Читать книгу The Rise of the Flying Machine - Hugo Byttebier - Страница 12

Henson and Stringfellow

The weight of the man-carrying machine was estimated by Cayley to be about 500 lbs, complete with engine and propeller. He thus arrived at a requirement of 10 hp for every 1000 lbs lifted. This fired the imagination of William Samuel Henson to such an extent that in 1843 he proposed an “Aerial Transit Company” bill in the House of Commons.

His object was the construction of a flying machine powered by a steam engine developing 25 to 30 hp and weighing over 600 lbs. The complete aeroplane would weigh about 3000 lbs with a wing surface of 6000 sq ft. This would, in Henson’s opinion, enable him to organize aerial transit to several distant points of the globe.

Henson’s proposals received a great deal of publicity but, if he had ever been given the green light to proceed with his Transit Company, the business would have floundered because of the lack of adequate power, as well as by the enormous surface requirement of the wing and the tail.

But Henson and his engineering associate John Stringfellow went to work anyway on small-scale models. If there is one thing that continually amazes the historian, it is the optimism with which the early pioneers tackled the host of difficulties that lay before them.

Henson realized that high steam pressures would be required so he set to and designed and built a model engine to work on a pressure of 100 lbs/sq in. After many discouraging years without result, Henson gave up in 1849, whilst Stringfellow continued alone and was at last able to build a small model steam engine which was said to produce about one-third hp for a weight of 13 lbs, including the steam generator.