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Show (nit our pL;ifM s ure su -.it ;ui'i;trl - ! tr.i" I tii;it Ujcv c-rin )C. r;t tni-thfr in j :i --h'jrt lime n f i . i f hen !'-. re u j' 1, nuirk-: nuirk-: I;.- r-j,rj i r'-'l. '' I'f'iit ! v A m:ri.-;i n a i r-rn'i r-rn'i wre Hi i p'I to France in j i:t J ".. 'I'h' p;i rt.s w'!re tn k'-n out. I iu i !tifi--ii in'.i ;i --.i-inbifd ami t to flyin;; ! within t'Ao hour.-. I I.il.rlo lias hfcn rear. of v-iiM. rhe navy ha he (-a loi in t he way- of -I a no r:Mn f riicv ion . It h;ns con strutted pianos capaljle of r-arryiri loa-U of 11,-O'Mi 11,-O'Mi ;inI ovii 13,000 potireh-, aii'l having engines of I'JDO lior.-ir-pover. Wit!) th"-.-i; facts and figure- in mind, wr1 -n j i f i-r I coriMilerable conn donee in tlio prori's.-i mado in aircraft production. produc-tion. I'Vofn this firm; forwnrd our quari-1 quari-1 1 1 y prodtictiun should bo a.-i grfiif as (tin; mo-t opt.imi.st U: hoped for a year a;o. Wo are a trifle late, but the w:ir is far from ended and soon thousands of our planes will be buttling in "the central blue'' above the American and allied lines in France and fraly. AIRCRAFT SUCCESS. Since Admiral Sims sent his cablegram cable-gram announcing the success of the j Liberty engine in the tests abroad, some ( of us have begun to suspect that the i1 critics of tin) aircraft board were not j s near the truth as they imagined a few months ago. A number of them i aid that the board's chief mistake was I in attempting to perfect un American motor. They told us that, the board should have adopted two or three of the -approved JCuropcan engines, and thus attained speed in production. Howard Coffin, former head of the aircraft board, had something instructive instruc-tive to say on this point at the Orville Wright dinner on June 17 at Dayton, Ohio, lie is quoted in the "Automobile "Automo-bile Industries" as stating that the adoption of European engines would havo spelled delay. To produce foreign engines it would j have been necessary, as Mr. Coffin pointed out, to bring across the Atlantic 1 tho tools, jigs, dies and fixtures for ! tho work. American tools and machinery machin-ery would havo been east aside for !l those brought from the other side. It I S is patent that this would have caused . J much deliiv. J " Although the drawings, equipment, and even the engineers, are brought from the other side," said Mr. Coffin, "We have but to point to the example i of tho Gnome engine at the plmt of ! the General Arehicle company, and the Hispano-Suiza at the Wright-Martin 1 plant, or the Bleriot at. the plant of the American Locomotive company'. Those who have seen the exhibitions here 1 (Dayton) and have been thoroughly conversant with the work, know that ,' American designs, American tools and American methods arc far ahead of ihose over there when it comes to a : production basis. "The British, after three years and more of war. are producing in the Rolls-Royce plant, where 10,000 men are employed, but fifty engines per , ' week, and thee have fifty horsepower less and weigh 10(1 pounds more than i the Liberty engines. "So far a.s our purposes are concerned, con-cerned, ttiere are several plants in this : country that will, within the next 120 I days, be producing from fifty to 100 of j i Hiese engines a day. Yet you cannot possibly convince a senator of this." j In the airplane industry, as in the 1 shipping industry, the initial progress nas slow. Our soldiers were trans- ; ported to France at the rato of ;!0,000 I or 40,000 a month last year, and 276,- j 000 were transported across the At- ! lantic last month. American achieve- ment. once it attains its stride, is tre-i tre-i mendous. ' We are able to gather from the re- ; 1 marks of Mr. Coffin and or" others who : attended the dinner, that we are on the I ' eve of an aircraft production which will j i far surpass production in Great Britain and Kuropc. Mr. Coffin sets down as ! ' follow? the three big things, according 1 . ; ! to his iew, done in the airplane indus- ! i try: ' . ! The production of the Liberty en-; en-; ' gine. including the Liberty cylinder, which should go through the war without with-out a change in spite of other develop- i merits which may come up in engine practice. J The discovery of a substitute for linen. ; The discovery that Douglas fir is I 1 a satisfactory wood for airplane construction. con-struction. The substitute for linen is Sea Island ! cotton, which is pronounced as good a' Irish linen, and so the shortage of linen is no longer a handicap. The Douglas fir was found to be superior even to the spruce, but the American airplane makers had difficulty in persuading ' the British or French manufacturers of the fact. The Americans won ahead : with their experiments and demonstrated demon-strated that the airplanes made of the Douglas fir were every bit as good as the planes made of spruce, and now 1 j tiicv have two sources of wood supply ; ( instead of the one which threatened to : ' limit production. 1 Ir will be recalh'd that the aircraft i board was also criticised for atternpt-; atternpt-; ( ing to secure quantify production by ' -.Landardi.ing all pails of a plane. The 1 crilics declared Dial it: could riot be t I |