Continued, page two. Kitty Hawk, 2002:
The engine was built in their bicycle shop in Dayton, put together by their mechanic,
Charles Taylor, according to their design.
It was extremely simple, gasoline powered, water cooled, and made to deliver up to 16 hp through a chain drive to a pair of contra-rotating propellers. Not bad for a couple of "small town tinkerers", right? Wrong. They did it mathematically. Neither man had more than a high school education, but it just didn't matter; they were men of genius.
But even geniuses get surprises; the one thing they hadn't counted on was the propeller. Since propellers had been used on ships for years, the brothers assumed the math had been done, so they saved it for last. When they finally got around to applying the concept to flight, they discovered at no propeller ever designed had been close to real efficiency. Further, the propeller they needed was, in fact, an airfoil. When they got that far, the rest pretty much fell into place.
While at Kitty Hawk, I talked with Darrell Collins, who's historian for the Wright Brothers National Memorial:
JS:"What happened here on that day?"
DC:"The Wright Brothers that morning made four successful powered flights..at 1035AM, Orville Wright flew 120 feet in 12 seconds..12 seconds to the stars.
Left: Takeoff point and landing markers.
They could have done the first flight inside of the C5A. Most of us could walk or run that far in less than 12 seconds; the other day, a man clocked his son running that distance in 7 seconds. But those short 12 seconds changed the world forever."
JS:"What was it like here that day?"
DC:"It was an overcast day, NE storms had blown in the night before. The winds were coming right off the Atlantic Ocean that morning.
Right: Darrel Collins.
"Gusts, nearly 30 mph with a wind chill factor of between 6 and 8 degrees that morning. The fellows who came over from the lifesaving station were all dressed in their heavy coats; the Wright Brothers were dressed in suit and ties for the occasion."
JS:"What kinda guys were they?"
DC:"They were pretty straight-laced fellas, no smoking, no drinking, no swearing. They were true scientists and engineers, even though they were self-taught. The Wright Brothers developed aerodynamics; they were visionaries and they were doers with dreams."
JS:"I read that Wilbur declared that no man could afford to have an airplane and a wife at the same time."
DC:"I think he said that when he was in Europe. When they became famous, women were just kinda throwing themselves at them."
JS:"Which must have been a surprise to them?"
DC:"Oh, yeah. They couldn't handle it." (Laughter)
But by that time, flight was fact and it was out of their hands altogther.
