Wings #5

1. Discuss the beginning of supersonic flight research in the United States and whether or not this technology was a priority.

The concept of supersonic flight began with the military development of supersonic bombers. Traveling faster than the speed of sound, these planes could depart from a military base at a moment’s notice and arrive to their destination much quicker than planes in the past. Because things change so rapidly in wartime, the ability to do such things was very convenient. After the war, it was assumed that supersonic transport would be further developed and become a new trend for commercial flight. The Concorde, developed by an alliance between the French and British governments, was a supersonic aircraft that could easily cut transatlantic travel time in half (pg 627). On the surface, supersonic flight appeared to be the newest frontier in aviation technology.

Supersonic flight was not all that it was cut out to be, however. It was apparent to experts that the development of such an aircraft would be unrealistically expensive and that the government would need to fund 90% of the research (pg. 625). The U.S. government was hesitant to invest in developing a capable aircraft, finally awarding a contract to Boeing for development of a prototype in 1967 (pg 627). Besides being expensive, the supersonic airplanes were not practical for the U.S. to develop because laws were created to make continental flights of these aircraft illegal due to sonic boom complaints.  Research was in favor of sonic booms causing fear and anxiety amongst citizens and anti-sonic boom groups were created to protest the planes. Farmers were particularly fervent critics of the planes. The airplanes were only used for transcontinental flights. England and France noted that the revenue raised from passenger service with their Concorde plane was not enough to offset its manufacturing expenses (pg. 626). The United States never really made the development of supersonic transport a priority for all of these reasons, instead focusing their efforts on other fields of aviation technology.

3. What role did the helicopter play in the development of aviation technology?

The invention of the helicopter was important in the development of aviation technology because it offered a new way to achieve flight, a method that didn’t involve the use of a runway or a large field to take off and land in. The idea that a person could simply go straight up in the air meant that flight could be used in a lot more situations. It is comical but true that, when Sikorsky introduced the first practical helicopter, it was believed that the helicopter would provide a means of personal transportation, just like automobiles, within the next few years (pg. 469). This dream did not come to fruition unfortunately, but helicopters were used in war and to provide regional transportation.

The importance of helicopters to the military was particularly relevant during the tumultuous and war-filled political environment of the 20^th century. In the beginning, helicopters were used by the United States and other countries for search and rescue missions and for medical transport. These machines were excellent for these two purposes because of their ability to land and take off quickly from a single point, minimizing delays in medical care and shortening the time that the aircraft could be on the ground behind enemy lines. Helicopters began to be used so much in wartime that a new type of helicopter, the helicopter utility vehicle, became the symbol of the Vietnam War to many Americans (pg 472). The importance of aviation continued to be tied with the idea of war. The Vietnam War was heavily publicized in the United States, and, as a result, so was the helicopter.

Helicopters proved that the principles of lift and obtaining heavier-than-air flight could be applied to aircraft other than the airplane. Because the helicopter could do things that the airplane could not, aviation was further applied to new situations.

7. What effect did the invention of the computer have on aviation technology?

Computers offered a new simplicity to the design and manufacturing of airplanes. Airplanes were and still are precise machines. They rely on specific measurements and equations to predict their success. As the concept of flight was studied further in the 1930’s, the issue of flutter, a vibration of the wing or tail mid-flight, arose (pg 511). Deadly if unaddressed, researchers aimed to find an equation to predict this variation. An equation was developed, but it was so complicated that the solving of it required the employment of math-savvy engineers to work together to find the answer. The computer revolutionized this process by allowing a method for any person to punch in the required numbers and let the computer do the work of actually solving the complex equation, simply spitting out an answer that would have taken man hours of work to find.

The computer was also pivotal in airplane manufacturing. Before its invention, the process of designing and building an airplane was extremely time consuming. Engineers created two dimensional models detailing every tiny screw and bolt of the plane, then the craftsmen would build a wooden model to test the design, and finally the model would progress to the actual end product, if no problems were found at each step. The computer, by the 1980’s, allowed for an engineer to input numbers into it and then the computer would show them a model of what their specifications would build. It was much easier for airplane craftsmen to build something that matched a computerized, three-dimensional design than a myriad of hand-drawn two-dimensional sketches.

The ways in which computers improved the processes of airplane design and manufacturing are only two of the incredible ways that computers impacted the aviation industry. The modern airplane cockpit has computers that control almost every aspect of the plane’s operation.