Re-Building the Wright Flyer

Isaac-Lew writes: "Several teams are trying to build a working replica of the first Wright Brothers' airplane." As the article says, "The catch is: Each team wants its plane to fly more or less as the Wrights' did." The only problem with that is that as Orville Wright put it, their plane was "exceedingly erratic," so the recreators have made some slight concessions to safety.

Comments

Exceedingly Erratic == Unsafe

[Coz]

I spent some time looking at various web sites about this yesterday - seems the original Flyer would Dutch roll from take-off to landing, and was very unfriendly in ground-effect. This made landing - interesting - until they finally cracked it up. Good thing it went so slowly that it didn't hurt so much when they hit.

By today's standards, the thing's unflyable - horrible control authority, CG all wrong, underpowered... Orville and Wilbur had to be talented in the first place to fly it. Of course, this is the basic device that we started from to derive "today's standards". I hope none of the replica teams crack up... there's enough aviation hysteria these days, without a "reenactment" generating more bad press.

Must be fun, inventing a whole science, and a set of industries.

Re:Exceedingly Erratic == Unsafe

[Surak]

My understanding having watched some things on TLC, the Discovery Channel, PBS, etc., is that some teams have already produced the flyer, they just can't get it to fly. And they have NO IDEA how the Wright Bros. were able to get the original one off the ground. The idea was that they've been doing this for years and can't get it to fly.

I'll believe they can get it to fly when I see it. :) The thing was built specifically for the original pilot's weight, height etc. Also as you point out, it took a lot of skill to fly that thing... way more than a pilot needs today.

Re:Exceedingly Erratic == Unsafe

[thogard]

I've been reading rec.aviation.student for a number of years.
One problem that all student pilots have is that they start overcontrolling the plane after about 10 hours. Most students are better at flying a modern (1960s?) airplane after 5 hours of instruction than at 10 hours. The reason is they try to compensate for every small dip. The planes dihedral will be doing the same adjsutments and the result is the plane goes the other way like any over controlled system. It can take another 10 hours to unlearn over controlling. I suspect that anyone with a 1/2 decent grasp of flying will over control the eary Wright flyers. Were the Wright brothers even controlling the plane or just along for the ride?

There is a nice landing strip near the Wright Brothers Memorial called First Flight. Just don't park there for more than 24 hours or a park ranger will give you a parking ticket.

Re:Exceedingly Erratic == Unsafe

[megapatzer]

There is a story about a British glider pilot, who created an exact replica of (I believe) a Percy Pilcher glider, to fly on the 100th anniversary of his death.
In order to make the replica realistic, the materials, and construction method used were closely modelled on those available at the time, and the first flight took place from exactly the same spot that Pilcher had taken off a hundred years previously.
The subsequent accident was an exact replica of Pilchers', except that the pilot was rushed to hospital by ambulance, and consequently survived his injuries.

Re:Exceedingly Erratic == Unsafe

[Coz]

They actually controlled it to some degree through body lean - their hips were cradled, and one of the control sets was wired up to that cradle.

By all accounts I've seen, it was a full-body experience.

Which approach should be taken in this case

[shockwaverider]

There are two approaches that can be taken when restoring/rebuilding things

a) Make it exactly as it was
b) Make it better

Usually I'd say that you should always make it exactly as it was, but in this case lives would be at stake if you followed that approach - So there's an argument for at least *some* improvement.

The question is - how far should they go in their improvements...

Were the Wrights first?

[macjerry]

Some folks, mainly from New Zealand, make a strong case that Richard Pearse made the first powered flight. Pearse belives it was in March, 1904, but others claim March, 1903 or even 1902. Even if he wasn't first, his design is surprising modern: " a monoplane configuration, wing flaps and rear elevator, tricycle undercarriage with steerable nosewheel, and a propeller with variable-pitch blades driven by a unique double-acting horizontally opposed petrol engine."

First flight

[pkplex]

Of course you blokes all know that kiwis were the first to fly, right? :)

Fair go, its true.

Re:What reminds me..

[ebbe11]

Although Santos Dumont did manage to get a powered airplane off the ground, he didn't do so until 1906, i.e. three years after the Wright brothers.

But while we're at it, don't forget Jacob Ellehammer, the Danish flying pioneer. He also flew in 1906 but as his plane was tethered to a central pole his flight is usually not considered the first flight in Europe even though he flew before Santos Dumont did.

Eole

[Balinares]

Eole was destroyed, but its immediate successor is displayed in full view in the CNAM museum in Paris. A heck of an impressive sight, I can tell you. :)

The blurb seems to say Eole was built between 1882 and 1889 and first flew in 1890, so if true that puts it slightly ahead of the Wright brothers' Kitty Hawk Flyer, but it's not like it matters much, for what we care. :)

But the French were leaders by 1912

[MtViewGuy]

What's interesting is that the hotbed of aviation in the 1906-1912 period was NOT the USA. It was France, who made up for lost time very quickly by building a lot of very innovative designs, designs that served as the basis for today's airplanes in terms of aerodynamic and structural design.

In that period, French pioneers like Alberto Santos-Dumont, Louis Blériot and the Duperdussin company were building monoplanes that used modern aerodynamic design. Indeed, the Duperdussin racer of 1912 had extremely sleek aerodynamics for its day thanks to the use of monocoque structural design.

In short, while the Wright brothers built the first successful heavier-than-air airplane, it was the French pioneers that laid the groundwork for designing the modern airplane.