Flying Machines: Construction and Operation | Page 6

the rear cell, which operated upon air already set in motion downward by the front cell, so nothing more was done with it, for it never occurred to the writer to try it as a kite and he thus missed the distinction which attaches to Hargrave's name.
Sir Hiram Maxim also introduced fore and aft superposed surfaces in his wondrous flying machine of 1893, but he relied chiefly for the lift upon his main large surface and this necessitated so many guys, to prevent distortion, as greatly to increase the head resistance and this, together with the unstable equilibrium, made it evident that the design of the machine would have to be changed.
How Lilienthal Was Killed.
In 1895, Otto Lilienthal, the father of modern aviation, the man to whose method of experimenting almost all present successes are due, after making something like two thousand glides with monoplanes, added a superposed surface to his apparatus and found the control of it much improved. The two surfaces were kept apart by two struts or vertical posts with a few guy wires, but the connecting joints were weak and there was nothing like trussing. This eventually cost his most useful life. Two weeks before that distressing loss to science, Herr Wilhelm Kress, the distinguished and veteran aviator of Vienna, witnessed a number of glides by Lilienthal with his double-decked apparatus. He noticed that it was much wracked and wobbly and wrote to me after the accident: "The connection of the wings and the steering arrangement were very bad and unreliable. I warned Herr Lilienthal very seriously. He promised me that he would soon put it in order, but I fear that he did not attend to it immediately."
In point of fact, Lilienthal had built a new machine, upon a different principle, from which he expected great results, and intended to make but very few more flights with the old apparatus. He unwisely made one too many and, like Pilcher, was the victim of a distorted apparatus. Probably one of the joints of the struts gave way, the upper surface blew back and Lilienthal, who was well forward on the lower surface, was pitched headlong to destruction.
Experiments by the Writer.
In 1896, assisted by Mr. Herring and Mr. Avery, I experimented with several full sized gliding machines, carrying a man. The first was a Lilienthal monoplane which was deemed so cranky that it was discarded after making about one hundred glides, six weeks before Lilienthal's accident. The second was known as the multiple winged machine and finally developed into five pairs of pivoted wings, trussed together at the front and one pair in the rear. It glided at angles of descent of 10 or 11 degrees or of one in five, and this was deemed too steep. Then Mr. Herring and myself made computations to analyze the resistances. We attributed much of them to the five front spars of the wings and on a sheet of cross-barred paper I at once drew the design for a new three-decked machine to be built by Mr. Herring.
Being a builder of bridges, I trussed these surfaces together, in order to obtain strength and stiffness. When tested in gliding flight the lower surface was found too near the ground. It was taken off and the remaining apparatus now consisted of two surfaces connected together by a girder composed of vertical posts and diagonal ties, specifically known as a "Pratt truss." Then Mr. Herring and Mr. Avery together devised and put on an elastic attachment to the tail. This machine proved a success, it being safe and manageable. Over 700 glides were made with it at angles of descent of 8 to 10 degrees, or one in six to one in seven.
First Proposed by Wenham.
The elastic tail attachment and the trussing of the connecting frame of the superposed wings were the only novelties in this machine, for the superposing of the surfaces had first been proposed by Wenham, but in accordance with the popular perception, which bestows all the credit upon the man who adds the last touch making for success to the labors of his predecessors, the machine has since been known by many persons as the "Chanute type" of gliders, much to my personal gratification.
It has since been improved in many ways. Wright Brothers, disregarding the fashion which prevails among birds, have placed the tail in front of their apparatus and called it a front rudder, besides placing the operator in horizontal position instead of upright, as I did; and also providing a method of warping the wings to preserve equilibrium. Farman and Delagrange, under the very able guidance and constructive work of Voisin brothers, then substituted many details, including a box tail for the dart-like tail which I used. This may have increased the resistance, but it adds to