possesses talent and insight to such a degree as to become a living legend this film is about the tu1 144 his latest model in a long life wholly dedicated to aircraft engineering when it was conceived several years ago there were few even among the top

Rankers who believed in its practical realization They would often get together like this and calculate design Ponder and discuss indefinitely they had worked together for years and understood one another at a glance it said locally that anyone who can out argue the general designer can count on a bonus or a promotion couldn’t a flutter effect

Appear in your control system and the body strengthening Engineers will see how much metal they must I’ll do the drawings counting on the body strengthening Engineers making their Corrections get started and we’ll find some time later for a report back that will help us arrive at the overall final

Form disc that question two days ago it’s clear now you finished turning over the finals to illusion so he can speed up his part of the job the model was tested at supersonic speed and here the character of the streamlining was studied the t44 required 10 times more

Investigation in the great wind tunnel than any previous aircraft This is Father and Son Andre tupo has trained hundreds of aircraft designers he founded a school of aircraft engineering his son Alex SE chief designer of the t44 has followed in his footsteps a tailess design was chosen what would it look like in reality the t144 would have been inconceivable without metallurgists chemists

Instrument makers and electronic experts taking an active part in its development new Alloys and new kinds of ruled metal were needed the electronic equipment accounts for half the planes cost some 10,000 parts are made of plastics so the building of this plane was a common achievement of Soviet Science and

Technology this is a fighter plane it flies at the design speed for the t44 2500 kilm an hour more than twice the speed of sound so it’s nothing new our foremost Army pilot have mastered it what is new though is that Tupa has put this incredible speed at the disposal of ordinary

Mortals however not only the speed altitude and distance barriers have been surmounted but the reliability barrier too the landing gear was being tested what was there about it that instilled confidence said the hyd system suddenly failed another backup system would take over and then if necessary a second

Backup system and even a third so one failure is nothing to worry about and even two failures will not cause a crash the crew had been pre-selected and had rehearsed the flight over and over again on the ground Airborne they wouldn’t have the time to recall waiver

Or grope they’d have to make Split Second decisions and that meant they had to know the plane like themselves each of them had a college education and lengthy thorough training for the maiden flight Commander Yan give us a Readiness report please first we’ll make the landing gear retraction and release

Test I wanted to hear what you have to say about takeoff we considered Alex’s remarks about reducing the ground run the shorter the takeoff the quicker will the Airborne well to you who are about to fly fingers cross the maiden flight took place on December the 31st 1968 everything had long been in

Readiness they been waiting for Clear Skies but the weather continued foul and nerves were wearing thin from the strin finally however the very last day of the year dawned clear the Mercury fell and visibility Rose Andre tuov had watched 120 Maiden flights and here he was again Waiting meet flight Commander Edward yam engineer Yuri Alto leading test engineer Vladimir vov and second pilot Mel kazal yes it was a fine day indeed it was good to be alive on a day like that as a well-known test pilot put It This is Dolphin 1 ready to take off permission granted got you some compare it to a bird for a bird never takes wing with its head drawn back the plane took off and gained altitude there was nothing left for us to do but watch and wait nothing depended any

Longer even upon the general designer Mr tup how did you Begin I matriculated at moscow’s higher technical school because I had a B for engineering our lecture on Aviation was Nikolai jukov we built the first glider and I made my first flight when chukovsky decided to set up an aerodynamic laboratory at the school he said that tupv had clever hands so he

Would be in charge of the equipment Actually there wasn’t any laboratory at all simply a big Hall the school allotted us and that’s how it all began when Soviet power came Nikolai Jovi had gathered a close circle of people people dedicated to Aviation we all wanted to help our Soviet Country tup has advanced through nearly every stage of Aviation he even recalls planes of plywood he built the first old metal aircraft this is one of them the entt 3 entt are his initials and another the maxim gorki at that time the world’s Biggest and this is the ent6 at the North Pole the famous amt2 5’s non-stop flights One World acclaimed it took chalov 63 hours to fly nonstop from Moscow to the United States for more than 30 years it was a plane that captured the imagination of the entire world from Africa to South America from Asia to Europe from London to New York City the aircraft simply known as Concord galvanized the globe its Sleek aerodynamic structure and supersonic speed brought passengers

To a whole new level in transportation in Britain and France the plane became a symbol of national pride during the Cold War where every technological breakthrough seemed to come from either America or the Soviet Union the Concord proved that Europe still mattered and while this supersonic transport became synonymous with

Patriotism it’s also remembered as a plane that turned into an economic disaster with skyrocketing development costs and a hefty price tag for admission when it finally debuted only the rich and Powerful were able to fly the Concord and in an era of heightened environmental awareness the aircraft was

Denied the most lucrative Roots across the Atlantic Ocean if not for the endless sums of government money it may have never seen the light of day in the end the plane was a two-edged sword hated by the economists yet loved by the people Concord after nearly three

Decades in service became one of the most recognizable aircraft in the world during a time when faster me better it so over its competition symbolizing the absolute best in European engineering and Aerodynamics on October the 14th 1947 Aviation enters a new and uncertain era when Bell’s rocket powered X1 launch from a b29 super Fortress becomes the first aircraft to break the sound barrier flying at over 800 mph at Mark 1.06 this breakthrough along with the introduction of jet technology causes

Countries to pour enormous resources into finding ways to go faster and faster during the Cold War With both America and the Soviet Union possessing the atomic bomb the requirement that airplanes go supersonic is a must this leads to a revolution in aeronautical design straight-winged aircraft unable to achieve faster speeds are replaced by

Swept wi planes most noticeably during the Korean conflict as American f86 Sabers battle Soviet Union Mig 15s bombers like the b29 and the b36 Peacemaker evolve into the swept-wing b47 Strat jet and the B52 Strat Fortress with the two superpowers investing gigantic sums of money into aircraft design the nations of Britain

And France are forced to play catchup in England where the Gloucester meteor symbolized London’s place at the Vanguard of aviation technology during the Cold War a trifecta of planes known as the V bombers and unveiled as a deterrent Force against the Soviet Union the third in this Trilogy avos

Vulcan a supersonic bomber equipped with four turbo Jets incorporates a new deltawing design giving the aircraft increased speed over the swept Wing across the English Channel where Aviation was born the nation of France also experiments with supersonic aircraft Doo Mirage 3 a plane incorporating the delta wing design

Flies at over M 2.2 in 1958 in addition the dandel is also tested during this time as an experimental supersonic plane but despite their respective legacies of being at the Forefront of aviation technology after the second world war with both England and France’s economies shattered it appears their best days of behind

Them in the realm of military aircraft there seems to be no way to compete with the vast resources of the United States however there is one area where if England and France pull together their resources a formidable challenge can be issued against America and the Soviets this comes in the form of a

Proposed supersonic transport airliner Mr deal was president of France at the time ande French Prestige was sort of important uh the French were very very concerned as were the British and other Europeans about the loss of Technology prowess in the aviation industry there was a feeling in Europe

At that time that the Concord project could be a vehicle a catalyst to uh jumpstart the European aviation industry after the clim with only military planes capable of breaking the sound barrier there’s much talk about about having this technology cross over into the civilian transport Market with jets replacing propeller

Driven aircraft as the preferred mode of flying conventional wisdom leads many to speculate that the next logical step for passenger travel is the ability to fly faster than the speed of sound in America the Undisputed champion of aircraft design it appears inevitable that they will build an SST

The Soviets not wanting to be outdone by their Rivals are no doubt going to follow suit this took place during the height of the Cold War the Cold War was taking place uh you have to remember there was competition in Aerospace defense we had announced the Apollo

Program at the end of 1961 which was in effect a cold war program I I think that the the attraction of the supersonic airplan was like the attraction of much of the Space Age prestige the National Honor that you had to be you were if you didn’t demonstrate that you could do

This you weren’t in the in the front ranks this leaves the powers of Europe with an important decision to make will they build their own SST and compete on an international scale the answer is given on November the 28th 1962 when representatives from the English and French governments sign a

Treaty creating a powerful New Consortium between the British aircraft Corporation and sud Aviation airliner of the future this is a model of a supersonic jet which Britain and France hope will dominate transatlantic travel flying at twice the speed of sound it will hop the ocean in 3 hours representatives of the two

Countries sign an agreement to share the $300 million cost and hope to have the plane operational by 1968 the deltawing craft will carry 100 passengers and crws at 1,400 mph Engineers say it can use present runways and fly so high that will be no Sonic shock when it breaks

The sound barrier the world grows smaller the two companies agree to build a supersonic transport with no cancellation Clause causing numerous Airlines to immediately Place orders including America’s PanAm Airways paname were announced has AED six new con cord supersonic jet transport which can fly to the United

States 2 and a half hours you can tell him he’s given me the best argument for not having one Airline represent the United States that I’ve ever heard and I’m going to spend the next time I’m here really giving a screwing to panamerican because that gives that

Sticks it right to us how can we possibly go ahead now with our program to which we’re going to spend an awful lot of money which was very important to the United States which affected the balance of payments in hundreds of millions of dollars and I’m going to put

All this out and then go ahead about 24 hours before we’re about to make our announcement across the Atlantic Ocean this treaty causes President Kennedy to act swiftly and in June of 1963 at the Air Force Academy’s graduation he announces the United States own SST program 30,000 Spectators packed the

Stadium at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs for ceremonies that will graduate Cadets into officer ranks the year President Kennedy call for a partnership of government and business to develop a supersonic passenger plane to hold the US lead in commercial Aviation he had been under some pressure

Uh to announce this project pres uh Vice President Johnson formed the little committee to look at the SST in the spring of that year and he recommended vigorously that we go ahead with an SST the Anglo French had announced the Conqueror project in ‘ 62 and that also

Created pressure for Kennedy to do something there was also some pressure from the Aerospace industry people uh to respond to what was taking place both in uh Britain and France and also Russia which had its own SST program in the Soviet Union work begins on their supersonic tupv Tu 144 with

Each plane now in a race to the Finish Line beginning in 1965 two prototypes are built known as1 in t l and2 in Bristol luckily for Britain its Aerospace indust has a huge jump on the competition having built numerous experimental aircraft proving vital in the research and development of the

Concord the Bristol 221 incorporating A variation of the Delta design known as the OG Wing is tested in order to determine the sst’s range and payload the tsr2 bomber an airplane cancelled due to the budget cuts of the 1950s provides invaluable information about the concord’s most daunting obstacle its power

Plants using Bristol’s Olympus engines the TSR 2’s testing sheds new light on the challenges supersonic planes face in the air in the Laboratories of the British aircraft Corporation and sud Aviation rigorous examinations are carried out investigating hundreds of materials and the effect heating has on them building the Concord uh required new materials

And they had concerns about heating which would never been a uh a sustain problem you had people had encountered Heating in in certain instances in in uh Brief Encounters with supersonic flight but if you’re going to cruise at supersonic flight then you’ve got a totally different heat dissipation

Problem for a period of 18 months straight Round the Clock 24-hour trials are conducted at its peak over 600 subcontractors are brought into to work on the Concord employing over 200 ,000 people filton Concord 002 stands like a great bird in a massive cage at the British aircraft Corporation plant near

Bristol but never has there been such an expensive bird before nor one that has been so reluctant to fly when she’s ready to fly she’ll fly nothing must be left to chance Concord is unlike any other aircraft everything about her is new in the wind tunnels the OG Wing passes with flying

Colors fullscale mockups are constructed in order to show all of this sst’s components the drooping nose a distinct feature of the Concord is built in order to balance Pilot’s visibility with its incredible aerodynamic structure and using a converted Vulcan bomber the Olympus 593 power plant is tested in the

Skies for concord’s team of designers its engines proved to be the most important obstacle to overcome uh the airframe was in advance of the engines and advance of the fuels of the time had had you had 10e Advanced engines to put in it and uh you you might have possibly

Made it a a more sustainable airplane but as it was it was a Prestige airplane for the 593 Jets to work properly air needs to enter at subsonic speeds a huge roadblock considering the Concord is built to fly at twice the speed of sound fortunately over a period of 4

Years a complex system of Inlet doors and ducts are installed in order for this SST to travel at m 2 by April of 1966 the final assembly of1 and2 begins with each country producing different parts of the Concord they’re shipped across the channel in order to make sure both prototypes are ready at

The same time massive transport aircraft are used to ship some of the biggest pieces of this giant jigsaw puzzle for the people of tulus and Bristol seeing specially designed trailers hauling different parts of the plane are not uncommon during this time and by December of 1967 conqu C1 makes its first appearance

In t lose its mesmerizing design stuns the entire world as Aviation enters a new highspeed age to lose the giant hanger at sud Aviation headquarters was the focal point of the entire world for inside was the most exciting new thing in the world of Aviation Concord o1 at last the angl French brainchild

Born out of the Technical and very sensible collaboration of two Nations could be shown to an envious World while Concord is being set up for its first test flight in Moscow the Communists are able to beat the Europeans debuting TV 144 on New Year’s Eve 1968 being almost identical to the angl

French design it’s nicknamed concordski around the world unfortunately for the Soviets it’s nowhere near the Concord in terms of structure and quality being put together so hastily and the Russians ran into even worse problems with their version of it because their engines were comparatively far less efficient than

Than the uh Rolls-Royce and the French engines in America delays and uncertainties about their SST program continue a competition between Boeing’s swing with wing and lockheed’s fixed Wing design causes the selection committee to debate endlessly the advantages and disadvantages between the two it turned out that this that the

Swing Wing didn’t work so they went with a fixed Wing then it turned out that this plane was going to be too heavy anyway so they tried to lighten it but it could never really it the only way it could pay for itself is it couldn’t really carry that many people but

Secondly because it was so heavy it would have to charge a lot a premium on the ticket and that that made that the economics go haywire when the decision is finally made in the winter of 1966 to award the contract to Boeing the Concord already has a 2-year jump on its transatlantic

Competition for the Europeans a far more important threat to the aircraft’s survival comes in the form of a jumbo jet Boeing’s 747 a subsonic airliner capable of flying passengers across the ocean far more cheaply than than the Concord as those in Britain and France worried and in a sense the Boeing

Company and airline companies as well understood that this was the real vehicle for leadership in commercial Aviation the jumbo jet the 747 efficient subsonic Jets of a variety of Kinds these were the vehicles that were going to keep America uh keep leadership in America in commercial Aviation not the American SST

Project this sphere is Amplified when the British overseas aircraft Corporation decides to purchase the 747 perhaps faster does not necessarily mean better despite these outside threats as well as concerns about its growing costs Concord 01 is cleared for its first test flight in March of 1969 to lose the great supersonic jet

Liner was going to fly a year late millions of pounds over the estimated cost and still a very big question mark but on this day a lot of those question marks would be answered for Concord 001 this was the chance to prove she was the super bird everyone had hoped and worked

For its maiden voyage is Flawless encountering no technical problems for testing purposes its undercarriage is kept down in France they can breathe a sigh of relief one month later across the channel2 takes off making another perfect flight you had to have really the true professionals here there’s

There’s no point in the flight in which a a any kind of a crew eror uh couldn’t have caused a disaster so it it was a um a Great Leap Forward we we didn’t have the advanced electronics that we had in later and uh so for its day it was

Really an advanced machine Concord 02 is clear takeoff and good luck gentlemen for the next 2 years a series of gruelling tests are done studying the impact that intense heat has on the nose and body of the aircraft in the sky Concord proves easy to maneuver as the two prototypes exceed

Both the speed of found and M 2 during this time every detail is checked and double checked with nothing being left to Chance in America with growing protests over the environmental impact of these planes including the effects of the Sonic Boom in 1971 the United States

Senate votes to cut off all funding for Boeing’s SST good evening the Senate has voted 51 to 46 to cut off money for building the supersonic transport as the house had done before unless private financing is forthcoming the controversial airplane appears doomed with this catastrophic decision concord’s most fierce competition is

Eliminated clearing the way for it to dominate the global Marketplace in Britain the plane becomes a symbol of Pride it was a proud sight this was the day when the traditional and the modern were brought together the British Concord that Masterpiece of Technology came to London to be seen by the queen

Her family and the millions who looked up with excitement for a first glimpse of this great plane then in 1973 at the Paris air show a Soviet tupv 144 crashes for the entire world to see This Disaster raises great doubts about the Communist concoctions feasibility it appears Concord has all

But won the race to build the first fully functioning SST now will anybody want to buy the plane after nearly a decade in development the angl French Concord flies to the African nation of senagal to begin its worldwide promotion tour the ultimate goal of this exercise is to convince the world’s airlines that

Speed means business and with the right dose of public relations Executives will be convinced to buy these planes from a marketing standpoint the tour is an outstanding success for years people across the globe hear stories about this new high-speed plane that takes takes passengers to their destination in half the

Time its unorthodox aerodynamic design brings in crowds from Rio de Janeiro to Beijing from tan to Sydney from Fairbanks Alaska to Mexico City and with America cancelling their SST program in 1971 and the Soviet Tu 144 in shambles the angl French Concord is destined to dominate The Marketplace unfortunately with the 1970s

Being defined by an oil crisis and economic unrest the enthusiasm for a supersonic transport is a far cry from the previous decade when anything seemed possible the question now is can this aircraft defy the odds by flying passengers around the globe in record time while remaining economically viable this becomes the concord’s greatest

Challenge across the globe Concord is ready to Galvanize the people wherever it flies the crowds are huge anxious to see the plane they’ve heard about for years during the year 1972 this SST tours Iran India China Japan and Australia with each country’s Airlines showing interest in the aircraft kings and queens Prime

Ministers and presidents rich and poor all want to take a tour inside this remarkable supersonic jet unfortunately during the 1970s with each Concord costing a record $31 million per plane only the very wealthy are able to board this aircraft ironically it’s biggest supporters are the masses who can never afford to fly

Supersonic as a result although there’s a fascination with the Concord the big airlines are hesitant to pull out their checkbooks the Chinese and the Iranians flirt with the idea of buying them but are unwilling to sign on the dotted line in the United States where the most lucrative destinations are to be had

President Richard Nixon tours the aircraft his country’s decision to cancel their own SST is the result of a growing environmental movement warning Americans about the ecological disasters these planes will have on their neighborhoods and communities a big drawback is the sonic boom when a plane exceeds the speed of

Sound a large noise capable of breaking windows and glass erupts when scientists study the effects of this boom in Oklahoma City during the year 1964 they conclude this noise will cause a public Revolt it turns out that the sonic boom in fact bothered lots of people and this was clear very early on

When they started to do research on the Sonic Boom in Oklahoma City and a report came out in 1964 which show which showed that a huge majority of the people quote could not live with a sonic boom unquote and the people who live with it are becoming more aroused becoming more

Sensitive to this form of pollution as they are to so many others the nation’s priorities are changing rapidly and the FAA may find that the general public has a different timetable in mind for the reduction of noise pollution David Khan CBS News New York it’s such a hot button issue that

The United States government places a ban on all ssts traveling Coast to Coast with this decision Concord is limited to only the East and West coasts in America as destinations as a result of this policy no American Airline wants to touch the plane once that killed the New York to

LA route the Miami to Seattle route the Boston to San Francisco routes the Washington to la la Routes once it killed th those routes it killed about a third of the market for the whole aircraft and therefore therefore you you didn’t have as much uh chance to recover

Your cost people in the United States reacted to the sound barrier as a uh means of uh going against the idea of an American supersonic transport and it of course affected the issue of the Concord flying in the United States but I don’t think it was a a a defining decision and

I also think it was a bit of a red herring I think it was put up mainly because people who were smart enough to see there was no way to make any money out of the Concord building it the the manufacturer was going to lose the

Government was going to lose I think it was perhaps uh overinflated just so that we wouldn’t do it and we wouldn’t have an American Contender as environmental groups gain strength pickets and protests against the sst’s sonic boom against its unhealthy fuel consumption and against noise pollution in general take

Place rumors begin that any passenger who boards the plane will become violently ill this bad publicity sour the concort reputation thankfully the two countries who built the aircraft come to its rescue when British Airways and Air France order nine planes for service they save the entire project from economic collapse unfortunately the overseas

Buyers needed to make this a worthwhile government investment never materialize what began as a European project is confined only to Europe despite these roadblocks Concord continues its worldwide tour to force to prove it can fly in the most brutal weather conditions the aircraft stops in America’s Arctic Outpost Alaska

Demonstrating that this SST can Excel even in the bitter cold next is a flight to the polar opposite Mexico City where thousands of people wait for hours to see concord’s grand entrance with orders placed the employees of BAC and aerospatial begin building more ssts improving the quality from the original

Prototypes the Bristol 593 engines gain strength reducing the black smoke emitted and in 1975 Concord receives its certificate of airworthiness when agents are first allowed to book passengers demand skyrockets a beautiful airplane that performed well I was lucky enough to fly on it on one occasion and U there’s it

Was it was the way to travel there’s no question about it you arrived in London in what seemed like a you know a couple of hours and uh feeling excellent although 20% more expensive than subsonic travel during the early years with all the hype and Fascination surrounding This Plane the people cannot

Resist the opportunity to fly supersonic one year later the first two Concords carrying paying customers depart from London and Paris Simultaneously almost a decade after its first test flight in 1969 the dreams of this SST are finally realized Concord is given a boost when its only competitor the Soviet t u44 fails miserably its crude design and enormous fuel consumption Fades quickly only a few months of novelty

Flights take place clearing the way for the angl French despite this early success the road ahead for this powerful new plane is going to be a bumpy one in America the Boeing 747 jumbo jet proves to be concord’s greatest competitor carrying more than twice the passengers at a fraction of the

Cost in the Big Apple where the most profitable route of London to New York is crucial because of noise pollution a judge rules that the supersonic airliner cannot land in the city over in Britain and France many speculate that because the United States could not get its SST up in the air sour

Grapes caused America to punish Concord as a result only after a Supreme Court ruling is the aircraft allowed to land at JFK International Airport in 1977 almost 20 years later it would set the world record for transatlantic flight traveling from London to New York in less than 3

Hours by this time however with rapid inflation an oil crisis and grow gr environmental concerns people begin speculating that this plane’s time in the sun has passed people would pay the additional cost to fly faster than the speed of sound whatever however you valued your time one times the value of

Your time 1.5 times the value of your time that’s what people thought it turned out in fact that this was a very questionable assumption the whole idea that there would be a market for people paying a premium to go faster than the speed of sound on commercial aviation in

Fact was a facade it turned out to be a facade it was not true it was a mirage during dire Economic Times Concord is viewed as a plane only for the super rich the clientele was superb I mean the there were really really rich people FLW it I can recall on the one

Flight that I made there was a group of about five or six kids all in one family and who were making their 15th or 16th Concord flight and we’re totally Blas about it so it taught me that you know the Concord was for Rich guys the novelty effect has worn

Off the enthusiasm of the 1960s when it was first built is replaced by the cynicism of the 1970s each year at in service conord fails financially unable to turn a profit as the 1980s begin many feel this technological Marvel’s days are numbered however it’s miraculously saved when British Airways decides to buy its

Planes from the government outright with this decision a new marketing campaign is launched to bring Concord back to life discovering that its Rich cantel are willing to pay more to fly supersonic prices go up exponentially making it a vehicle exclusive ly for the super wealthy as a result it’s marketed as

Such and for the next two decades the plane stays afloat then after more than 30 years Concord flight 4590 crashes raising doubts on the safety of SuperSonic flight with the terrorist attacks of September the 11th 2001 and the decline in air travel that follows both British Airways and Air France decide to cancel

Service of the Concord in the end the aircraft became a mixed blessing I think that the angl French conquered project may have been a model that showed the Europeans that they could collaborate in aviation and while the conquered itself was not successful it may have been an impetus

Toward forming Airbus which has been relatively successful in building aircraft and becoming a for aable competitor uh to Boeing so in some ways although the conquered itself was not successful maybe it was a catalyst or vehicle to create a successful larger Enterprise called Airbus without question its ability to

Travel at twice the speed of sound made the plane a first class attraction wherever it landed over a period of several years Europe’s finest produced a true technological Marvel a pict optimizing the very best in engineering and aerodynamics for those reasons Concord goes down in the history books as one of

The greatest aircraft ever in Britain and France it was more than just a plane it came to symbolize a time when they and not the Americans were at the top of the mountain just as England had ruled the Seas with their dreadnots they would rule over the skies with their Concord

But with all its state-of-the-art capabilities it became Out Of Reach for the average man woman and child who ironically became the concord’s biggest supporters with the dim realities of the 197s the plane’s biggest obstacles were not in its jet engines nor in its payload but with a skeptical public who

Grew cynical at the idea of government and big business teaming up to produce a plane that only the privileged and Powerful could fly on it was a a beautiful airplane still is a beautiful airplane and it’s just a shame that perhaps it’s a sanctuary maybe you don’t need to go

Supersonically and uh obviously not not enough people need to go supersonically to justify the market now with the ability to communicate in a matter of micros seconds through the use of computers the Concord symbolizes a much different time when the best technology available to see each other in person was the

Airplane in this era faster meant better and in getting people to their destination no aircraft has been able to surpass the speed of the Concord if you enjoyed this video please remember to like And subscribe and as always thank you for watching He the P-51 Mustang the most dominant escort fighter of World War II it helped blaze a trail from England all the way to Berlin for America’s bomber force of course the Mustang was a revelation it was war winner its creation was sparked by a mixture of genius and

Chance the Mustang and its two-stage two-speed supercharged Merlin engine were the end result of years of technological development from World War One to World War II each generation of aircraft went ever higher and faster but the Mustang’s marriage with the Merlin might never have happened national pride

Delayed the coupling of these two great Innovations but a new deadly German adversary changed everything they [ __ ] off 190 this was really a topnotch fighter aircraft with the fw190 terrorizing the Skies of Europe the British and American forces swallowed their pride and joined together to create the ultimate fighting machine December 17th

1903 the W Brothers aircraft the Wright one successfully takes off initiating the dawn of Aviation man had already taken to the skies with gliders and balloons but this was the first time that an engine had propelled him into the air the right 1’s engine was a crude

Design by today’s standards and put out 12 horsepower only it was an inline engine meaning that its cylinders four in total were mounted in a straight line a layout that would Inspire some of the most advanced piston engined aircraft ever created though a simple design the right

Engine was Innovative it was the first engine to make use of a lightweight cast aluminum crank case every pound counted with a heavier engine the rights may not have made history that Winter’s day in North Carolina aircraft weight and power would continue to be important to the evolution of

Flight World War I was approaching and the newly formed Air Forces of the world needed reliable engines with enough power to sustain flight during operations from France would come a new type of power plant to take the fight into the air the Rotary engine rotary engines operated

Differently than the inline ones used by the Reich Brothers the cylinders were arranged in a radial pattern rather than a line when the engine was fired up the crankshaft remained stationary while the crank case and cylinders rotated around it a rotary engine had one giant advantage over the inlines of the era it

Was much lighter and thus gave a pilot better performance during combat or while trying to evade an enemy however the rotary engine was not without its shortcomings it had poor fuel economy as it was often run on Full Throttle it also provided an unpleasant ride castor oil was mixed with the fuel

Mixture for lubrication with the side effect of heavy fumes smoke and an oil shower for Pilots turns with a rotary powered aircraft could prove treacherous as the whole engine rotated It produced a gyroscopic effect a turn to the right at full power and low level could end with the death of a

Pilot rotory powered aircraft remained part of Air Force inventories till War’s end but they were gradually supplanted by the inline engine inlines based on the same principles as the one found in the original right plane kept improving in terms of power and performance between the wars and across

The Atlantic a new type of aircraft engine would emerge to dominate American Aviation the US Navy was looking for aircraft to populate its fledgling aircraft carriers space on board was extremely limited but aircraft with inline engines often had lengthy noses their engines built with rows of cylinders took up too much space on

Cramped carriers rotary engines though more compact had too many other weaknesses to be serious contenders for the role there was however a third type of engine before the war there had been limited experimentation with radial engines at first glance these appeared to be just like rotary

Engines it’s only when they are fired up that that the difference becomes clear in a rotary engine the crank case and cylinders rotate around the crankshaft but with a radial engine the crankshaft rotates while the engine block is static radials often weren’t as powerful as inline engines but they were less

Complicated they were cooled by air rushing over the engine rather than through a liquid cooling system this made radials less vulnerable to battle damage which might rupture the coolant lines Navy pilots who might have to travel long distances over the ocean to get to a Target needed an engine that

Would be sure to get them home under any circumstance most importantly for the Navy radials were smaller than inline engines so a greater number of aircraft equipped with them could be stored on board their carriers the Wright aeronautical Corporation a successor to the original Wright brothers company used their

Aviation expertise to create the first reliable radial engine for the Navy the J5 Whirlwind the J5 was put on display for the entire world to see when Charles Lindberg crossed the Atlantic in his Spirit of St Louis in 1927 his flight solidified the reputation of the J5 radial as a Dependable power

Plant the budding Airlines of the world were looking for engines to power their airliners and to bring their passengers across continents and eventually across the globe safely reliable radial engines seem to be the ideal Choice radials would power many of the principal airliners in the history of

Civil aviation from the Ford Tri motor to the Boeing 247 to the Lockheed model 10 Electra both the US Navy and US Army aircore would rely heavily on radial engines as they built up their inventories of Fighters and other aircraft in the 1930s the US had just one inline engine in development the

Allison v710 an engine that would one day power some of America’s great Fighters at the time relying on radials seemed a prudent decision but in the years to come and in the battles ahead it will leave the US playing catchup with their allies and enemies in Europe in Europe in the 1930s Air Forces and aircraft manufacturers were looking for Speed Above All Else as they designed the next generation of Fighters using streamlined designs and Powerful V12 inline engines they pushed their aircraft to speeds over 350 Mph their inline engine were not only more powerful they also helped to create more aerodynamic air frames their elongated shapes allowed for more streamline designs as compared with radials inline engines may have been more vulnerable to attack due to their complex liquid cooling systems but no matter how durable a radial engine is

Speed kills in a dog fight inline engines were built to provide just that it was from this year European obsession with speed that some of the legendary fighters of World War II were born including the supermarine Spitfire the hacker hurricane and the messers Schmid BF 109 beneath their elegant frames heard

Ever more powerful inline engines from Rolls-Royce and damler Benz respectively in the middle of 1940 the pilots of the RAF tested their metal and the endurance of their Fighting Machines in some of the most spectacular air battles of World War II Vice fur Goring had promised to

Destroy the RAF and thus facilitate the invasion of Britain Goring had at his disposal an armada of medium bombers protected by a deadly fighter Force the result of the Battle of Britain during those few vital months of 1940 is well known there was a heavy toll in fighters in pilots on both

Sides British and German Engineers tried to squeeze every ounce of power from their engines any tiny Advantage could be the difference between life and death with Britain and her industry under direct attack she looked to her old colony more than ever to provide her with desperately needed aircraft even before the Battle of

Britain the British purchasing commission had already been shock shopping for additional aircraft the US’s initial offer of Fighters was not well suited for the High Altitude dog fights taking place over Europe This was partially due to the American engines available the US had concentrated on radial engine production instead of

Inline engines like the one so popular in European Fighters they did have the Allison engine the v710 like the British Rolls-Royce Merlin it was a 12cyl Cinder inline engine but it had a complex turbocharger often difficult to fit into an aircraft to boost power in the thin air

At high altitudes the Allison engine used the heat of its exhaust to power a turbine and thereby increase the air flow and power one American aircraft the lock heat P38 had the extra space needed to house the turbocharger it was a big twin engined aircraft to begin with and had space in

Its tail Booms for the extra equipment but given the size of the P38 it wouldn’t have fared well against Nimble single- engine German fighters in a dog fight America had other smaller Fighters powered by the Allison engine the P39 era Cobra and the Curtis P40 Warhawk in both cases their

Manufacturers failed to include Allison’s turbocharger the P39 had an Innovative layout with its engine situated mid fuselage behind the pilot it was designed to house both the Allison engine and the turbocharger however a scoop built into the left side of the fuselage to cool the turbocharger was deemed too aerodynamically

Expensive both the scoop and the turbocharger were eliminated from the production design this change crippled the AOC Cobra’s ability to fight at high altitudes in the case of the P40 Warhawk a rugged single engined airplane the turbocharger was excluded from the design from the get-go this limited its optimal altitude

To just 15,000 ft and thus relegated the aircraft to ground attack the British purchasing commission was still interested in the Warhawk even with its limitations they saw it as more of an army support aircraft however the Curtis Factory was running at capacity and could not fulfill the order with no suitable aircraft readily

Available for purchase the Brits would turn to North American aircraft the British purchasing commission proposed that North American build the Warhawk under license from Curtis but NAA president Dutch kindleberger had a bolder plan he guaranteed that he could create an even better airplane using the same Allison engine in less time than it

Would take for him to retool for Warhawk production the Brits said yes and the end result was an airplane that may well have changed the outcome of the second world war in Europe back in Europe Germany was looking for an aircraft to augment the bf19 in the Battle of Britain the BF 109 and spitfire were closely matched but the BF 109 lacked the range to be highly effective in its escort role over Britain in the summer of

1940 the Luft Waffa had a twin engined escort the bf10 it had the range to be an excellent escort but it lacked the maneuverability to defend itself or its charge in a dog fight it also used two diimler Ben 605 engines making it an expensive Sitting Duck for British

Interceptors looking for a quick solution to their escort dilemma the if gufa even considered having the 110s tow 109’s into battle to conserve fuel but in the long run using two aircraft to perform the role of a single fighter was an even more wasteful solution what the lift wafa needed was a

Dedicated single engine aircraft to fill in for the BF 109 on longer range missions in ideally something to give them a decided advantage over the British fighters of the time however the lwfa wanted to have its cake and eat it too they wanted a new fighter

But they didn’t want to sacrifice any of the precious 605 engines meant for the BF 109 to the consternation of the rift wafa most of the new submissions for fighter designs from German industry were to be built around this very same engine to solve Germany’s escort woes

One man Kurt P [ __ ] a wolf’s legendary designer and test pilot did what was almost Unthinkable at the time since the start of the War British and German designers had relied upon powerful 12 cylinder inline engines to power their Fighters tank dared to build Germany’s Next fighter around a bombers radial

Engine the aircooled BMW 801 radial engine had plenty of power and had proven reliable in the ju88 and do 217 but radials in a fighter were a rare site in Europe it was difficult to build this aerodynamic a fuselage to house them in as when constructing one for a slender inline Engine though an unconventional design track tank saw two reasons for encouragement firstly the national advisory committee for Aeronautics and the US had already done research on improving air flow around radial engines over time they had developed the NACA cowl which at least helped to reduce drag this was a simple ring which fitted

Snugly around the cylinders of a radial engine it not only made the engine more aerodynamic it also improved cooling secondly tank observed that the US and Japanese navies were employing several modern carrier aircraft all with radial engines aircraft like the F4F Hellcat and the Japanese a6m 0 the lightweight zero had been almost

Unstoppable in the early part of the Pacific War ton had continued to explore ways of improving his new radial engined aircraft and reducing the drag effect although some say his greatest task was selling the radial idea to the ministry if that was the case the bureaucrats must have been quickly won

Over by Kurt KK’s first prototypes given the designation the ful wolf 190 and unofficially known as The Butcher bird Thea’s latest fighter was rushed into production fortunately for the Allies the fw190 arrived after the close of the Battle of Britain in the summer of 1941 five Mark

5 Spitfires flying over the South Coast spotted several radial engine fighters in German markets at first glance they were mistaken for us built Republic Lancers it was a deadly case of mistaken identity the aircraft were in reality early model fw1 190s the Spitfire pilots who survived the ensuing battle lived to

Tell just how quickly their comrades had been lost but Britain’s greatest loss that day was not Pilots or planes the battle marked the day Britain lost air superiority to the lift wafa the RAF had to do something and fast All Eyes looked to Rolls-Royce manufacturer of the Merlin engine that power plant of

The Spitfire Hurrican and so many of Britain’s Great Planes although the company had the Next Generation engine the 12-cylinder Griffin in development it was well over a year away more than enough time for Britain to lose the war earlier their been some thought given to modifying a few Merlin engines

For experimental high altitude work to be executed by a Wellington bomber it was little more than an idea at the time but in Britain’s hour of desperate need Rolls-Royce Engineers worked night and day to test the concept Merlin engines were already supercharged an air compressor mechanically attached to the rotating

Cam shaft increased the air flow to the engine allowing it to burn more fuel and to boost performance Rolls-Royce Engineers had theorized that adding a second supercharger could give the engine even more punch during high altitude work might a two-stage supercharger help the RAF reclaim Air Supremacy the end result of the

Rolls-Royce experiments was breathtaking it was almost as if the two-stage two-speed Merlin was an entirely different engine when in fact it was just a modification when the double supercharged aircraft dubbed the Spitfire Mark 9 finally arrived in June of 1942 the RAF had a rare opportunity to test it directly against a captured

Fw190 the test results were far different than the day a group of unlucky RAF Pilots ran into a flock of butcher Birds the two aircraft were virtual equals in terms of performance Captain Eric Brown who had flown a capture fw190 had a chance to test the new Spitfire 9 against the German aircraft

In live combat I had Flo the0 quite a bit so I wasn’t too frightened I reckoned I knew what that aircraft could do and I knew what my spit could do so I thought well can I can handle this guy hoping he was somebody just out of

Training school but no I picked somebody who really knew what he was up to and we had I would say a toing and flowing over France but neither could get a draw be than the other and we finally realized that both of us we run out of fuel we

Waggled our wings at each other and departed and um I realized this was really a topnotch fighter aircraft the RAF had leveled the playing field with the lwfa at least for the time being but what the RAF really needed was an aircraft to give them the upper hand the new Merlin’s greatest

Contribution to the war was still to come when it was mated with an extraordinary aircraft of American design back in the US North American aircraft had continued to work on a Warhawk substitute which met the specifications laid out by the British purchasing commission they had specify that the

Airplane would be powered by an Allison engine that it cost less than $40,000 and that had to be armed with 4303 in machine guns North American answered with the P-51 Mustang it featured an advanced laminer flow wing for good aerodynamic efficiency and a wide gate undercarriage for safer

Landing pleasing to the eye and to fly although mainly at lower altitudes the new arrival quickly gained respect from pilots and ground Crews alike there there were some concerns about how the Mustang would Faire should it be forced to ditch while crossing the channel during a water landing its air

Scoop located beneath the fuselage might flood the aircraft or cause it to overturn water tank tests at Saunders row were initiated to perfect the techniques for ditching the aircraft around the same time that the RAF was getting the Spitfire Mark 9 ready for combat and the fw190 was dominating the skies Rolls-Royce test

Pilot Ronald Hawker was tasked with the mission of evaluating all aircraft powered by non Rolls-Royce engines he was thoroughly impressed with the p-51a save for its poor performance at high altitude like the P40 Warhawk it had an Allison engine and no turbocharger Hawker pondered how the aircraft might perform with the new Merlin

Engine the results on paper were phenomenal according to rolls-royce’s calculations with a Merlin power plant the Mustang would not only outclass any American aircraft but even new Spitfires using the same engine oddly Hawker had to push for the mating of the Merlin 61 and the Mustang even though the double supercharged P-51

Would have outclassed the fw190 as well Hawker finally arranged for the marriage of the two great inventions and test TR confirmed his hunch the Mustang was a war rner the main challenge was to produce enough aircraft and engines to reclaim the Skies of Europe North American would tweak the

Mustang design to accommodate the Merlin 61 engine it was a much more powerful engine so the original p-51a airframe had to be reinforced as well the three-bladed prop was exchanged for one with four blades the addition of Plumbing for drop tanks might have seemed a small change but it

Would have a great impact on the air battles to come Packard took up manufacturer of the Merlin 61 engines in the US they were designated the V1 1650s Packard had arranged a licensing agreement with Rolls-Royce earlier in the war Ford was originally slated to build americanmade Merlins and seemed a

Perfect choice due to the company’s industrial might but Henry Ford was adamant that his company build defensive weapons only North American’s double supercharged aircraft the p-51b and p-51c first took flight in the spring and summer of 1943 air Vice Marshall Patty Harbison recalls when the Mustangs first arrived at his Spitfire Squadron of course the Mustang was a revelation it was a much more comfortable airplane than the Spitfire was and I have heard people talk about the relative merits of both they were both War winners the Spitfire

Was melt as an Interceptor it could I turn a Mustang and could I climb it but it didn’t to the legs Mustang and then of course if you can’t get to where the fight is you’re not you’re you’re not too effective as P-51 started to arrive in Europe the war was

Changing and the Mustang was the perfect aircraft for the time the US was taking the war to Germany they were bombing the German War Industry out of business the only problem was their bombers were being shredded by Speedy German interceptors the US had hinged their hopes on the ability of their bombers to

Defend themselves by maintaining a tight box formation when this strategy failed they were in dire need of an escort fight the P38 Lightning was simply not agile enough to take on the role then there was the p47 Thunderbolt it was an awesome radial engine fighter more than capable of taking care of

Itself in battle but it had two major flaws it was expensive and it lacked the range to take the bombers all the way to Berlin and back the P-51 B’s and C’s arrived just in time they had been designed to carry drop tanks and with the addition of a

Fuel tank behind the pilots they had more than enough fuel to escort American bombers to Hitler’s Lair the Mustang proved more more than a match for Germany’s fw190 and me 109 slowly American bombers closed in around Berlin suddenly the Germans found themselves playing catchup Kurt KK’s fw190 with a radial

Engine found it difficult at higher altitudes where the bombers roam KK swapped its radial engine for an inline the long-nosed aircraft was nicknamed the Dora the f wolf Dora little later Dora was a magnificent fighter with an ancient change not really any structural changes other than those to accommodate the engine but what

It meant was here was an airplane that could keep up with the hunt as the years of the war progressed so from 1942 right up to the end of the war the [ __ ] W 190 was in the top grade of fighter or fighter B the P-51 Mustang also continued to

Evolve as mechanics and Engineers Incorporated changes based on the feedback of pilots who had tested the plane in battle its canopy went through several permutations the British swapped the original one for a sliding Malcolm Hood similar to a Spitfires for improved visibility the p-51b the definitive version of the Mustang had a bubble

Canopy which offered 360° of Clear View North American also upgraded the D’s Firepower it had 650 caliber machine guns compared to four in earlier models and it had solved the problem of gun jamming during hard turns the fuel tank situated behind the pilot may have increased range but it

Created other issues the plane had poed directional stability when the tank was full to counter this problem Engineers added a small dorsal fin in the D model these and other improvements would help the Mustang blaze a path to Berlin for America’s bombers mes Marshall Herman gar

Commander of the Lu was quoted as saying when I saw Mustangs over Berlin I knew the jig was up when the European War had come to a close the battle still raged in the Pacific the Mustang was the best escort available but even with its incredible range it

Could not accompany an aircraft like the b29 super fortress on extended bombing missions over Japan the expanses of ocean were too large the engineers at North American struggled with the problem of stretching the Mustang’s range their solution was a Zing or twin Mustang by fusing two Mustangs together

They hope to dramatically increase the range of the Mustang while maintaining its excellent dog fighting abilities the new Mustang the f82 had an incredible range 2,000 miles though the prototypes were powered by Packard built Merlin engines the US Army Air core was adamant that the production version be totally

Americanmade unfortunately for the f82 without Merlin engines it was not the same aircraft when fitted with the Allison v710 100 it speed speed dropped and high altitude performance suffered it was one of the few cases of a prototype outperforming the production model of an aircraft by the time the f82 was ready

Japan had surrendered and the war was over after the war the P-51 continued to serve while other piston engine fighters of the era went quietly into retirement though it was the dawn of the jet age there there was still a place for the Mustang in a variety of

Roles Colonel Ray o Roberts flew the Mustang during its Second Life at that time I was flying what they call the F6 which is a P-51 with cameras also had guns and uh you could had the B bombing and gun Gunnery capability and we participated in a post off Realties

Mapping program we mapped revised all the Japanese Maps photographed did aial Photography in Japan and and Korea when the Korean War arrived Mustangs which had been mothballed for long-term storage were suddenly being shipped across the Pacific on carriers unable to compete with the next generation of jet fighters for the dog

Fighter role Mustangs returned to where they started in Korea Mustangs made excellent ground attack aircraft they didn’t have the speed of jets but they had the endurance to make it from Japan to Korea on bombing runs in Korea the f82 also had an opportunity to taste combat for the first time f82

Is flew strike escort and night fighter missions the marriage of the P-51 Mustang and the Merlin 61 engine produced incredible results it provided the allies with an effective escort to pound the last Nails into Germany’s cofin perhaps the most amazing thing about the P-51 Stellar career is that it might never have

Happened if the Merlin and Mustang had never been made it at the suggestion of Hawker at Rolls-Royce the P-51 might have had a humdrum career as a reliable ground attack aircraft rather than an elite dog fighter it arrived at the right time and the right place in history just when the

Allies needed an escort fighter the P-51 was the end result of years of aircraft and engine development though jet powered aircraft would supplant it the impact of the Mustang and Merlin in military history cannot be Unwritten or Denied at the farboro air show in 1949 barely 4 years after the war ended Britain presented an impressive array of jet aircraft some were purely military others experimental and there were even some airliners converted from piston engines to the new jet technology perhaps the best crowd-pleaser was the advanced deavin Comet turbojet

Airliner elsewhere in England other types of jet airliners were being developed but these were somewhat different this is the vicker’s vicount airline when it first came into service in the early 50s it quickly became a success one of the main reasons for the Vic Count’s ever expanding order book

Was the aircraft’s Rolls-Royce Dart turboprop engines however the vicount wasn’t the only Contender nor was the dart the only turbo prop engine available at the time slightly smaller than the vicount and with different turbo prop engines the Armstrong witworks aircraft represented a giant step forward in Airline design the target market for both

Aircraft was the short to medium roots of the emerging post-war airline industry with government backing British industry they had something special for offer with the Revolutionary turbo prop engines the concept of a conventional jet having its exhaust thrust converted into turning power for traditional propeller blades was brand new and it

Made for extremely economical and very smooth running there were two early examples the Rolls-Royce Dart and the competitive Armstrong sley Mamba the Apollo’s designers favored the Mamba whereas Vicor chose the Dart construction of the Apollo started in Armstrong woodworth’s Factory at Bingington airport in 1948 baggon had been bombed during the

German Blitz on Coventry it was used as an RAF fighter base during the War years but now it would be used as part of Britain’s critical export drive to repay the war debt there were grounds for optimism as the country refocused its industry only 3 years earlier manufacturers had produced Spitfires and

Lancasters by the thousands and for a time most of the skilled aircraft Builders were still on hand one of the more notable features of the Apollo’s Mamba engines was their narrow diameter slender and aerodynamic they complemented the aircraft’s Aesthetics however the smaller engine housings that accompanied the Mamba did

Not provide for an area to store the landing gear in flight this meant that the main Wheels had to retract into the fuselage consuming valuable space however the Mamba still showed great promise apart from anything else it had already powered a trainer the Athena which was actually the first

Production aircraft to employ a turbo prop engine also early test suggested good performance in 1948 a 500h hour test run confirmed the engine’s durability after this Armstrong Whitworth were sure that they had a winning combination the aw55 Apollo prototype was designed and built to accommodate a

Crew of three two pilots and one cabin crew passenger seating could be configured for up to 31 people however a slightly longer version for production had also been discussed as well well as a military version for troop transport construction on the Apollo progressed until its roll out in April of

1949 this Sleek fully pressurized airliner was a far cry from the utility Fighters and bombers the industry had produced just a few years before on the 10th of April Apollo aircraft serial number vx220 took to the air from a grass field at baggon airport its first flight lasted just half an

Hour and the results were less than impressive the first problem was that the Mamba asm2 engines failed to produce the 1200 plus horsepower expected which were indeed needed to meet the aircraft’s performance requirements the 800 horsepower that was actually recorded was Far short of what was anticipated subsequent test flights also

Demonstrated numerous flaws in the airframe design improvements were constantly made until a critical flight test to parison back was undertaken on the 12th of March 1951 still problems persisted with the Apollo having a flawed airframe and the Mamba engines remaining underpowered in June of 1952 all further development on the Apollo was abandoned

And the only two examples ever built were used for research work at bosome down this left the vicker’s vi count the undoubted winner and it was this type that also went on to become one of Britain’s all-time airliner export earners with 445 built the redoutable Rolls-Royce dark turbo prop engine was even more

Successful with over 7,000 engines delivered to numerous customers up until 1987 41 years after its first test for a while the Armstrong Sly m had no such success but then again it certainly wasn’t a complete failure either rather with Improvement it morphed into several different life forms each one displaying considerable and unexpected

Ingenuity at about the same time that the Apollo was under construction the Royal Navy and Ferry Aviation were developing a truly remarkable anti-submarine aircraft the fairy ganet shared the same problems as many carrier born aircraft it had the performance needs of two power plants but this usually meant the

High risk of possibly having to land with one engine not functioning this type of asymmetric approach is highly dangerous for the air Crew a second consideration for Fair’s designers was the significant economy that might be achieved on Long missions if one of two engines could actually be turned off and yet still leave the plane with the same balance as a single engine a aircraft Armstrong Sly thought that they

Might have the answer the very narrow diameter of the Mamba turbo prop might now prove most useful if two could be assembled side by side driving two Contra rotating propellers both able to be turned on and off independent of the other the double Mamba as it became known was a major success providing

Ganet Pilots with two jet power plants in an aircraft that had great range and at the same time was safe to land even with one engine down because of its Mamba engines the G it became a much trusted Maritime aircraft which went on to serve in a number of other

Countries with nearly 350 of all types made it wasn’t so far off the numbers of VI counts delivered although the vicer plane had four turbo props as opposed to the ganet 2 Still The Versatile mod BBA had much more to offer by removing the gearbox and the propeller Drive Armstrong sidley

Were able to present a conventional terbo jat with a few more deletions and economies this evolved into a so-called Expendable power plant and it transpired that there actually was quite a market for a shortlife jet engine it was named the adder postwar Western governments knew that they might have to deal with Soviet

Forces that would include jet aircraft target practice on anything flying less than in the high 500 mph range would be useless equally important a Target would have to be able to fly up to a height of 50,000 ft and get there quickly since most drones only have a limited flight

Time in 1948 the Australian government aircraft Factory entered into a contract to develop an unmanned radio controlled flying Target it was given the name gind ofic Aboriginal for the hunted one made in Australia many were shipped to Britain in Parts where with their experience with the Mamba engine Ferry

Aviation assembled each unit that was powered by the Mamba descendant the adder more than 500 gind divix were built and employed by Australia Britain the United States and Sweden over time Armstrong slyy merged with the rivals rolls voice although not before it had redeveloped the adder into

A stronger and more reliable Turbo Jet the end result was also much more powerful it was named the Viper and Vipers were produced in the hundreds powering the jet Provost strike Masters Hawker cidly 125 and many more what started out as a misfire with the Mamba engines on the Apollo developed over

Time into a successful line of engines with the double Mamba adder and vipers that would power numerous aircraft for years to come one problem facing the designers of the next generation of turbojet engines is that of increasing turbine Inlet temperatures air cooled turbine blades may offer a solution to this problem the

Fabrication of a cast aircool turbine blade that has shown promise in Prototype testing will be shown in this Film this blade was made using a modification of the Lost wax casting technique a process to provide long slender holes for cooling passages was developed by the Lewis flight propulsion laboratory of the national advisory committee for Aeronautics this development is particularly important because the super Alloys used in aircraft turbine blades

Are extremely difficult to machine ceramic tubes are used as part of the casting mold to establish cores or holes through the turban blade casting core tubes of the desired outside diameter are assembled in a pattern die the core tubes are held in place by embedding them in a bar of soft

Wax using a hot wire or knife the dyes used are made of a low melting alloy cast around a brass Master pattern a casting pattern is made by closing the dyes containing the ceramic tubes clapping the dyes in a wax injection machine and injecting molten wax Under Pressure the wax pattern

Containing ceramic tubes is removed from the dye and excess wax is trimmed leaving a light wax film on the exposed ceramic tubes to permit freedom of movement due to expansion additional pieces of wax are assembled by welding with a hot wire these pieces will form sprew Runners and

Ingates or passages for the molten metal to reach the blade cavity in the casting mold the assembled wax is mounted on a waxed base to seal it a can type flask is placed over the assembly and it too is sealed at the bottom when the investment is Thoroughly mixed it is

Poured into the flask and around the wax pattern assembly the flask is then placed in a vacuum chamber to remove air from the mix after investing and air drying the moles are placed in a furnace here the drying is completed the wax is melted out the wax resid do is

Burned off and the mold is cured during this furnace cycle the temperature is gradually increased from room temperature to 1900 de fah metal alloy for the casting is melted in an electric induction furnace when the metal reaches a temperature of 3000° f The Crucible of molten metal is placed in a centrifugal

Casting machine and the hot mold is placed over it as the casting machine is spun the molten metal is thrown into the mold the casting is removed by breaking away the mold after the casting is cleaned up the ceramic tubes used to form the cooling passages in the blade must be

Removed this is done by threading fine stainless steel wires through each ceramic tube and stretching them taut on a frame the turbine blade is then attached to a cam device designed to to slide the blade up and down on the wires the lower part of the assembly is then immersed in

A bath of Molen costic this helps to remove reaction products and introduces fresh costic to the bore of the tubes and hence accelerates the solution and removal of the core tubes the rough casting is cleaned in an air water abrasive blast a suitable base configuration is

Then ground and the blade is ready for Tes in a research facility the process you have just seen illustrates a principle that has been effective in producing long th cord holes in castings this process may be useful in fabricating turbine blades to be used at very high turban Inlet temperatures

The F100 is one of our primary tactical support weapon systems this air has a proven history of outstanding performance one of the reasons for this dependability is the rugged power plant the one one a high performance aircraft is adaptable to many missions it is used for reconnaissance as a

Tactical fighter and as an Interceptor approximately 30,000 lb of thrust is developed by its twin engin the f102 is the first operational Air Force Delta wi aircraft performance characteristics of this weapon system are ideally suited for intercept missions a reliable power plant is essential for the success of any

Mission the f102 101 and 100 are all powered by the rugged j57 engine developed by fratton Whitney the individual engines vary somewhat but for most part are the same fundamental design the j57 is a dual compressor engine the engine consists of the following components the inlet the low press compressor the high press

Compressor the diffuser case combustion chamber the first second and third stage turbin the After Burner and the exhaust nozzle the low press compressor referred to as N1 is driven by the second and third stage turbine the high-press compressor M2 is driven by the first stage turbine these two units or spools

Are not mechanically connected the j57 operates on the same basic principle as all jet engines pressure presented in grph form below the basic engine offline and velocity are increased by a series of rers in the compressor section a compressor bleed system prevents compressor instability when the engine is operating at reduced

Power the compressed air passes through the diffuser into the combustion chamber where the air expands thus reducing somewhat the velocity and pressure fuel is mixed with a portion of the air to form the combustible Mass when combustion occurs the gases are expelled through the turbin at this

Point power is extracted by the turbin to drive the compressor the remaining energy expelled through the exhaust nozzle provides the thrust since exhaust nozzle and curban discharge pressures are relative curban discharge pressure is used as a parameter to determine the grust crust is the measure of force developed by the engine force is

Determined by mass time acceleration mass is the weight of air and fuel passing through the engine acceleration is the difference between Inlet and turban discharge verities of this Mass thus crust may be expressed by the formula Force equals mass time acceleration the engine trim charts are based on this

Formula additional frust is obtained in the After Burner by increasing mass and acceleration at that stage the basic engine pressure ratio during After Burner operation is maintained by increasing the exhaust nozzle area efficient engine operation depends on correct fuel schedule the basic component of the the j57 main engine

Fuel system are fuel pump and fuel pump transfer valve fuel control and the pressurizing and dump valves the fuel pump is a dual element per gear pump one element supplies fuel to the afterburn the other to the main engine the fuel control meters the fuel required to operate the engine through its full

Range the pressurizing and dump valve supplies the main engine fuel manifold and drains the manifold at engine shut down at engine start fuel enters the pump through the impeller where the pressure is increased this provides a positive pressure head to the main stage at this stage the fuel reaches output

Pressure the pressurized fuel closes the fuel regulating transfer valve and the afterburner check valve and flows into the fuel control the main metering valve is closed at this time a portion of this fuel passes through the minimum slow orifice through the signal line to the pmv valve since

The control is in bypass pressure does not build up enough to close this valve until the power lever moves from cut off to idle when the power lever is moved to the idle position the fuel dump valve closes the main metering valve opens the cut off valve moves off its

Seat the pressure valve op the p&v valve Inlet check valve opens and fuel is supplied to the primary side of the fuel manifold through the pressurizing and dump Val at approximately 74% RPM the fuel pressurizing valve will open to supply fuel to the secondary side of the fuel

Manifolds the j57 engine uses a primary and secondary system in order to obtain the highest possible fuel flow with the shortest possible place at low RPMs only the primary side is used when the emergency system is selected the actuator positions the pilot valve to direct pressure to the

Shuttle valve system the shuttle valve blocks off metered flow and provides a port for unmetered fuel to the emergency throttle valve this mechanical valve controls the flow of fuel the After Burner element of the fuel pump will supply fuel to the engine in the event of main element

Failure the primary function is to furnish fuel for the after bur the other components of the j57 afterburner system are the afterburner fuel control exhaust nozzle control igniter valve and the mechanical shut off valve the relative position of the components varies according to engine model the afterburner fuel

Control meters fuel to the ab spray box the exhaust nozzle control directs compressor discharge air to open and close the nozzles the igniter valve injects fuel into the combustion chamber creating a streak of flame to ignite the After Burner in the event of electrical failure the mechanical shut off valve

Will terminate AB operation at Approximately 80% % RPM rotation of this valve causes AB stage fuel to bypass through the ab fuel control regulator valve the fuel control unit is carefully calibrated on the test bench to assure accurate engine fuel schedule the main functions of the fuel control are to maintain acceleration

Schedules below compressor stall Zone to prevent over temperature during acceleration prevent lean die out during deceleration and to maintain any selected engine speed within operating limits regardless of altitude the fuel control senses engine RPM Inlet temperature and burner pressure to supply the correct amount of fuel for any ambient

Condition when calibration has been completed all external adjustments except the idle and Military trim screws are sealed these seals are installed to protect test bench precision calibrations and must not be removed the j57 engine will provide relatively trouble-free operation when all systems are functioning correctly however the systems must be properly

Rigged and adjusted one of the most critical engine adjustments is the rigging of the fuel control Lage full range movement is obtained only when the fuel control and afterburner mechanical shut off valve levers are correctly positioned the levers are set to predetermined angles a protractor or ET template is used to set

The linkage at these angles the protractor is positioned at the oil pump and accessory housing plug to establish a reference angle this reference angle will be used to adjust the fuel control lever with the fuel control lever in off position the difference between the reference angle and this reading must be the

Number of degrees specified in the tech manual it may be necessary to readjust the fuel control lever to obtain the correct angle the fuel control lever and serrated spacer are ratcheted to give the desired angle the fuel control position which when all other linkage is connected will close

The afterburner mechanical shut off down the power actuating Rod is then attached to the fuel control leather move the machanical shut off lever to the detent position the rod connecting the cross shaft lever and mechanical shut off valve lever may have to be adjusted to the specified

Length the ab mechanical shut off valve is held in detent position while the lever is ratcheted to the position where the rod which has already been adjusted to the specified length will fit then all connections are tightened either the protractor or an etched template is used to again check

The angle of the fuel control lever it may be necessary to readjust the fuel control lever to obtain the correct angle after Corrections are made all connections are then safety replacement or adjustment of most components will affect engine operation prior to aircraft installation the engine is Thoroughly inspected and tested to ensure satisfactory

Performance a fuel at least check is imperative before initial start of a repaired Engine with the system pressurized check all fuel lines and connections the exhaust nozzle opening must also be rechecked before initial engine starts nozle diameter not within specified limits will affect engine efficiency on some engines a fail safe

Device is installed to prevent total loss of power in the event of linkage failure the device will position the fuel control lever to a 45° angle setting which will provide approximately 90% RPM thus ensuring sufficient thrust to maintain flight after installation in the aircraft all air frame to engine

Connections must be checked and adjusted and the engine retri Final Trim to compensate for aircraft installation losses is preferably accomplished with the aircraft headed directly into the WID prevailing wind velocity and direction must be within limits specified in the tech menu the trim pad area must be free of

Loose objects that could damage the engine if ingested to effectively trim the engine power control settings must be coordinated throttle linkage is operationally tested before making fuel control adjustments movement of the fuel control control quadrant must synchronize with throttle movement power control movement is transferred to obtain predetermined fuel control

Settings the aircraft manual indicates the relative degree of movement throughout the entire throttle Range close attention to detail is required when trimming an engine changes in ambient barometric pressure and temperature will affect engine performance characteristics true barometric pressure and correct temperature both recorded within 15 minutes of the trim run are used to

Determine Target pt7 Target pp7 is obtained by tracing the temperature and pressure coordinates on the trim chart start engine is specified in the tech manual and allow engine and exhaust gas temperature to stabilize reard throttle to idle settings desired idle speed is obtained by adjusting the idle trim

Screw As in all fuel control adjustments Final Trim is always in the increased RPM Direction proceeding with the trim operations slowly Advance throttle to military power allow 5 minutes for stabilizing caution do not over speed or overt engine during runup and stabilization with throtle set at military power record RPM EGT and the

Turban discharge pressure cp7 If PP seven reading is low return throttle to idle and readjust maximum rpm setting at the fuel control turn the adjustment clockwise to increase RPF in order to obtain Target pp7 Advanced travels and military [Applause] power Stabilize then recheck pt7 return throttle to idle check EGT and RPM make certain that RPM is within 2% of data plate speed indication at the completion of the trim run follow standard shutdown procedures accurate troubleshooting depends on a thorough understanding of the j57 engine and its system function

Only by correct analysis of the interrelated parameters can the malfunction be isolated proficient troubleshooting is the mark of quality the tech manual outlines the common symptoms of engine malfunctions the probable causes and their remedy basic parameters used to determine engine performance must also be considered when analyzing problems these basic parameters are

RPM cp7 and EGT one of the most detrimental engine malfunctions is overtting or high EGP perform static checks of cd7 lines and connections and the exhaust nozzle opening make sure the anti-icing valves are closed then check for instrument accuracy all static checks have been performed and found satisfaction now the

Engine must be checked for proper trip as engine approaches military power check exhaust nozzle for free check to make sure the pt7 has not exceeded Target and RPMs within data plate limits if High EGT still exists the engine must be removed and the hot section inspection must be

Performed inspect the burner can for crack or Hotpot check fuel nozzles for loose burned or missing air caps and evidence of seal leaks or clogged air holes check the first stage turban nozzle guide veins for excessive bow turban veins bowed Beyond limits will distort the gas path causing loss of turban

Efficiency the amount of fuel required to compensate for this loss accounts for the excess temperature in conjunction with correction of the Bode nozzle guide veins or providing they were within limits additional checks are necessary to assure the problem is corrected insect first and second stage outer air seat for cracks burned areas

And damage to Outer knife edges check clearance between outer air seals and turban blade shrouds check first stage turbine dislocating Dimension the cause of high EGT may have been one major problem isolated at any phase of the investigation or the accumulation of minor deficiencies requiring several procedures to isolate and

Correct had RPM exceeded data plate limits during initial High EGT troubleshooting trim run the engine would have to be feel cleaned before proceeding with other checks This process is intended to restore pressor efficiency when this operation is completed retrimming the engine may bring all parameters within Women when troubleshooting engine performance deficiencies it is necessary to consider all three parameters EGT RPM and pp7 as an example failure to obtain Target pp7 can be caused by many things by comparing the relationship to EGT and RPM many unnecessary troubleshooting steps can be eliminated for instance when all three

Parameters are low a fuel scheduling deficiency is indicated first check for a full travel of the power lever is a fuel control quadrant military position must not be less than 54° the next step is to remove the fuel control and check the position of the cam shaft with Cam Shaft cover removed lever

Positioned at 11° and the temperature sense balled in a 60° F path measure the distance from the end of Cam Shaft to the cover flange this reading should coincide with that on the cam shaft depth plate tolerances and replacement instruction are included in the engine tech manual the engine tech manual includes

Specific Instructions for maintenance procedures these manuals represent a vast accumulation of knowledge and experience through individual ability initiative and constant use of the tech manual proper maintenance and troubleshooting procedures can be achieved this is the goal of the improved maintenance program I was quite astonished to know what it was because it had no propeller and John replied oh it’s easy old boy it just sucks itself along like a Hoover there was the awful Race Against Time there was the skull duggery she used to say oh well Daddy’s doing something very hush

Hush I thought my goodness what why didn’t I think of this before and it seems so obvious Then a small English church as the last resting place of a man who didn’t just change the face of the Earth he enabled us to see what it actually looked like his name was Frank Whittle this is the story of how he invented the jet engine he overcame all

The odds only to see the British government almost throw his idea away and miss a chance to shorten the Second World [Applause] War I was born on June the 1st 1907 in centry my parents were working class my father was a foreman in machine tool manufactur

I lived there in cry for 9 years went from elementary school there and then the family moved to lington Spa because my father bought a small very small engineering outfit called the Livington valve and Pistol ring company and I really did get my first engineering experiences there because I helped him

Sometimes for I think it was about TS an hour or something like that uh making slots in valve stems in lemington Frank also also won a scholarship to the town secondary school I was very lazy with homework and got a series of raspber for

That but at the end of term I often do quite well for inst I come top of maths something like that I never did win a prize at school but I did an awful lot of private study I used to go down to the library in lington Spar and study all sorts of

Things which are not in the school curriculum and uh that was where I first started to learn about Guest turbin I um was always attracted to flying from my earliest years almost when I was for my favorite toy and this was 191 was a tin model of aerio and my

Heroes were people like Captain Albert ball and major mccon and so on the VCS of the first world war and I just wanted to fly and also I thought that boys in the uniform of aircraft apprentices look very good so I decided I’d like to wear that uniform and applied to joined

As an apprentice the Royal Air Force however rejected young Whittle he was too small I uh was sunk for the time being but before I left the camp a very kindly physical training sergeant if you could imagine such a thing uh took pity on me and he gave me a diet to follow

And series of exercises Max aling exercises I did all that for 6 months I put on three Ines on height and three inches on my chest so I thought well I have another shot and I wrote to the ministry they said no once you’ve been turned down you’ve been turned on

Forever I thought well I go through the whole process again as i’ never happen in the hope that the uh bureaucracy wouldn’t pick it up and I was lucky that time and ended up at cranell in number four Wing Whittle didn’t enjoy life as an Air Force Apprentice in that rank he

Would never get to fly what brightened whittle’s life was the model aircraft Society where he became the leading light at building working replicas so much so that uh the initials bwm which stood for boys wi model aircraft Society was most people said that boy wh boy Whitt’s model aircraft

Society because we known we were known as boy Whittle Boy Smith and so forth in those days whittle’s skills at making model planes singled him out to the authorities perhaps he might be officer material there were to be uh five Cadets selected from number four Wing at

Cranwell and uh I was number six in the passing out list so when the number one boy failed because of his eyesight uh it made me eligible the founder of the royal Air Force had his doubts though Lord trenchard nearly stopped it because um I hadn’t been a leading boy

And I hadn’t made my uh no kind of a name in sports on which a lot of weight was put in those days Whitt’s Co had a compelling reason to make trenchard think again he thought that he got a a mathematical genius it was this natural gift that got little a Cadet Ship less than 1% of apprentices made the huge step to join the elite in the Officers Training college at Cranwell although this was next to the apprentices wing it was socially another world one that shared the culture of the public schools from where most of the cadets then Came In The Bleak Lincolnshire Countryside Frank whittle’s life now took a new Direction Crownwell provided a very intensive education for Whittle for the cadets just as it is today the highlight of the course was the flying lessons I learned to fly on the a504 K that was a very ancient type of a plane 1911 type and it sort with a toothpick Between the Wheels you know

Uh to prevent it tipping over on its nose which in reality it helps it to tip it over on its nose or even turn upside down Whitt was soon a daring even overconfident pilot and one who had his fair share of accidents I’m I have to confess I wrecked two or three

Airplanes three at least yeah the the first run I got lost and wanted to get back to cramel when the visibility deteriorated very badly it was the day incidentally of the cross country run at Cranwell which all Cadets hated and they most of my fellow cadetes thought I’d done it to get out

Of the cross country Room in between Learning to Fly and studying at Cranwell Whittle first conceived the idea that would make him famous it all started with a student thesis or had to write a thesis and I chose future developments and aircraft design rather ambitious and rather concentrated on the engine side but the

Main thing in that thesis was that I arrived at what I now know was the wellknown bre formula I wasn’t familiar with it at the time connecting speed range engine efficiency and so forth and to me that meant that if you wanted to go very fast and far you would have to

Go very high heights of 50,000 ft that sort of thing at T where the piston engine obviously wouldn’t work and at speed it’s a uh where the propeller wouldn’t work so it was I started to look for a new kind of power plant Whitt prepared this paper during

The first half of 1928 but his findings at Cran were the fruit of the 5 years he had by now been training there my cramel thesis um when the professor marked it he wrote on it uh in effect that he didn’t really understand it but he gave me 30 out of

30 which I thought was quite satisfactory Whittle envisaged flying speeds of 500 mph at a time when propeller planes struggled to reach 150 these machines were noisy and shook the pilot terribly that’s because their engines were actually car motors on a bigger scale with many moving Parts Whittle felt an

Aesthetic dislike for such power plants the problem with a piston engine as you go up height even though you supercharge it is that the power drops off as the air gets thinner and there eventually comes a point where it won’t generate enough power to turn itself over against its own

Friction whittle’s idea would use the same Principle as a balloon filled with air when this escapes every child knows what happens but it wasn’t clear how an engine might recreate such a force I considered a piston engine driving a fan inside a hollow fuselage and then thought well why not

Throw that piston engine away up the compression ratio of the fan and substitute a turbine for the piston engine and there was the turbo by now Whittle had left Cranwell but his search for this solution had preoccupied him ever since it didn’t come to me out of the blue for

The simple reason that I’ve been trying to find it for 18 months but just the the thought get rid of the piston engine and substitute a turbine you might say that came out of the blue whether I was having a bath or what whatever at the time I couldn’t tell

You Whitt’s plan proposed just one moving part this would be a shaft with a compressor driven by a turbine at the other end it would work like this the compressor spins round sucking air into combustion Chambers at many times atmospheric pressure here this air is mixed with

Vaporized Fuel and ignited the hot gas created expands through the turbine turning the shaft and escapes into the atmosphere it is this continuous Force which propels a jet airplane along the turbojet concept brought with it so many natural advantages a very big factor in favor of a a jet

Engine was that when you went up high uh the air temperature was very low very cold and that benefited the compressor a lot it meant that you could get a uh much better conditions for the compressor and the other thing is that in a normal turb velocity coming out of

It is wasted in the case of the jet engine that was completely used after the idea had come to me I thought my goodness why didn’t I think of this before and it seems so obvious then this was Whitt’s moment of Genius he had seen the future of powered flight

And he was a pilot officer aged just 22 I was at the central flying school at wittering uh doing the flying instructor course one one of the instructors there was WEP Johnson who became a very good friend and colleague in later years and he’d been trained as a patent agent and

He became very interested in my proposal he thought it would work and he helped me to draft a patent have you ever patented anything no I don’t know thing about it does a patent both publish and protect that is the whole point of patents but one thing’s essential file a

Patent application before touting the thing wrong otherwise you haven’t a hope I’ll tell you what let’s rough out a specification now oh what fine what do we do well you make a rather better sketch and I’ll get on with a clever bit the writing okay armed with his patent

Whittle offered his idea to Industry no one thought it could ever work according to the theories of the time there was this fundamental difficulty with gas turbines inefficient compressors inefficient turbines and the other big snag was the materials then existing in 1929 wouldn’t stand temperatures of more than say about 500°

Centigrade but I knew or felt pretty confident that they would evolve in the normal course of development and of course they did the positive young officer also went to London to put his revolutionary concept of the air Ministry Whitt fared no better when he met AA Griffith one of the ministry’s top scientists

I went to see uh Dr Griffith and another scientist at South Kensington explain the idea it was very cooly received Griffith uh pointed out an error in my calculations and it was all rather depressing you know and then after that I got a letter from the a Ministry

Saying in effect that uh they weren’t really interested and so forth it didn’t help that um I hadn’t then received an engineering degree soon after this rejection whittles seemed to have more bad news after I completed the flying instructors course I very nearly got posted to

Number four FTS Abu SAR in Egypt that would have been a real nail in the coughing of the jet engine if that had happened fortunately the posting was changed Whittle remained in Britain and served a year as a flying instructor these were happy times for him in May

1930 he married Dorothy Lee during this period he also got the chance to develop his exceptional flying skills he was now one of the raf’s best pilots and was chosen to fly in the henden air pageants where he thrilled Spectators with his skills at crazy flying these were the Red Arrows of the

Day and Whitt loved entertaining the public this way at this time in Germany a young scientist was eagerly looking forward to his first trip in an airplane his name was Hans Von ohin I always dreamed about the beauty of flying my first flight with a commercial airplane I believe it was a three

Engine yonus was a great disappointment it was so noisy and so vibratory that I felt the piston engine and propeller is not the good propulsion system the Elegance of flying is destroyed by it the sight of smoke rushing from chimneys inspired F Ain to think if that Force

Could be created by a turbine maybe he could make a smoother AO engine highp speeded was not the primary goal to me the smoothness and no noise was more the starting point of my thinking but as I thought about it I noticed that as a matter of fact it

Will be capable of driving the airplane faster Britain’s air Ministry had declined to keep whittle’s patents a secret freely available they quickly made their way to Germany just as the Nazis came to power these patents were widely read in German Aviation circles at the same time that Hitler was rapidly

Building a new Luft buffer whittle’s idea aroused no such interest in Great Britain and his own jet engine remained still born yet the Royal Air Force was certainly Keen to nurture its inventor after four years every General duties officer had to specialize he was given a choice between engineering

Radio navigation physical training and so on uh but I didn’t get a choice because having been pestering the Adry with inventions they just said to me you will be an engineer though they’d stopped sending officers to Cambridge they decided that I should go so I went to Cambridge in uh

September 34 to take mechanical scien of tripods once at University Whittle applied every piece of learning to his idea for jet propulsion I had got the feeling rather that I might might be ahead of my time um with the extra knowledge I gained at Cambridge I did become rather more aware of the

Difficulties then this letter arrived in the post which says my dear Whitt this is just a hurried note to tell you that I have just met a man who is a bit of a big noise in an engineering concern and to whom I mentioned your invention of an airplane s’s propeller as it

Were and who is very interested he’s jotted a note at the top of the original letter he says this letter changed the course of my life and triggered a revolution in aviation and it did because this letter rescued the turbo jet idea in this country from Oblivion the writer was

Ralph Dudley Williams an old friend from Cranwell he visited Whittle at Cambridge with another former officer named Collingwood tinling and they approached me with the idea of forming a company and getting on with it and they succeeded a merchant bank was the Catalyst our Falcon Partners were approached by an intermediary an

Engineer named Bramson uh Williams attending got in touch with him and he got in touch with Falcon partners and Falcon Partners commissioned him to write a report on the whole project which he did and it was wholly favorable Bron’s report you might say was another

Of the big key points in the whole story he’d been very much involved with Aviation he was a pretty skillful aeronautical engineer and his report inspired Falcon Partners to go on with the job and in March 1936 they formed the company called Power Jets limited Whittle told his backers the

Project had a 1 in3 chance of success the air Ministry quickly added another obstacle one claw said that I was not to work more than 6 hours a week on the job but of course uh that didn’t operate as a an effective control on me and I worked all the practically fulltime

Out at Cambridge Whitt also had to fit in the task for which he’d gone to University in the first place and I very much wanted first class honors so I had to work like hell because I was designing the Jet Engine and preparing for my finals at the same time and that was

U a very difficult thing to do I succeeded in getting my first happily and then was able to turn back to the jet engine Whittle approached a manufacturer in rugby to build the world’s first jet engine British Thompson Houston made steam turbines Whittle drove over from Cambridge rehearsing what he’d say to

Persuade the huge company to accept a contract he succeeded when all he could offer them was £22,000 well below what his project really needed the proper scientific way to go about the job would be to build a compressor and test it build a turbine and test it build combustion Chambers

And test it and then put them all together when we the results from each were satisfactory but the cost for that would have been about £30,000 and there was no hope of getting that amount of money so the only way the only thing to do was go ahead with the

Complete engine what we were doing was trying to prove the engine right from the word go in a cavernous rugby Workshop Whitt set to work on this huge challenge the bth built the engine and I stood over it more or less while it was

Going on I felt that we were going to be all right as far as the simple centrifugal compressor was concerned I felt that I the turbine was going to be all right but I was uneasy about the combustion problem because we were aiming at 24 times the kind of in

Combustion intensity that was um obtainable in those days but the engine became ready for running proper on April the 12th of 1937 lot of people said it wouldn’t even turn itself over what did happen proved the very opposite that I gave a signal with my hands to raise the speed

With the electric motors 2,000 RPM and that was done and then I open the main control and it it started to run away hey it’s it accelerated out of control and so did everyone standing around it they all went down the factory like the wind I didn’t because I was petrified

With fright I just couldn’t Move it seemed like perpetual motion but of course it wasn’t the fact was that of a pool of fuel that accumulated in the combustion chamber which we didn’t know about and that was keeping it running after I switched off the control well that sort of thing happened day

After day we had about four of that kind of runaway just after the engine first ran and we submitted a report to the air Ministry this was the subject of another report by Griffith the man who turn the job down in the early days and his report damned it with faint praise

Uh he brought in all the difficulties said that no propeller meant that we wouldn’t have the slipstream to help us take off and so forth Whittle didn’t know that in Germany some people were by now far more willing to bet on his idea one of them was ER Hino a legend in his

Country’s resurgent aviation industry Fon oine had been introduced to him he was alone in his Villa in V he explained to me that he wanted to finance the whole thing by himself if it works when he said I have the best alomes I have that the best and best designers

And uh I want you to tomorrow to speak with them and explain your ideas I love the Baltic Sea Coast very much I sure would think that would be a nice place to work and uh so I choose hle additionally I felt I was afraid to go to in engine

Companies I thought they were too much ingrained in their engines and my model didn’t work sufficiently good hindle’s company was attractive for another reason the whole development was very inexpensive but we would have asked for more money we would have gotten it so money was not a

Problem by contrast the Power Jets Kitty was empty as the Nazi threat grew Whittle had a war winner yet Britain was set to abandon it there were several things which hampered progress in 1937 38 the worst was the tight financial situation our financial backers began to get cold feet they had uh quite

Unrealistically expected that within a matter of a month or two we would have an engine capable of fly in the stratosphere of course we had breakdown after breakdown and then began to lose heart and they did not produce the the money that they promised the air Ministry were very

Hesitant to help because we were in financial difficulty after we’d first run the engine and shown that it at least was self-driving they did agree to um a very limited contract the ministry’s grudging help only created new problems as soon as they gave us a contract we came under the official

Secrets act that meant that we couldn’t tell people what we wanted their money for you can’t go to someone and say look we got a damn good idea would you let us have some money uh we can’t tell you what it is uh but but it’s very good no

It uh we couldn’t do it by 1939 Britain had spent just £7,000 on Whitt’s jet his very position on the project was perilous at the end of June he was actually due to leave Power Jets on his last day there Whittle had to impress an important visitor with his

Engine on June the 30th of 1939 we managed to get a big breakthrough in the attitude of the air Ministry in that uh uh Pi director of scientific research uh came up to see the engine run and we managed to keep it going for about 20

Minutes in his presence and he became a complete convert so much so that he agreed that an engine for flight should be ordered and that an airplane to use it should be ordered too when I drove him back to the station to get his train back to London

I had the Curious experience of him explain to me all the advantages of the engine that it could run on any fuel that it was vibrationless etc etc and I just sat quietly I was only a squadron leader of this time I thought yeah you’re telling me Oh

Boy this of course was the big turning point in the whole job the turbo jet was saved for Great Britain but Germany unaware of Whitt’s breakthrough already had a Jet Plane I was uh very certain that it would work but of course you always feel there’s a danger and um we

Had made not too many pretests we run uh the engine before it flew uh perhaps several hours at the very most the support of a huge Aircraft company had enabled Hans Fon oine to overtake Whittle H’s H1 78 was ready just days before war broke out test pilot Eric

Vaset was eager to take off he started and then he disappeared and after a while he came back and we thought oh he’s Landing he didn’t he made another round and we said oh my God he must like it uh but we didn’t have the airplane very filled up with

Gasoline he landed and stopped the airplane just where hle stood and he said everything function beauti and and and the engine worked well and he was he was really himself very ined we had a nice Festival a jubilant hle rang General Ernst udet at the German air

Ministry I learned later on he called udet and he said hey congratulation but let me sleep that’s an ungodly time by now Frank Whittle had been forced to move Power Jets from rugby to a scruffy Foundry at nearby lorth ladywood Works was the name of the site today there’s nothing to show that

History was once made here but in these buildings Britain slowly expanded its jet program in 1939 we only had just a handful of of about half a dozen and then the beginning of 1940 we began to build up a team and I was very careful in picking um real quality know first

Class honors Cambridge first class honors Oxford Imperial College of science we were advertising of course we couldn’t say what we were advertising for and when we were interviewing them we couldn’t tell them what we wanted them for though I think some can guess from the questions we asked whittle’s

Charm and enthusiasm at once inspired his new team to strive for the impossible the noise and lack of space at ladywood forced wi himself to work at brownsover Hall A Country House nearby here he worked work through the night desperately aware that his work could shorten the war and drove himself to nervous

Exhaustion my memory of him really was just somebody always working and when he was at home if he took any time off say Sunday he would sit in his chair by the fire at Broomfield and we’d be there with his slide rule which of course people used in those days to do their

Calculations and um Bits of Paper all over the place working and a little bit of time for myself and my brother but not much not much as Britain entered its most critical phase of the war the expanding team at ladywood was galvanized by a new order to prepare engines for a prototype

Jet fighter code named f940 we know it as the gler meteor as a potential War winner getting it in the sky to fight the Luft vaa now became the focus of their work at Power Jets they did not know that Germany was by now developing in its own twinjet combat planes at

Messes Schmid and hanle the country’s prototype jet the h178 had not been a success but its last flight was exploited to the full by its maker hle invited the evry to come and the highest who came was udad and somehow hle used that possibility to offer a new design of a two engine

Fighter aircraft and actually he got the contract about two months later the plane was the h280 the Nazis wanted it in 14 months hle passed this demanding deadline to Fon oine to build its jet engines ohle wanted things very fast he was very uh um optimistic very positive but a little

Bit unreal and unrealistic in his time schedule in Britain the air Ministry still wouldn’t fund Frank quitt properly forcing Power Jets to work in impossible conditions in addition to our continuing financial problems had many others like having to use the same Parts over and over again when they ought to have been

Scrapped and of course that was linked with the finance because we couldn’t B new parts we had to make do and Furbish up damag parts some people continued to claim Whitt’s jet wouldn’t even fly by May 1941 his engine was ready to go in Britain’s first Jet Plane the experimental Gloucester E28

39 for its Maiden flight the top secret aircraft was taken to Cranwell where the jet story had begun the Power Jets team followed full of Hope on on the same day a young Naval pilot Eric Brown was forced to land at Cranwell today he’s one of the few surviving Witnesses of

This historic occasion when when I landed I was a bit astonished to find so many civilians present and uh when I went to check in the mess and asked what was going on there seemed to be almost an ER of conspiracy about the whole place and um nobody would give a

Straight answer to this we’ve been out day before for Tech some texting trials then on the May the 15th the weather looked as though it wasn’t going to uh work out so I went back to uh lorth that morning I went the control tower to check if the weather was good

Enough for my onot flight to Cen but it obviously wasn’t and they said would I mind doing a weather check for them anyway I landed and um they said would I be prepared to do a further weather test in the afternoon and then we got a message to say the weather was clearing

So I rushed back to cranell again and in the evening Jer did the flight an airplane was rolled out with a shape I had well not so much to shape but the construction of which I’d never seen before because it had no propeller and an extraordinary whining noise came from

It and it taxed out to the end of the runway and after a while eventually took off and I was quite astonished to know what it was because I’d never heard at this stage in my career of a jet aircraft the various government Ministries refused to film this remarkable event luckily an unknown

Photographer grabbed it in secret Jerry was sitting at the end of the runway and party of was sitting just to the right and he held it on the brakes and ran out the engine to full speed released his brakes and then he he hopped off in about 600 yards quite an

Impressive take off and he held it down level and then GL one of my colleagues Pat Johnson WP Johnson SLA me on the back he said Frank it flies and in the tension of the moment I rather rudely said that was Bloody well what it was designed to do isn’t

It and it landed successfully and immediately it landed it was absolutely inundated with people rushing out and congratulating the pilot so I realized something quite extraordinary taking place people in the area hadn’t heard that uh particular kind of noise before and you couldn’t hide it however secret it was supposed to

Be uh one officer was said to have asked another one how does that thing work John and John replied oh it’s easy old boy it just sucks itself along like a Hoover another story was that someone who claimed to have been an eyewitness said there was a Merlin engine inside

The hollow fuselage with a little propeller and he he’d seen it he was a reliable witness he claimed well everybody gravitated towards officer’s mess and so I followed on and there was quite a lot of hilarity going on in a corner of the room I asked what it was

All about but still nobody would reveal what was involved but um it was quite obvious it was something quite momentous the flight Vindicated Whittle Britain’s new jet plane was better than anybody had realized one event particularly brought the point home the ministry gave us permission to open up

To 17,000 just for one flight and then that um engine speed that did 375 or 38 anyway it was faster than the Spitfire the news reached London and Winston Churchill he ordered a thousand whittles alas the E28 could not be a war plane hence the disappointment felt behind the scenes up at

Cranwell I would have preferred it to have been the meteor which is then on the stalks because that was the combat airplane whereas the E28 was just an experimental a whittle’s jet served notice on all piston engines a notice that fast reached their manufacturers they now demanded their share of a product none

Had invented and which they’d rejected for years because of the war Whitt would have to share his secrets with them all this of course is um putting Power Jets into a weaker and weaker position from the commercial point of view and that we had to uh swallow because it was a

Wartime situation and I and several other of my team were serving officers and uh we had to put U National considerations before commercial considerations that was very dominant in my mind Whittle played a selfless patriotic role in which he offered his knowledge freely to the British Aviation companies however they were working flat

Out to build engines for planes like the hurricane and the Spitfire so in 1941 Great Britain turned to the United States then at peace for backup in manufacturing its jet engine the Americans had only been told about Whitt’s power plant earlier that year ironically their top scientists had dismissed the concept in

1940 they concluded the gas turbine engine could hardly be considered a feasible application to airplanes the British government expected to keep the rights in Whitt’s invention and did not intend to give it away to a future competitor but that’s inevitably what happened we sh shipped over the engine

In Parts in the bomb Liberator also with the team who were horribly frightened L the pilot should pull the wrong lever and they’d all drop into the Atlantic the company selected to build the engine was General Electric for America the jet story began the night of October 4th

1941 with the arrival of a highly secret engine assembly at a Boston airport it was Britain’s now famous Whittle turbo jet the first jet engine successfully produced and flown by the Allies gentlemen I give you the Whittle engine consult all you wish and arrive at any

Decision you please just as long as you accept a contract to build 15 of them General Electric had that engine their engine version of the w2b called the typi on test in April of 42 so just rather less than 6 months which is astonishing and even better than that 6 months later

The bill Aircraft company had their twin engine jet flying it was agreed that I would go over and help them out and so I went over at the end of May I went to Lynn under an assumed name they insisted I use an assume name I call myself Whitely

There were times when I forgot it like uh in the hotel I would sign waking up sign for my early morning coffee and forget that I was supposed to be using an assumed name of course sign the real one I’m told that uh that didn’t matter really because the waiter was an FBI

Man in the great Republic Whittle was treated royally and he in turn was astounded by what he found there it was most satisfying to see the work GE were doing because well they got on with the job so fast it was remarkable and their enthusiasm was most

Inspiring and I thought at the time if only I had had that kind of cooperation a few years earlier what a difference it would have made in America doctors found that Whittle was by now battling with severe ill health back in Britain the problems that caused it had only got

Worse the engine that was destined to be the power plant of the meteor was a more powerful version of the experimental engine really there were no major difference it it looked quite similar from the outside the Royal Air Force eagerly waited the meteor but Power Jets was not

Allowed to produce the engines for it that job had been contracted to a car maker Rover GLS were getting on with the job fairly well but Rovers were making an absolute nonsense of the engine they kept they just hadn’t got the people who could do the job and they thought they

They thought they knew what to do the situation became so bad that it looked as though there would be a complete hash of everything the Rover were Rover were making such a poor job of the engine that uh the order for the production of the meter was cut right back R tried to

Redesign its engines and held up the meteor by 2 years but there was also Dirty Work We intended that the Rover company should be subcontractors and only subcontractors but unfortunately they went behind our back to the ministry and and trying to get direct contracts and eventually they succeeded

In doing that and instead of being subcontractors to us they in effect became competitors who had the advantage of having all our information handed to them on the orders of the ministry in December 1942 a solution was at last found to the problems with Rover Rolls-Royce took

Over the job of building Whitt’s engines but the mighty company would only weaken Power Jets further Ernest he was the chief executive of r rollsroyce he was responsible for the Rolls-Royce part in taking over the jet development course he he had come to realize that this was

The future of the AO engine and since Rolls-Royce then were one of the most prominent AO engine firms in the world he wasn’t going to be left out I would call him an honest Rogue because when he was going to do the dirt he told you he was in advance

And one of the things he said to me on one occasion was he said we’re going to be the center of this job and nothing you you can do will stop us by 1943 the rollsroyce having made such a big difference to the prospects of the engine the ministry agreed to reinstate

The production of the metor with Whitt’s engines the plane finally made its first flight that year yet it should have been ready 2 years earlier and had the air Ministry pursued Whitt’s idea back in 1929 a similar plane would have been available by the start of the war to

Repel tell the lfaa lives would have been saved the war even shortened at least the work of Frank Whitt could now have a bearing on how that war was fought I thought that he was doing something quite important because every time I asked my mother what he was doing

She used to say oh well Daddy’s doing something very hush hush I didn’t become aware that he was anybody out of the ordinary until 1944 in January when they um made the whole thing public and then the house became surrounded by reporters we we had been working in complete secrecy until uh

Early January 1944 at which time for reasons I don’t really know um the British and American governments decided to make an announcement about it and it was like the world blew up around me the shock was very considerable Whitt and his engine dominated the front pages says here in

The Daily Herald I knew Frank had a secret says his wife so the cat is out of the bag how strange it seems to be able to talk about it it may mean that I shall be known throughout the world in any case my younger son Ian is a far

Brighter boy than I was at his age I think he will be a success the success of the family have you seen that before no I’ve never seen that before oh dear how wrong as industry reaped the rewards of whittle’s Genius new jet fighters joined the meteor first off the drawing board

Was to Haven’s brilliant vampire the pilots loved their new equipment although the planes remained highly secret as Eric Brown discovered when he came to fly them when I was allotted to the Jet flight of at Farm BR of course it was a top secret flight and

It was in a hanger at the far side of the Airfield well away from the main activity and there were um RAF regiment guards there with guard dogs so it was very highly guarded at the time once inside the plane was a revelation to Brown we’re getting into the cockpit of

A j El for the first time you you are struck by the wonderful view um because in a tricycle underage no propeller or large engine ahead of you it is quite remarkable and once you start up the engine although to listen to a jet if you’re outside the cockpit it sounds

Thunderous when you’re in the cockpit it is incredibly quiet Frank Whitt often visited farra to check how his invention was performing was quite obvious he was itching to get his hands on it and fly it but we were always alerted that he was coming and a little M would be

Passed around saying would you make sure that the E 2839 was not serviceable for flight on that particular day and um because this would save off Frank it was obvious they didn’t want this wonderful airplan and this wonderful man to be United in case there was a an accident so he twied this

Pretty soon and I think he played along with it in July 1944 the gluster metor became the first jet fighter to enter operational service when the Air Force allocated its initial supply of planes to 616 squadron at manston in Kent by now the L baa could no longer

Mount a raids over Britain but these meteors were quickly put to work intercepting a lethal new Menace the V1 guided missile Germany’s flying bomb terrified the londoners who were its Target in the skies of a Kent the meteor Pilots sought to prevent v1’s reaching the capital some used their wing tips to

Flip the missile over so it crashed around this time Allied Pilots were startled to find themselves being attacked by a German plane with no propeller this was the Messa Schmid 262 Germany’s own jet program had by now Advanced to the sophisticated design it had been chosen instead of the

H280 the Nazis never liked hle and had cancelled his promising jet fighter yet it could have been mass-produced by 1944 by contrast the 262 arrived late and was rushed into battle too soon in Britain meanwhile Frank Whittle seemed at his Peak he was a national hero while his company now had a custombuilt

Factory from which to expand he had a Clear Vision for its future I always wanted to include Manufacturing in our duties in 1944 Power Jets had reached a point where they were able to produce say batches of 40 or 50 engines and we had a first class NES uh for proper manufacturing

Organization Power Jets also had some outstanding work in progress Whitt was already planning the second generation of jet engines there was the lr1 turbo fan which would have been the first turbo fan in the world there was the um engine for the miles m52 the supersonic airplane those are our two

Big projects which we had in hand lr1 stood for long range one Whitt saw the scope for jets that would fly planes further as well as faster than Pistons but he would need a more efficient engine from the earliest days of the over a jet engine I was bothered by the

Fact that it has a basically low propulsive efficiency about 50% as compared with their propeller at moderate speeds of 80% and so the answer to me was that we must gear down the jet in some way and that led to the concept of the turbo fan for which I took out a

Patent in 1936 the turbo fan is a turbo jet to which a fan has been added this fan causes air both to flow through the core of the engine and to bypass it this additional jet of cold air increases thrust and improves fuel economy the design had huge

Potential with a t fan you can expect propulsive efficiencies of 75% or even better if you have a very large bypass pressure as piston engine bombers approach their design limits with planes like the Lancaster Whitt saw a timely use for his new bypass jet as the war progressed in 1943

For example uh I came to the conclusion that it could be the answer to a longrange bomber for the Pacific War we also visualized it as an engine for a transatlantic airplane Whitt was already predicting longrange jet airliners and the kind of engines they would need but it was the

Other Power Jets project that would grab people’s attention the engine for the super playe the m52 was an half fan with after burning all tacked onto the back end of a w2700 jet engine and that should have given sufficient power for the miles m52 to do

1,000 M hour I think it would have done it despite its huge potential White Hall never felt comfortable with Power Jets it was a private company but its driving force was a serving officer and it was publicly funded the fault lines were clear I realized that there was a

Complete mess uh from the contractual point of view there was no there were no effective agreements and no one except pets and RIS any money except the government of course and I felt that um the government having put in 2 million that all the comp should be nationalized forming a collective double jet

Establishment and of course I hope the par jet would be the at the top of the pyramid with myself as chief engineer Whitt’s proposal was considered in the high levels of government s Stafford Crips the minister of aircraft production at that time used what i’ had said to get the ministry out

Of the mess that they created by nationalizing Power Jets only which relieve them of all their undertakings it was expected that power jets would still continue with its Advanced engine projects but then other firms began to uh uh create difficulties they said they weren’t going to have the government

Competing with private Enterprise so considerable pressure was brought to bear on the the ministry and the minister caved in to the large AO engine companies so we the people who had pioneered the whole thing were deprived of the right to design and build engines sorry that was too to much for myself

And my leading team members and most of us resigned the supersonic plane and the turbofan project had by then been cancelled the civil servants found a reason to justify this loss believe it or not the minister said that people wouldn’t want to fly at speeds more than about 250 M an

Hour as Whittle left Power Jets he was acutely aware of the commercial opportunity that was now at stake the position in 1945 and 1950 was that Britain was really ahead of the world in all forms of gas seran development but stupidly we allowed the lead to slip

Away in 1945 the Allies discovered the Germans impressive range of jet planes and their designers after the capitulation of Germany I was at that time in fber the CEO of the captured enemy aircraft flight so I was sent to Germany and to look at their Advanced aircraft and also

At the same time to interrogate their designers and test pilots amongst them was Fon oin and naturally I wanted to know what his connection with the Whittle patent had or patent had been in Germany but he was not going to answer this question he was very non-committal and Sid stepped as much as

He could Brown flew the various German jet planes including the Messa Schmid 262 the Allies already knew that its engine the yumo 004 was a sophisticated axial Flow Design now they could compare its performance with that of the less complex British Jets so a more efficient engine in many ways it was

Highly unreliable the yumo 004 in operational service had a scrap life of only 25 hours and the engine when I flew this engine I found it extremely sensitive and difficult to handle because it did not like Quick Throttle movements either accelerated or decelerating any Quick Throttle movement either way could possibly cause

A flame out of the engine Whitt’s Jets were more reliable but he could take them no further the course of events brought anguish I think my mother was most distressed by what was happening to to Father she was most distressed I’m I could remember her crying about it at

Times because she would tell me oh Dad’s so unwell because of what’s happening and it is such a shame and how can they treat him like this yes it’s very sad for her he managed to Soldier on in the RAF and he was an air Commodore in 1946 but

In the end by 1948 he’d been declared as unfit for flying and somehow that triggered that was the last straw and he he and the RAF both agreed that he should retire and he did it’s been very sad for him oh very sad yes the Air

Force was e everything to him the public knew none of this and saw a war Herer receiving his just rewards in 1948 Whittle went to Buckingham Palace to collect a Knighthood he also had a financial award for his invention which was good for the time worth nearly £3

Million today it would soon become clear he was greatly under rewarded he sought a role but his stature made him hard to place in an industry he himself had founded no engine maker hired his services in many ways I paid quite heavily for um uh the the work I did there was the

Awful Race Against Time that dominated life on top of all the technical difficulties there were the financial difficulties there was the skull duggery of uh uh people who were uh messing things up and uh oh it was frustration after frustration and it took its toll I began to have a series of nervous

Breakdowns and for years it was years before I really recovered my Health Britain stole a march on the rest of the world when it launched the first jet airliner the beautiful new plane with its four engines was a fruition of all Frank Whitt’s early visions first after he left the RAF he turned his mind to the introduction of the Comet and he

Joined boac as a consultant to help them introduce the comet into service he was very worried at the time that the thing was being rushed into service I’ve got his 1949 diary where he discusses uh the strength of the Square Windows and he was worried about that at

The time and um was making a suggestion to deavin and how they could could get over the problem whittle’s advice was ignored the comet crashes which followed were caused in part by its Square windows with time on his hands Whittle traveled and tried to recover his health he also turned to writing his

Memoirs the jet age took off without Frank Whittle but the Royal Air Force was soon re-equipped with the benefits of his invention by 19 1950 the gluster meteor provided the backbone of Britain’s air defense capability it was a fitting outcome to all the secret toil of the Power Jets

Team in the dark days of the [Applause] war the nation did at last build its own supersonic fighter in the shape of the English electric lightning while jet engines also powered an awesome British Fleet of nuclear bombers but the country could never really afford such planes they would

Later play an important role in the Forkland campaign but were destined to become Museum pieces British civil jet planes fared little better after the comet crashes it was Boeing 707 which brought longrange jet travel to the masses by 1960 Airlines were mostly buying their planes from America that year the bypass engine

Entered Sur turbo fans soon followed with their far better fuel economy they were just what the airlines needed to realize lowcost Global Travel for Frank Whittle it was the ultimate Vindication of his wartime vision and revealed the sheer Folly of cancelling his Pioneer turbo fan yet he never worked on jet engines

Again and memories began to fade of how the story had begun I think in this country they were beginning to forget all about Frank Whittle by the 60s and 7 70s it was all so different in the United States they were so much more gung-ho they were very good at slapping

Them on the back and telling him what a good chap he was in 1976 Whitt went to live in America I think he felt more recognized over in the states than he did over here after the war Hans Von oine had himself moved to America to

Work on jet propulsion for the US Air Force fascinated by each other’s work Whittle and oine became good friends back across the Atlantic Britain eventually rediscovered its Genius of the jet by 1986 even um the queen took a hand and ordered him the order of Merit um and other honors came along

Following that so I would say from about the early 80s onwards people began to remember who it was who was the Prime Pioneer of the Turbo Jet and also a man with a profound Legacy today we make almost 1 and a half billion air passenger Journeys a year

Cheaply and safely thanks to Frank Whitt he shrank the world but his gift to Britain is less appreciated its famous plane makers have departed but today Rolls-Royce is a world world leader in building jet engines I’m often asked how I feel about it and it’s a question I find very

Difficult to answer things could have been a lot better we could have had a much bigger influence in the war than uh happened but when I see what’s happened in in the way of civil aviation and uh military Aviation too but particularly civil aviation I can only say it’s extremely satisfying

Especially when you see something like the Concord and one of the things you see I never fora when I was working on this thing is that I would be a passenger crossing the Atlantic in 3 and 1 half hours and incidentally another thing I didn’t foresee is that I would

Have a son who would be flying 747s as a captain in Cathy Pacific kitac Aerodrome at at Hong Kong was had a very interesting approach occur right hand turn right down to almost a touchdown and when father came with me in the back of the in the cockpit in a Boeing

747 um he he was very startled when he saw that his son was flying an airplane at 1,000 ft straight towards the Foothills and then making a a steep final turn which of course was quite normal at kitech it was the way you had to do it I had I hadn’t briefed him

Unfortunately so he was was very white knuckled by the time we landed he was continuing to theorize in aerodynamic improvements and aeroengine improvements until the end of his life he always took an active interest in Concord and uh looking into a second generation SS supersonic transport and making recommendations and

Speaking publicly and privately uh amongst uh the industry to try and encourage the uh airframe manufacturers to take the risk and embark on another generation of SuperSonic transports Concord is a marvelous airplane I’ve plan it many times but I’m looking forward to the next generation of SuperSonic transports which I think

Should be capable of uh carrying 300 passengers for distances of the order of 4,500 miles like San Francisco Tokyo at speeds of about a mark number about 2.3 that we getting up to 2,000 mil hour as compared with the Concords 1350 but beyond that um I think we’re

Going to see even much higher speeds than that in due course unfortunately they going to be very expensive propositions sir Frank Whitt died in August 1996 assured of his position as the greatest AO engineer of the 20th century the Royal Air Force paid fitting tribute to its distinguished son for the

Memorial service at Westminster Abbey he and I had wanted the opportunity to fly together preferably in an open cockpit bipe so so that together we could Loop and spin and climb and dive this modest ambition was never realized for one reason or another the nearest we got was when I

Flew him to Hong Kong in a boing 747 on the last morning of his life I lent over his bed and said Dad let’s put on our kit and go fly ly he opened his eyes and looked at me and smiled that evening with hazel holding his hand he died and I

Wondered I wondered if he went flying and if he did if he went on his own or did he have a companion [Applause] He was crated in the USA and the aache there um brought his ashes over to this country and I went to Heath row to meet the a plane and I came home and put the ashes on the bookshelf in my study with the ashes of my mother

Who died 3 weeks earlier I uh decided to put them in at the church at Cranwell and they organized a a meteor and a vampire so we flew the ashes up to Cranwell and they were in interred there with a little ceremony [Applause] October 4th [Applause] 1941 [Applause] [Applause] [Applause] Incredible as it may seem these crates Mark the start of the development of the first jet engine in America they contained an experimental engine which was flown to the United States from Great Britain under great Secret in the fall of 1941 this flight was the direct result

Of a conference in the Washington office of General Arnold a few weeks earlier here was the actual beginning of the jet story in America gentlemen I give you the Whittle engine consult all you wish arrive at any decision you please just as long as General Electric accepts a contract to

Build 15 of them these were the plans of the first turbojet engine that had been successfully produced by any of the Allies they were the results of a long hard struggle by England’s group Captain Frank Whittle he had worked toward jet propulsion in the face of many difficulties and he had succeeded the

Air Corp felt the jet propulsion had tremendous possibilities and the British Air Ministry made all their information available to the United States the men of generally new from there with the national advisory committee for Aeronautics that the essentials of a turbo jet were a compressor and a I cannot overemphasize the secrecy and

The importance of this work we know that both the Italians and the Germans are working on Jets I hardly need tell you that they must not win the race General given unlimited priority we will have the first unit running on contest in 6 months six unbelievably

Short months in all to plan design and build the first American jet engine for a revolutionary new principle of flight yet these men were able to make this promise to their government in time of War because actually this problem was not new to them it really began on the campus of

Cornell University in 193 where a young mechanical engineer named Sanford Moss was working for his P he was engaged in research for his thesis on gas turbans he and his work had been consigned to this little building because there seemed to be a certain amount of noise connected with [Applause]

It not to mention smoke and odd smells when he had completed his work at Cornell and received his degree Moss went to General Electric where he joined other experts and continued his work later they set up a research Department to study turbines of all kinds as well as compressors pumps boilers and related

Equipment by 1918 moss and his fellow workers had accumulated a tremendous amount of knowledge in relation to turbines and compressors and as a result he was called to Washington there the national advisory committee for Aeronautics initiated work with Dr Moss on a prac itical turbo supercharger which the air core hoped

Would increase the altitude performance of its World War I Fighters a gasoline engine runs on a mixture of air and fuel which burns in a cylinder at higher altitudes the atmosphere becomes progressively thinner so that the engine cannot get enough air to burn as much gasoline as it should for maximum

Power the turbo supercharger simply adds a compressor to the engine engine Which packs or charges the thin air into the cylinders this allows the engine to burn more fuel and deliver full power the compressor is run by a turbine which is turned by the exhaust gases of the

Engine Moss’s work on the turbo continued and his improvements had a tremendous influence on Aviation in 1920 the army established a world altitude record of 36,000 ft proving the turbo and air so rarified that the pilot became unconscious and fell almost 6 miles before pulling out General Billy Mitchell’s famous test

Which demonstrated For the First Time The tremendous importance of air power was actually made possible by Moss’s turbos Mitchell’s plane had to come in at 15,000 ft in order to avoid theoretical anti-aircraft fire to give a plane enough power to carry a 2,000lb bomb at that altitude Mitchell had

General Electric turb turos installed on new twin engine Martin bombers and the results made aviation History with the beginning of World War II The Air Force’s interest in turos was greatly intensified they quickly became standard equipment on such outstanding aircraft as Republic bolt LED lightning Consolidated Liberator and all reliable the flowing Flying Fortress the High Altitude daylight strategic bombing operations which destroyed the strength of our

Enemy in Europe would not have been possible without Turbos they have contributed immeasurably to the science of flight and continue to do so they are used on some of today’s finest piston engine planes the most formidable weapon the world has ever seen was carried by a turbo supercharged Plane so in 1941 with a new but related problem it was only natural for the air core to again turn to the same organization and ask them to build the first American Turbo Jet and build it they did at a series of secret meetings 1 month before the Ral of the Whitt

Engine the project had been started with a small nucleus of Key Personnel these men picked those they wanted to work with however in most cases they did not let them know what they were to work on there were over a thousand men on the project but less

Than 100 actually knew what they were making planning an assembly of the engine itself was segregated in an entirely separate building and heavily guarded 24 hours a day many of the parts were made in the regular super supercharger department but as a further protection the project

Was called a new type of Turbo and simply given another production number Typi all the vast resources of the company were thrown behind the project the knowledge gained in years of production and design of giant turbines of every kind the research laboratory for Special Metals the experience gained in the manufacturing operation of thousands of Turbo superchargers and the vast store of knowledge of the Consulting

Laboratories during the actual design and manufacturer under DF Warner these great resources led to the modification and Improvement of the Whitt engine for example the English had trouble with turban bucket forgings because of the high temperatures involved but it was an old story to these men and their long experience with

Turbos hastened the solution to this problem also the English impellers had been giving trouble because because of cracking but skilled Craftsmen were already making hundreds of thousands of successful impellers for all types of superchargers American techniques of rotor balancing were very Advanced and contributed greatly to smoothness of

Operation yet in spite of the diversity and size of the operation there was not a single failure in Security today we realize even more fully than the Pioneers the almost incalculable importance of of that first American jet engine the Forerunner of the engines that power the military

Planes of today yet those early workers seemed to sense the true value of their work and it brought them together there was a wonderful spirit of common purpose of cooperation between the people who did the work Britain our air force and the men of General Electric in this

Atmosphere the engine grew at an unbelievable rate until at last the first engine right on schedule schedule rolled under heavy guard into the test cell now they would see the results of 6 months of Round the Clock effort but they would see much more than that they

Would see the birth of the jet engine in America they would see the first really radical change in air power since the wri brothers flight so many years ago they would see the first faint beginning of a whole new era in the age of flight that is they would see it if the

Engine ran Now all they needed was to see it Fly meanwhile under the same rigid secrecy the Bell aircraft Corporation had been designing laying out and building the AAC Comet to be powered by the new engine They too had performed miracles of production in a startling New

Field I can’t get used to working on a plane without a propeller neither can I I hope it flies there were a lot of other people who hoped it would fly too from Top brass to Joe average man walking along Main Street USA of course he wouldn’t hear about this particular

Plane for 2 or 3 years maybe never but he’s a guy who carries deep within him a hope and conviction that any plane America bills will [Applause] fly these are the original films of the first jet plane ever to fly in [Applause] America with that first flight on October 1st

1942 less than a year from the start of the project Jeet Propel flight in America became a reality they had gotten off to a flying start but in a race it’s the stamina that counts so everybody kept right on working the original engine the IIA delivered 1,400 lb of thrust it was soon

Followed by another Engine with more power the i16 with, 1600 lb of thrust then came the j33 with 4,000 lb of thrust and the Jet Engine really came into its own the First Flight of the j33 was in June of 1944 in a lock heat f80 shooting

Star again less than a year from the start of the project this outstanding plane set many records such as coast to coast in 4 and 1/2 hours and became our first operational jet f in order to get the jet industry moving and in the interest of National Defense

GE passed along its plans to other manufacturers Allison began mass production of the j33 engine to help meet production requirements of the f80 shooting star the British whle engine and the first engines designed by GE used compressors of the centrifugal type in these air enters the Hub and is

Hurled radially outward however even prior to seeing the British engine work on an axial compressor had been started with the national ad advisory committee for Aeronautics in this compressor air flows in a straight line to the rear the axal compressor increases the engines efficiency and handles a greater volume

Of air without increasing the engine’s diameter long range research led to an axial flow j35 which powered the Republic Thunderbolt and the Douglas Sky streak holder at that time of the world’s official speed record of 640 m per hour eight of these powerful new jet engines were also used in northrop’s 100

Ton flying wing and many other planes in the rapidly developing jet field during these years of progress with landbased aircraft the Navy had worked with the McDonald aircraft Corporation and Westinghouse to develop the Phantom proof that problems associated with carrier-based aircraft were not Beyond solution came with the

Phantom’s first takeoff and Landing from an aircraft carrier meanwhile a school was established at General Electric to train the people who would install operate and service their new GE jet engines one of the courses given is simply a general familiarization with the principles of jet propulsion and the jet

Engine ever since man undertook the conquest of the air he has had two primary considerations first the aircraft itself and second its method of propulsion needless to say has not always been successful sometimes the airframe itself has been unsatisfactory at at other times the method of propulsion has lacked the

Necessary power in this case for example it’s extremely simple while in this it’s so complex that it borders on confusion actually the early attempts at propulsion by reaction were not associated with aircraft and as in the case of most of man’s early Endeavors they led to some rather startling Results the principle itself is is very simple Newton’s third law of motion states that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction for example an ordinary rotary lawn sprinkler turns because of the reaction of the arm to the action of the jet of water it does

Not turn because the water squirted out pushes against the air it would spin just as well in a vacuum similarly the jet plane flies because of the reaction to the jet it does not fly because the jet pushes against against the air behind it the engine itself consists of two

Main rotating elements the compressor and the turban which are both mounted on a single rotating shaft air is drawn in compressed and packed into the firing Chambers where fuel is injected the constantly burning fuel tremendously increases the energy of the enclosed gases which rush through the turban and

Out of the tail core the turban operating like a wind supplies the power to spin the compressor the expanding gases pushing their way out of the rear at about 1200 m per hour give the plane its forward thrust this then is the simple principle of propulsion which Changs the whole

Outlook of the aviation industry by 1951 ge’s production models were delivering more than 5800 lb of thrust a five-fold increase in 10 years these engines are being mass-produced at both Linn Massachusetts and the great new Lockton Ohio plant the Jet Center of the world Lin represents more than huge

Production facilities it represents a new production plan thousands of suppliers and subcontractors contribute to the manufacturer of the jet engines which are assembled at laand thus all sources of Supply down to the smallest individually owned machine shops are benefited by the program and kept mobilized for production the Lin plan is truly another

Milestone just as the engines which roll from its production lines are the end product of many Milestones the result of almost 50 years of the best thought and effort of Executives Engineers scientists and skilled Craftsmen doing the work they are best fitted for in their own way this freedom of effort is

After all the real Heritage of all America and the engines are living up to that Heritage today General Electric turbo jets are doing their job powering the great new planes they were designed for such planes as the Republic xf-91 highspeed high altitude Interceptor the North American f-86d the Martin XP 51 super fast tactical Bomer the North American saber holder of the world’s official speed

Record of 671 mph the 100 km closed course of 635 mph the North American b45 tornado the first operational jet bomber the Boeing b47 Strat jet bomber which in 949 flew non-stop coast to coast in 3 hours and 46 minutes and the mighty conver b36 the Intercontinental bomber which is powered

By six turbo supercharged piston engines and four jets these and others are the Flames which must maintain the common security of the free peoples of the world and thereby ensure peace and M in one six month period three new G engine designs were okay for production powerful than the preceding one the last

Of these is no larger than the model then in mass production yet it delivers so much more thrust that it is not even in the same class even so by the time any new engine is in mass production still newer and better engines are on the way engines that will

Be a tribute to the life work of Dr Moss who died in 1946 one year after being awarded the colia trophy aviation’s highest award Moss’s work is finished but there will always be others to carry on with new ideas perhaps we will travel from coast

To coast in 3 or 4 hours of quiet vibrationless Comfort certainly our energetic and Progressive aircraft industry will give us commercial jet liners as soon as the time is Right even the atom May release its giant strength for aircraft the atomic energy commission the Air Force and General Electric are already cooperating on an atomic power plant for an aircraft to be built by conveyor NACA the US Navy’s Bureau of Aeronautics and a number of private corporations are also making real

Contributions to this [Applause] program developmental engineering moves forward with great new facilities such as ge’s aircraft gas turban laboratory here Engineers can simulate conditions for tomorrow’s aircraft here men look ahead at the requirements of the planes of the future requirements established by the product planners of the engine

Builders of the airframe builders and of the aircraft users these are the molders of Aviation progress as long as imagination research search design test and mass production continue year after year in a never ending constantly improving chain there is no limit to the future of the aircraft engine and so the jet story

Grows in 10 years we have come from this to this no one can foretell the tremendous strides the aircraft industry will make in the next 10 years yet we can be sure that the engines will keep pace the engines that are keeping and will always keep America [Applause] Strong [Applause] Oh how indifferent we’ve become we’ve forgotten what it is to be astonished another new plane one more so what but there is something unusual about it it’s long and has a sharp snout and its head is lowered there hasn’t been any like this before and it has a delta wing folded back to

The tail the Wing’s Leading Edge is razor sharp a powerful 4 engine unit is mounted below and there’s another Singularity it has no stabilizer this is the new tupo supersonic airliner take off script Anatoli agranovski Direction Vera Director of Photography kin a central documentary film Studios Production Andre tupelov now in his 80s

Possesses talent and insight to such a degree as to become a living legend this film is about the TU 144 his latest model in a long life wholly dedicated to aircraft engineering when it was conceived several years ago there were few even among the top rankers who believed in its practical Realization they would often get together like this and calculate design Ponder and discuss indefinitely they had worked together for years and understood one another at a glance it’s said locally that anyone who can out argue the general designer can count on a bonus or a promotion couldn’t the flutter effect

Appear in your control system and the body strengthening Engineers will see how much metal they must add I’ll do the drawings count in on the body strengthening Engineers making their Corrections get started and we’ll find some time later for a report back that will help us arrive at the overall final

Form we discussed that question two days ago it’s clear now you finished turning over the finals to illusion so he can speed up his part of the job the model was tested at supersonic speed and here the character of the streamlining was studied the t44 required 10 times more

Investigation in the great wind tunnel than any previous aircraft this is Father and Son Andre tupo has trained hundreds of aircraft designers he founded a school of aircraft engineering his son Alex SE chief designer of the t44 has followed in his footsteps a tailess design was chosen what would it look like in

Reality the t144 would have been inconceivable without metallurgists chemists instrument makers and electronic experts taking an active part in its development new Alloys and new kinds of ruled metal were needed the electronic equipment accounts for half the plan’s cost some 10,000 parts are made of plastics so the

Building of this plane was a common achievement of Soviet Science and Technology this is a fighter plane it flies at the design speed for the t44 2,500 km hour more than twice the speed of sound so it’s nothing new our foremost Army Pilots have mastered it

What is new though is that tupo has put this incredible speed at the disposal of ordinary Mortals however not only the speed altitude and distance barriers have been surmounted but the reliability barrier too the landing gear was being tested what was there about it that instilled confidence should the hydraulic system

Suddenly fail another backup system would take over and then if necessary a second backup system and even a third so one failure is nothing to worry about and even two failures will not cause a crash the crew had been pre-selected and had rehearsed the flight over and over

Again on the ground Airborne they wouldn’t have the time to recall waiver or grope they’d have to make split-second decisions and that meant they had to know the plane like themselves each of them had a college education and length thorough training for the maiden flight Commander Yan give us a Readiness report

Please first we’ll make the landing gear retraction and release test I wanted to hear what you have to say about take off we considered Alex’s remarks about reducing the ground run the shorter the takeoff the quicker will the Airborne well to you who are about to fly fingers

Crossed the maiden flight took place on December the 31st 1968 everything had long been in Readiness they’d been waiting for Clear Skies but the weather continued foul and nerves were wearing thin from the strin finally however the very last day of the year dawned clear the Mercury fell and visibility

Rose Andre tuov had watched 120 maen flights and here he was again waiting L FL Commander Edward Yan engineer Yuri zto leading test engineer Vladimir bendero and second pilot Mel kazal Yes it was a fine day indeed it was good to be alive on a day like that as a well-known test pilot put It Yeah this is Dolphin one ready to take off permission granted got you some compare it to a bird for a bird never takes wing with its head drawn back the plane took off and gained altitude there was nothing left for us to do but watch and wait nothing depended any

Longer even upon the G designer Mr tupv how did you Begin I matriculated at moscow’s higher technical school because I had a B for engineering our lecture on Aviation was Nikolai zukovsky we built the first glider and I made my first flight when chukovsky decided to set up an aerodynamic laboratory at the school he said that tupv had clever hands so he

Would be in charge of the Equipment TR there wasn’t any laboratory at all simply a big Hall the school allotted us and that’s how it all began when Soviet power came Nikolai Jovi had gathered a close circle of people dedicated to Aviation We all wanted to help our Soviet country tup has advanced through nearly every stage of Aviation he even recalls PLS of plywood he broke the first old metal aircraft this is one of them the ent3 entt are his initials and another the maxim gorki at that time the world’s Biggest and this is the ent6 at the North Pole the famous entt 25’s non-stop flights won World Acclaim it took scull of 63 3 hours to fly nonstop from Moscow to the United States for more than 30 years it was a plane that captured the imagination of the entire world from Africa to South America from Asia to Europe from London to New York City the aircraft simply known as Concord galvanized the Globe its Sleek aerodynamic structure and supersonic speed brought passengers

To a whole new level in transportation in Britain and France the plane became a symbol of national pride during the Cold War where every technological breakthrough seemed to come from either America or the Soviet Union the Concord proved that Europe still mattered and while this supersonic transport became synonymous with

Patriotism it’s also remembered as a plane that turned into an economic disaster with skyrocketing development costs and a hefty price tag for admission when it finally debuted only the rich and Powerful were able to fly the Concord and in an era of heightened environmental awareness the aircraft was

Denied the most lucrative routs across the Atlantic Ocean if not for the endless sums of government money it may have never seen the light of day in the end the plane was a two-edged sword hated by the economists yet loved by the people Concord after nearly three

Decades in service became one of the most recognizable aircraft in the world during a time when faster meant better it s over its competition symbolizing the absolute best in European engineering and Aerodynamics on October the 14th 1947 Aviation enters a new and uncertain era when Bell’s rocket powered X1 launched from a b29 super Fortress becomes the first aircraft to break the sound area flying at over 800 mph at Mark 1.06 this breakthrough along with the introduction of jet technology causes

Countries to pour enormous resources into finding ways to go faster and faster during the Cold War With both America and the Soviet Union possessing the atomic bomb the requirement that airplanes go supersonic is a must this leads to a revolution in aeronautical design straight-winged aircraft unable to achieve faster speeds are replaced by

Swept-wing planes most noticeably during the Korean conflict as American f86 Sabers battle Soviet Union Mig 15s bombers like the b29 and The b36 Peacemaker evolve into the swept wi b47 Strat jet and the B52 Strat Fortress with the two superpowers investing gigantic sums of money into aircraft design the nations of Britain

And France are forced to play catchup in England where the Gloucester meteor symbolized London’s place at the Vanguard of aviation technology during the Cold War a trifecta of planes known as the V bombers and unveiled as a deterrent Force against the Soviet Union the third in this Trilogy avos Vulcan a

Supersonic bomber equipped with four turbo Jets incorporates a new delta wing design giving the aircraft increased speed over the swept Wing across the English Channel where Aviation was born the nation of France also experiments with supersonic aircraft Doo’s Mirage 3 a plane incorporating the delta wing design flies at M 2.2 in

1958 in addition the dandel is also tested during this time as an experimental supersonic plane but despite their respective legacies of being at the Forefront of aviation technology after the second world war with both England and France’s economies shattered it appears their best days are behind them in the realm of military aircraft

There’s seems to be no way to compete with the vast resources of the United States however there is one area where if England and France pull together their resources a formidable challenge can be issued against America and the Soviets this comes in the form of a proposed supersonic transport

Airliner Mr deal was President of France at the time ande French Prestige was sort of important uh the French were very very concerned as were’re the British and other Europeans about the loss of Technology prowess in the aviation industry there was a feeling in Europe at that time that the Concord

Project could be a vehicle a catalyst to uh jumpstart the European aviation industry After Decline with only military planes capable of breaking the sound barrier there’s much talk about having this technology cross over into the civilian transport Market with jets replacing propeller-driven aircraft as the preferred mode of flying

Conventional wisdom leads many to speculate that the next logical step for passenger travel is the ability to fly faster than the speed of sound in America the Undisputed champion of aircraft design it appears inevitable that they will build an SST the Soviets not wanting to be outdone by their rivals no doubt going

To follow suit this took place during the height of the Cold War the Cold War was taking place uh you have to remember there was competition in Aerospace defense we had announced the Apollo program at the end of 1961 which was in effect a cold war program I I think that

The the attraction of the supersonic airplane was like the attraction of much of the Space Age Prestige the National Honor that you had to be you were if you didn’t demonstrate that you could do this you weren’t in the in the front ranks this leaves the powers of Europe

With an important decision to make will they build their own SST and compete on an international scale the answer is given on November the 28th 1962 when representatives from the English and French governments sign a treaty creating a powerful New Consortium between the British aircraft Corporation and sud Aviation

Airliner of the future this is a model of a supersonic jet which Britain and France hope will dominate transatlantic travel flying at twice the speed of sound it will hop the ocean in 3 hours representatives of the two countries sign an agreement to share the $300

Million cost and hope to have the plane operational by 1968 the deltawing craft will carry 100 passengers and cruise at 1,400 mph Engineers say it can can use present runways and fly so high there will be no Sonic shock when it breaks the sound barrier the world grows

Smaller the two companies agreed to build a supersonic transport with no cancellation Clause causing numerous Airlines to immediately Place orders including America’s PanAm Airways panamerican were announced ordered six New Concord supersonic jet transport which can fly from the United States 2 and 1/2 hours you can tell him

He’s given me the best argument for not having one Airline represent the United States that I’ve ever heard and I’m going to spend the next time I’m here really giving a screwing to panamer because that gives that sticks it right to us how can we possibly go ahead now

With our program to which we’re going to spend an awful lot of money which was very important to the United States which affected the balance of payments in hundreds of millions of dollars and I’m going to put all this out and then go ahead about 24 hours before we’re about to make our

Announcement across the Atlantic Ocean this treaty causes president Kennedy to act swiftly and in June of 1963 at the Air Force Academy’s graduation he announces the United States own SST program 30,000 Spectators packed the stadium at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs for ceremonies that will graduate Cadets into officer ranks

They he President Kennedy call for a partnership of government and business to develop a supersonic passenger plane to hold the US lead in commercial Aviation they had been under some pressure uh to announce this project pres Vice President Johnson formed a little committee to look at the SST in

The spring of that year and he recommended vigorously that we go ahead with an SST the Anglo French had announced the Conqueror project in ‘ 62 and that also created pressure for Kennedy to do something there was also some pressure from the Aerospace industry people uh to respond to what

Was taking place both in uh Britain and France and also Russia which had its own SST program in the Soviet Union work begins on their supersonic tupv Tu 144 with each plane now in a race to the Finish Line beginning in 1965 two prototypes are built known as1 in tulus and2 in

Bristol luckily for Britain its Aerospace industry has a huge jump on the competition having built numerous experimental aircraft proving vital in the research and development of the Concord the Bristol 221 incorporating A variation of the Delta design known as the OG Wing is tested in order to determine the sst’s range and

Payload the tsr2 bomber an airplane cancelled due to the budget cuts of the 1950s provides invaluable information about the concord’s most daunting obstacle its power plants using Bristol’s Olympus engines the TSR 2’s testing sheds new light on the challenges supersonic planes face in the air in the Laboratories of the British

Aircraft Corporation and suit Aviation rigorous examinations are carried out investigating hundreds of materials and the effect heating has on them building the Concord uh required new materials and they had concerns about heating which would never been a uh sustain problem you had people that encountered Heating in in certain instances in in

Brief Encounters with supersonic flight but if you’re going to cruise at supersonic flight then you’ve got a totally different heat dissipation problem for a period of 18 months straight Round the Clock 24hour trials are conducted at its peak over 600 subcontractors are brought into work on the Concord employing over 200,000

People filton Concord 02 stands like like a great bird in a massive cage at the British aircraft corporation’s plant near Bristol but never has there been such an expensive bird before nor one that has been so reluctant to fly when she’s ready to fly she’ll fly nothing

Must be left to chance Concord is unlike any other aircraft everything about her is new in the wind tunnels the OG Wing passes with flying colors fullscale mockups are constructed in order to show all of this sst’s components the drooping nose a distinct feature of the Concord is built in order

To balance Pilot’s visibility with its incredible aerodynamic structure and using a converted Vulcan bomber the Olympus 593 power plant is tested in the skies for concord’s team of designers its engines prove to be the most important obstacle to overcome uh the airframe was in advance of the engines

And advance of the fuels of the time had had you had 10e Advanced engines to put in it and uh you you might have possibly made it a more sustainable airplane but as it was it was a Prestige airplane for the 593 Jets to work properly air needs to enter at subsonic

Speeds a huge roadblock considering the Concord is built to fly at twice the speed of s found fortunately over a period of 4 years a complex system of Inlet doors and ducts are installed in order for this SST to travel at m 2 by April of 1966 the final assembly of1 and2

Begins with each country producing different parts of the Concord they’re shipped across the channel in order to make sure both prototypes are ready at the same time massive transport aircraft are used to ship some of the biggest pieces of this giant jigsaw puzzle for the people of tulus and Bristol seeing specially designed

Trailers hauling different parts of the plane are not uncommon during this time and by December of 1967 Concord 001 makes its first appearance in tul L in mesmerizing design stuns the entire world as Aviation enters a new high-speed age toose the giant hanger at sud Aviation headquarters was the focal

Point of the entire world for inside was the most exciting new thing in the world of Aviation Concord o1 at last the angl French brainchild born out of the technical and very sensible collaboration of two Nations could be shown to an Envy World while Concord is being set up for

Its first test flight in Moscow the Communists are able to beat the Europeans debuting tupv 144 on New Year’s Eve 1968 being almost identical to the angl French design it’s nicknamed concordski around the world unfortunately for the Soviets it’s nowhere near the Concord in terms of structure and quality being put together

So hastily and the Russians ran into even worse problems with their version of it because their engines were comparatively far less efficient than than the uh Rolls-Royce and the French engines in America delays and uncertainties about their SST program continue a competition between Boeing’s swing wi and lockheed’s fixed wi design

Causes the selection committee to debate endlessly the advantages and disadvantages between the two it turned out that this that the swing Wing didn’t work so they went with a fixed Wing then it turned out that this plane was going to be too heavy anyway so they tried to

Lighten it but it could never really it the only way it could pay for itself is it couldn’t really carry that many people but secondly because it was so heavy it would have to charge a lot a premium the ticket and that meant that made that the economics go haywire when

The decision is finally made in the winter of 1966 to award the contract to Boeing the Concord already has a 2-year jump on its transatlantic competition for the Europeans a far more important threat to the aircraft’s survival comes in the form of a jumbo jet Boeing’s 747 a subsonic airliner

Capable of flying passengers across the ocean far more cheaply than the Concord has those in Britain and France worried and in a sense the Boeing Company and airline companies as well understood that this was the real vehicle for leadership in commercial Aviation the jumbo jet the 747 efficient subsonic Jets of a variety

Of Kinds these were the vehicles that were going to keep America uh keep leadership in America in commercial Aviation not the American SST project this fear is Amplified when the British overseas aircraft Corporation decides to purch is the 747 perhaps faster does not necessarily mean better despite these outside threats as

Well as concerns about its growing costs Concord 01 is cleared for its first test flight in March of 1969 to lose the great supersonic jet liner was going to fly a year late millions of pounds over the estimated cost and still a very big question mark

But on this day a lot of those question marks would be answered for Concord 001 this was the chance to prove she was the Superbird everyone had hoped and worked for it’s maiden voyage is Flawless encountering no technical problems for testing purposes its undercarriage is kept

Down in France they can breathe a sigh of relief one month later across the channel2 takes off making another perfect flight you had to have really the true professionals here there’s there’s no point in the flight in which a a any kind of a crew error uh couldn’t

Have caused a disaster so it it was a um Great Leap Forward we we didn’t have the advanced electronics that we had in uh later and uh so for its day it was really an advanced machine Concord to is clear take off and good luck gentlemen for the next 2 years a series

Of gruelling tests are done studying the impact that intense heat has on the nose and body of the aircraft in the sky Concord proves easy to maneuver as the two prototypes exceed both the speed of sound and M 2 during this time every detail is checked and double

Checked with nothing being left to Chance in America with growing protests over the environmental impact of these planes including the effects of the Sonic Boom in 1971 the United States Senate votes to cut off all funding for Boeing’s SST good evening the Senate has voted 51

To 46 to cut off money for building the supersonic transport as a house had done before unless private financing is forthcoming the controversial airplane appears doomed with this catastrophic decision concord’s most fierce competition is eliminated clearing the way for it to dominate the global Marketplace in Britain the plane becomes a symbol of

Pride it was a proud sight this was the day when the traditional and the modern were brought together the British Concord that Masterpiece of Technology came to London to be seen by the queen her family and the millions who looked up with excitement for a first glimpse of this great

Plane then in 1973 at the Paris air show a Soviet tupv 144 crashes for the entire world to see This Disaster raises great doubts about the Communist concoctions feasibility it appears Concord has all but won the race to build the first fully functioning SST now will anybody want to buy the

Plane after nearly a decade in development the anglo-french Concord flies to the African nation of senagal to begin its worldwide promotional tour the ultimate goal of this exercise is to convince the world’s airlines that speed means business and with the right dose of public relations Executives will be convinced to buy these

Planes from a marketing standpoint the tour is an outstanding success for years people across the globe hear stories about this new highspeed plane that takes passengers to their destination in half the time its unorthodox aerodynamic design brings in crowds from Rio de Janeiro to Beijing from Tran to Sydney from

Fairbanks Alaska to Mexico City and with America cancelling their SST program in 1971 and the Soviet Tu 144 in shambles the Anglo French Concord is destined to dominate The Marketplace unfortunately with the 1970s being defined by an oil crisis and economic unrest the enthusiasm for a supersonic transport is

A far cry from the previous decade when anything seemed possible the question now is can this aircraft defy the odds by flying passengers around the globe in record time while remaining economically viable this becomes the concord’s greatest challenge across the globe Concord is ready to Galvanize the

People wherever it flies the crowds are huge anxious to see the plane they’ve heard about for years during the year 1972 this SST tours Iran India China Japan and Australia with each country’s Airlines showing interest in the aircraft kings and queens Prime Ministers and presidents rich and poor all want to

Take a tour inside this remarkable supersonic jet unfortunately during the 1970s with each Concord costing a record $31 million per plane only the very wealthy are able to board this aircraft ironically its biggest supporters are the masses who could never afford to fly supersonic as a result although there’s a

Fascination with the Concord the big airlines are hesitant to pull out their check books the Chinese and the Iranians flirt with the idea of buying them but are unwilling to sign on the dotted line in the United States where the most lucrative destinations are to be had president Richard Nixon tours the

Aircraft his country’s decision to cancel their own SS T is the result of a growing environmental movement warning Americans about the ecological disasters these planes will have on their neighborhoods and communities a big drawback is the sonic boom when a plane exceeds the speed of sound a large noise capable of breaking

Windows and glass erupts when scientists study the effects of this boom in Oklahoma City during the year 1964 they conclude this noise will cause a public Revolt it turns out that the sonic boom in fact bothered lots of people and this was clear very early on

When they started to do research on the Sonic Boom in Oklahoma City and a report came out in 1964 which show which showed that a huge majority of the people quote could not live with a sonic boom unquote and the people who live with it are becoming more aroused becoming more

Sensitive to this form of pollution as they are to so many others the nation’s priorities are changing rapidly and the FAA may find that the general public has a different timetable in mind for the reduction of noise pollution David Khan CBS News New York it’s such a hot button issue that

The United States government places a ban on all ssts traveling Coast to Coast with this decision Concord is limited to only the East and West coasts in America as destinations as a result of this policy no American Airline wants to touch the plane once they killed the New York to

LA route the Miami to Seattle routes the Boston to San Francisco routes the Washington to la la Routes once it killed th those routes it killed about a third of the market for the whole aircraft and therefore therefore you you didn’t have as much uh chance to recover

Your cost people in the United States re reacted to the sound barrier as a uh a means of U going against the idea of an American supersonic transport and it of course affected the issue of the Concord flying in the United States but I don’t

Think it was a a a defining decision and I also think it was a bit of a red herring I think it was put up mainly because people who were smart enough to see there was no way to make any money out of the Concord Building it the the

Manufacturer was going to lose the government was going to lose I think it was perhaps uh overinflated just so that we wouldn’t do it and we wouldn’t have an American Contender as environmental groups gain strength pickets and protests against the sst’s sonic boom against its unhealthy fuel consumption and against

Noise pollution in general take place rumors begin that any passenger who boards the plane will become violently ill this bad publicity sour the concort reputation thankfully the two countries who built the aircraft come to its rescue when British Airways and Air France order nine planes for service they save the

Entire project from economic collapse unfortunately the overseas buyers needed to make this a worthwhile government investment never materialize what began as a European project is confined only to Europe despite these roadblocks Concord continues its worldwide tour to force to prove it can fly in the most brutal weather conditions the aircraft

Stops in America’s Arctic Outpost Alaska demonstrating that this SST can Excel even in the bitter cold next is a flight to the polar opposite Mexico City where thousands of people wait for hours to see concord’s grand entrance with orders placed the employees of BAC and aerospatial begin building more ssts

Improving the quality from the original prototypes the Bristol 593 engines gain strength reducing the black smoke emitted and in 1975 Concord receives its certificate of airworthiness when agents are first allowed to book passengers demand skyrockets a beautiful airplane that performed well I was lucky enough to fly

On it on one occasion and U there’s it was it was the way to travel there there’s no question about it he arrived in London in what seemed like a you know a couple of hours and uh feeling excellent although 20% more expensive than subsonic travel during the early

Years with all the hype and Fascination surrounding This Plane the people cannot resist the opportunity to fly supersonic one year later the first two Concords carrying paying customers depart from London and Paris Simultaneously almost a decade after its first test flight in 1969 the dreams of This Ss are finally realized Concord is given a boost when its only competitor the Soviet t144 fails miserably it’s crude design and enormous fuel consumption Fades quickly only a few months of novelty flights take place clearing the way for

The angl French despite this early success the road ahead for this powerful new plane is going to be a bumpy one in America the Boeing 747 jumbo jet proves to be concord’s greatest competitor carrying more than twice the passengers a fraction of the cost in the Big Apple where the most

Profitable route of London to New York is crucial because of noise pollution a judge rules that the supersonic airliner cannot land in the city over in Britain and France many speculate that because the United States could not get its SST up in the air sour grapes causes America to punish Concord as a

Result only after a Supreme Court ruling is the aircraft allowed to land at JFK International Airport in 1977 almost 20 years later it would set the world record for transatlantic flight traveling from London to New York in less than 3 hours by this time however with rapid inflation and oil crisis and growing

Environmental concerns people begin speculating that this plane’s time in the Sun has passed people would pay the additional cost to fly faster than the speed of sound whatever however you valued your time one times the value of your time 1.5 times the value of your time that’s what people thought it

Turned out in fact that this was a very questionable assumption the whole idea that there would be a market for people paying a premium to go faster than the speed of sound on Commercial aviation in fact was a facade it turned out to be a

Facade it was not not true it was a mirage during dire Economic Times Concord is viewed as a plane only for the super rich the clientele was superb I mean the there were really really rich people flu it I can recall on the one flight that I made there was a group of

About five or six kids all in one family and who were making their 15th or 16th Concord flight and we totally Blas about it so it taught me that you know the C was for Rich guys the novelty effect has worn off the enthusiasm of the 1960s when it

Was first built is replaced by the cynicism of the 1970s each year it’s in service Concord fails financially unable to turn a profit as the 1980s begin many feel this technological Marvel’s days and numbered however it’s miraculously saved when British Airways decides to buy its planes from the government

Outright with this decision a new marketing campaign is launched to bring Concord back to life discovering that its Rich cantele are willing to pay more to fly supersonic prices go up exponentially making it a vehicle exclusively for the super wealthy as a result it’s marketed as

Such and for the next two decades the plane stays afloat then after more than 30 years Concord flight 459 crashes raising doubts on the safety of SuperSonic flight with the terrorist attacks of September the 11th 2001 and the decline in air travel that follows both British Airways and Air France decide to cancel

Service of the Concord in the end the aircraft became a mixed blessing I think that the angl French conquered project may have been a model that showed the Europeans that they could collaborate in aviation and while the conquered itself was not successful it may have been an impetus toward

Forming Airbus which has been relatively successful in building aircraft and becoming a formidable competitor uh to Boeing so in some ways although the conquered itself self was not successful maybe it was a catalyst or vehicle to create a a successful larger Enterprise called aabus without question its ability to

Travel at twice the speed of sound made the plane a first class attraction wherever it landed over a period of several years Europe’s finest produced a true technological Marvel epitomizing the very best in engineering and aerodynamics for those reason Concord goes down in the history books as one of the greatest aircraft

Ever in Britain and France it was more than just a plane it came to symbolize a time when they and not the Americans were at the top of the mountain just as England had ruled the Seas with their dreadnots they would rule over the skies with their Concord but with all its

State-of-the-art capabilities it became out of reach for the average man woman and child who ironically became the concord’s biggest supporters with the dim realities of the 1970s the plane’s biggest obstacles were not in its jet engines nor in its payload but with a skeptical public who grew cynical at the idea of government

And big business teaming up to produce a plane that only the privileged and Powerful could fly on it was a a beautiful airplane still is a beautiful airplane and it’s just a shame that perhaps it’s a sanctuary maybe you don’t need to go supersonically and uh obviously not not

Enough people need to go supersonically to justify the market now with the ability to communicate in a matter of micros seconds through the use of computers the Concord symbolizes a much different time when the best technology available to see each other in person was the airplane in this era faster meant

Better and in getting people to their destination no aircraft has been able to surpass the speed of the Concord if you enjoyed this video please remember to like And subscribe and as always thank you for watching The P-51 Mustang the most dominant escort fighter of World War II it helped blaze a trail from England all the way to Berlin for America’s bomber force of course the Mustang was a revelation that was war winner its creation was sparked by a mixture of genius and chance the Mustang and its two-stage

Two-speed supercharged Merlin engine were the end result of years of technological development from World War I to World War II each generation of aircraft went ever higher and faster but the Mustang’s marriage with the Merlin might never have happened national pride delayed the coupling of these two great Innovations

But a new deadly German adversary changed everything [ __ ] off 190 this was really a topn fighter aircraft with the fw190 terrorizing the Skies of Europe the British and American forces swallowed their pride and joined together to create the ultimate fighting machine December 17th 1903 the wri brothers aircraft the right

One successfully takes off initiating the dawn of Aviation man had already taken to the skies with gliders and balloons but this was the first time that an engine had propelled him into the air the right one’s engine was a crude design by today’s standards and put out 12 horsepower

Only it was an inline engine meaning that its cylinders four in total were mounted in a straight line a layout that would Inspire some of the most advanced piston engine aircraft ever created though a simple design the right engine was Innovative it was the first engine to make use of a lightweight cast

Aluminum crank case every pound counted with a heavier engine the rights may not have made history that Winter’s day in North Carolina aircraft weight and power would continue to be important to the evolution of flight World War I was approaching and the newly formed Air Forces of the world

Needed reliable engines with enough power to sustain flight during operations from France would come a new type of power plant to take the fight into the air the rotary engine rotary engines operated differently than the inline ones used by the re Brothers the cylinders were arranged in

A radial pattern rather than a line when the engine was fired up the crankshaft remained stationary while the crank case and cylinders rotated around it a rotary engine had one giant advantage over the inlines of the era it was much lighter and thus gave a pilot better performance during combat or

While trying to evade an enemy however the rotary engine was not without its shortcomings it it had poor fuel economy as it was often run on Full Throttle it also provided an unpleasant ride castor oil was mixed with the fuel mixture for lubrication with the side

Effect of heavy fumes smoke and an oil shower for Pilots turns with a rotary powered aircraft could prove treacherous as the whole engine rotated It produced a gyroscopic effect a turn to the right at full power and low level could end with the death of a pilot rotary powered aircraft remained

Part of Air Force inventories till War’s end but they were gradually supplanted by the inline engine inlines based on the same principles as the one found in the original right plane kept improving in terms of power and performance between the wars and across the Atlantic a new type of aircraft

Engine would emerge to dominate American Aviation the US Navy was looking for aircraft to populate its fledgling aircraft carriers space on board was extremely limited but aircraft with inline engines often had lengthy noses their engines built with rows of cylinders took up too much space on cramped carriers rotary engines though more compact

Had too many other weaknesses to be serious contenders for the role there was however a third type of engine before the war there had been limited experimentation with radial engines at first glance these appeared to be just like rotary engines it’s only when they are fired up that the difference becomes

Clear in a rotary engine the crank case and cylinders rotate around the crankshaft but with a radial engine the crankshaft rotates while the engine block is static radials often weren’t as powerful as inline engines but they were less complicated they were cooled by air rushing over the engine rather than

Through a liquid cooling system this made radials less vulnerable to battle damage which might rupture the coolant lines Navy pilots who might have to travel long distances over the ocean to get to a Target needed an engine that would be sure to get them home under any circumstance most importantly for the

Navy radials were smaller than inline engines so a greater number of aircraft equipped with them could be stored on board their carriers the W aeronautical Corporation a successor to the original wri Brothers company used the revation expertise to create the first reliable radial engine for the Navy the J5 whirlwind

Wind the J5 was put on display for the entire world to see when Charles Lindberg crossed the Atlantic in his Spirit of St Louis in 1927 his flight solidified the reputation of the J5 radio as a Dependable power Plant the budding Airlines of the world were looking for engines to power their airliners and to bring their passengers across continents and eventually across the globe safely reliable radial engines seem to be the ideal Choice radials would power many of the principal airliners in the history of

Civil aviation from the Ford Tri motor to the Boeing 247 to the Lockheed model 10 Electra both the US Navy and US Army Air Corp would rely heavily on radial engines as they built up their inventories of Fighters and other aircraft in the 1930s the US had just

One inline engine in development the Allison v710 an engine that would one day power some of America’s great Fighters at the time relying on radial seemed a prudent decision but in the years to come and in the battles ahead it will leave the US playing catch up with their allies and enemies in Europe in Europe in the 1930s Air Forces and aircraft manufacturers were looking for Speed Above All Else as they designed the next generation of Fighters using streamlined designs and Powerful V12 inline engines they pushed their aircraft to speeds over 350 Mph their inline engines were not only more powerful they also helped to create more aerodynamic airframes their elongated shapes allowed for more streamline designs as compared with radials inline engines may have been more vulnerable to attack due to their complex liquid cooling systems but no matter how durable a radial engine is

Speed kills in a dog fight inline engines were built to provide just that it was from this European obsession with speed that some of the legendary fighters of World War II were born including the supermarine Spitfire the Hawker hurricane and the messers Schmid BF 109 beneath their elegant frames heard

Ever more powerful inline engines from Rolls-Royce and damler Benz respectively in the middle of 1940 the pilots of the RAF tested their metal and the endurance of their Fighting Machines in some of the most spectacular air battles of World War II Vice furer Goring had promised to destroy destroy the RAF and thus

Facilitate the invasion of Britain Goring had add his disposal an armada of medium bombers protected by a deadly fighter Force the result of the Battle of Britain during those few vital months of 1940 is well known there was a heavy toll in Fighters and pilots on both sides British and German Engineers tried

To squeeze every ounce of power from their engines any tiny Advantage could be the difference between life and death with Britain and her industry under direct attack she looked to her old colony more than ever to provide her with desperately needed aircraft even before the Battle of Britain the British purchasing

Commission had already been shopping for additional aircraft the US’s initial offer of Fighters was not well suited for the High Altitude dog fight taking place over Europe This was partially due to the American engines available the US had concentrated on radial engine production instead of inline engines like the one so popular

In European Fighters they did have the Allison engine the v710 like the British Rolls-Royce Merlin it was a 12 cylinder inline engine but it had a complex turbocharger often difficult to fit into an aircraft to boost power in the thin air at high altitudes the Allison engine

Used the heat of its exhaust to power a turbine and thereby increase the air flow and power one American aircraft the lock heat P38 had the extra space needed to house the turbocharger it was a big twin engined aircraft to begin with and had space in its tail Booms for the extra

Equipment but given the size of the P38 it wouldn’t have fared well against Nimble single engine German fighters in a dog fight America had other smaller Fighters powered by the Allison engine the P39 era Cobra and the Curtis P40 Warhawk in both cases their manufacturers failed to include Allison’s

Turbocharger the P39 had an Innovative layout with its engine situated mid fuselage behind the pilot it was designed to house both the the Allison engine and the turbocharger however a scoop built into the left side of the fuselage to cool the turbocharger was deemed too aerodynamically expensive both the scoop and the

Turbocharger were eliminated from the production design this change crippled the aeroc Cobra’s ability to fight at high altitudes in the case of the P40 Warhawk a rugged single engined airplane that turbocharger was excluded from the design from the get-go this limited its optimal altitude to just 15,000 ft and thus relegated the

Aircraft to ground attack the British purchasing commission was still interested in the Warhawk even with its limitations they saw it as more of an army support aircraft however the Curtis Factory was running at capacity and could not fulfill the order with no suitable aircraft readily available for purchase the Brits would

Turn to North American aircraft the British purchasing commission proposed that North American build the Warhawk under license from Curtis but NAA president Dutch kindleberger had a bolder plan he guaranteed that he could create an even better airplane using the same Allison engine in less time than it

Would take for him to retool for Warhawk production the Brit said yes and the end result was an airplane that may well have changed the outcome of the second world war in Europe back in Europe Germany was looking for an aircraft to augment the BF 109 in the Battle of Britain the BF 109 and spitfire were closely matched but the BF 109 lacked the range to be highly effective in its escort rule over Britain in the summer of

1940 the lift wafa had a twin engined escort the bf10 it had the range to be an excellent escort but it lacked the maneuverability to defend itself or its charge in a dog fight it also used two diimler Ben 605 engines making it an expensive Sitting Duck for British

Interceptors looking for a quick solution to their escort dilemma the lift wafa even considered having the 110s tow 109’s into battle to conserve fuel but in the long run using two aircraft to perform the role of a single fighter was an even more wasteful solution what the lift wafa needed was a

Dedicated single engine aircraft to fill in for the BF 109 on longer range missions and ideal something to give them a decided advantage over the British fighters of the time however the Lu Waffa wanted to have its cake and eat it too they wanted a new fighter but they didn’t want to

Sacrifice any of the precious 605 engines meant for the BF 109 to the consternation of the LIF wafa most of the new submissions for fighter designs from German industry were to be built around this very same engine to solve Germany’s escort woes one man Kurt P [ __ ] a wolf’s legendary

Designer in test pilot did what was almost Unthinkable at the time since since the start of the War British and German designers had relied upon powerful 12 cylinder inline engines to power their Fighters tank dared to build Germany’s Next fighter around a bombers radial engine the aircooled BMW 801 radial

Engine had plenty of power and had proven reliable in the ju88 and do 217 but radials in a fighter were a rare sight in Europe it was difficult to build this aerodynamic fuselage to house them in as when constructing one for a slender inline Engine though an unconventional design track tanks saw two reasons for encouragement firstly the national advisory committee for Aeronautics in the US had already done research on improving air flow around radial engines over time they had developed the NACA cowl which at least helped to reduce drag this was a simp simple ring which

Fitted snugly around the cylinders of a radial engine it not only made the engine more aerodynamic it also improved cooling secondly tank observed that the US and Japanese navies were employing several modern carrier aircraft all with radial engines aircraft like the F4F Hellcat and the Japanese A6

M0 the lightweight zero had been almost Unstoppable in the early part of the Pacific War ton could continued to explore ways of improving his new radial engined aircraft and reducing the drag effect although some say his greatest task was selling the radial idea to the ministry if that was the case the

Bureaucrats must have been quickly won over by Kurt KK’s first prototypes given the designation the [ __ ] wolf 190 and unofficially known as The Butcher bird the lia’s latest fighter was rushed into production fortunately for the Allies the fw190 arrived after the close of the Battle of

Britain in the summer of 1941 five Mark 5 Spitfires flying over the South Coast spotted several radial engine fighters in German markets at first glance they were mistaken for us-built Republic Lancers it was a deadly case of mistaken identity the aircraft were in reality early model fw1 190s the Spitfire pilots

Who survived the ensuing battle lived to tell just how quickly their comrades had been lost but Britain’s greatest loss that day was not Pilots or planes the battle marked the day Britain lost air superiority to the lift wafa the RAF had to do something and fast All Eyes looked to Rolls-Royce man

Manufacturer of the Merlin engine that power plant of the Spitfire Hurrican and so many of Britain’s Great Planes although the company had the Next Generation engine the 12 cylinder Griffin in development it was well over a year away more than enough time for Britain to produce the

War earlier there had been some thought given to modifying a few Merlin engines for experimental high altitude work to be executed by a Wellington bomber it was little more than an idea at the time but in Britain’s hour of desperate need Rolls-Royce Engineers worked night and day to test the

Concept Merlin engines were already supercharged an air compressor mechanically attached to the rotating cam shaft increased the air flow to the engine allowing it to burn more fuel and to boost performance Rolls-Royce Engineers had theorized that adding a second supercharger could give the engine even more punched during high altitude

Work might a two-stage supercharger help the RAF reclaim Air Supremacy the end result of the Rolls-Royce experiments was breathtaking it was almost as if the two-stage two-speed Merlin was an entirely different engine when in fact it was just a modification when the double supercharged aircraft du the Spitfire

Mark 9 finally arrived in June of 1942 the RAF had a rare opportunity to test it directly against a captured fw190 the test results were far different than the day a group of unlucky RAF Pilots ran into a flock of butcher Birds the two aircraft were virtual equals in terms of

Performance Captain Eric Brown who had flown a captured fw190 had a chance to test the new Spitfire 9 against the German aircraft in live combat I Flo the 190 quite a bit so I wasn’t too frightened I reckoned I knew what that aircraft could do and I

Knew what my spit could do so I thought well can I can handle this guy hoping he was somebody just out of training school but no I picked somebody who really knew what he was up to and we had I would say a twoing and flowing over France but

Neither could get a draw beat on the and we finally realized as both of us we run out of fuel we waggled our wings at each other and departed and um I realized this was really a topnotch fighter aircraft the RAF had leveled the playing field with the lfer at least for

The time being but what the RAF really needed was an aircraft to give them the upper hand the new Merlin’s greatest contribution to the war was still to come when it was mated with an extraordinary aircraft of American design back in the US North American aircraft had continued to work on a

Warhawk substitute which met the specifications laid out by the British purchasing commission they had specified that the airplane would be powered by an Allison engine that it cost less than $40,000 and that it be armed with 4.33 in machine guns North American answered with the p 51 Mustang it featured an advanced laminer

Flow wing for good aerodynamic efficiency and a wide gate undercarriage for safer Landing pleasing to the eye and to fly although mainly at lower altitudes the new arrival quickly gained respect from pilots and Grand Crews alike there were some concerns about how the Mustang would fa should it be forced

To ditch while crossing the channel during a water landing its air scoop located beneath the fuselage might flood the aircraft or cause it to overturn water tank tests at Saunders row were initiated to perfect the techniques for ditching the aircraft around the same time that the RAF was getting the Spitfire Mark 9

Ready for combat and the fw190 was dominating the skies Rolls-Royce test pilot Ronald Hawker was tasked with the mission of evaluating all aircraft powered by non Rolls-Royce engines he was thoroughly impressed with the p-51a save for its poor performance at high altitude like the P40 Warhawk it had an Allison engine and no

Turbocharger Hawker pondered how the aircraft might perform with the new Merlin engine the results on paper were phenomenal according to rolls-royce’s calculations with a Merlin power plant the Mustang would not only outclass any American aircraft but even new Spitfires using the same engine oddly Hawker had to push for the

Mating of the Merlin 61 and the Mustang even though the double supercharged P-51 would have outclassed the fw190 as well Hawker finally arranged for the marriage of the two great inventions and test trials confirmed his hunch the Mustang was a Warner the main challenge was to produce enough aircraft in engines to reclaim

The Skies of Europe North American would tweak the Mustang design to accommodate the Merlin 61 engine it was a much more powerful engine so the original p-51a airframe had to be reinforced as well the three-bladed prop was exchanged for one with four blades the addition of Plumbing for drop tanks

Might have seemed a small change but it would have a great impact on the air battles to come Packard took up manufacturer of the Merlin 61 engines in the US they were designated the V1 1650s Packard had arranged a licensing agreement with Rolls-Royce earlier in the war Ford was originally slated to build

Americanmade Merlins and seemed a perfect choice due to the company’s industrial might but Henry Ford was adamant that his company build defensive weapons only North American’s double supercharged aircraft the p50 1 B and p-51c first took flight in the spring and summer of 1943 air Vice Marshall Patty Harbison recalls when the Mustangs first arrived at his Spitfire Squadron of course the Mustang was a revelation it was a much more comfortable airplane than the Spitfire was and I have heard people talk about the relative merits of both they were both War winners the Spitfire

Was melted as an Interceptor it could I turn a Mustang and could I climb it but it didn’t have the legs must last time and and of course if you can’t get where the fight is you’re not you’re you’re not too effective as P-51 started to arrive in Europe the war was

Changing and the Mustang was the perfect aircraft for the time the US was taking the war to Germany they were bombing the German War Industry out of business the only problem was their bombers were being shredded by Speedy German interceptors the US had hinged their hopes on the ability of their bombers to

Defend themselves by maintaining a tight box formation when this strategy failed they were in dire need of an escort fight the P38 Lightning was simply not agile enough to take on the role then there was the p47 Thunderbolt it was an awesome radial engine fighter more than capable of taking care of

Itself in battle but it had two major flaws it was expensive and it lacked the range to take the bombers all the way to Berlin and back the P-51 BS and C’s arrived just in time they had been designed to carry drop tanks and with the addition of a

Fuel tank behind the pilots they had more than enough fuel to escort American bombers to Hitler’s Lair the Mustang proved more than a match for Germany’s fw19 and me 109 slowly American bombers closed in around Berlin suddenly the Germans found themselves playing catchup Kurt Ton’s fw190 with a radial

Engine found it difficult at higher altitudes where the bombers roam TK swapped its radial engine for an inline the long-nosed aircraft was nicknamed the Dora the fer wolf Dora the later Dora was a magnificent fighter with an engine change not really any structural changes other than those to

Accommodate the engine but what it meant was here was an airplane that could keep up with the hunt as the years of the war progressed so from 1942 right up to the end of the war the [ __ ] wolf 190 was in the top grade of fighter or fighter

B the P-51 Mustang also continued to evolve as mechanics and Engineers Incorporated changes based on the feedback of pilots who had tested the plane in battle its canopy went through several permutations the British swapped the original one for a sliding Malcolm Hood similar to a Spitfires for improved visibility the p-51b the definitive

Version of the Mustang had a bubble canopy which offered 360° of Clear View North American also upgraded the D’s Firepower it had 650 caliber machine guns compared to four in earlier models and it had solved the problem of gun jamming during hard turns the fuel tank situated behind the

Pilot may have increased range but it created other issues the plane had poured directional stability when the tank was full to counter this problem Engineers added a small dorsal fin in the D model these and other improvements would help the Mustang blaze a path to Berlin for America’s bombers

Rees Marshall Herman gar commander of the Lu was quoted as saying when I saw Mustangs over Berlin I knew the jig was up when the European War had come to a close the battle still raged in the Pacific the Mustang was the best escort available but even with its incredible

Range it could not accompany an aircraft like the b29 super fortress on extended bombing missions over Japan the expanses of ocean were too large the engineers at North American struggled with the problem of stretching the Mustang’s range their solution was a Zing or twin Mustang by fusing two Mustangs together

They hope to dramatically increase the range of the Mustang while retaining its excellent dog fighting abilities the new Mustang the f82 had an incredible range 2,000 Mi though the prototypes were powered by Packard built Merlin engines the US Army aircore was adamant that the production version be totally americanmade unfortunately for the f82

Without Merlin engines it was not the same aircraft when fitted with the Allison v710 100 it speed dropped in high altitude performance suffered it was one of the few cases of a prototype outperforming the production model of of an aircraft by the time the f82 was ready

Japan had surrendered and the war was over after the war the P-51 continued to serve while other piston engine fighters of the era went quietly into retirement though it was the dawn of the jet age there was still a place for the Mustang in a variety of

Roles Colonel Ray o Roberts flew the Mustang during its second in life at that time I was flying what they call the F6 which is a P-51 with cameras also had guns and you could had the b b bombing and gun Gunnery capability and we participated in a post hostilities

Mapping program we mapped revised all the Japanese Maps photographed did aial Photography in Japan and and Korea when the Korean War arrived Mustangs which had been mothballed for long-term storage were suddenly being shipped across the Pacific on carriers unable to compete with the next generation of jet fighters for the dog

Fighter role Mustangs returned to where they started in Korea Mustangs made excellent ground attack aircraft they didn’t have the speed of jets but they had the endurance to make it from Japan to Korea on bombing runs in Korea the f82 also had an opportunity to taste combat for the first time

F82 flew strike escort and night fighter missions the marriage of the P-51 Mustang and the Merlin 61 engine produced incredible results it provided the allies with an effective escort to pound the last Nails into Germany’s Cen perhaps the most amazing thing about the P-51 Stellar career is that it might never have

Happened if the Merlin and Mustang had never been been made it at the suggestion of Hawker at Rolls-Royce the P-51 might have had a hum drum career as a reliable ground attack aircraft rather than an elite dog fighter it arrived at the right time and the right place in history just when the

Allies needed an escort Fighter the P-51 was the end result of years of aircraft and engine development though jet powered aircraft would supplant it the impact of the Mustang and Merlin in military history cannot be Unwritten or Denied at the farboro air show in 1949 barely 4 years after the war ended Britain presented an impressive array of jet aircraft some were purely military others experimental and there were even some air liners converted from piston engines to the new jet technology perhaps the best crowd-pleaser was the advanced de havin

Comet turbojet airliner elsewhere in England other types of jet airliners were being developed but these were somewhat different this is The vicker’s vicount Airliner when it first came into service in the early 50s it quickly became a success one of the main reasons for the Vic Count’s ever expanding order book

Was the aircraft’s Rolls-Royce Dart turboprop engines however the vicount wasn’t the only Contender nor was the dart the only turbo prop engine available at the time slightly smaller than the vicount and with different turbo prop engines the Armstrong witor aw55 Apollo was no less pleasing to the to the eye and in

Tandem with the vicer aircraft represented a giant step forward in Airline design the target market for both aircraft was the short to medium roots of the emerging post-war airline industry with government backing British industry they had something special to offer with the Revolutionary turbo prop engines the concept of a conventional

Jet having its exhaust thrust converted into turning power for traditional propeller blades was brand new and it made for extremely economical and very smooth running there were two early examples the Rolls-Royce Dart and the competitive Armstrong Sidle Mamba the Apollo’s designers favored the Mamba whereas Vickers chose the

Dart construction of the Apollo started in Armstrong woodworth’s Factory at Bingington Airport port in 1948 baggon had been bombed during the German Blitz on Coventry it was used as an RAF fighter base during the War years but now it would be used as part of Britain’s critical export drive to repay the war

De there were grounds for optimism as the country refocused its industry only 3 years earlier manufacturers had produced Spitfires and lancasters by the thousands and for a time most of the skilled aircraft Builders were still on hand one of the more notable features of the Apollo’s Mamba engines was their

Narrow diameter slender and aerodynamic they complemented the aircraft’s Aesthetics however the smaller engine housings that accompanied the Mamba did not provide for an area to store the landing gear in flight this meant that the main main Wheels had to retract into the fuselage consuming valuable space however the Mamba still showed

Great promise apart from anything else it had already powered a trainer the Athena which was actually the first production aircraft to employ a turbo prop engine also early tests suggested good performance in 1948 a 500h hour test run confirmed the engine’s durability after this Armstrong Whitworth were sure that they had a winning

Combination the aw55 Apollo prototype was designed and built to accommodate a crew of three two pilots and one cabin crew passenger seating could be configured for up to 31 people however a slightly longer version for production had also been discussed as well as a military version for True transport construction on the Apollo

Progress rest until its rolled out in April of 1949 this Sleek fully pressurized airliner was a far cry from the utility Fighters and bombers the industry had produced just a few years before on the 10th of April Apollo aircraft serial number vx220 took to the air from a grass field at Bingington

Airport its first flight lasted just half an hour and the results were less than impressive the first problem was that the Mamba asm2 engines failed to produce the 1200 plus horsepower expected which were indeed needed to meet the aircraft’s performance requirements the 800 horsepower that was actually recorded was Far short of what

Was anticipated subsequent test flights also demonstrated numerous flaws in the airframe design improvements were constantly made until a critical flight test to parison back was under taken on the 12th of March 1951 still problems persisted with the Apollo having a flawed airframe and the Mamba engines remaining

Underpowered in June of 1952 all further development on the Apollo was abandoned and the only two examples ever built were used for research work at bosome down this left the vicer vi count the undoubted winner and it was this type that also went on to become one of Britain’s all time airliner export

Earners with 445 built the redoutable Rolls-Royce Dart Turbo prop engine was even more successful with over 7,000 engines delivered to numerous customers up until 1987 41 years after its first test for a while the Armstrong Sidle Mamba had no such success but then again it certainly wasn’t a complete failure

Either rather with Improvement it more into several different life forms each one displaying considerable and unexpected Ingenuity at about the same time that the Apollo was under construction the Royal Navy and fery Aviation were developing a truly remarkable anti-submarine aircraft the fairy ganet shared the same problems as many carrier born

Aircraft it had the performance needs of two power plants but this usually meant the high risk of possibly having to land with one engine not functioning this type of asymmetric approach is highly dangerous for the air Crew a second consideration for Fair’s designers was the significant economy that might be achieved on Long missions if one of two engines could actually be turned off and yet still leave the plane with the same balance as a single engined aircraft Armstrong tily thought that they might have the answer the very

Narrow diameter of the Mamba turbo prop might now prove most useful if two could be assembled side by side driving two Contra rotating propellers both able to be turned on and off independent of the other the double Mamba as it became known was a major success providing

Ganet Pilots with two jet power plants in an aircraft that had great range and at the same time was safe to land even with one engine down because of its Mamba engines the ganet became a much trusted Maritime aircraft which went on to serve in a number of other

Countries with nearly 350 of all types made it wasn’t so far off the numbers of VI counts delivered although the vicer plane had four turbo props as opposed to the ganit 2 Still The Versatile Mamba had much more to offer by removing the gearbox and the propeller Drive Armstrong sidley

Were able to present to con ventional turbojet with a few more deletions and economies this evolved into a so-called Expendable power plant and it transpired that there actually was quite a market for a shortlife jet engine it was named the adder postwar Western governments knew that they might have to deal with Soviet

Forces that would include jet aircraft target practice on anything flying less than in the high 500 mph range would be useless equally important a Target would have to be able to fly up to a height of 50,000 ft and get there quickly since most drones only have a limited flight

Time in 1948 the Australian government aircraft Factory entered into a contract to develop an unmanned radio controlled flying Target it was given the name gind ofic Aboriginal for the hunted one made in Australia many were shipped to Britain in Parts where with their experience with the Mamba engine fery

Aviation assembled each unit that was powered by the Mamba descendant the adder more than 500 gind divix were built and employed by Australia Britain the United States and Sweden over time Armstrong sidley merged with the rivals Rolls-Royce although not before had redeveloped the adder into a stronger and more reliable Turbo Jet the

End result was Al much more powerful it was named the Viper and Vipers were produced in the hundreds powering the jet Provost strike Masters Hawker cidly 125 and many more what started out as a misfire with the Mamba engines on the Apollo developed over time into a successful line of engines with the

Double Mamba adder and vipers that would power numerous aircraft for years to come one problem facing the designers of the next generation of turbo jet engines is that of increasing turban Inlet temperatures air cooled turbine blades may offer a solution to this problem the fabrication of a cast aircool turbine

Blade that has shown promise in Prototype testing will be shown in this film This blade was made using a modification of the Lost wax casting technique a process to provide long slender holes for cooling passages was developed by the Lewis flight propulsion laboratory of the national advisory committee for aeronautics this development is particularly important because the super Alloys used in aircraft turbine blades

Are extremely difficult to machine ceramic tubes are used as part of the casting mold to establish cores or holes through the turban blade casting core tubes of the desired outside diameter are assembled in a pattern die the core tubes are held in place by embedding them in a bar of soft

Wax using a hot wire or Knight the dyes used are made of a low melting alloy cast around a brass Master pattern a casting pattern is made by closing the dyes containing the ceramic tubes clapping the dyes in a wax injection machine and injecting molten wax Under Pressure the wax pattern containing

Ceramic tubes is removed from the dye and excess wax is trimmed leaving a light wax film on the exposed ceramic tubes to permit freedom of movement due to expansion additional pieces of wax are assembled by welding with a hot wire these pieces will form sprew Runners and

Ingates or passages for the molten metal to reach the blade cavity in the casting mold the assembled wax is mounted on a waxed base to seal it a can type flask is placed over the assembly and it too is sealed at the bottom when the investment is Thoroughly mixed

It is poured into the flask and around the wax pattern assembly the flask is then placed in a vacuum chamber to remove air from the mix after investing and air drying the moles are placed in a furnace here the drying is completed the wax is melted

Out the wax residue is burned off and the mold is cured during this furnace cycle the temperature is gradually increased from room temperature to 1900 de F metal alloy for the casting is melted in an electric induction furnace when the metal reaches a temperature of 3000° f The Crucible of

Molten metal is placed in a centrifugal casting machine and the hot mold is placed over it as the casting machine is spun the molten metal is thrown into the mold the casting is removed by by breaking away the mold after the casting is cleaned up the ceramic tubes used to form the cooling

Passages in the blade must be removed this is done by threading fine stainless steel wires through each ceramic tube and stretching them taut on a frame the turban blade is then attached to a cam device designed to slide the blade up and down on the wires the lower

Part of the assembly is then immersed in a bath of Molen costing this helps to remove reaction products and introduces fresh costic to the bore of the tubes and hence accelerates the solution and removal of the core tubes the rough casting is cleaned in an air water abrasive

Blast a suitable base configuration is then ground and the blade is ready for testing in a research facility the process you have just seen illustrates a principle that has been effective in producing long thin cord holes in castings this process may be useful in fabricating turbine blades to be used at

Very high turban Inlet temperatures the F100 is one of our primary tactical support weapon systems this aircraft has a proven history of outstanding performance one of the reasons for this dependability is the rugged power plant the one one a high performance aircraft is adaptable to many missions

It is used for reconnaissance as a tactical fighter and as an Interceptor approximately 30,000 pounds of crust is developed by its twin engin the f102 is the first operational Air Force delta wing aircraft performance characteristics of this weapon system are ideally suited for intercept missions a reliable power

Plant is essential for the success of any Mission the f102 101 and 100 are all powered by the rugged j57 engine developed by R the individual engines vary somewhat but for most part are the same fundamental design the j57 is a dual compressor engine the engine consists of the following

Components the inlet the low press compressor the high press compressor the diffuser case combustion chamber the first second and third stage turbin the after ER and the exhaust nozzle the low pressure compressor referred to as N1 is driven by the second and third stage turban the high-press compressor M2 is

Driven by the first stage turb these two units or spools are not mechanically connected the j57 operates on the same basic principle as all jet engines pressure presented in Grass form below the basic engine offline and velocity are increased by a series of rotors in the compressor section a compressor bleed system prevents

Compressor instability when the engine is operating at reduced power the compressed air passes through the diffuser into the combustion chamber where the air expands thus reducing somewhat the velocity and pressure fuel is mixed with a portion of the air to form the combustible Mass when combustion occurs the gases are

Expelled through the turbin at this point power is extracted by the turbin to drive the compressor the remaining energy expelled through the exhaust nozzle provides the thrust since exhaust nozzle and curban discharge pressures are relative curban discharge pressure is used as a parameter to determine thrust thrust is the measure of force

Developed by the engine force is determined by mass times acceleration mass is the weight of air and fuel passing through the engine acceleration is the difference between Inlet and turban discharge veres of this Mass thus frust may be expressed by the formula Force equals mass time acceleration the engine trim charts are

Based on this formula additional frust is obtained in the afterburners by increasing mass and acceleration at that stage the basic engine pressure ratio during afterburner operation is maintained by increasing the exhaust nozzle area efficient engine operation depends on correct fuel schedule the basic components of the j57 main engine fuel

System are fuel pump and fuel pump transfer valve fuel control and the pressurizing and dump Val the fuel pump is a dual element per gear pump one element supplies fuel to the After Burner the other to the main engine the fuel control meters the fuel required to operate the engine through its full

Range the pressurizing and dump valve supplies the main engine fuel manifold and drains the manifold at engine shut down at engine start fuel enters the pump through the impeller where the pressure is increased this provides a positive pressure head to the main stage at this stage the fuel reaches output

Pressure the pressurized fuel closes the fuel regulating transfer valve and the afterburner check valve and flows into the fuel control the main metering valve is closed at this time a portion of this fuel passes through the minimum flow orifice through the signal line to the pmv valve

Since the control is in bypass pressure does not build up enough to close this valve until the power lever moves from cut off to idles when the power lever is moved to the idle position the fuel duum valve closes the main metering valve opens the cut off valve moves off its seat the

Pressure loading valve opens the p&v valve Inlet check valve opens and the fuel is supplied to the prim Ary side of the fuel manifold through the pressurizing and dump Val at approximately 74% RPM the fuel pressurizing valve will open to supply fuel to the secondary side of the fuel

Manifolds the j57 engine uses a primary and secondary system in order to obtain the highest possible fuel flow with the shortest possible flate at low RPMs only the primary side is used when the emergency system is selected the actuator positions the pilot valve to direct pressure to the shuttle valve

System the shuttle valve blocks off metered flow and provides a port for unmetered fuel to the emergency throttle valve this mechanical valve controls the flow of fuel the After Burner element of the fuel pump will supply fuel to the engine in the event of main element failure the primary function is to

Furnish fuel for the after bur the other components of the j57 afterburner system are the afterburner fuel control exhaust nozzle control igniter valve and the mechanical shut off valve the relative position of the components varies according to engine models the afterburner fuel control meters fuel to the ab spray

Box the exhaust nozzle control directs compressor discharge air to open and close the nozzles the igniter valve injects fuel into the combustion chamber creating a streak of flame to ignite the After Burner in the event of electrical failure the mechanical shut off valve will terminate AB operation at Approximately 80%

RPM rotation of this valve causes AB stage fuel to bypass through the ab fuel control regulator valve the fuel control unit is carefully calibrated on the test bench to assure accurate engine fuel schedule the main functions of the fuel control are to maintain acceleration schedules below compressor stall Zone to prevent over

Temperature during acceleration prevent lean die out during deceleration and to maintain any selected engine speed within operating limits regard less of altitude the fuel control senses engine RPM Inlet temperature and burner pressure to supply the correct amount of fuel for any ambient condition when calibration has been completed all external adjustments

Except the idle and Military trim screws are sealed these seals are installed to protect test bench precision calibrations and must not be removed the j57 engine will provide relatively trouble-free operation when all systems are functioning correctly however the systems must be properly rigged and adjusted one of the most critical engine

Adjustments is the rigging of the fuel control linkage full range movement is obtained only when the fuel control and afterburner mechanical shut off valve levers are correctly positioned the levers are set to predetermined angles a protractor or ET template is used to set the linkage at these angles the protractor is positioned at

The oil pump and accessory housing plug to establish a reference angle this reference angle will be used to adjust the fuel control lever with the fuel control lever in cut off position the difference between the reference angle and this reading must be the number of degrees specified in the tech manual

It may be necessary to readjust the fuel control lever to obtain the correct angle the fuel control lever and serrated spacer are ratcheted to give the desired angle the fuel control position which when all other linkage is connected will close the After Burner mechanical shut off down the power actuating Rod is then

Attached to the fuel control lever move the mechanical shut off lever to the detent position the rod connecting the cross shaft lever and mechanical shut off valve lever may have to be adjusted to the specified length the ab mechanical shut off valve is held in detent position while the

Lever is ratcheted to the position where the rod which has already been adjusted to the specified length will fit then all connections are tightened either the protractor or an eted template is used to again check the angle of the fuel control level it may be necessary to readjust the fuel

Control lever to obtain the correct angle after Corrections are made all connections are then safety replacement or adjustment of most components will affect engine operation prior to aircraft installation the engine is Thoroughly inspected and tested to ensure satisfactory performance a fuel at least check is imperative before initial start of a repaired

Engine with the system pressurized check all fuel lines and connections the exhaust nozzle opening must also be rechecked before initial engine starts nozzle diameter not within specified limits will affect engine efficiency on some engines a fail safe device is installed to prevent total loss of power in the event of linkage failure the

Device will position the fuel control lever to a 45° angle setting which will provide approximately 90% RPM thus ensuring sufficient thrust to maintain flight after installation in the aircraft all airframe to engine connections must be checked and adjusted and the engine rri Final Trim to compensate for aircraft installation losses is preferably

Accomplished with the aircraft headed directly into the wiip prevailing wind velocity and direction must be within limits specified in the tech manual the trim pad area must be free of loose objects that could damage the engine if ingested to effectively trim the engine power control settings must be coordinated

Throttle linkage is operationally tested before making fuel control adjustments movement of the fuel control quadrant must synchronize with throttle movement power control movement is transferred to obtain predetermined fuel control settings the aircraft manual indicates the relative degree of movement throughout the entire throttle Range close attention to detail is

Required when trimming an engine changes in ambient barometric pressure and temperature will affect engine performance characteristics true barometric pressure and correct temperature both recorded within 15 minutes of the trim run are used to determine Target pp7 Target pp7 is obtained by tracing the temperature and pressure coordinates on the trim chart

Start engine is specified in the tech manual and allow engine and exhaust gas temperature to stabilize reard bottle to idle settings desired idle speed is obtained by adjusting the idle trim Screw As in all fuel control adjustments Final Trim is always in the increased RPM Direction proceeding with the trim

Operations slowly Advance throttle to military power allow 5 minutes for stabilizing caution do not over speed or overt engine during runup and stabilization with throttle set of military power record RPM EGT and the turban discharge pressure pp7 If pp7 reading is low return throttle to idle and readjust maximum

Rpm setting at the fuel control turn the adjustment clockwise to increase RPS in order to obtain Target PP f advanced trottel in military [Applause] Power stabilize then recheck p7 return thr to idle check EGT and RPM make certain that RPM is within 2% of data plate speed indication at the completion of the trim run follow standard shutdown procedures accurate troubleshooting depends on a thorough understanding of the j57 engine and its system functions

Only by correct analysis of the interrelated parameters can the malfunction be isolated proficient troubleshooting is the mark of quality the tech manual outlines the common sympt of engine malfunctions the probable causes and their remedy basic parameters used to determine engine performance must also be considered when analyzing problems these basic parameters are RPM

Ct7 and EGT one of the most detrimental engine malfunctions is over tting or high EGP perform static checks of pt7 lines and connections and the exhaust nozzle opening make sure the anti-icing valves are closed then check for instrument accuracy all static checks have been performed and found satisfaction now the

Engine must be checked for proper trip as engine approaches military power check exhaust nozle for three check to make sure the pt7 has not exceeded Target and RPM is within data plate limits if High EGT still exists the engine must be removed and a hot section inspection must be

Performed inspect burner can for cracked or hot spots check fuel nozzles for loose burned or missing air caps and evidence of seal leaks or clogged air holes check the first stage turban nozzle guide veins for excessive bow turban veins bowed Beyond limits will distort the gas path causing loss of turban

Efficiency the amount of fuel required to compensate for this loss accounts for the excess temperature in conjunction with correction of the Bode nozzle guide veins or providing they were Within limits additional checks are necessary to assure the problem is corrected insect first and second stage outer air seal for cracks burned areas

And damage to Outer knife edges check clearance between outer air seals and turban blade shrouds check first stage turbine dislocating Dimension the cause of high EGT may have been one major problem isolated at any phase of the investigation or the accumulation of minor deficiencies requiring several procedures to isolate and correct

Had RPM exceeded data plate limits during initial High EGT troubleshooting trim run the engine would have to be feel cleaned before proceeding with other checks This process is intended to restore compressor efficiency when this operation is completed retrimming the engine may bring all parameters within Limit when troubleshooting engine performance deficiencies it is necessary to consider all three parameters EGT RPM and pt7 as an example failure to obtain Target pt7 can be caused by many things by comparing the relationship to EGT and RPM many unnecessary troubleshooting steps can be eliminated for instance when all three

Parameters are low a fuel scheduling deficiency is indicated first check for a full travel of the power lever is a fuel control quadrant military position must not be less than 54° the next step is to remove the fuel control and check the position of the cam shaft with Cam Shaft cover removed

Lever positioned at 11° and the temperature sense balled in a 60° f b measure the distance from the end of Cam Shaft to the cover flange this reading should coincide with that on the cam shaft depth plate tolerances and replacement instruction are included in the engine tech manual the engine tech manual will

Include Specific Instructions for maintenance procedures these manuals represent a vast accumulation of knowledge and experience through individual ability initiative and constant use of the tech manual proper maintenance and troubleshooting procedures can be achieved this is the goal of the improved maintenance program I was quite astonished to know what it was because it had no propeller and John replied oh it’s easy old boy it just sucks itself along like a Hoover there was the awful Race Against Time there was the skull duggery she used to say oh well Daddy’s doing something very hush

Hush I thought my goodness why didn’t I think of this before and it seems so obvious then A small English church is the last resting place of a man who didn’t just change the face of the Earth he enabled us to see what it actually looked like his name was Frank Whittle this is the story of how he invented the jet engine he overcame all

The odds only to see the British government almost throw his idea away and miss a chance to shorten the Second World [Applause] War I was born on June the 1st 1907 in centry my parents were working class my father was a foreman in Machine Tool manufacturers I lived there in centry

For 9 years went from elementary school there and then the family moved to lington because my father bought a small very small engineering outfit called the Livington valve and Pistol ring company and I really did get my first engineering experiences there because I helped him sometimes so I think it was

About TS an hour or something like that uh U making slots in valve stems in lemington Frank also won a scholarship to the town’s secondary school I was very lazy with homework and got a series of r for that but at the end of term I often do

Quite well for i’ come top of maths something like that I never did win a prize at school but I did an awful lot of uh private study I used to go down to the library in lington Spar and study all sorts of things which are not in the school

Curriculum and uh and that was where I first started to learn about Guest turbin I um was always attracted to flying from my earliest years almost when I was for my favorite toy and this is 1911 was a tin model of oblero and my heroes were people like Captain Albert

Ball and major mccon and so on the VCS of the first world war and I just wanted to fly and also I thought the boys in the uniform of aircraft apprentices look very good so I decided I’d like to wear that uniform and applied to join as an apprentice the Royal Air Force

However rejected young Whitt he was too small I uh was sunk for the time being but before I left the camp a very kindly physical training sergeant if you could imagine such a thing uh took pity on me and he gave me a diet to follow and and

Series of exercises Max aling exercises I did all that for 6 months I put on 3 in on height and 3 inches on my chest so I thought well I have another shot and I wrote to the ministry they said no once you have been turned on you’ve been

Turned on forever I thought well I go through the whole process again as i’ never happened in the hope that the bureaucracy wouldn’t pick it up and I was lucky that time and ended up at cranell in number four Wing Whittle didn’t enjoy life as an Air Force

Apprentice in that rank he would never get to fly what brightened whittle’s life was the model aircraft Society where he became the leading light at building working replicas so much so that uh the initials bwm which stood for boy wi model aircraft Society was most people said

That meant boy W boy whittles model aircraft Society was we known we were known as boy Whittle Boy Smith and so forth in those days whittle’s skills at making model planes singled him out to the authorities perhaps he might be officer material there were to be uh five Cadets selected

From number four Wing at Cranwell and uh I was number six in the passing out list so when the number one boy failed because of his eyesight uh it made me eligible the founder of the royal Air Force had his doubts though Lord trenchard nearly stopped it because um I hadn’t been a

Leading boy and I hadn’t made my uh no kind of a name in sports on which a lot of weight was put in those days whittle’s Co had a compelling reason to make trenchard think again he thought that he got a a a mathematical genius it was this natural gift that got

Whittle a Cadet Ship less than 1% of apprentices made the huge step to join the Elite in the Officers Training college at Cranwell although this was next to the apprentices wing it was socially another world one that shared the culture of the public schools from where most of the cadets Then Came In The Bleak Lincolnshire Countryside Frank whittle’s life now took a new Direction Cranwell provided a very intensive education for Whittle for the cadets just as it is today the highlight of the course was the flying lessons I learned to fly on the a 504k that was a very ancient type of airplane 191111 type and it sort with a toothpick Between the Wheels you know uh

To prevent it tipping over on its nose which in reality it helps it to tip it over on its nose or even turn upside down Whitt was soon a daring even overconfident pilot and one who had his fair share of accidents I have to confess I wrecked two or three

Airplanes three at least yeah the first run I got lost and wanted to get back to crell when the visibility deteriorated very badly it was the day incidentally of the cross country run at crell which all could hated and they most of my fellow cadetes thought I’d done it to get out

Of the cross country Room in between Learning to Fly and studying at Cranwell Whittle first conceived the idea that would make him famous it all started with a student thesis oret had to write a thesis and I chose future developments and aircraft design rather ambitious and rather concentrated on the engine side but the

Main thing in that thesis was that I arrived at what I now know know was the well-known bre formula I wasn’t familiar with it at the time connecting speed range engine efficiency and so forth and to me that meant that if you wanted to go very fast and far you would have to

To go very high heights of 50,000 ft that sort of thing at height where the piston engine obviously wouldn’t work and that speed it’s a uh where the propeller wouldn’t work so it was I started to look for a new kind of power plant Whitt prepared this paper during

The first half of 1928 but his findings at Cranwell were the fruit of the 5 years he had by now been training there my cramel thesis um when the professor marked it he wrote on it in effect that he didn’t really understand it but he gave me 30 out of

30 which I thought was quite satisfactory Whittle envisaged flying speeds of 500 mph at a time when propeller planes struggled to reach 150 these machines were noisy and shook the pilot terribly that’s because their engines were actually car motors on a bigger scale with many moving Parts

Whittle felt an aesthetic dis like for such power plants the problem with a pistol engine as you go up height even though you supercharge it is that the power drops off as the air gets thinner and there eventually comes a point where it won’t generate enough power to turn

Itself over against its own friction Whitt’s idea would use the same Principle as a balloon filled with air when this escapes every child knows what happens but it wasn’t clear how an engine might recreate such a for for I considered a piston engine driving a fan inside a hollow

Fuselage and then thought well why not throw that piston engine away up the compression ratio of the fan and substitute a turbine for the piston engine and there was the turb yet by now Whittle had left Cranwell but his search for this solution had preoccupied him

Ever since it didn’t come to me out of the blue for the simple reason that I’ve been trying to find it for 18 months but just the the thought get rid of the piston engine and substitute a turbine you might say that came out of the blue whether I was

Having a bath or what whatever at the time I couldn’t tell you Whitt’s plan proposed just one moving part this would be a shaft with a compressor driven by a turbine at the other end it would work like this the compressor spins round sucking air into combustion Chambers at many times atmospheric

Pressure here this air is mixed with vaporized Fuel and ignited the hot gas created expands through the turbine turning the shaft and escapes into the atmosphere it is this continuous Force which propels a jet airplane along the turbojet concept brought with it so many natural advantages a very big factor in favor of

A a jet engine was that when you went up high uh the air temperature was very low very cold and that benefited the compressor a lot it meant that you could get a uh much better conditions for the compressor and the other thing is that in a normal Tobin velocity coming out of

It is wasted in the case of the jet engine that was completely used after the idea had come to me I thought my goodness why didn’t I think of this before and it seems so obvious then this was Whitt’s moment of Genius he had seen the future of powered flight

And he was a pilot officer aged just 22 I was at the central flying school at wittering uh doing the flying instructors course one of the instructors there was WP Johnson who became a very good friend and colleague in later years and he’d been trained as a patent agent and he

Became very interested in my proposal he thought it would work and he helped me to draft a patent have you ever patented anything no I don’t know thing about it does a patent both publish and protect that is the whole point of patents but one thing’s essential file a patent

Application before touting the thing round otherwise you haven’t a hope I’ll tell you what let’s rough out a specification now oh what fine what do we do well you make a rather better sketch and I’ll get on with a clever bit the writing okay armed with his patent

Whittle offered his idea to Industry no one thought it could ever work according to the theories of the time there was this fundamental difficulty with gas turbines inefficient compressors inefficient turbines and the other big snag was the materials then existing in 1929 wouldn’t stand temperatures of more than S about 500°

Centigrade but I knew or felt pretty confident that they would evolve in an normal course of development and of course it did the positive young officer also went to London to put his revolutionary concept of the air Ministry Whittle fared no better when he met AA Griffith one of the ministry’s top

Scientists I went to see uh Dr Griffith and another scientist at South Kensington explain the idea it was very cooly received Griffith uh pointed out an error in my calculations and it was all rather depressing you know and then after that I got a letter from the air Ministry

Saying in effect that uh they weren’t really interested and so forth it didn’t help that um I hadn’t then received an engineering degree soon after this rejection whittles seem to have more bad news after I completed the flying instructors course I very nearly got posted to

Number four FTS Abu SAR in Egypt that would have been a real nail in the coffin of the jet engine if that had happen fortunately the posting was changed Whitt remained in Britain and served a year as a flying instructor these were happy times for him in May

1930 he married Dorothy Lee during this period he also got the chance to develop his exceptional flying skills he was now one of the rf’s best pilots and was chosen to fly in the henden air pageants where he thrilled Spectators with his skills at crazy flying these were the Red Arrows of the

Day and Whittle loved entertaining the public this way at this time in Germany a young scientist was eagerly looking forward to his first trip in an airplane his name was Hans V Ohio I always dreamed about the beauty of flying my first flight with a commercial airplane I believe it was a three

Engine yonas was a great disappointment it was so noisy and so vibratory that I felt the piston engine and propeller is not the good propeller ion system the Elegance of flying is destroyed by it the sight of smoke rushing from chimneys inspired F A to think if that Force

Could be created by a turbine maybe he could make a smoother Aero engine highp speeded was not the primary goal to me the smoothness and low noise was more the starting point of my thinking but as I thought about it uh I noticed that as

A matter of fact it will be capable of driving the airplane faster Britain’s air Ministry had declined to keep whittle’s patents a secret freely available they quickly made their way to Germany just as the Nazis came to power these patents were widely read in German Aviation circles

At the same time that Hitler was rapidly building a new Luft buffer Whitt’s idea aroused no such interestes in great Britain and his own jet engine remained still born yet the Royal Air Force was certainly Keen to nurture its inventor after 4 years every General duties

Officer had to specialize he was given a choice between engineering radio navigation physical training and so on uh but I didn’t get a choice because having been pestering the airry with inventions they just said to me you will be an engineer though they’d stopped sending officers to Cambridge they decided that I should

Go so I went to Cambridge in uh September 34 to take mechanical science as tripods once at University Whitt applied every piece of learning to his idea for jet propulsion I had got the feeling rather that I might might be ahead of my time um with the extra knowledge I gained at

Cambridge I did become rather more aware of the difficulties then this letter arrived in the post which says my dear Whittle this is just a hurried note to tell you that I have just met a man who is a bit of a big noise in an engineering concern and

To whom I mentioned your invention of an airplane s’s propeller as it were and who is very interested he’s jotted a note at the top of the original letter he says this letter changed the course of my life and triggered a revolution in aviation and it did because this letter

Rescued the turbo jet idea in this country from Oblivion the writer was Ralph Dudley Williams an old friend from Cranwell he visited Whitt at Cambridge with another former officer named Collingwood tinling and they approached me with the idea of forming a company and getting on with it and they

Succeeded a merchant bank was the catalyst our Falcon Partners were approached by an intermediary an engineer named Bramson uh Williams attending got in touch with him and he got in touch with Falcon partners and Falcon Partners commissioned him to write a report on the whole project which he did and it

Was wholly favorable Bron’s report you might say was another of the big key points in the whole story he’d been very much involved with Aviation he was a pretty skillful aeronautical engineer and his report inspired Falcon Partners to go on with the job and in March 1936 they formed the company called

Power Jets limited Whittle told his backers the project had a 1 in3 chance of success the air Ministry quickly added another obstacle one for said that I was not to work more than 6 hours a week on the job but of course uh that didn’t operate as a an

Effective control on me I worked all the practically fulltime at Cambridge Whittle also had to fit in the task for which he’d gone to University in the first place and I very much wanted first class honors so I had to work like help because I was designing the Jet Engine

And preparing for my finals at the same time and that was u a very difficult thing to do I succeeded in getting my first happily and then was able to turn back to the jet Engine Whitt approached a manufacturer in rugby to build the world’s first jet engine British Thompson Houston made steam turbines Whittle drove over from Cambridge rehearsing what he’d say to persuade the huge company to accept a contract he succeeded when all he could offer them was £2,000 well below what his project

Really needed the proper scientific way to go about the job would be to build a compressor and test it build a turbine and test it build combustion Chambers and test it and then put them all together the results were me satisfactory but the cost for that would have been about

£30,000 and there was no hope of getting that amount of money so the only way the only thing to do was go ahead with the complete engine what we were doing was trying to prove the engine right from the word go in a cavernous rugby Workshop Whittle set to work on this huge

Challenge the bth built the engine and I stood over it more or less while it was going on I felt that we were going to be all right as far as the simple centrifugal compressor was concerned I thought that I the turbine was going to

Be all right but I was uneasy about the combustion problem because we were aiming at 24 times the kind of in combustion intensity that was um obtainable in those days but the engine became ready for running proper on April the 12th of 1937 a lot of people said it wouldn’t even turn itself

Over what did happen proved the very opposite that I gave a signal with my hands to raise the speed with the electric motor to 2,000 RPM and that was done and then I open the main control and it it started to R [Applause] right it accelerated AR of control and

So did everyone standing around it they all went down the factory like the wind I didn’t because I was petrified with fright I just couldn’t Move it seemed like perpetual motion but of course it wasn’t the fact was that a pool of fuel had accumulated in the combustion chamber which we didn’t know about and that was keeping it running after I switched off the control well that sort of thing happened day after day we had

About four of that kind of runaway just after the engine first ran and we’ submitted a report to the air Ministry this was the subject of another report by Griffith the man who turned the job down in the early days and his report damned it with faint

Praise uh he brought in all the difficulties said that no propeller meant that we wouldn’t have the slip stream to help us take take off and so forth Whittle didn’t know that in Germany some people were by now far more willing to bet on his idea one of them

Was Ernest hinol a legend in his country’s resurgent aviation industry Fon oine had been introduced to him he was alone in his Villa in V he explained to me that he wanted to finance the whole thing by himself if it works when he said I have the best ELD Nores I have

That the best and best designers and uh I want you to tomorrow to speak with them and explain your ideas I led the Baltic Sea Coast very much I sure would think that would be a nice place to work and uh so I choose hle additionally

I felt I was a afraid to go to in engine companies I thought they were too much ingrained in their reip engines and my model didn’t work sufficiently good H’s company was attractive for another reason the whole development was very inexpensive but when we would have asked for more money

We would have gotten it so money was not a problem by contrast the power Jet’s Kitty was empty as the Nazi threat grew Whitt had a war winner yet Britain was set to abandon it there were several things which hampered progress in 1937 38 the worst was the tight financial

Situation our financial backers began to get cold feet they had uh quite unrealistically expected that within a matter of a month or two we would have an engine capable of flying in the stratosphere of course we had breakdown after breakdown and then began to lose heart and they did not

Produce the the money that they promised the air Ministry were very hesitant to help because we were in financial difficulty after we’d first run the engine and shown that it at least was self driving they did agree to um a very limited contract the ministry’s grudging help only created new

Problems as soon as they gave us a contract we came under the official Secrets act that meant that we couldn’t tell people what we wanted their money for you can’t go to someone and say look we got a damn good idea would you let us have some money uh we can’t tell you

What it is uh but it’s very good no it uh we couldn’t do it by 1939 Britain had spent just $7,000 on Whitt’s jet his very position on the project was perilous at the end of June he was actually due to leave Power Jets on his last day there Whittle had to

Impress an important visitor with his engine on June the 30th of 1939 we managed to get a big breakthrough in the attitude of the ad Ministry in that uh uh Pi director of scientific research uh came up to see the engine run and when managed to keep it going for about 20

Minutes in his presence and he became a complete convert so much so that he agreed that an engine for flight should be ordered and that an airplane to use it should be ordered too when I drove him back to the station to catch his train back to

London I had the Curious experience of him explain to me all the advantages of the engine that it could run on any fuel that it was vibrationless etc etc and I just sat quietly I was only a squadron leader at this time I thought yeah you’re telling me Oh

Boy this of course was the big turning point in the whole job the turbojet was saved for Great Britain but Germany unaware of Whitt’s breakthrough already had a Jet Plane I was uh very certain that it would work but of course you always feel there’s a

Danger and um we had made not too many pretests we run uh the engine before it flew uh perhaps several hours at the very most the support of a huge Aircraft company had enabled Hans Fon oine to overtake Whitt H’s h178 was ready just days before war broke out test pilot

Eric vaset was eager to take off he started and then he disappeared and after a while he came back and we thought oh he’s Landing he didn’t he met another round and we said oh my God he must like it uh but we didn’t have the airplane very filled up with

Gasoline he landed and stopped the airplane just where hle stood and he said everything functioned beautiful and and and the engine worked well and he was he was really himself very ined we had a nice f esal a jubilant hle rang General Ernst udet at the German air

Ministry I learned later on he called udet and he said hey congratulation but let me sleep that’s an ungodly time by now Frank Whittle had been forced to move Power Jets from rugby to a scruffy Foundry at nearby lutterworth ladywood Works was the name of the site today there’s nothing to

Show that history was once made here but in these buildings Britain slowly expanded its jet program in 1939 we only had just a handful of of about half a dozen and then the beginning of 1940 we began to build up a team and I was very careful

In picking um real quality know first class honors Cambridge first class honors Oxford Imperial College of science we were advertising of course we couldn’t say what we were advertising for and when we were interviewing them we couldn’t tell them what we wanted them for though I think some can guess

From the questions we asked whittle’s charm and enthusiasm at once inspired his new team to strive for the impossible the noise and lack of space at ladywood forced Whittle himself to work at brownsover Hall A Country House nearby here he worked through the night desperately aware that his work could

Shorten the war and drove himself to nervous exhaustion my memory of him really was just somebody always working and when he was at home if he took any time off say Sunday he would sit in his chair by the fire at Broomfield and we’d be there with his slide rule which of

Course people used in those days to do their calculations and um Bits of Paper all over the place working and a little bit of time for myself and my brother but not much not much as Britain entered its most critical fa of the war the expanding

Team at ladywood was galvanized by a new order to prepare engines for a prototype jet fighter codenamed f940 we know it as the gluster meteor as a potential War winner getting it in the sky to fight the lft vafa now became the focus of their work at Power Jets they did not

Know that Germany was by now developing its own twinjet combat planes at messes Schmid and hanle the country’s prototype jet the H17 8 had not been a success but its last flight was exploited to the full by its maker hle invited the air Ministry to come and the highest who

Came was udad and somehow hle used that possibility to offer a new design of a two engine fighter aircraft and actually he got the contract about two months later the plane was the h280 the Nazis wanted it in 14 months hle pass this demanding deadline to Fon oine to build its jet engines

Ohle wanted things very fast he was very uh um optimistic very positive but a little bit unreal and unrealistic in his time schedules in Britain the air Ministry still wouldn’t fund Frank quitt properly forcing Power Jets to work in impossible conditions in addition to our continuing financial problems had many others like

Having to use the same Parts over and over again when they ought to have been scrapped and of course that was linked to the finance because we couldn’t afford new parts we had to make do and Furbish up damage Parts some people continued to claim Whitt’s jet wouldn’t even fly by May

1941 his engine was ready to go in Britain’s first Jet Plane the experimental Gloucester E28 39 for its Maiden flight the top secret aircraft was taken to Cranwell where the jet story had begun the Power Jets team followed full of Hope on the same day a young Naval pilot Eric Brown was forced

To land at Cranwell today he’s one of the few surviving w Witnesses of this historic occasion when when I landed I was a bit astonished to find so many civilians present and uh when I went to check in the mess and asked what was going on there seemed to be almost an

Air of conspiracy about the whole place and um nobody would give a straight answer to this we’ve been out the day before for Te some texting trial then on the May the 15th the weather looked as though it wasn’t going to uh work out so

I went back to uh lorth that morning I went the control tower to check if the weather was good enough for my own flight to Cen but it obviously wasn’t and they said would I mind doing a weather check for them anyway I landed and um they said would I be prepared to

Do a further weather test in the afternoon and then we got a message to say the weather was clearing so I rushed back to cranell again and in the evening Jer did the flight an airplane was rolled out with a shape I had well not so much to shape but the construction of

Which I’d never seen before because it had no propeller and an extraordinary whining noise came from it and it taxed out to the end of the runway and after a while eventually took off and I was quite astonished to know what it was because I’d never heard at

This stage in my career of a jet aircraft the various government Ministries refused to film this remarkable event luckily an unknown photographer grabbed it in secret Jerry was sitting at the end of the runway and party offers are sitting just to the right and he held it on the

Brakes and ran out the engine to full speed released his brakes and then he he hopped off in about 600 yards quite pressure take off and he held it down level and then glim one of my colleagues Pat Johnson W Johnson SLA me on the back he said Frank

It flies and in the tension of the moment I rather rudely said that was Bloody well what it was designed to do isn’t it and it landed successfully and immediately it landed it was absolutely inundated with people rushing out and congratulating the pilot so I realized something quite extraordinary taking

Place people in the area hadn’t heard that particular kind of noise before and you couldn’t hide it however secret it was supposed to be uh one officer was said to have asked another one how does that thing work John and John replied oh it’s easy old

Boy it just sucks itself along like a Hoover another story was that someone who claimed to have been an eyewitness said there was a Merlin engine inside the hollow fuselage with a little propeller and he he’d seen it he was a reliable witness he claimed well everybody gravitated towards the officer’s

Mess and so I followed on and there was quite a lot of hilarity going on in a corner of the room I asked what it was all about but still nobody would reveal what was involved but um it was quite obvious it was something quite momentous the flight Vindicated Whittle Britain’s

New jet plane was better than anybody had realized one event particularly brought the point home the ministry gave us permission to open up to 17,000 just for one flight and at that um engine speed it did 375 or 38 anyway it was faster than the Spitfire the news reached London and Winston

Churchill he ordered a thousand whittles alas the E28 could not be a war plane hence the disappointment felt behind the scenes up at Cranwell I would have preferred it to have been the meteor which is then on the stalks because that was a combat airplane whereas the E28 was just an

Experimental airplane whittles jet served notice on all piston engines a notice that fast reached their manufacturers they demanded their share of a product none had invented and which they’d rejected for years because of the war Whitt would have to share his secrets with them all this of course is

Um putting Power Jets into a weaker and weaker position from the commercial point of view and that we had to uh swallow because it was a wartime situation and I and several other of my team were serving officers and uh we had to put U National considerations before commercial considerations that was very

Dominant in my mind Whittle played a selfless patriotic role in which he offered his knowledge freely to the British Aviation companies however they were working flat out to build engines for planes like the hurricane and the Spitfire so in 1941 Great Britain turned to the United States then at peace for backup in

Manufacturing its jet engine the Americans had only been told about Whitt’s power plant earlier that year ironically their top scientists had dismissed the concept in 1940 They concluded the gas turbine engine could hardly be considered a feasible application to airplanes the British government expected to keep the rights in

Whittler’s invention and did not intend to give it away to a future competitor but that’s inevitably what happened we shipped over the engine in Parts in the bomb Liberator also with the team who were horribly frightened unless the pilot pull the wrong lever and they’d all drop into the

Atlantic the company selected to build the engine was General Electric for America the jet story began the night of October 4th 1941 with the arrival of a highly secret engine assembly at a Boston airport it was Britain’s now famous Whitt Turbo Jet the first jet engine successfully produced and flown by the Allies

Gentlemen I give you the Whittle engine consult all you wish and arrive at any decision you please just as long as you accept a contract to build 15 of them General Electric had that engine their engine version of the w2b called the typy on test in April of 42 so just

Rather less than 6 months which is astonishing and even better than that 6 months later the bill Aircraft company had their twin engine jet flying it was agreed that I would go over and help them out and so I went over at the end of May I went to Lynn under an

Assume name they insisted I use an assume name I call myself whitly there were times when I forgot it like uh in the hotel I would sign waking up sign for my early morning coffee and forget that I was supposed to be using an assumed name and of course sign the real

One I’m told that uh that didn’t matter really because the waiter was an FBI man in the great Republic Whittle was treated royally and he in turn was astounded by what he found there it was most satisfying to see the work GE were doing because well they got

On with the job so fast it was remarkable and their enthusiasm was most inspiring and I thought at the time if only I had had that kind of cooperation a few years earlier what a difference it would have made in America doctors found that Whittle was by now B battling with

Severe ill health back in Britain the problems that caused it had only got worse the engine that was destined to be the power plant of the meteor was a more powerful version of the experimental engine really there were no major difference it it looked quite similar from the

Outside the Royal Air Force eagerly awaited the meteor but Power Jets was not allowed to produce the engines for it that job had been contracted to a car maker Rover LS were getting on with the job fairly well but Rovers were making an absolute nonsense of the engine they

Kept they just hadn’t got the people who could do the job and they thought they they thought they knew what to do the uh situation became so bad that it looked as though there would be a complete hash of everything the Rover were Rover were making such a poor job of the engine

That uh the order for the production of the me was cut right back Rover tried to redesign its engines and held up the meteor by two years but there was also Dirty Work We intended that the Rover company should be subcontractors and only subcontractors but unfortunately they went behind our back to the

Ministry and and trying to get direct contracts and eventually they succeeded in doing that and instead of being subcontractors to us they in effect became competitors who had the advantage of having all our information handed to them on the orders of the ministry in December

1942 a solution was at last found to the problems with Rover Rolls-Royce took over the job of building Whitt’s engines but the mighty company would only weaken Power Jets further Ernest he was the chief executive of Rolls-Royce he was responsible for the Rolls-Royce part in taking over the jet development course

He he had had come to realize that this was the future of the Aero engine and since Rolls-Royce then were one of the most prominent AO engine firms in the world he wasn’t going to be left out I would call him an honest Rogue because when he was going to do

The dirt he told you he was in advance and one of the things he said to me on one occasion was he said we’re going to be the center of this job and nothing you you can do will stop us by 1943 uh the rollsroyce having made

Such a big difference to the prospects of the engine the ministry agreed to reinstate the production of the meta with Whitt’s engines the plane finally made its first flight that year yet it should have been ready 2 years earlier and had the M Ministry pursued whittle’s

Idea back in 1929 a similar plane would have been available by the start of the war to repel the Lu buffer lives would have been saved the war even shortened at least the work of Frank Whittle could now have a bearing on how that war was fought I thought that he was doing

Something quite important because every time I asked my mother what he was doing she used to say oh well Daddy’s doing something very hush hush I didn’t become aware that he was anybody out of the ordinary until 1944 in January when they um made the whole thing public and then the house became

Surrounded by reporters we we had been working in complete secrecy until uh early January 1944 at which time for reasons I don’t really know um the British and American governments decided to uh make an announcement about it and it was like the world blew up around me the shock was very

Considerable Whittle and his engine dominated the front pages says here in the Daily Herald I knew Frank had a secret says his wife so the cat is out of the bag how strange it seems to be able to talk about it it may mean that I shall be known throughout

The world in any case my youngest son Ian is a far brighter boy than I was at his age I think he will be a success the success of the family have you seen that before no I’ve never seen that before oh dear how wrong as industry reaped the rewards of

Whittle’s Genius new jet fighters joined the meteor first off the drawing board was to hein’s brilliant vampire the pilots loved their new equipment although the planes remained highly secret as Eric Brown discovered when he came to fly them when I was allotted to the Jet flight at farra of

Course it was a top secret flight and it was in a hanger at the far side of the Airfield well away from the main Act activity and there were um RAF regiment guards there with guard dogs so was very highly guarded at the time once inside the plane was a revelation to

Brown we’re getting into the cockpit of a jetland for the first time you are struck by the wonderful view um because in a tricycle underage no propeller or large engine ahead of you it is quite remarkable and once you start up the engine although to listen to a jet if

You’re outside the cockpit it sounds thunderous when you’re in the cockpit it is incredibly quiet Frank Whitt often visited farra to check how his invention was performing it was quite obvious he was itching to get his hands on it and fly it but we were always alerted that he

Was coming and a little M would be passed around saying would you make sure that the E28 39 was not serviceable for flight on that particular day and um because this would save off Frank it was obvious they didn’t want this wonderful airplane and this wonderful man to be

United in case it was a an accident so he tged this pretty soon and I think he played along with it in July 1944 the Gloster metor became the first jet fighter to enter operational service when the Air Force allocated its initial supply of planes to 616 squadron at manston in

Kent by now the LT vaa could no longer Mount Air Raids over Britain but these meteors were quickly put to work intercepting a lethal new Menace the V1 guided missile Germany’s flying bomb terrified the londoners who were its Target in the sky eyes over Kent the meteor Pilots sought to prevent v1’s

Reaching the capital some used their wing tips to flip the missile over so it crashed around this time Allied Pilots were startled to find themselves being attacked by a German plane with no propeller this was the Messa Schmid 262 Germany’s own jet program had by now Advanced to this sophisticated

Design it had been chosen instead of the h280 the Nazis never liked hle and had cancelled his promising jet fighter yet it could have been mass-produced by 1944 by contrast the 262 arrived late and was rushed into battle too soon in Britain meanwhile Frank Whittle seemed

At his Peak he was a national hero while his company now had a custombuilt factory from which to expand he had a Clear Vision for its future I always wanted to include Manufacturing in our duties in 194 4 Power Jets had reached a point where they were able to produce say batches of

40 or 50 engines and we had a first class nutrius uh for proper manufacturing organization Power Jets also had some outstanding work in progress Whitt was already planning the second generation of jet engines there was the lr1 turbo fan which would have been the first turbo fan in the world there was

The um engine for the miles m52 the supersonic airplane those are our two big projects which we had in hand lr1 stood for long range one Whitt saw the scope for jets that would fly planes further as well as faster than Pistons but he would need a more efficient

Engine from the earliest days of the turbo jet engine I was bothered by the fact that it has a basically low propulsive efficiency about 50% as compared with say propeller at moderate speeds of 80% and so the answer to me was that we must gear down the jet in

Some way and that led to the concept of the turbo fan for which I took out a patent in 1936 the turbo fan is a turbo jet to which a fan has been added this fan causes air both to flow through the core of the engine and to

Bypass it this additional jet of cold air increases thrust and improves fuel economy the design had huge potential with a turbofan you can expect propulsive efficiencies of 75% or even better if you have a very large bass pressure as piston engine bombers approach their design limits with planes

Like the Lancaster Whittle saw a timely use for his new bypass jet as the war progressed in 1943 for example uh I came to the conclusion that it could be the answer to a longrange bomber for the Pacific War we also visualized it as an engine for a transatlantic

Airplane Whittle was already predicting longrange jet airliners and the kind of engines they would need but it was the other Power Jets project that would grab people’s attention the engine for the supersonic plane the m52 was uh an half fan with after burning all tacked onto the back end of

A w2700 jet engine and that should have given sufficient power for the miles m52 to do 1,000 M hour I think it would have done it despite its huge potential whiteall never felt comfortable with Power Jets it was a private company but its driving force was a serving officer

And it was publicly funded the fault lines were clear I realized that there was a complete mess uh from the contractual point of view the there was no there were no effective agreements and no one except pets and risked any money except the government of course

And I felt that um the government having put in 2 million that all the C should be nationalized forming a collective double jet establishment and of course I hope the Power Jets would be the at the top of the pyramid with myself as chief engineer whittle’s proposal was

Considered in the high levels of government s Stafford Crips the minister of aircraft production at that time used what I’d said to get the ministry out of the mess that they created by nationalizing P Jets only which relieved them of all their undertakings it was expected that power

Jets would still continue with its Advanced engine projects but then other firms began to uh uh create difficulties they said they won’t going to have the government competing with private Enterprise so considerable pressure was brought to bear on the the ministry and the minister caved in to

The large AO engine companies so we the people who had pioneered the whole thing were deprived of the right to design and build engines sorry that was too much for myself and my leading team members and most of us uh resigned the supersonic plane and the turbofan

Project had by then been cancelled the civil servants found a reason to justify this loss believe it or not the minister said that people wouldn’t want to fly at speeds more than about 250 Mi an hour as Whittle left Power Jets he was acutely aware of the commercial

Opportunity that was now at stake the position in 1945 and 1950 was that Britain was really ahead of the world and all forms of gas seran development but stupidly we allowed the lead to slip away in 1945 the Allies discovered the Germans impressive range of jet planes and their designers after the

Capitulation of Germany I was at that time in farra the CEO of the captured enemy aircraft flight so I was sent to Germany and to look at their advanced craft and also at the same time to interrogate their designers and test pilots amongst them was Fon oin and naturally I wanted to

Know what his connection with the Whittle patent had or patent had been in Germany but he was not going to answer this question he was very non-committal and Sid stepped as much as he could Brown flew the various German jet planes including the Messa Schmid 262 the Allies already knew that its

Engine the yumo 004 was a sophisticated axial Flow Design now they could compare its performance with that of the less complex British Jets so a more efficient engine in many ways it was highly unreliable the yo 004 in operational service had a scrap life of only 25

Hours and the engine when I flew this engine I found it extremely sensitive and difficult to handle because it did not like Quick Throttle movements either accelerating or decelerating any Quick Throttle movement either way could possibly cause a flame out of the engine whittle’s Jets were more reliable but he

Could take them no further the course of events brought anguish I think my mother was most distressed by what was happening to to Father she was most distressed I’m I could remember her crying about it at times because she would tell me oh Daddy’s so unwell because of what’s happening and it is

Such a shame and how can they treat him like this yes it’s very sad for her he managed to Soldier on in the RAF and he was an air Commodore in 1946 but in the end by 1948 he’d been declared as unfit for flying and somehow that

Triggered that was the last straw and he he and the RAF both agreed that he should retire and he did it’s been very sad for him oh very sad yes the Air Force was over everything to him the public knew none of this and saw a war

Herer receiving his just rewards in 1948 Whittle went to Buckingham Palace to collect a Knighthood he also had a financial award for his invention which was good for the time worth nearly £3 million today it would soon become clear he was greatly under rewarded he sought

A role but his statue made him hard to place in an industry he himself had founded no engine maker hired his services in many ways I paid quite heavily for um uh the the work I did the was the awful Race Against Time that dominated life on top of all the technical

Difficulties there were the financial difficulties there was the skull duggery of uh uh people who were uh messing things up and uh oh it was frustration after frustration and it took its toll I began to have a series of nervous breakdowns and for years it was years before I really recovered my health Britain stole a march on the rest of the world when it launched the first jet airliner the beautiful new plane with its four engines was a fruition of all Frank Whitt’s early Visions first after he left the RAF he turned his mind to the introduction of the Comet and he

Joined boa as a consultant to help them introduce the comet into service he was very worried at the time that the thing was being rushed into service I’ve got his 1949 diary where he discusses uh the strength of the Square Windows and he was worried about that at

The time and um was making a suggestion to deavin and how they could get over the problem whittle’s advice was ignored the comet crashes which followed were cus cused in part by its Square windows with time on his hands Whittle traveled and tried to recover his health he also turned to writing his

Memoirs the jet age took off without Frank Whittle but the Royal Air Force was soon re-equipped with the benefits of his invention by 1950 the gluster meteor provided the backbone of Britain’s air defense capability it was a fitting outcome to all the secret toil of the Power Jets

Team in the dark days of the [Applause] war the nation did at last build its own supersonic fighter in the shape of the English electric lightning while jet engines also powered an awesome British Fleet of nuclear bombers but the country could never really afford such planes they would

Later play an important role in the Forkland campaign but were destined to become Museum pieces British civil jet planes fed little better after the comet crashes it was Boeing 707 which brought longrange jet travel to the masses by 1960 Airlines were mostly buying their planes from America that year the bypass engine

Entered service turbo fans soon followed with their far better fuel economy they were just what the airlines needed to realize low lost Global Travel for Frank Whitt it was the ultimate Vindication of his wartime vision and revealed the sheer Folly of cancelling his Pioneer turbo fan yet he

Never worked on jet engines again and memories began to fade of how the story had begun I think in this country they were beginning to forget all about Frank Whitt by the 60s and ’70s it was all so different in the United States they were so much more gung-ho they were very good

At slapping him on the back and telling him what a good cap he was in 1976 Whitt went to live in America I think he felt more recognized over in the states than he did over here after the war Hans Von oine had himself moved to America to work on jet propulsion for

The US Air Force fascinated by each other’s work Whitt and Fon oine became good friends back across the Atlantic Britain eventually rediscovered its genius of the jet by 1986 even um the queen took a hand and ordered him the order of Merit um and other honors came along

Following that so I would say from about the early 80s onwards people began to remember who it was who was the Prime Pioneer of the turbo jet and also a man with a profound Legacy today we make almost 1 and a half billion air passenger Journeys a year

Cheaply and safely thanks to Frank Whitt he shrank the world but his gift to Britain is less appreciated its famous plane makers have departed but today Rolls-Royce is a world leader in building jet engines I’m often asked how I feel about it and it’s a question I find very difficult to

Answer things could have been a lot better we could have had a much bigger influence in the war than uh happened but when I see what’s happened in in the way of civil aviation and uh military Aviation too but particularly civil aviation I can only say it’s extremely satisfying

Especially when you see something like the Concord and one of the things you see I never foresaw when I was working on this thing is that I would be a passenger crossing the Atlantic in 3 and 1 half hours and incidentally another thing I didn’t foresee is that I would

Have a son who would be flying 747s as a captain in Cathy Pacific kitac Aerodrome at at Hong Kong was had a very interesting approach a curved right hand turn right down to almost a touchdown and uh when father came with me in the

Back of the in the cockpit in a Boeing 7 47 um he he was very startled when he saw that his son was flying an airplane at 1,000 feet straight towards the Foothills and then making a a steep final turn which of course was quite

Normal at kitech it was the way you had to do it I had I hadn’t briefed him unfortunately so he was was very white knuckled by the time we landed he was continuing to theorize in aerodynamic improvements and aeroengine improvements until the end of his life he always took an active

Interest in Concord and uh looking into a second generation SST supersonic transport and making recommendations and speaking publicly and privately uh amongst uh the industry to try and encourage the uh airframe manufacturers to take the risk and embark on another generation of SuperSonic transports Concord is a marvelous

Airplane I’ve plan it many times but I’m looking forward to the next generation of SuperSonic transports which I think should be capable of uh carrying 300 passengers for distances of the order of 4,000 500 Miles like San Francisco Tokyo at speeds of about a mark number

Of about 2.3 that’s we getting up to 2,000 M hour as compared with the Concords 1350 but beyond that um I think we’re going to see even much higher speeds than that in due course unfortunately they’re going to be very expensive propositions sir Frank Whitt died in August 1996

Assured of his position as the greatest AO engineer of the 20th century the Royal Air Force paid fitting tribute to its distinguished son for the memorial service at Westminster ABY He and I had wanted the opportunity to fly together preferably in an open cockpit bipe so that together we could Loop and spin and climb and dive this modest ambition was never realized for one reason or another the nearest we got was when I flew him to Hong Kong in a Boeing

747 on the last morning of his life I lent over his bed and said Dad let’s put on our kit and go flying he opened his eyes and looked at me and smiled that evening with hazel holding his hand he died and I wondered I wondered if he went flying and if he

Did if he went on his own or did he have a companion [Applause] He was cremated in the USA and the a atache there um brought his ashes over to this country and I went to Heath R to meet the airplane and I came home and put the ashes on the bookshelf in my study with the ashes of

My m father who died 3 weeks earlier I uh decided to put them in at the church at Cranwell and they organized a a meor and a vampire so we flew the ashes up to Cranwell and they were in interred there with a little [Applause] [Applause] ceremony October 4th [Applause] 1941 [Applause] [Applause] Incredible as it may seem these crates marked the start of the development of the first jet engine in America they contained an experimental engine which was flown to the United States from Great Britain under great secrecy in the fall of 1941 this flight was the direct result

Of a conference in the Washington office of General Arnold a few weeks earlier here was the actual beginning of the jet story in America gentlemen I give you the Whittle engine consult all your wish arrive at any decision you please just as long as General Electric accepts a contract to

Build 15 of them these were the plans of the first turbojet engine that had been successfully produced by any of the allies they were the results of a long hard struggle by England’s group Captain Frank Whittle he had worked toward jet propulsion in the face of many difficulties and he had succeeded the

Air Corp felt that jet propulsion had tremendous possibilities and the British Air Ministry made all their information available to the United States the men of General new from there with the national advisory committee for Aeronautics that the essentials of a turbo jet were a compressor and a I cannot overemphasize the secrecy and

The importance of this work we know that both the Italians and the Germans are working on Jets I hardly need tell you that they must not win the race General given unlimited priority we will have the first unit running on test in 6 months six unbelievably short

Months in all to plan design and build the first American jet engine for a revolutionary new principle of flight yet these men were able to make this promise to their government in time of War because actually this problem was not new to them it really began on the campus of

Cornell University in 193 where a young mechanical engineer named Sanford Moss was working for his Pad he was engaged in research for his thesis on gas turbans he and his work had been assigned to this little building because there seemed to be a certain amount of noise connected with [Applause]

It not to mention smoke and odd smells when he had completed his work at Cornell and received his degree Moss went to General Electric where he joined other experts and continued his work later they set up a research Department to study turbin of all kinds as well as compressors pumps boilers and related

Equipment by 1918 moss and his fellow workers had accumulated a tremendous amount of knowledge in relation to turbines and compressors and as a result he was called to Washington there the national advisory committee for Aeronautics initiated work with Dr Moss on a practical turbo supercharger which the aircore hoped

Would increase the altitude performance of its World War I Fighters a gasoline engine runs on a mixture of air and fuel which burns in a cylinder at higher altitudes the atmosphere becomes progressively thinner so that the engine cannot get enough air to burn as much gasoline as it should for maximum

Power the turbo supercharger simply adds a compressor to the engine Which packs or charges the thin air into the cylinders this allows the engine to burn more fuel and deliver full power the compressor is run by a turban which is turned by the exhaust gases of the engine Moss’s work on the turbo

Continued and his improvements had a tremendous influence on Aviation in 1920 the army established a world altitude record of 36,000 ft proving the turbo and air so rarified that the pilot became unconscious and fell almost 6 miles before pulling out General Billy Mitchell’s famous test which demonstrated For the First Time

The tremendous importance of air power was actually made possible by Moss’s turbos Mitchell’s plane had to come in at 15,000 ft in order to avoid theoretical anti-aircraft fire to give a plane enough power to carry a 2,000lb bomb at that altitude Mitchell had General Electric turbos installed on new

Twin engine Martin bombers and the results made aviation history With the beginning of World War II The Air Force’s interest in turos was greatly intensified they quickly became standard equipment on such outstanding aircraft as Republic’s Thunderbolt L’s lightning Consolidated Liberator and all reliable the bo Flying Fortress the High Altitude daylight strategic bombing operations which destroyed the strength of our enemy in

Europe would not have been possible without Turbos they have contributed immeasurably to the science of flight and continue to do so they are used on some of today’s finest piston engine planes the most formidable weapon the world has ever seen was carried by a turbo supercharged plane So in 1941 with a new but related problem it was only natural for the air core to again turn to the same organization and ask them to build the first American Turbo Jet and build it they did at a series of secret meetings one month before the arrival of the

Whitt engine the project had been started with a small nucleus of Key Personnel these men picked those they wanted to work with however in most cases they did not let them know what they were to work on there were over a thousand men on the project but less

Than 100 actually knew what they were making planning and assembly of the engine itself were segregated in an entirely separate building and heavily guarded 24 hours a day many of the parts were made in the regular supercharger department but as a further protection the project was

Called a new type of Turbo and simply given another production number Tai Five all the vast resources of the company were thrown behind the project the knowledge gained in years of production and design of giant turbines of every kind the research laboratory for Special Metals the experience gained in the manufacturing operation of thousands of Turbo superchargers and the vast store of knowledge of the Consulting

Laboratories during the actual design and manufact under DF Warner these great resources led to the modification and Improvement of the Whitt engine for example the English had trouble with turban bucket forgings because of the high temperatures involved but it was an old story to these men and their long experience with

Turbos hastened the solution to this problem also the English impellers had been giving trouble because of cracking but skilled Craftsmen were already making hundreds of thousands of successful impellers for all types of supercharges American techniques of rotor balancing were very Advanced and contributed greatly to smoothness of

Operation yet in spite of the diversity and size of the operation there was not a single failure in Security today we realize even more fully than the Pioneers the almost incalculable importance of that first American jet engine the Forerunner of the engines that power the military planes of today yet those early workers

Seemed to sense the true value of their work and it brought them together there was a wonderful spirit of common purpose of cooperation between the people who did the work Britain our air force and the men of General Electric in this atmosphere the engine grew at an unbelievable rate until at last the

First engine right on schedule rolled under heavy guard into the test cell now they would see the results of 6 months of Round the Clock effort but they would see much more than that they would see the birth of the jet engine in America they would see the first really

Radical change in air power since the wri brothers flight so many years ago they would see the first faint beginning of a whole new era in the age of flight that is they would see it if the engine Ran now all they needed was to see it Fly meanwhile under the same rigid secrecy the Bell aircraft Corporation had been designing laying out and building the AAC Comet to be powered by the new engine They too had performed miracles of production in a start Ling New

Field I can’t get used to working on a plane without a propeller neither can I I hope it flies there were a lot of other people who hoped it would fly too from Top brass to Joe average man walking along Main Street USA of course he wouldn’t hear about this particular

Plane for 2 or 3 years maybe never but he’s a guy who carries deep within him a hope and conviction that any plane America bills will fly these are the original films of the first jet plane ever to fly in [Applause] America with that first flight on October 1st

1942 less than a year from the start of the project Jeff Propel flight in America became a reality they had gotten off to a flying start but in a race it’s the stamina that counts so everybody kept right on working the original engine the IIA delivered 1,400 lb of

Thrust it was soon followed by another Engine with more power the i16 with 1600 lb of thrust then came the j33 with 4,000 lb of thrust and the Jet Engine really came into its own the First Flight of the j33 was in June of 1944 in a lock f80 shooting star

Again less than a year from the start of the project this outstanding plane set many records such as coast to coast in 4 and 1/2 hours and became our first operational jet PR in order to get the jet industry moving and in the interest of National Defense GE passed along its plans to

Other manufacturers Alison began mass production of the j33 engine to help meet production requirements of the f80 shooting star the British whle engine and the first engines designed by GE used compressors of the centrifugal type in these air enters the Hub and is hurled radially outward however even

Prior to seeing the British engine work on an axial compressor had been started with the national advisory committee for Aeronautics in this compressor air flows in a straight line to the rear the actual compressor increases the engines efficiency and handles a greater volume of air without increasing the engines

Diameter long range research led to an axial flow j35 which powered the Republic Thunderbolt and the Douglas Sky streak older at that time of the world’s official speed record of 640 mph eight of these powerful new jet engines were also used in northrop’s 100ton flying wing and many other planes

In the rapidly developing jet field during these years of progress with land-based aircraft the Navy had worked with the McDonald aircraft Corporation and Westinghouse to develop the Phantom proof that problems associated with carrier-based aircraft were not Beyond solution came with the Phantom’s first takeoff and Landing from an aircraft

Carrier meanwhile a school was established at General Electric to train the people who would install operate and service their new GE jet engines one of the courses given is simply a general familiarization with the principles of jet propulsion and the jet engine ever since man undertook the

Conquest of the air he has had two primary considerations first the aircraft itself and second its method of propulsion needless to say is not always been successful sometimes the airframe itself has been unsatisfactory at other times the method of propulsion has lacked the necessary power in this case for example it’s extremely simple

While in this it’s so complex that it borders on confusion actually the early attempts at propulsion by reaction were not associated with aircraft and as in the case of most of man’s early Endeavors they led to some rather startling Results the principle itself is very simple Newton’s third law of motion states that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction for example an ordinary rotary lawn sprinkler turns because of the reaction of the arm to the action of the jet of water it does not turn because the water

Squirted out pushes against the air it would spin just as well in a vacuum similarly the jet plane flies because of the reaction to the jet it does not fly because the jet pushes against the air behind it the engine itself consists of two main rotating elements the compressor

And the turbine which are both mounted on a single rotating shaft air is drawn in compressed and packed into the firing Chambers where fuel is injected the constantly burning fuel tremendously increases the energy of the enclosed gases which rush through the turban and out of the tail cone the turban

Operating like a windmill supplies the power to spin the compressor the expanding gases pushing their way out of the rear at about 12 00 mph give the plane its forward thrust this then is the simple principle of propulsion which changed the whole outlook of the aviation industry by 1951 G’s production models

Were delivering more than 5,800 lb of thrust a 5-fold increase in 10 years these engines are being mass-produced at both Linn Massachusetts and the great new Lockton Ohio plant the jet center of the world Lin represents more than huge production facilities it represents a new production plan thousands of suppliers and

Subcontractors contribute to the manufacturer of the jet engines which are assembled at laand thus all sources of Supply down to the smallest individually owned machine shops are benefited by the program and kept mobilized for production the Lin plan is truly another milestone just as the engines which roll from its

Production lines are the end product of many Milestones the result of almost 50 years of the best thought and effort of Executives Engineers scientists and skilled Craftsmen doing the work they are best fitted for in their own way this freedom of effort is after all the real Heritage of all Americans and the

Engines are living up to that Heritage today General Electric turbo jets are doing their job powering the great new planes they were designed for such planes as the Republic xf-91 highspeed high altitude Interceptor the North American f-86d the Martin xb-51 Superfast tactical Bomer the North American saber holder of the world’s official speed

Record of 671 mph and the 100 km closed course of 635 mph the North American B4 five tornado the first operational jet bomber the Boeing v47 Strat jet bomber which in 949 flew non-stop coast to coast in 3 hours and 46 minutes and the mighty conver b36 the Intercontinental

Bomber which is powered by six turbo supercharged piston engines and four jets these and others are the planes which must maintain the common security of the free peoples of the world and thereby ensure peace and Main in one six months period three new G engine designs were okay for production

Powerful in the preceding one the last of these is no larger than the model then in mass production yet it delivers so much more thrust that it is not even in the same Class even so by the time any new engine is in mass production still newer and better engines are on the way engine that will be a tribute to the life work of Dr Moss who died in 1946 one year after being awarded the colia trophy aviation’s highest award Moss’s work is

Finished but there will always be others to carry on with new ideas perhaps we will travel from coast to coast in 3 or 4 hours of quiet vibrationless Comfort certainly our energetic and Progressive aircraft industry will give us commercial jet liners as soon as the time is Right Even the atom May release its giant strength for aircraft the atomic energy commission the Air Force and General Electric are already cooperating on an atomic power plant for an aircraft to be built by conveyor NACA the US Navy’s Bureau of Aeronautics and a number of private corporations are also making real

Contributions to this [Applause] program developmental engineering moves forward with great new facilities such as ge’s aircraft G turban laboratory here Engineers can simulate conditions for tomorrow’s aircraft here men look ahead at the requirements of the planes of the future requirements established by the product planners of the engine

Builders of the airframe builders and of the aircraft users these are the molders of Aviation progress as long as imagination research design test and mass production continue year after year in in a never-ending constantly improving chain there is no limit to the future of the aircraft engine and so the jet story

Grows in 10 years we have come from this to this no one can fortell the tremendous strides the aircraft industry will make in the next 10 years yet we can be sure that the engines will keep Pace the engines that are keeping and will always keep America strong [Applause] A [Applause] How indifferent we’ve become we’ve forgotten what it is to be astonished another new plane one more so what but there is something unusual about it it’s long and has a sharp snout and its head is lowered there hadn’t been any like this before and it has a delt a wing folded

Back to the tail the Wing’s Leading Edge is Razor sharp a powerful 4 engine unit is mounted below and there’s another Singularity it has no stabilizer this is the new tupo supersonic airliner take off script anatol rovski Direction Vera Director of Photography caption a central documentary film Studios Production

Andre tupelov now in his 80s possesses talent and insight to such a degree as to become a living legend this film is about the TU 144 his latest model in a long life holy dedicate ated to aircraft Engineering when it was conceived several years ago there were few even among the top rankers who believed in its practical Realization they would often get together like this and calculate design p and discuss indefinitely they had worked together for years and understood one another at a glance it’s said locally that anyone who can out argue the general designer can count on a bonus or a promotion couldn’t the flutter effect

Appear in your control system and the body strengthening Engineers will see how much metal they must add I’ll do the drawings counting on the body strengthening Engineers making their Corrections get started and we’ll find some time later for a report back that will help us arrive at the overall final

Form we discussed that question two days ago it’s clear now you finished turning over the finals to illusion so he can speed up his part of the job the model was tested at supersonic speed and here the character of the streamlining was studied the t44 required 10 times more

Investigation in the great wind tunnel than any previous Aircraft this is Father and Son Andre tupo has trained hundreds of aircraft designers he founded a school of aircraft engineering his son Alex s chief designer of the t44 has followed in his footsteps a tailess design was chosen what would it look like in reality the t144 would have been inconceivable

Without metallurgists chemists instrument makers and electronic experts taking an active part in its development new Alloys and new kinds of ruled metal were needed the electronic equipment accounts for half the plan’s cost some 10,000 parts are made of plastics so the building of this plane was a common achievement of Soviet Science and

Technology this is a fighter plane it flies at the design speed for the t44 2,500 km hour more than twice the speed of sound so it’s nothing new our foremost Army Pilots have mastered it what is new though is that tupo has put this incredible speed at the disposal of ordinary

Mortals however not only the speed altitude and distance barriers have been surmounted but the reliability barrier too the landing gear was being tested what was there about it that instilled confidence should the hydraulic system suddenly fail another backup system would take over and then if necessary a

Second backup system and even a third so one failure is nothing to worry about and even two failures will not cause a crash the crew had been pre-selected and had rehearsed the flight over and over again on the ground Airborne they wouldn’t have the time to recall waver

Or grope they’d have to make Split Second decisions and that meant they had to know the plane like themselves each of them had a college education and lengthy thorough training for the maiden flight Commander Yan give us a Readiness report please first we’ll make the landing your retraction and release

Test I wanted to hear what you have to say about take off we considered Alex’s remarks about reducing the ground run the shorter the takeoff the quicker will be airborne well to you who are about to fly fingers crossed the maiden flight took place on December the 31st

1968 everything had long been in Readiness they’d been waiting for Clear Skies but the weather continued foul and nerves were wearing thin from The Strain finally however the very last day of the year dawned clear the Mercury f and visibility Rose Andre tuov had watched 12 Maiden flights and here he was again Waiting flight Commander Edward yam engineer Yuri Alto leading test engineer Vladimir bendero and second pilot Mel Kwal yes it was a fine day indeed it was good to be alive on a day like that as a well-known test pilot put It this is Dolphin one ready to take off permission granted got you some compare it to a bird for a bird never takes wing with its head drawn back the plane took off and gained altitude there was nothing left for us to do but watch and wait nothing depended any

Longer even upon the general designer Mr T how did you Begin I matriculated at moscow’s higher technical school because I had a B for engineering our lecture on Aviation was Nikolai zukovsky we built the first glider and I made my first flight when chukovsky decided to set up an aerodynamic laboratory at his school he said that tupv had clever hands so he

Would be in charge of the Equipment actually there wasn’t any laboratory at all simply a big Hall the school allotted us and that’s how it all began when Soviet power came Nikolai Jovi had gathered a close circle of people dedicated to Aviation we all wanted to help our Soviet country tup has advanced through nearly every stage of Aviation he even recalls PLS of plywood he built the first old metal aircraft this is one of them the ent3 entt are his initials and another the maxim gorki at that time the world world’s Biggest and this is the ant6 at the North Pole the famous entt 25’s non-stop flights won World acclaimed it took chalov 63 hours to fly nonstop from Moscow to the United States for more than 30 years it was a plane that captured the imagination of the entire world from Africa to South America from Asia to

Europe from London to New York City the aircraft simply known as Concord galvanized the globe its Sleek aerodynamic structure and supersonic speed brought passengers to a whole new level in transportation in Britain and France the plane became a symbol of national pride during the Cold War where every technological breakthrough seemed to

Come from either America or the Soviet Union the Concord proved that Europe still mattered and while this supersonic transport became synonymous with patriotism it’s also remembered as a plane that turned into an economic disaster disaster with skyrocketing development costs and a hefty price tag for admission when it finally debuted only

The rich and Powerful were able to fly the Concord and in an era of heightened environmental awareness the aircraft was denied the most lucrative routes across the Atlantic Ocean if not for the endless sums of government money it may have never seen the light of

Day in in the end the plane was a two-edged sword hated by the economists yet loved by the people Concord after nearly three decades in service became one of the most recognizable aircraft in the world during a time when faster meant better it soar over its competition symbolizing the absolute best in

European engineering and aerodynamics On October the 14th 1947 Aviation enters a new and uncertain era when Bell’s rocket powerered X1 launched from a b29 super Fortress becomes the first aircraft to break the sound barrier flying at over 800 mph at Mark 1.06 this breakthrough along with the introduction of jet technology causes countries to pour enormous resources

Into finding ways to go faster and faster during the Cold War With both America and the Soviet Union possessing the atomic bomb the requirement that airplanes go supersonic is a must this leads to a revolution in aeronautical design straight-winged a aircraft unable to achieve faster speeds are replaced by

Swept-wing planes most noticeably during the Korean conflict as American f86 Sabers battle Soviet Union Mig 15s bombers like the b29 and The b36 Peacemaker evolve into the swept wi b47 Strat jet and the B-52 Strat Fortress with the two superpowers investing gigantic sums of money into aircraft design the nations of Britain

And France are forced to play catchup in England where the Gloucester meteor symbolized London’s place at the Vanguard of aviation technology during the Cold War a trif fector of planes known as the V bombers are unveiled as a deterrent Force against the Soviet Union the third in this Trilogy avos

Vulcan a supersonic bomber equipped with four turbojets incorporates a new Delta wi design giving the aircraft increased speed over the swept Wing across the English Channel where Aviation was born the nation of France also experiments with supersonic aircraft Doo’s Mirage 3 a plane incorporating the delta wing design

Flies at over M 2.2 in 1958 in addition the dandel is also tested during this time as an experimental supersonic plane but despite their respective legacies of being at the Forefront of aviation technology after the second world war with both England and France’s economies shattered it appears their best days are behind

Them in the realm of military aircraft there seems to be no way to compete with the vast resources of the United States however there is one area where if England and France pull together their resources a formidable challenge can be issued against America and the Soviets this comes in the form of a

Proposed supersonic transport airliner Mr deal was President of France at the time and French Prestige was sort of important uh the French were very very concerned as were the British and other Europeans about the loss of Technology prowess in the aviation industry there was a feeling in Europe

At that time that the Concord project could be a vehicle a catalyst to uh jumpstart the European aviation industry After Decline with only military planes capable of breaking the sound barrier there’s much talk about having this technology cross over into the civilian transport Market with jets replacing propeller

Driven aircraft as the preferred mode of flying conventional wisdom leads many to speculate that the next logical step for passenger travel is the ability to fly faster than the speed of sound in America the Undisputed champion of aircraft design it appears inevitable that they will build an

SST the Soviets not wanting to be outdone by their Rivals are no doubt going to follow suit this took place during the height of the Cold War the Cold War was taking place uh you have to remember there was competition in Aerospace defense we had announced the

Apollo program at the end of 1961 which was in effect the cold war program I I think that the the attraction of the supersonic airpl was like the attraction of much of the Space Age Prestige the National Honor that you had to be you were if you didn’t demonstrate that you

Could do this you weren’t in the in the front ranks this leaves the powers of Europe with an important decision to make will will they build their own SST and compete on an international scale the answer is given on November the 28th 1962 when representatives from the English and French governments sign a

Treaty creating a powerful New Consortium between the British aircraft Corporation and sud Aviation airliner of the future this is a model of a supersonic jet which Britain and France hope will dominate transatlantic travel flying at twice the speed of sound it will hop the ocean in 3 hours representatives of the two

Countries sign an agreement to share the $300 million cost and hope to have the plane operational by 1968 the deltawing craft will carry 100 passengers and cruise at 1,400 mph Engineers say it can use present runways and fly so high there will be no Sonic shock when it

Breaks the sound barrier the world grows smaller The two companies agreed to build a supersonic transport with no cancellation Clause causing numerous Airlines to immediately Place orders including America’s PanAm Airways panamerican were announc just audited six New Concord supersonic jet transport which can fly from the United States 2 and a half hours you can tell

Him he’s given me the best argument for not having one Airline represent the United States that I’ve ever heard and I’m going to spend the next time I’m here really giving screwing the panamer because that gives that sticks it right to us how can we possibly go ahead now

With our program to which we’re going to spend an awful lot of money which was very important to the United States which affected the balance of payments in hundreds of millions of dollars and I’m going to put all this out and then go ahead about 24 hours before we’re about to make our

Announcements across the Atlantic Ocean this treaty causes President Kennedy to act swiftly and in June of 1963 at the Air Force Academy’s graduation he announces the United States own SST program 30,000 Spectators packed the stadium at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs for ceremonies that will graduate Cadets into officer ranks

They he President Kennedy call for a partnership of government and business to develop a supersonic passenger plane to hold the US lead in commercial Aviation they had been under some pressure uh to announce this project pres Vice President Johnson formed a little committee to look at the SST in

The spring of that year and he recommended vigorously that we go ahead with an SST the Anglo French had announced the conquer project in ‘ 62 and that also created pressure for Kennedy to do something there was also some pressure from the Aerospace industry people uh to respond to what

Was taking place both in uh Britain and France and also Russia which had its own SST program in the Soviet Union work begins on their supersonic tupv Tu 144 with each plane now in a race to the Finish Line beginning in 1965 two prototypes are built known as1 in tulus and2 in

Bristol luckily for Britain its Aerospace industry has a huge jump on the competition having built numerous experimental aircraft proving vital in the research and development of the Concord the Bristol 22 1 incorporating A variation of the Delta design known as the OG Wing is tested in order to determine the sst’s range and

Payload the tsr2 bomber an airplane cancelled due to the budget cuts of the 1950s provides invaluable information about the concord’s most daunting obstacle its power plants using Bristol’s Olympus engines the TSR 2’s testing sheds new light on the challenges supersonic planes face in the air in the Laboratories of the British

Aircraft Corporation and Su Aviation rigorous examinations are carried out investigating hundreds of materials and the effect heating has on them building the Concord uh required new materials and they had concerns about heating which would never been a uh a sustained problem you had people that encountered Heating in in certain instances and in

Uh Brief Encounters with supersonic flight but if you’re going to cruise suers Sonic flight then you’ve got a totally different heat dissipation problem for a period of 18 months straight Round the Clock 24-hour trials are conducted at its peak over 600 subcontractors are brought into work on the Concord employing over 200,000

People filton Concord 02 stands like a great bird in a massive cage at the British aircraft corporation’s plant near Bristol but never has their been such an expensive bird before nor one that has been so reluctant to fly when she’s ready to fly she’ll fly nothing

Must be left to chance Concord is unlike any other aircraft everything about her is new in the wind tunnels the OG Wing passes with flying colors fullscale mockups are constructed in order to show all of this sst’s components the drooping nose a distinct feature of the Concord is built in order

To balance Pilots visibility with its incredible aerodynamic structure and using a converted Vulcan bomber the Olympus 593 power plant is tested in the skies for concord’s team of designers its engines proved to be the most important obstacle to overcome uh the airframe was in advance of the engines

And advance of the fuels of the time had had you had 10e Advanced engines to put in it and uh you you might have possibly made it a more sustainable airplane but as it was it was a Prestige airplane for the 593 Jets to work properly air needs to enter at subsonic

Speeds a huge roadblock considering the Concord is built to fly at twice the speed of sound fortunately over a period of 4 years a complex system of Inlet doors and ducts are installed in order for this SST to travel at m 2 by April of 1966 the final assembly of1 and2

Begins with each country producing different parts of the Concord they’re shipped across the channel in order to make sure both prototypes are ready at the same time massive transport aircraft are used to ship some of the biggest pieces of this giant jigsaw puzzle for the people of tulus and Bristol seeing specially designed

Trailers hauling different parts of the plane are not uncommon during this time and by December of 1967 Concord 001 makes its first appearance in lose its mesmerizing design stuns the entire world as Aviation enters a new highspeed age toose the giant hanger at sud Aviation headquarters was the focal

Point of the entire world for inside was the most exciting new thing in the world of Aviation Concord o1 at last the Anglo French brainchild born out of the technical and very sensible collaboration of two Nations could be shown to an envious World while Concord is being set up for

Its first test flight in Moscow the Communists are able to beat the Europeans debuting tupv 144 on New Year’s Eve 1968 being almost identical to the angl French design it’s nicknamed Concord ski around the world unfortunately for the Soviets it’s nowhere near the Concord in terms of structure and quality being put together

So hastily and the Russians ran into even problems with their version of it because their engines were comparatively far less efficient than than the uh Rolls-Royce and the French engines in America delays and uncertainties about their SST program continue a competition between Boeing’s swing wi and lockheed’s fixed Wing

Design causes the selection committee to debate endlessly the advantages and disadvantages between the two it turned out that this that the swing Wing didn’t work so they went with a fixed Wing then it turned out that this plane was going to be too heavy anyway so they tried to

Lighten it but it could never really it the only way it could pay for itself is it couldn’t really carry that many people but secondly because it was so heavy it would have to charge a lot a premium on the ticket and that meant that made that the economics go haywire

When the decision is finally made in the winter of 1966 to award the contract to Boeing the Concord already has a 2-year jump on its transatlantic competition for the Europeans a far more important threat to the aircraft’s survival comes in the form of a jumbo jet Boeing’s 747 a subsonic airliner

Capable of flying passengers across the ocean far more cheaply than the Concord as those in Britain and France worried and in a sense the Boeing Company and airline companies as well understood that this was the real vehicle for leadership in commercial Aviation the jumbo jet the 747 efficient subsonic Jets of a variety

Of Kinds these were the vehicles that were going to keep America uh keep leadership in America in commercial Aviation not the American SST project this fear is Amplified when the British overseas aircraft Corporation decides to purchase the 747 perhaps faster does not necessarily mean better despite these outside threats as well as

Concerns about its growing costs Concord 01 is cleared for its first test flight in March of 1969 to lose the great supersonic jet ler was going to fly a year late millions of pounds over the estimated cost and still a very big question mark but on this day a lot of those question

Marks would be answered for Concord 001 this was the chance to prove she was the Superbird everyone had hoped and worked for it’s maiden voyage is Flawless encountering no technical problems for testing purposes its undercarriage is kept down in France they can breathe a sigh of relief one month later across the

Channel2 takes off making another perfect flight you had to have really the true professionals here there’s there’s no point in the flight in which a a any kind of a crew ER uh couldn’t have caused a disaster so it it was a um Great Leap Forward we we didn’t have the

Advanced electronics that we had in later and uh so for its day it was really an advanced machine Concord 02 is clear take off and good luck gentlemen for the next 2 years a series of gruelling tests are done studying the impact that intense heat has on the nose and body of the

Aircraft in the sky Concord proves easy to maneuver as the two prototypes exceed both the speed of sound and M 2 during this time every detail is checked and double checked with nothing being left to Chance in America with growing protests over the environmental impact of these planes including the effects of the

Sonic Boom in 1971 the United States Senate votes to cut off all funding for Boeing’s SST good evening the Senate has voted 51 to 46 to cut off money for building the supersonic transport as the house had done before unless private financing is forthcoming the controversial airplane appears doomed with this catastrophic decision

Concord’s most fierce competition is eliminated clearing the way for it to dominate the global Marketplace in Britain the plane becomes a symbol of Pride it was a proud sight this was the day when the traditional and the modern were brought together the British Concord that Masterpiece of Technology

Came to London to be seen by the queen her family and the millions who looked up with excitement for a first glimpse of this great plane then in 1973 at the Paris air show a Soviet tupv 144 crashes for the entire world to see This Disaster raises great doubts about the Communist concoctions

Feasibility it appears Concord has all but won the race to build the first fully functioning SST now will anybody want to buy the plane after nearly a decade in development the angl French Concord flies to the African nation of senagal to begin its worldwide promotional tour the ultimate goal of this exercise

Is to convince the world’s airlines that speed means business and with the right dose of public relations Executives will be convinced to buy these planes from a marketing standpoint the tour is an outstanding success for years people across the globe hear stories about this new high-speed plane that takes passengers

To their destination in half the time it’s unorthodox aerodynamic design brings in crowds from Rio de Janeiro to Beijing from from Tran to Sydney from Fairbanks Alaska to Mexico City and with America cancelling their SST program in 1971 and the Soviet Tu 144 in shambles the angl French Concord is destined to

Dominate The Marketplace unfortunately with the 1970s being defined by an oil crisis and economic unrest the enthusiasm for a super IC transport is a far cry from the previous decade when anything seemed possible the question now is can this aircraft defy the odds by flying passengers around the globe in record

Time while remaining economically viable this becomes the concord’s greatest challenge across the globe Concord is ready to Galvanize the people people wherever it flies the crowds are huge anxious to see the plane they’ve heard about for years during the year 1972 this SST tours Iran India China Japan and Australia with each country’s

Airlines showing interest in the aircraft kings and queens Prime Ministers and presidents rich and poor all want to take a tour inside this remarkable supersonic jet unfortunately during the 1970s with each Concord costing a record $31 million per plane only the very wealthy are able to board this aircraft ironically its biggest

Supporters are the masses who can never afford to fly supersonic as a result although there’s a fascination with the Concord the big airlines are hesitant to pull out their checkbooks the Chinese and the Iranians flirt with the idea of buying them but are unwilling to sign on the dotted

Line in the United States where the most lucrative destinations are to be had president Richard Nixon tours the aircraft his country’s decision to cancel their own SST is the result of a growing environmental movement warning Americans about the ecological disasters these planes will have on their neighborhoods and

Communities a big drawback is the sonic boom when a plane exceeds the speed of sound a large noise capable of breaking windows and glass erupts when scientists study the effects of this boom in Oklahoma City during the year 1964 they conclude this noise will cause a public Revolt it turns out that the

Sonic boom in fact bothered lots of people and this was clear very early on when they started to do research on the Sonic Boom in Oklahoma City and a report came out in 1964 which show which showed that a huge majority of the people quote could not live with a sonic boom

Unquote and the people who live with it are becoming more aroused becoming more sensitive to this form of pollution as they are to so many others the nation’s priorities are changing rapidly and the FAA may find that the General Public has a different timetable in mind for the

Reduction of noise pollution David Khan CBS News New York it’s such a hot button issue that the United States government places a ban on all ssts traveling Coast to Coast with this decision Concord is limited to only the East and West coasts in America as destinations as a result of this policy

No American Airline wants to touch the plane once they kill the New York to LA route the Miami to Seattle routes the Boston to San Francisco routes the Washington to la la Routes once it killed th those routes it killed about a third of the market for the whole

Aircraft and therefore therefore you you didn’t have as much uh chance to recover your cost people in the United States reacted to the sound barrier as a uh a means of uh going against the idea of an American supersonic transporter and it of course affected the issue of the

Concord flying in the United States but I don’t think it was a a a defining decision and I also think it was a bit of a red herring I think it was put up mainly because people who were smart enough to see there was no way to make

Any money out of the Concord Building it the the manufacturer was going to lose the government was going to lose I think it was perhaps uh overinflated just so that we wouldn’t do it and we wouldn’t have an American Contender as environmental groups gain strength pickets and protests against

The sst’s sonic boom against its unhealthy fuel consumption and against noise pollution in general take place rumors begin that any passenger who boards the plane will become violently ill this bad publicity sour the concort reputation thankfully the two countries who built the aircraft come to its rescue when British Airways and Air

France order nine planes for service they save the entire project from economic collapse unfortunately the overseas buyers needed to make this a worthwhile government investment never materialize what began as a European project is confined only to Europe despite these Road Blocks Concord continues its worldwide tour to

Force to prove it it can fly in the most brutal weather conditions the aircraft stops in America’s Arctic Outpost Alaska demonstrating that this SST can Excel even in the bitter cold next is a flight to the polar opposite Mexico City where thousands of people wait for hours to see concord’s grand

Entrance with orders placed the employees of BAC and aerospatial begin building more SS T’s improving the quality from the original prototypes the Bristol 593 engines gain strength reducing the black smoke emitted and in 1975 Concord receives its certificate of airworthiness when agents are first allowed to book passengers demand

Skyrockets a beautiful airplane that performed well I was lucky enough to fly on it on one occasion and U there’s it was it was the way to travel there there’s no question about it he arrived in London in what seemed like a you know a couple of hours and uh feeling

Excellent although 20% more expensive than subsonic travel during the early years with all the hype and Fascination surrounding This Plane the people cannot resist the opportunity to fly supersonic one year later the first two Concords carrying paying customers depart from London and Paris simultaneously almost a decade after its first test flight in

1969 the dreams of this SST are finally realized Concord is given a boost when its only competitor the Soviet tu1 144 fails miserably its crude design and enormous fuel consumption Fades quickly only a few months of novelty flights take place clearing the way for the angl French despite this early success the

Road ahead for this powerful new plane is going to be a bumpy one in America the Boeing 747 jumbo jet proves to be concord’s greatest competitor carrying more than twice the passengers at a fraction of the cost in the Big Apple where the most profitable route of London to New York

Is crucial because of noise pollution a judge rules that the supersonic airliner cannot land in the city over in Britain and France many speculate that because the United States could not get its SST up in the air sour grapes causes America to punish Concord as a result only after a Supreme Court ruling

Is the aircraft allowed to land at JFK International Airport in 1977 7 almost 20 years later it would set the world record for transatlantic flight traveling from London to New York in less than 3 hours by this time however with rapid inflation an oil crisis and growing environmental concerns people begin

Speculating that this plane’s time in the sun has passed people would pay the additional cost to fly faster than the speed of sound whatever however you value of your time one times the value of your time 1.5 times the value of your time that’s what people thought it

Turned out in fact that this was a very questionable assumption the whole idea that there would be a market for people paying a premium to go faster than the speed of sound on Commercial aviation in fact was a facade it turned out to be a facade it was not true it was a

Mirage during dire Economic Times Concord is viewed as a plane only for the super ring Rich the clientele was superb I mean the there were really really rich people flu it I can recall on the one flight that I made there was a group of about five or six kids all in

One family and who were making their 15th or 16th Concord flight and were totally Blas about it so it taught me that you know the Concord was for Rich guys the novelty effect has worn off the enthusiasm of the 1960s when it was first built is replaced by the cynicism of the

1970s each year it’s in service Concord fails financially unable to turn a profit as the 1980s begin many feel this technological Marvel’s days are numbered however it’s miraculously saved when British Airways decides to buy its planes from the government outright with this decision a new marketing campaign is launched to bring

Concord back to life discovering that its Rich cantele are willing to pay more to fly supersonic prices go up exponentially making it a vehicle exclusively for the super wealthy as a result it’s marketed as such and for the next two decades the plane stays afloat then after more more than 30

Years Concord flight 4590 crashes raising doubts on the safety of SuperSonic flight with the terrorist attacks of September the 11th 2001 and the decline in air travel that follows both British Airways and Air France decide to cancel service of the Concord in the end the aircraft became a

Mixed blessing I think that the angl French conquered project may have been a model that showed the Europeans that they could collaborate in aviation and while the conquered itself was not successful it may have been an impetus toward forming Airbus which has been relatively successful in building aircraft and becoming a formidable

Competitor uh to Boeing so in some ways although the conquered itself was not successful maybe it was a catalyst or vehicle to create a successful larger inter prise called Aus without question its ability to travel at twice the speed of sound made the plane a first class attraction wherever it

Landed over a period of several years Europe’s finest produced a true technological Marvel epitomizing the very best in engineering and aerodynamics for those reasons Concord goes down in the history books as one of the greatest aircraft ever in Britain and in France it was more than just a plane it came to

Symbolize a time when they and not the Americans were at the top of the mountain just as England had ruled the Seas with their dreadnots they would rule over the skies with their Concord but with all its state-of-the-art capabilities it became Out Of Reach for the average man woman

And child who ironically became the concord’s biggest supporters with the dim realities of the 1970s the plane’s biggest obstacles were not in its jet engines nor in its payload but with a skeptical public who grew cynical at the idea of government and big business teaming up to produce a plane

That only the privileged and Powerful could fly on it was a a beautiful airplane still is a beautiful airplane and it’s it’s just a shame that perhaps it’s a sanctuary maybe you don’t need to go supersonically and uh obviously not not enough people need to go supersonically to justify the

Market now with the ability to communicate in a matter of micros seconds through the use of computers the Concord symbolizes a much different time when the best technology available to see each other in person was the airplane in this era faster meant better and in getting people to their destination

No aircraft has been able to surpass the speed of the Concord if you enjoyed this video please remember to like And subscribe and as always thank you for Watching Go the P-51 Mustang the most dominant escort fighter of World War II it helped blaze a trail from England all the way to Berlin for America’s boming force of course the Mustang was a revelation it was war winner its creation was sparked by a mixture of of genius and

Chance the Mustang and its two-stage two-speed supercharged Merlin engine were the end result of the years of technological development from World War I to World War II each generation of aircraft went ever higher and faster but the Mustang’s marriage with the Merlin might never have happened national pride delayed the coupling of

These two great Innovations but a new deadly German adversary changed everything they [ __ ] off 190 this was really a topnotch fighter aircraft with the fw190 terrorizing the Skies of Europe the British and American forces swallowed their pride and joined together to create the ultimate fighting machine December 17th

1903 the right Brothers aircraft the right one successfully takes off initiating the dawn of Aviation man had already taken to the skies with gliders and balloons but this was the first time that an engine had propelled him into the air the right one’s engine was a crude

Design by today’s standards and put out 12 horsepower only it was an inline engine meaning that its cylinders four in total were mounted in a straight line layout that would Inspire some of the most advanced piston engined aircraft ever created though a simple design the right engine was Innovative it was the first

Engine to make use of a lightweight cast aluminum crank case every pound counted with a heavier engine the rights may not have made history that Winter’s day in North Carolina aircraft weight and power would continue to be important to the evolution of flight World War I was approaching and the

Newly formed Air Forces of the world needed reliable engines with enough power to sustain flight during operations from France would come a new type of power plant to take the fight into the air the rotary engine rotary engines operated differently than the inline ones used by the re

Brothers the cylinders were arranged in a radial pattern rather than a line when the the engine was fired up the crankshaft remained stationary while the crank case and cylinders rotated around it a rotary engine had one giant advantage over the inlines of the era it was much lighter and thus gave a pilot

Better performance during combat or while trying to evade an enemy however the rotary engine was not without its shortcomings it had poor fuel economy as it was often run on Full Throttle it also provided an unpleasant ride castor oil was mixed with the fuel mixture for lubrication with the side

Effect of heavy fumes smoke and an oil shower for Pilots turns with a rotary powerered aircraft could prove treacherous as the whole engine rotated It produced a gyroscopic effect a turn to the right at full power and low level could end with the death of a pilot rotary powered aircraft remained part of

Air Force inventories till War’s end but they were gradually supplanted by the inline engine inlines based on the same principles as the one found in the original right plane kept improving in terms of power and performance between the wars and across the Atlantic a new type of aircraft

Engine would emerge to dominate American Aviation the US Navy was looking for aircraft to populate its fledgling aircraft carriers space on board was extremely limited but aircraft with inline engines often had lengthy noses their engines built with rows of cylinders took up too much space on cramped carriers rotary engines though more

Compact had too many other weaknesses to be serious contenders for the role there was however a third type of engine before the war there had been limited experimentation with radial engines at first glance these appeared to be just like rotary engines it’s only when they are fired up that the difference becomes

Clear in a rotary engine the crank case and cylinders rotate around the crankshaft but with a radial engine the crankshaft rotates while the engine block is stack static radios often weren’t as powerful as inline engines but they were less complicated they were cooled by air rushing over the engine rather than

Through a liquid cooling system this made radial less vulnerable to battle damage which might rupture the coolant lines Navy pilots who might have to travel long distances over the ocean to get to a Target needed an engine that would be sure to get them home under any circumstance

Most importantly for the Navy radials were smaller than inline engines so a greater number of aircraft equipped with them could be stored on board their carriers the right aeronautical Corporation a successor to the original wri Brothers company used the aviation expertise to create the first reliable radial engine for the Navy the J5

Whirlwind the J5 was put on display for the entire world to see when Charles Lindberg crossed the Atlantic in his Spirit of St Louis in 1927 his flight solidified the reputation of the J5 radial as a Dependable power Plant the budding Airlines of the world were looking for engines to power their airliners and to bring their passengers across continents and eventually across the globe safely reliable radial engines seem to be the ideal choice radials would power many of the principal airliners in the history of

Civil aviation from the Ford Tri motor to the Boeing 247 to the Lockheed model 10 Electra both the US Navy and US Army aircore would rely heavily on radial engines as they built up their inventories of Fighters and other aircraft in the 1930s the US had just one inline engine in development the

Allison V 1710 an engine that would one day power some of America’s great Fighters at the time relying on radial seemed a prudent decision but in the years to come and in the battles ahead it will leave the US playing catch up with their allies and enemies in Europe in Europe in the 1930s Air Forces and aircraft manufacturers were looking for Speed Above All Else as they designed the next generation of Fighters using streamlined designs and Powerful V12 inline engines they pushed their aircraft to speeds over 350 Mph their inline engines were not only more powerful they also helped to create more aerodynamic airf frames their elongated shapes allowed for more streamlined designs as compared with radials inline engines may have been more vulnerable to attack due to their complex liquid cooling systems but no matter how durable a radial engine is

Speed kills in a dog fight inline engines were built to provide just that it was from this European obsession with speed that some of the legendary fighters of World War II were born including the supermarine Spitfire the Hawker hurricane and the mmid BF 109 beneath their elegant frames heard ever

More powerful inline engines from Rolls-Royce and damler Benz respectively in the middle of 1940 the pilots of the RAF tested their metal and the endurance of their Fighting Machines in some of the most spectacular air battles of World War II Vice fer Goring had promised to destroy the RAF and thus facilitate the

Invasion of Britain Goring had at his disposal an armada of medium bombers protected by a deadly fighter Force the result of the Battle of Britain during those few vital months of 1940 is well known there was a heavy toll in Fighters and pilots on both sides British and German Engineers tried

To squeeze every ounce of power from their ranges any tiny Advantage could be the difference between life and death with Britain and her industry under direct attack she looked to her old colony more than ever to provide her with desperately needed aircraft even before the Battle of Britain the British purchasing

Commission had already been shopping for additional aircraft the US’s initial offer of Fighters was not well suited for the High Altitude dog fights taking place over Europe This was partially due to the American engines available the US had concentrated on radial engine production instead of inline engines

Like the one so popular in European Fighters they did have the Allison engine the v710 like the British Rolls-Royce Merlin it was a 12 cylinder inline engine but it had a complex turbocharger often difficult to fit into an aircraft to boost power in the thin air at high altitudes the Allison engine

Used the heat of its exhaust to power a turbine and thereby increase the air flow and power one American aircraft the lock heat P38 had the extra space needed to house the turbocharger it was a big twin engined aircraft to begin with and had space in its tail Booms for the extra

Equipment but given the size of the P38 it wouldn’t have fared well against Nimble single engine German fighters in a dog fight America had other smaller Fighters powered by the Allison engine the P39 erac Cobra and the Curtis P40 Warhawk in both cases their manufacturers failed to include Allison’s

Turbocharger the P39 had an Innovative layout with its engine situated mid fuselage behind the pilot it was designed to house both the Allison engine and the turbocharger however a scoop built into the left side of the fuselage to cool the turbocharger was deemed too aerodynamically expensive both the scoop and the

Turbocharger were eliminated from the production design this change crippled the aeroc Cobra’s ability to fight at high altitudes in the case of the P40 Warhawk a rugged single engine airplane the turbocharger was excluded from the design from the get-go this Limited its optimal altitude to just 15,000 ft and thus relegated the

Aircraft to ground attack the British purchasing commission was still interested in the Warhawk even with its limitations they saw it as more of an army support aircraft however the Curtis Factory was running at capacity and could not fulfill the order with no suitable aircraft readily available for purchase the Brits would

Turn to North American aircraft the British purchasing commission proposed that North American build the Warhawk under license from Curtis but NAA president Dutch kindleberger had a bolder plan he guaranteed that he could create an even better airplane using the same Allison engine in less time than it

Would take for him to retool for Warhawk production the Brit said yes and the end result was an airplane that may well have changed the outcome of the second second world war in Europe back in Europe Germany was looking for an aircraft to augment the BF 109 in the Battle of Britain the BF 109 and spitfire were closely matched but the bf19 lacked the range to be highly effective in its escort role over Britain in the summer of

1940 the Luft Waffa had a twin engined escort the bf10 it had the range to be an excellent an escort but it lacked the maneuverability to defend itself or its charge in a dog fight it also used two diimler Ben 605 engines making it an expensive Sitting Duck for British

Interceptors looking for a quick solution to the resort dilemma the lift wafa even considered having the 110s tow 109’s into battle to conserve fuel but in the long run using two aircraft to perform the role of a single fighter was an even more wasteful Sol solution what the lift wafa needed was a

Dedicated single engine aircraft to fill in for the bf109 on longer range missions in ideal something to give them a decided advantage over the British fighters of the time however the lufa wanted to have its cake and eat it too they wanted a new fighter but they didn’t want to

Sacrifice any of the precious 605 engines meant for the BF 109 to the consternation of the LIF wafa most of the new submissions for fighter designs from German industry were to be built around this very same engine to solve Germany’s escort woes one man Kurt P [ __ ] Wolf’s legendary

Designer and test pilot did what was almost Unthinkable at the time since the start of the War British and German designers had relied upon powerful 12 cylinder inline engines to power their Fighters tank dared to build Germany’s Next fighter around a bombers radial engine the aircooled BMW 801 radial

Engine had plenty of power and had proven reliable in the ju88 and do 217 but radials in a fighter were a rare sight in Europe it was difficult to build this aerodynamic a fuselage to house them in as when constructing one for a slender inline engine Though an unconventional design track tank saw two reasons for encouragement firstly the national advisory committee for Aeronautics in the US had already done research on improving air flow around radial engines over time they had developed the NACA cowl which at least helped to reduce drag this was a simple ring which fitted

Snugly around the cylinders of a radial engine it not only made the engine more aerodynamic it also improved cooling secondly tank observed that the US and Japanese navies were employing several modern carrier aircraft all with radial engines aircraft like the F4F Hellcat and the Japanese a6m 0 the lightweight zero had been almost

Unstoppable in the early part of the Pacific War Tonk had continued to explore ways of improving his new radial engined aircraft and reducing the drag effect although some say his greatest task was selling the radial idea to the ministry if that was the case the bureaucrats must have been quickly won

Over by Kurt KK’s first prototypes given the designation the [ __ ] wolf 190 and unofficially known as The Butcher bird the lia’s latest fighter was rushed into production fortunately for the Allies the fw19 arrived after the close of the Battle of Britain in the summer of 1941 five Mark

5 Spitfires flying over the South Coast spotted several radial engine fighters in German markets at first glance they were mistaken for us-built Republic Lancers it was a deadly case of mistaken identity the aircraft were in reality early model fw1 190s the Spitfire pilots who survived the ensuing battle lived to

Tell just how quickly their comrades had been lost but Britain’s greatest loss that day was not Pilots or planes the battle marked the day Britain lost air superiority to the lift wafa the RAF had to do something and fast All Eyes looked to Rolls-Royce manufacturer of the Merlin engine that

Power plant of the Spitfire Hurrican and so many of Britain Great Planes although the company had the Next Generation engine the 12 cylinder Griffin in development it was well over a year away more than enough time for Britain to lose the war earlier there had been some thought

Given to modifying a few Merlin engines for experimental high altitude work to be executed by a Wellington bomber it was little more than an idea at the time but in Britain’s hour of desperate need Rolls-Royce Engineers work night and day to test the concept Merlin engines were already supercharged an air compressor

Mechanically attached to the rotating cam shaft increased the air flow to the engine allowing it to burn more fuel and to boost performance Rolls-Royce Engineers had theorized that adding a second supercharger could give the engine even more punch during high altitude work might a two-stage super charger helped the RAF reclaim Air

Supremacy the end result of the Rolls-Royce experiment was breathtaking it was almost as if the two-stage two-speed Merlin was an entirely different engine when in fact it was just a modification when the double supercharged aircraft dubbed the Spitfire Mark 9 finally arrived in June of 1942 the RAF had a rare opportunity to

Test it directly against a captured fw190 the test results were far different than the day a group of unlucky RAF Pilots ran into a flock of butcher Birds the two aircraft were virtual equals in terms of performance Captain Eric Brown who had flown a captured fw190 had a chance to test the new

Spitfire 9 against the German aircraft in live combat I had flown the 190 quite a bit so I wasn’t too frightened I reckoned I knew what that aircraft could do and I knew what my spit could do so I thought well can I can handle this guy hoping he was

Somebody just out of training school but no I picked somebody who really knew what he was up to and we had I would say a touring and FL over France but neither could get a draw be than the other and we finally realized it both of us we run

Out of fuel we wagle our wings at each other and departed and um I realized this was really a top not Fighter the RAF had leveled the playing field with the lwfa at least for the time being but what the RAF really needed was an aircraft to give them the upper

Hand the new Merlin’s greatest contribution to the war was still to come when it was mated with an extraordinary aircraft of American design back in the US North American aircraft had continued to work on a Warhawk substitute which met the specifications laid out by the British purchasing commission they had specified that the

Airplane would be powered by an Allison engine that it cost less than $40,000 and that it be armed with 4303 in machine guns North American answered with the P-51 Mustang it featured an advanced laminer flow wing for good aerod Dynamic efficiency and a wide gate undercarriage for safer

Landing pleasing to the eye and to fly although mainly at lower altitudes the new arrival quickly gained respect from pilots and ground Crews alike there were some concerns about how the Mustang would F should it be forced to ditch while crossing the channel during a water landing its air scoop

Located beneath the fuselage might flood the aircraft or cause it to overturn water tank tests at Saunders row were initiated to perfect the techniques for ditching the aircraft around the same time that the RAF was getting the Spitfire Mark 9 ready for combat and the fw190 was dominating the skies Rolls-Royce test

Pilot Ronald Hawker was tasked with the mission of evaluating all aircraft powered by non Rolls-Royce engines he was thoroughly impressed with the p-51a save for its poor performance at high altitude like the P40 Warhawk it had an Allison engine and no turbocharger Hawker pondered how the aircraft might perform with the new Merlin

Engine the results on paper were phenomenal according to rolls-royce’s calculations with a Merlin power plant the Mustang would not only outclass any American aircraft but even new Spitfires using the same engine oddly Hawker had to push for the mating of the Merlin 61 and the Mustang even though the double supercharged P-51

Would have outclassed the fw190 as well Hawker finally arranged for the marriage of the two great inventions and test trials confirmed his hunch the Mustang was a war winner the main challenge was to produce enough aircraft and engines to reclaim the Skies of Europe North American would tweak the St

Designed to accommodate the Merlin 61 engine it was a much more powerful engine so the original p-51a airframe had to be reinforced as well the three-bladed prop was exchanged for one with four blades the addition of Plumbing for drop tanks might have seemed a small change but it

Would have a great impact on the air battles to come Packard took up manufacturer of the Merlin 61 engines in the US they were designated the V1 1650s Packard had arranged a licensing agreement with Rolls-Royce earlier in the war Ford was originally slated to build americanmade Merlins and seemed a

Perfect choice due to the company’s industrial might but Henry Ford was adamant that his company built defensive weapons only North American’s double supercharged aircraft the p-51b and p-51c first took flight in the spring and summer of 1943 air Vice Marshall Patty Harbison recalls when the Mustangs first arrived at his

Spitfire Squadron of course the Mustang was a revelation that was a much more comfortable airplane than the Spitfire was and I have heard people talk about the relative merits of both they were both War winners the Spitfire was melt as an Interceptor it could out turn the

Mustang and could our climb it but it didn’t with the legs the most time and of course if you can’t get to where the fight is you’re not you’re not too effective as P-51 started to arrive in Europe the war was changing and the Mustang was the perfect aircraft for the

Time the US was taking the war to Germany they were bombing the German War Industry out of business the only problem was their bombers were being shredded by Speedy German interceptors the US had hinged their hopes on the ability of their bombers to defend themselves by maintaining a tight box formation

When this strategy failed they were in dire need of an escort fight the P38 Lightning was simply not agile enough to take on the rooll then there was the p47 Thunderbolt it was an awesome radial engine fighter more than capable of taking care of itself in battle but it had two major

Flaws it was expensive and it lacked the range to take the bombers all the way to Berlin and back the P-51 BS and C’s arrived just in time they had been designed to carry drop tanks and with the addition of a fuel tank behind the pilots they had more

Than enough fuel to escort American bombers to Hitler’s Lair the Mustang proved more than a match for Germany’s fw190 and me 109 slowly American bombers closed in around Berlin suddenly the Germans found themselves playing catch up Kurt Ton’s fw190 with a radial engine found it difficult at higher altitudes where the bombers

Ro Tonk swapped its radial engine for an inline the long-nosed aircraft was nicknamed the Dora the fer wolf Dora the later Dora was a magnificent fighter with an engine change not really any structural changes other than those to accommodate the engine but what it meant was here was an airplane that could keep

Up with the hunt as the years of the war progressed so from 1942 right up to the end of the war the [ __ ] wolf 190 was in the top grade of fighter or fighter B the P-51 Mustang also continued to evolve as mechanics and Engineers Incorporated changes based on the

Feedback of pilots who attested the plane in battle it’s canopy went through several permutations the British swapped the original one for a sliding Malcolm Hood similar to a Spitfires for improved visibility the p-51b the definitive version of the Mustang had a bubble canopy which offered 360° of Clear

View North American also upgraded the D’s Firepower it had 650 caliber machine guns compared to four in earlier models and it had solved the problem of gun jamming during hard turns the fuel tank situated behind the pilot may have increased range but it created other issues the plane had

Poured directional stability when the tank was full to counter this problem Engineers added a small dorsal fin in the D model these and other improvements would help the Mustang blaze a path to Berlin for America’s bombers vies Marshall Herman gar commander of the Lu was quoted as saying

When I saw Mustangs over Berlin I knew the jig was up when the European War had come to a close the battle still raged in the Pacific the Mustang was the best escort available but even with its incredible range it could not accompany an aircraft like the b29 super fortress on extended

Bombing missions over Japan the expanses of ocean were too large the engineers at North American struggled with the problem of stretching the Mustang’s range their solution was a willing or twin Mustang by fusing two Mustangs together they hope to dramatically increase the range of the Mustang while retaining its excellent dog fighting

Abilities the new Mustang the f82 had an incredible range 2,000 mil though the prototypes were powered by Packard Merlin engines the US Army aircore was adamant that the production version be totally americanmade unfortunately for the f82 without Merlin engines it was not the same aircraft when fitted with the

Allison v710 100 its speed dropped and high altitude performance suffered it was one of the few cases of a prototype outperforming the production model of an aircraft by the time the f82 was ready Japan had Sur surrendered and the war was over after the war the P-51 continued to

Serve while other piston engine fighters of the era went quietly into retirement though it was the dawn of the jet age there was still a place for the Mustang and a variety of roles Colonel Rayo Roberts flew the Mustang during its Second Life at that

Time I was flying what they call the F6 which is a P-51 with cameras also had guns and uh you could had the bombing and gun Gunnery capability and we participated in a post hostilities mapping program we mapped revised all the Japanese Maps photographed did aial photography and Japan and and

Korea when the Korean War arrived Mustangs which had been mothballed for long-term storage were suddenly being shipped across the Pacific on carriers unable to compete with the next generation of jet fighters for the dog fighter role Mustangs returned to where they started in Korea Mustangs made excellent ground attack

Aircraft they didn’t have the speed of jets but they had the endurance to make it from Japan to Korea on bombing runs in Korea the f82 also had an opportunity to taste combat for the first time f82 is flew strike escort and night fighter missions the marriage of the P-51 Mustang and the

Merlin 61 engine produced incredible results it provided the allies with an effective escort to pound the last Nails into Germany’s Cen perhaps the most amazing thing about the P-51 Stellar career is that it might never have happened if the Merlin and Mustang had never been mated at the suggestion of

Hawker at Rolls-Royce the P-51 might have had a hum drum career as a reliable ground attack aircraft rather than an elite dog fighter it arrived at the right time and the right place in history just when the Allies needed an escort Fighter the P-51 was the end result of

Years of aircraft and engine development though jet powered aircraft would supplant it the impact of the Mustang and Merlin in military history cannot be Unwritten or Denied at the farboro air show in 1949 barely four years after the war ended Britain presented an impressive array of jet aircraft some were purely military others experimental and there were even some airliners converted from piston engines to the new jet technology perhaps the best crowd pleaser was the advanced deavin Comet turbojet

Airliner elsewhere in England other types of jet airliners were being developed but these were somewhat different this is The vicer vicount Airliner when it first came into service in the early ‘ 50s it quickly became a success one of the main reasons for the Vic Count’s ever expanding order book

Was the aircraft’s Rolls-Royce Dart turboprop engines however the vi count wasn’t the only Contender nor was the dart the only turbo prop engine available at the time slightly smaller than the vicount and with different turbo propop engines the Armstrong Whitworth aw55 Apollo was no less pleasing to the eye and in

Tandem with the vicker’s aircraft represented a giant step forward in Airline design the target market for both aircraft was the short to medium roots of the emerging postwar airline industry with government backing British industry they had something special to offer with the Revolutionary turbo prop engines the concept of a conventional

Jet having its exhaust thrust converted into turning power for traditional propeller blades was brand new and it made for extremely economical and very smooth running there were two early examples the Rolls-Royce Dart and the competitive Armstrong sidley Mamba the Apollo’s designers favored the Mamba whereas Vickers chose the

Dart construction of the Apollo started in Armstrong woodworth’s Factory at bagging airport in 1948 Bingington had had been bombed during the German Blitz on Coventry it was used as an RAF fighter base during the War years but now it would be used as part of Britain’s critical export drive to repay the war

Debt there were grounds for optimism as the country refocused its industry only 3 years earlier manufacturers had produced Spitfires and lancasters by the thousands and for a time most of the skill aircraft Builders were still on hand one of the more notable features of the Apollo’s Mamba engines was their

Narrow diameter slender and aerodynamic they complemented the aircraft’s Aesthetics however the smaller engine housings that accompanied the Mamba did not provide for an area to store the landing gear in flight this meant that the main Wheels had to retract into the fuselage consuming valuable space however the Mamba still showed great

Promise apart from anything else it had already powered a trainer the Athena which was actually the first production aircraft to employ a turbo prop engine also early tests suggested good performance in 1948 a 500h hour test run confirmed the engine’s durability after this Armstrong Whitworth were sure that they had a winning combination

The aw55 Apollo prototype was designed and built to accommodate a crew of three two pilots and one cabin crew passenger seating could be configured for up to 31 people however a slightly longer version for production had also been discussed as well as a military version for True transport construction on the Apollo

Progressed until its roll out in April of 1949 this sleep fully pressurized airliner was a far cry from the utility Fighters and bombers the industry had produced just a few years before on the 10th of April Apollo aircraft serial number vx220 took to the air from a grass field at Bingington

Airport its first flight lasted just half an hour and the results were less than impressive the first problem was that the Mamba asm2 engines failed to produce the 1200 plus horsepower expected which were indeed needed to meet the aircraft’s performance requirements the 800 horsepower that was actually recorded was Far short of what

Was anticipated subsequent test flights also demonstrated numerous flaws in the airframe design improvements were constantly made until a critical flight test to parison back was undertaken on the 12th of March 1951 still prob problems persisted with the Apollo having a flawed airframe and the Mamba engines remaining

Underpowered in June of 1952 all further development on the Apollo was abandoned and the only two examples ever built were used for research work at bosome down this left the vicker’s vi count the undoubted winner and it was this type that also went on to become one of Britain’s all-time airliner export

Earners with 445 built the redoutable Rolls-Royce dark turbo prop engine was even more successful with over 7,000 engines delivered to numerous customers up until 1987 41 years after its first test for a while the Armstrong Sidle Mamba had no such success but then again it certainly wasn’t a complete failure

Either rather with Improvement it morphed into several different life forms each one displaying considerable and unexpected ingenuity at about the same time that the Apollo was under construction the Royal Navy in fairy Aviation were developing a truly remarkable anti-submarine aircraft the fairy ganet shared the same problems as many carrier born

Aircraft it had the performance needs of two power plants but this usually meant the high risk of possibly having to land with one engine not functioning this type of asymmetric approach is highly dangerous for the air Crew a second consideration for Fair’s designers was the significant economy that might be achieved on Long missions if one of two engines could actually be turned off and yet still leave the plane with the same balance as a single engined aircraft Armstrong tily thought that they might have the answer the very

Narrow diameter of the Mamba turbo prop might now prove most useful if two could be assembled side by side driving two Contra rotating propellers both able to be turned on and off independent of the other the double Mamba as it became known was a major success providing

Ganet Pilots with two jet power plants in an aircraft that had great range and at the same time was safe to land even with one engine down because of its Mamba engines the ganet became a much trusted Maritime aircraft which went on to serve in a number of other

Countries with nearly 350 of all types made it wasn’t so far off the numbers of VI counts delivered although the vicker’s plane had four turbo props as opposed to the ganet 2 Still The Versatile Mamba had much more to offer by removing the gearbox and the propeller Drive Armstrong sidley

Were able to present a conventional turbojet with a few more deletions and economies this evolved into to a so-called Expendable power plant and it transpired that there actually was quite a market for a shortlife jet engine it was named the adder postwar Western governments knew that they might have to deal with Soviet

Forces that would include jet aircraft target practice on anything flying less than in the high 500 mph range would be useless equally important a Target would have to be able to fly up to a height of 50,000 ft and get there quickly since most drones only have a limited flight

Time in 1948 the Australian government aircraft Factory entered into a contract to develop an unmanned radio controlled flying Target it was given the name gind ofic Aboriginal for the hunted one made in Australia many were shipped to Britain in Parts where with their experience with the maamba engine Ferry

Aviation assembled each unit that was powered by the Mamba descendant the adder more than 500 gind divix were built and employed by Australia Britain the United States and Sweden over time Armstrong sidley merged with the rivals Rolls-Royce although not before it had redeveloped the adder into a stronger and more reliable Turbo Jet

The end result was also much more powerful it was named the Viper and Vipers were produced in the s powering the jet Provost strike Masters Hawker cidly 125 and many more what started out as a misfire with the Mamba engines on the Apollo developed over time into a

Successful line of engines with the double Mamba adder and vipers that would power numerous aircraft for years to come one problem facing the designers of the next generation of turbojet engines is that of increasing turbine Inlet temperatures air cooled turban blades may offer a solution to this problem the

Fabrication of a cast aircool turban blade that has shown promise in Prototype testing will be shown in this film This blade was made using a modification of the Lost wax casting technique a process to provide long slender holes for cooling passages was developed by the Lewis flight propulsion laboratory of the national advisory committee for Aeronautics this development is particularly important because the super Alloys used in aircraft turbine blades

Are extremely difficult to machine ceramic tubes are used as part of the casting mold to establish cores or holes through the turban blade casting core tubes of the desired outside diameter are assembled in a pattern Dy the core tubes are held in place by embedding them in a bar of soft

Wax using a hot wire or Knight the dyes used are made of a low melting alloy cast around a brass Master pattern a casting pattern is made by closing the dieses containing the ceramic tubes clapping the dyes in a wax injection machine and injecting molten wax Under Pressure the wax pattern

Containing ceramic tubes is removed from the Dy and excess wax is trimmed leaving a light wax film on the exposed ceramic tubes to permit freedom of movement due to expansion add to additional pieces of wax are assembled by welding with a hot wire these pieces will form sprew

Runners and ingates or passages for the molten metal to reach the blade cavity in the casting mold the assembled wax is mounted on a waxed base to seal it a can type flask is placed over the assembly and it too is sealed at the bottom when the investment is Thoroughly mixed it is

Poured into the flask and around the wax pattern assembly the flask is then placed in a vacuum chamber to remove air from the mix after investing and air drying the moles are placed in a furnace here the drying is completed the wax is melted out the wax residue is burned off and

The mold is cured during this furnace cycle the temperature is gradually increased from room temperature to 1900 de f metal alloy for the casting is melted in an electric induction furnace when the metal reaches a temperature of 3000° f The Crucible of molten metal is placed in a centrifugal

Casting machine and the hot mold is placed over it as the casting machine is spun the molten metal is thrown into the mold the casting is removed by breaking away the mold after the casting is cleaned up the ceramic tubes used to form the cooling passages in the blade must be

Removed this is done by threading fine stainless steel wires through each ceramic tube and stretching them taut on a frame the turbine blade is then attached to a cam device designed to slide the blade up and down on the wires the lower part of the assembly is then immersed in

A bath of molten costic this helps to remove reaction products and introduces fresh costic to the four of the tubes and hence accelerates the solution and removal of the core tubes the rough casting is cleaned in an air water abrasive blast a suitable base configuration is

Then ground and the blade is ready for testing in a research facility the process you have just seen illustrates a principle that has been effective in producing long thin cord holes in castings this process C may be useful in fabricating turbine blades to be used at very high turban Inlet

Temperatures the F100 is one of our primary a tactical support weapon system this aircraft has a proven history of outstanding performance one of the reasons for this dependability is the rugged power plant the one one a high performance aircraft is adaptable to many missions it is used for reconnaissance as a

Tactical fighter and as an Interceptor approximately 30,000 lb of crust is developed by its twin eny the f102 is the first operational Air Force delta wing aircraft the performance characteristics of this weapon system are ideally suited for intercept missions a reliable power plant is essential for the success of any

Mission the f102 101 and 100 are all powered by the rugged j57 engine developed by fron rney the individual engines vary somewhat but for the most part are same fundamental design the j57 is a dual compressor engine the engine consists of the following components the inlet the low press compressor the high press

Compressor the diffuser case combustion chamber the first second and third stage turbin the After Burner and the exhaust nozzle the low pressure compressor referred to as N1 is driven by the second and third stage turbin the high-press compressor M2 is driven by the first stage turbine these two units

Or spools are not mechanically connected the j57 operates on the same basic principle as all jet engines pressure presented in Grass form below the basic engine offline and velocity are increased by a series of rers in the compressor section a compressor bleed system prevents compressor instability when the engine is operating at reduced

Power the compressed air passes through the diffuser into the combustion chamber where the air expands thus reducing somewhat the velocity and pressure fuel is mixed with a portion of the air to form the combustible Mass when combustion occurs the gases are expelled through the turban at this

Point power is extracted by the turbin to drive the compressor the remaining energy expelled through the exhaust nozzle provides the thru since exhaust nozzle and curban discharge pressures are relative cbon discharge pressure is used as a parameter to determine the thrust crust is the measure of force developed by the engine force is

Determined by masstimes acceleration mass is the weight of air and fuel passing through the engine acceleration is the difference between Inlet and turban discharge veres of this Mass thus crust may be expressed by the formula Force equals mass time acceleration the engine trim charts are based on this formula additional frust

Is obtained in the After Burner by increasing mass and acceleration at that stage the basic engine pressure ratio during afterburner operation is maintained by increasing the exhaust nozzle area efficient engine operation depends on correct fuel schedule the basic components of the j57 main engine fuel system are fuel pump and fuel pump

Transfer valve fuel control and the pressurizing and dump Val the fuel pump is a dual element per gear pump one element supplies fuel to the after bur the other to the main engine the fuel control meters the fuel required to operate the engine through its full range the pressurizing and dump valve

Supplies the main engine fuel manifold and drains the manifold at engine shut down at engine start fuel enters the pump through the impeller where the pressure is increased this provides the positive pressure head to the main stage at this stage the fuel reaches up pressure the pressurized fuel closes the

Fuel regulating transfer valve and the afterburner check valve and flows into the fuel control the main metering valve is closed at this time a portion of this fuel passes through the minimum flow orifice through the signal line to the pmv valve since the control is in bypass pressure does

Not build up enough to close this this valve until the power lever moves from cut off to idle when the power lever is moved to the idle position the fuel up valve closes the main metering valve opens the cut off valve moves off its seat the pressure loading valve opens

The p&v valve Inlet check valve opens and the fuel is suppli to the primary side of the fuel manifold through the pressurizing and dump Val at approximately 74% RPM the fuel pressurizing valve will open to supply fuel to the secondary side of the fuel manifolds the j57 engine uses a primary

And secondary system in order to obtain the highest possible fuel flow with the shortest possible flate at low RPMs only the primary side is used when the emergency system is selected the actuator positions the pilot valve to direct pressure to the shuttle valve system the shuttle valve

Blocks off metered flow and provides a port for unmetered fuel to the emergency throttle valve this mechanical valve controls the flow of fuel the afterburner element of the fuel pump will supply fuel to the engine in the event of main element failure the primary function is to furnish fuel for the after Bur

The other components of the j57 After Burner system are the After Burner fuel control exhaust nozzle control igniter valve and the mechanical shut off Val the relative position of the components varies according to engine model the afterburner fuel control meters fuel to the ab spray box the exhaust nozzle control directs

Compressor discharge are a to open and close the nozzles the igniter valve injects fuel into the combustion chamber creating a streak of flame to ignite the After Burner in the event of electrical failure the mechanical shut off valve will terminate AB operation at Approximately 80% RPM rotation of this valve causes AB

Stage fuel to bypass through the ab fuel control regulator valve the fuel control unit is carefully calibrated on the test bench to assure accurate engine fuel schedule the main functions of the fuel control are to maintain acceleration schedules below compressor stall Zone to prevent over temperature during acceleration prevent lean die out during

Deceleration and to maintain any selected engine speed within operating limits regardless of altitude the fuel control senses engine RPM Inlet temperature and burner pressure to supply the correct amount of fuel for any ambient condition when calibration has been completed all external adjustments except the idle and Military trim screws

Are sealed these seals are installed to protect test bench precision calibrations and must not be removed the j57 engine will provide relatively troubl free operation when all systems are functioning correctly however the systems must be properly rigged and adjusted one of the most critical engine adjustments is the rigging of the fuel control

Lage full range movement is obtained only when the fuel control and afterburner mechanical shut off valve levers are correctly positioned the levers are set to predetermined angles a protractor or eted template is used to set the linkage at at these angles the protractor is positioned at the oil pump

And accessory housing plug to establish a reference angle this reference angle will be used to adjust the fuel control lever with the fuel control lever in cut off position the difference between the reference angle and this reading must be the number of degrees specified in the tech

Manual it may be necessary to readjust the fuel control lever to obtain the correct angle the fuel control lever and serrated spacer are ratcheted to give the desired angle the fuel control position which when all other linkage is connected will close the After Burner mechanical shut

Off down the power actuating Rod is then attached to the fuel control weon move the mechanical shut off lever to the detent position the rod connecting the cross shaft lever and mechanical shut off valve lever may have to be adjusted to the specified length the ab mechanical shut off valve

Is held in detent position while the lever is ratcheted to the position where the rod which has already been adjusted to the specified length will fit then all connections are tightened either the protractor or an etched template is used to again check the angle of the fuel control

Lever it may be necessary to readjust the fuel control lever to obtain the correct angle after Corrections are made all connections are then SA replacement or adjustment of most components will affect engine operation prior to aircraft installation the engine is Thoroughly inspected and tested to ensure satisfactory

Performance a fuel at least check is imperative before initial start of a repaired Engine with the system pressurized check all fuel lines and connections the exhaust nozzle opening must also be rechecked before initial engine starts nozzle diameter not within specified limits will affect engine efficiency on some engines a fail safe

Device is installed to prev total loss of power in the event of linkage failure the device will position the fuel control lever to a 45° angle setting which will provide approximately 90% RPM thus ensuring sufficient thrust to maintain flight after installation in the aircraft all airframe to engine

Connections must be checked and adjusted and the engine retrims Final Trim to compensate for for aircraft instulation losses is preferably accomplished with the aircraft headed directly into the whip prevailing wind velocity and direction must be within limits specified in the tech Manu the trim pad area must be free of

Loose objects that could damage the engine if ingested to effectively trim the engine power control settings must be coordinated throttle linkage is operationally tested before making fuel control adjustments movement of the fuel control quadrant must synchronize with throttle movement power control movement is transferred to obtain predetermined fuel control

Settings the aircraft manual indicates the relative degree of movement throughout the entire throttle Range close attention to detail is required when trimming an engine changes in ambient barometric pressure and temperature will affect engine performance characteristics true barometric pressure and correct temperature both recorded within 15 minutes of the trim run are

Used to determine Target pp7 Target pt7 is obtained by tracing the temperature and pressure coordinates on the trim chart start engine is specified in the tech manual and allow engine and exhaust gas temperature to stabilize reard bottle to I setting desired idle speed is obtained by adjusting the idle trim

Screw As in all fuel control adjustments Final Trim is always in the increased RPM Direction proceeding with the trim operations slowly Advance throttle to military power allow 5 minutes for stabilizing caution do not over speed or overtemp engine during run up and stay stabilization with throttle set of

Military power record RPM EGT and the turban discharge pressure cp7 If pp7 reading is low return throttle to idle and readjust maximum rpm setting at the fuel control turn the adjustment clockwise to increase RP F in order to obtain Target pt7 Advanced Travel to military [Applause] Power stabilize then recheck pt7 return TR to I