Aeolus; or, the future of the flying machine — Edition Insights

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_For the Contents of this Series see the end of the Book_

THE FUTURE OF THE FLYING MACHINE

_Author of ‘The Strategy and Tactics of Air Fighting,’ etc._

LONDON KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER & Co., LTD. NEW YORK: E. P. DUTTON & CO.

———————————————————————————————————————————————————————————— Made and Printed in Great Britain by M. F. Robinson & Co., Ltd., at The Library Press, Lowestoft.

THE FUTURE OF THE FLYING-MACHINE

The aeroplane is an aerial sailing-ship, its wings are the sails, its source of power the wind. It can claim to be a direct descendant of the family of sailing ships whose father was AEOLUS, god of the winds and the inventor of sails.

Aeroplane, helicopter, ornithopter, rotorplane, and autogiro are sailing-ships because they all derive lift from sails or aerofoils. An aerofoil is a structure so shaped as to obtain a reaction from the wind—a sail is nothing more and nothing less. Whether the wind is natural or is artificially raised by an engine does not affect the function of aerofoil or sail.

The heavier-than-air flying-machine, either engineless glider or power-driven craft, is the true aerial sailing-ship. The prolate gasbag which is called an airship resembles only one kind of ship, a sinking ship, because it is totally immersed in the fluid which supports it. If a sea parallel to the airship is required, that parallel may justly be said to be the submarine, which is suspended in the water as the airship is suspended in the air.

Before I deal with the future of the aerial sailing-ship I must define three aeronautical terms. No excuse is needed for introducing these apparently elementary definitions since aeronautical terms are almost as well misunderstood by aviators as by laymen. The three terms are:

Wing Airscrew Propeller

The definitions I advance are supported by the Royal Aeronautical Society’s _Glossary of Aeronautical Terms_ and by the British Engineering Standards Association’s _Glossary of Aeronautical Terms_ although they are often departed from in official forms and in speech.

_Wing._ A few days ago I read in a newspaper of a “single-winged airplane”. Accustomed as I am to the aircraft which appear between the drapers’ advertisements in the daily newspapers, I was startled at the notion of a “single-winged airplane”. A bird has wings. A single-winged bird would be a queer creature and would be incapable of flying. A “single-winged airplane” would be equally queer and equally earth-bound.

The reporter, in trying to hack out an explanatory synonym for monoplane, docked the aeroplane of one of its wings.

_Airscrew and Propeller._ An aeroplane can have an airscrew yet no propeller. Most aeroplanes, in fact, are without propellers. In the interests of differentiation it is worth endeavouring to confine the word propeller to the thing that propels or pushes the machine, to use airscrew as a general term, and tractor airscrew when a precise definition is required for the thing that pulls the machine. The colloquialism “prop’” may perhaps be allowed to stand for both tractor airscrew and propeller.

In the following pages I make no attempt to hit upon any sudden invention which may revolutionize flight. I confine myself to developing lines of progress which have already given some proof of practicability. For determining the general trend of progress I rely upon a utilitarian review of the aeronautical situation. I have avoided leaping into the distant future. Readers will be disappointed to learn that things like inter-planetary voyaging are not dealt with in this booklet.

I am aware that scientists have demonstrated that some of the things I do mention are impossible. But scientists have demonstrated that the world is flat, that it is round, and that it is oblong. In the future they will demonstrate that it is rectangular. It was Mr W. N. Sullivan, I think, who said that “To judge from the history of science, the scientific method is excellent as a means of obtaining plausible conclusions which are always wrong, but hardly as a means of reaching the truth.” While a few generations can still witness wide variations of opinion among those who know, I incline to the Pyrrhonic doctrine. It is impossible to know with certainty what is impossible, and in attempting a forecast the best that can be done is to take the trend of contemporary thought and, with that, to build a future upon the principles of the present.