Air Wonder Stories, July 1929 — page 93: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

‘ , Telephone Service For Airplanes HH equipping of planes with radlo-phone attachments to thelr radio reselving seta la allowing pilotg to converse freely with the ground and thus sscerfain weather condi- (ions, to rageive orders, ete; Teste made by the Boemg Air Transport has proved tha pructicabliity of thig, ay well. as the com- munication between plines while in the air. Both means of oommumnication are Geemed neoessary by aircraft operntors to avold col- Usions In the alr, which will become more of a factor as the alr trafic continues to frow. Redio, or at least redlo-phone, con- trol) is considered to be equivalent to tha railway blocks signal in nvoiding necidente, and for this purpose Fadéeral Radio Gom- mishion haa been neked by aircraft com- panies for exclusive usa of four short wave channelz, The posaibitity of a person in w Plane conversing with telephones in nefgh- boring ofties' has also been succeasfully fasted but no immediate use will be made of New York-Argentine Air Line NHW air line, The Tri-Motor Safety Alrway, has been organized for mail and passenger service between. New York init Buenos Aires, Argentina. The trip, it is estimated will tuka only seven Gayy, one third o2 the time now consumed by steam- ship. Rio de Janeiro will also be a point on the route. The company hes already been awarded, by the Argentine government, the exclusive right to oatry mail from that country to the United States. The company will uge for its passenger service six thirty- two passenger flying boats. Ignition Does and Does Not Cause Fires BILIBY among aviators that if the Ignition switch Jn opened before crash- ing the dreaded fire wit be averted 4s founded on fact #ays Bradley Jones in U.S. Afr Services. Thla does hot mean how- ever that the fire is onused by the exploding of gases by the eleotria apark caused by the fxnfttion, A test to determine the cause of fires In orashes wos made: Old airplanes were slld down » long runway and Into a brick wall Slow motion moving pictures were taken of the ensuing crash. By re- tmhoving the batteries from the planes it was found that just-as many fires took place as with batteries in place. What Jones con- eludes is that the gasoine tank being rup- turefl throws the gasoline against the hot plpes which ignites {t. Thus the ignition is not responsible, But, he says, if the ignition Js switched off before a crash the piped will cool and no fire should occur when the gaso- line Js thrown against them. . . New Air Thermometer Devised A YHERMOMETER by which the mini- mum temperature of the air thru which &@ plane is flying onn be determined has been invented by H. B, Hondriekson. of the Bureau of Standards, The instrument makes use of a bi-meta) strip mounted on one of the struts of the plane. [tis very Heht, and a number of them can be used to determine temperatures at various points on the plane. England-India Non-Stop Flight Made Je the first India-England non- atop fight was made, in a Fatrey-Napler Monoplane by an Hnglish crew, the orlginal purpose of the filght, the breaking of the non-stop record, falled.. The record which ipchela by. the ItaHans 1s 4,417 miles, The projected flight of the Britons from Gincoin- shire, England to Batigaloro was-6,300 miler, But the plane was-foroed down 1,170 milea short of Its goal thereby completing.a flight of 4,130 milgs, A heavy. head-wind In the Persian Gulf*so reduced the plene’s speed that they rn ehort of gasoline snd had to return to the shore, The actual filght thne was forty-eight hours as compared with seven and a-half days which Is consumed by the new air mall service, Commenting on the filght the British Air Ministry said that the results were satizfactory In view of the syveather conditions, and that attempts svould. he made soon to better the duration rooord of sixty-five hours and twenty-four minutes held by Germany and the altitude reoord of 34,432 feet held by America. For the Jutter an airplane driven with a super- charged engine and men equipped with oxygen breathing apparatus and electrically heated clothing would be used. AIR WONDER STORIES OPERATION Aviation Progress Slow Says Expert PROFOUND dissatisfaction with the progress made In the development of the airplane since the days of Wright's Kitty Hawk, characterized the statement-of Grover Losning,; aeronautical expert, in the New York Arterican,. Mr, Loening is one of the pioneers in aviation In America, having been assonlited with the Wrights during thelr early days. Mr, Loening's indictment is directed against the exploitation of avia- tion as a commercial venture at the expense of the development of planes, _Altha wa have made great atridea in the refinement of design in planes and Inthe tise of the Planes (development of alrports, use of bencons-and radio communication) we have meade very Httle progreas in the develop~- meant of new principles of alrplenes. A much preater safety and grenter speeds are neces- Bary to Justify our claims to progress, What ig necessury, he says, are planes cnpable of dolng 809 miles per hour, climbing to 26,000 foot altitudes above storms and clouds, Jand-~ ing atlower speeds and rising more quickly; Hnd-the universal use of amphtfblans, « Better designing of planes, Improvement in engines, higher—power and eflicfency, und use of lighter fuels ure all necessary to get 800 mile an hour planes, capable of Having that speed during sustained filghts,, The three greatest dangele-to distance: flying, he sald, —fuel-consuming head-winds, fogs _and ice- forming weather, would be avolded by tho Planes he advocates. Such a plane can pick its own course, outrun any storm, fly Bbove the ice and fog, nnd would have a crulaing range which wotld make unimport- ant small delays dus to unfavorable winds. The plane, he sald; should make a trans- Atlantic trip fn 12 hours, ADE OMDHBHOOEHOnEVOMDHOWENEUDNENQMENUMDH HEMI 3 “Aviation News of the Month” portrays in plain yet concise language every important avia- tion advance during the month. Nowhere can the average reader get such a wealth of accurate and vital information condensed into such a small yolume. Some 40 aviation magazines and news- papers are ttilized by our edi- tors in the compilation of this department, The publishers welcome short contributions to these pages from the various scientific institutions, Iaborator- ies, makers and distributors of planes, etc. oO ro Bee Dee MerMe Ge Ore Ger@ Ge GOs Ge nD Ooo meer OrrMerar Begs rem Sy DUH OH ehh er ee Mher are Drm ire er Oar Baer reer Orr er Ber Err Mir HOH EHO HOH OHI e: i i i i i i i 2 i ‘ ‘ Planes Protect Ontario’s Timber 4 ks tusk of protecting Ontario's. 160,000 sqtnre miles of timberland agalnat fire, once quite hopejest, js now being pushed vigorously by the adoption of alrcraft, Where formerly the only means of inspection was trekling wearily across the forests, or float- ing down the streams, now at airplane can inspect thoroly o whole district in o few hours. ‘The -alroraftds aleo uaed in making aurveya of the forest land and in penetrat- ing into possible aress where minerals in great guantitles may He. . ‘ . Aerial Towing Begins V 7HAT appears to be the first Job of tow- ing an airplane is recorded in Acro Digest: A glider was towed by a Fokker plane for over 200 miles across the Sierra Nevada. Inwamich as it was neceseary to have an altitude of 7,600 feet to navigate the peaks, the glider rose to 4 helght few of its kind Have achieved. ‘The crossing of the mountain had already been made when the tow line broke and the glider wan lett to make to ita own way to safety. Both planes headed toward the Los Angeles Air- port, 20 miles distant, The glider weighted by the tow-line manniged to get within one mile of the port before it landed in safety. 91 Thirty-Hour New York-Frisco Air Mail ITH the instituting of night flying in the nir-mall service batwean New: York and San Francisco, 7 schedule. of service has begun which will put a letter or package aorosa the continent in less than thirty-two hours, A pleog of mail lenving a city on alther const nat night wilk arrive on the other side of the continent the morning after the following evening, This Is pos- slble by having 68% of the distance flown at night. The olties along the route, by the new schedule, will have a twice-a-day service in either direction. Stops. will be made in fifteen olties, The-route that will be faken by the coast-to-coast. service is the same used by the Pony Hxpress of the nineteenth century, In 1800, for example, the Pony Express-had a cross oountry service which consumed thirteen days and cost the user $5 per half ounce for mad] or packages. The same letter that cost $10 then goes for 5 cents now by alr mail Moving Plane Makes Ground Pickup A DBVICH has been successfully tested whloh allows a pinne to make a pitkup from the ground while In motion, It may deliver mail, supplies or fuel. The dGsvica is o catapujt fitted on a special mounting which releases a oar on which the load to be picked up Je placed. The lond in mada to move at the same speed as tha plane so that no jar to the under carriage will cour when the plokhup je made, Ona teat a 23 pound sack of mail was picked up five times and a 87 pound gasoline-load once, New Altitude Attempts Probable UMORS concerning new attempts to break’ the present altituda recarda by France end England, are current. It Is said by. Aviation that. the BngHsh plan an all metul plans, with the engine enclosed in the fuselage and heated. by its own exhaust, In this plane they hope to ascend 8 miles. The French attempt is said to be along the same line as the Hnglsh. Plane-Cooling Liquid Successful HWS despatches recently mentioned a mysterious Hquid to cool alrplane engines which has been developed by the War De- partment. Now the name of itis divulged gs ethylene-glyool, and a report that on-a standard fitty hour test, the Hanid was used mt an outlet temperature of 300 degrees Fahrenheit (far ebove the boiling point of water) and no serjaus odverse effenta were noted. It ft also revealed that thls com- Pound {is not new; ft has, in fact, been sold at gasollne stations ag nn antl-fraese com- pound, The War Department offers certuin cautions however about ifs use os 2 cooling ggent on planes. It recommends tighter joints and o closed cooling system. <A lerger expansion spice, to take care of the large expansion of the Ilquid when hot, Is also necessary. The fuel must also be treated, with some anti-knook solution to offset tendencies toward detonation. Air Passengers Speak Over Land Phone to New York sf a firat commercial apparatus for main- taining telephonlo communication of a plnne with the ground was suocedsfully tested when pesbengers In a plane 2600 fect xbove Pininfleld, N. J,, carried on a tele- Dhone converfation’ with New York, To male the oall the passengers called the radio station WKN of the Bell Telephone Company at Whippany, N. J, As-the re- celver was cut-into the cirouit the operator asked the customary “Number please,’ and thereupon the mlnne was connected over long distance Innd lines to New York, The reception at both ends, despite the roar of the plane travelling 94 mies an hour, wns deemed as good-as tho one were sitting in a—private booth. A four tuhe tad{o set was used on the plane, three being of the screened grid and the fourth o heating tube to Intrease the eensitivity. The set is ran from’ a -generator attached to the motor, requiring 2 horsnpower ot 1,100 volts to piek up and amplify the ground: messager. The sending set runs from a wind-driven generator mounted outelde the cabin. comnliclooolks.com