OCR Text |
Show vju HOW FAST WILL AEROPLANES GO? Nothing In the early days of the aeroplane appealed to the imagination more than its possibilities for speed. It was Hubert Latham at Sandgate in 1908, when he was preparing for the first flight across the channel, who gave tho world the hypothetical figure of 200 miles an hour, and we havo been conjuring with ever since. No aeroplane has so far got anywhere any-where near this speed by Its own propulsion through the air, but if the pitch of tho propeller may be taken as a criterion of pace In the same way that a ship's screw is, then v,& are very near to seeing Latham's prophecy pro-phecy fulfilled, all other things being equal. At its maximum thrust, the projpel-ler projpel-ler is designed for 186 miles an hour It was being tested on a 300-horse-power engine mounted on massive tree trunks driven into the ground like piles Even these shook from the pressure, and the violence of the back flash of air displaced caused some young trees to bend and break under the starin. And, as some, fear was at first entertained en-tertained lest the propeller should split Into fragments, it became neces- sary to insure the operators before the experiments began. |