On this date in 1903...

[BlitzPig_EL]

 

Two bicycle makers from Dayton Ohio put a machine of their own making into the air.  The first aeroplane with true 3 axis control.

This act, which many today don't even recount, ushered in the true beginning of the 20th. century.

 

It also brought this group of crazies together to share in our passion for flight.

So, take some time to think about that today when you take to the digital sky.  We owe a lot to the Wrights, and all the other early aviation pioneers that looked to the sky and said, "Why not?"

 

 

[CanadaOne]

And look at all the trouble they started! ?

[ShamrockOneFive]

10 minutes ago, CanadaOne said:

And look at all the trouble they started! ?

So many forum arguments that they are responsible for ?

[firdimigdi]

2 hours ago, BlitzPig_EL said:

and all the other early aviation pioneers that looked to the sky and said, "Why not?"

 

And quite a few that looked down to the ground and said "oh ?".

Edited December 17, 2022 by Wardog5711
Replaced profanity

[DD_Arthur]

I didn’t realise they managed it in the middle of December.

I agree that in many ways this date could be viewed as the true start of the twentieth century.

As a reminder of what a spur to technology war is; on this day forty-four years later the B47 made its first flight too.

 

[DBFlyguy]

Sometimes you just have to stop and think how fast aviation has progressed in such a relatively short amount of time...

 

First Flight Airport (KFFA) which is right at the bottom of the Kitty Hawk monument was actually the first place I took the controls of an airplane several years ago!

 

 

On a related note of how fast aviation has advanced... this British Airways commercial....MY GOD this is so good! And that piano piece "The Aviators" by Helen Jane Long fits perfectly ?

 

 

[Gort]

Great book about their methodical effort and mindset is “The Wright Brothers” by David McCullough.

 

It was an amazing, challenging journey.

Edited December 17, 2022 by Gort

[Rjel]

Next time I go to the Air Force museum in Dayton, I'm going to set aside some time to visit the Wright Bros museum too.

[DD_fruitbat]

Not sure what it aays about humanity, but in 12 short years, went from first ever flight, to killing each other in them?

[danielprates]

18 minutes ago, DD_fruitbat said:

Not sure what it aays about humanity, but in 12 short years, went from first ever flight, to killing each other in them?

 

Axcktchually....  believe it or not but the first military use of airplanes was in this little known war:

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contestado_War

 

It happened a few hundred kms from my hometown and it has all the markings of a good Sergio Leone movie. Worth a read.

[Bonnot]

On 12/17/2022 at 8:30 PM, DBFlyguy said:

Sometimes you just have to stop and think how fast aviation has progressed in such a relatively short amount of time...

 

It could be interesting to compare the speed of the progress in real flight and in our Computers sims ...I have not the precise memory of it,  but I think  It took much time to move from the MS monochrome sim to something a bit recognizable....when 10 years changed Blériot to regular Channel crossings ?

[DD_fruitbat]

1 hour ago, danielprates said:

 

Axcktchually....  believe it or not but the first military use of airplanes was in this little known war:

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contestado_War

 

It happened a few hundred kms from my hometown and it has all the markings of a good Sergio Leone movie. Worth a read.

 

Interesting,  never heard of that conflict at all.

[AndyJWest]

1 hour ago, danielprates said:

 

Axcktchually....  believe it or not but the first military use of airplanes was in this little known war:

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contestado_War

 

It happened a few hundred kms from my hometown and it has all the markings of a good Sergio Leone movie. Worth a read.

 

Or maybe not. See This article, which states that Italy used aircraft in the Turko-Italian War, and on November 1st, 1911, one Second Lieutenant Giolio Gavotti dropped bombs onto a Turkish-held position. 

[Bonnot]

1 hour ago, danielprates said:

believe it or not but the first military use of airplanes was in this little known war:

 

I think there was also some Italian use of airplane in Cyrenaica in 1912 (???) , must check .

[AndyJWest]

Giolio Gavotti in a Farman, 1910. Not a lot of protection from gunfire. Or anything else...

 

From Wikipedia:

Quote

On 1 November 1911, he flew his early model Etrich Taube monoplane against Ottoman military in Libya. He took four grenades ("Cipelli") in a leather pouch, each of a size of grapefruit and weighing about four pounds. Flying at an altitude of 600 feet, Gavotti screwed in the detonators and tossed each munition over the side—three onto the Tagiura (Jagiura) oasis and one more onto military camp at Ain Zara. This event is the first recoded airstrike launched from an airplane.

Link

 

 

Edited December 19, 2022 by AndyJWest

[MAJ_stug41]

On 12/17/2022 at 1:54 PM, DD_Arthur said:

didn’t realise they managed it in the middle of December

The greater air density of a cooler day certainly helped

[RyanR]

On 12/17/2022 at 4:40 PM, Rjel said:

Next time I go to the Air Force museum in Dayton, I'm going to set aside some time to visit the Wright Bros museum too.

 

Same here. There's some really nice artifacts on display at the USAF museum as well. I got to claw around their Wright Military Flyer replica a bit for a project.

 

 

2 hours ago, Bonnot said:

 

It could be interesting to compare the speed of the progress in real flight and in our Computers sims ...I have not the precise memory of it,  but I think  It took much time to move from the MS monochrome sim to something a bit recognizable....when 10 years changed Blériot to regular Channel crossings ?

 

What were the first computer sims? I started in the 1980's with Falcon on an Atari ST. Can't remember much before that.

 

-Ryan

 

[DD_Arthur]

37 minutes ago, stug41 said:

The greater air density of a cooler day certainly helped

Hmmm…not quite sure that would have made too much difference at the kind of altitude they reached that day.?

[AndyJWest]

Just now, DD_Arthur said:

Hmmm…not quite sure that would have made too much difference at the kind of altitude they reached that day.?

 

I read an article somewhere that made fairly credible arguments that the original Wright Flyer was so marginal on power that it could only have flown under the specific conditions they did: cold air, and high pressure.

 

The Wright's real achievement wasn't so much their first flight, but what they were able to do within a few years. Their systematic approach enabled them not just to 'fly', but to build a practical flying machine. A need that few other aviation pioneers seem to have understood. Most seem to have assumed that one you got a contraption vaguely airborne you could sort out minor difficulties like being able to actually control it later.

[MAJ_stug41]

26 minutes ago, DD_Arthur said:

Hmmm…not quite sure that would have made too much difference at the kind of altitude they reached that day.?

They tried again the next day, when it was slightly warmer, and did not succeed.

[DD_Arthur]

Amazing. I didn’t realise it was that marginal.

 Got an idea on what I’ll be spending those book tokens on next week…..?

[danielprates]

3 hours ago, AndyJWest said:

 

Or maybe not. See This article, which states that Italy used aircraft in the Turko-Italian War, and on November 1st, 1911, one Second Lieutenant Giolio Gavotti dropped bombs onto a Turkish-held position. 

 

You bet. It is a disputed claim. I thought it irresistible to mention it since it happened in my backyard but there is no consensus. You can throw in many angles: what is "first military use"? Recon flights? Shooting at someone? Being shot by someone? Air combat? Air to ground fire? Ground to air? In the example I mentioned, for instance, those were unarmed aircraft.

[AndyJWest]

I think part of the problem may have been that the Wright's engine lost significant power as it warmed up:

Quote

Upon starting, it delivered sixteen horsepower, but after turning over for a minute or two, the preheated air entering the cylinders expanded so greatly that output typically dropped to about twelve horsepower.

From Visions of a Flying Machine: The Wright Brothers and the Process of Invention by Peter L. Jakab - an excellent book on how the Wright's systematic approach produced the results it did.

 

The engine was a fairly simple design, with no carburettor, and cooling reliant on a one-way flow from a small water tank. The Wright's came up with improvements later, but they'd calculated that even twelve horsepower would do the job. It did, but only just...

 

 

Edited December 19, 2022 by AndyJWest

[BlitzPig_EL]

If you go the the National Museum of the USAF at Wright Field, you can see an actual Wright built wind tunnel that they used to crack the nut of powered flight.

 

Their propellers were remarkably efficient, it was that hand made engine that was the issue, as mentioned.  There was simply no suitable engine available in 1903 for them to use "off the shelf".  Auto engines of the day were all focused on reliability and hence were grossly over weight for use in an aircraft.

[Rjel]

As someone else mentioned about how quickly aviation advanced, seeing a replica of the Wright flyer and contrasting that with even a mid WW1 aircraft let alone end of war machines, the technological advances in the first two decades of flight is absolutely incredible. After centuries of mankind dreaming of flight, then realizing it in less than 20 years truly demonstrates the potential of mankind. I still believe our future is bright. Hopeful anyway.