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OT: 1929 biplane blueprints needed for refurb

i_r_machinist

Titanium
Joined
Apr 12, 2007
Location
Dublin Texas
I traded some machine work for a ride in a biplane for me and my wife. Completely diferent sensation than being in an enclosure. Now I'm hooked! The guy runs an air museum over in Ranger Tx. and asked if I would be willing to do more trading and I said sure. He needs a cad drawing of the wing spars for a 1929 Travel Air 4000. He has a guy in south Texas that will cut them for him. I've been looking for a print on the net with poor results. TARA, Travel Air Restoration Association, seem to have disbanded a few years ago. I can always reverse engineer them, but would feel better knowing factory specs.
Anyone have biplane experience? Sources?
have fun
i_r_
 
I can always reverse engineer them, but would feel better knowing factory specs.
Anyone have biplane experience? Sources?
have fun
i_r_

"Indirectly".

Google "Tony Anger Baron von Anger".

I'd met him in his "civilian" clothes when I was flying. I had previously taken kids to the "Flying Circus" to watch him in his pseudo-WWI "German" costume putting on a show with another experienced pilot. Sort of "Snoopy vs the Black Baron", and great good fun many a Sunday.

But I mention him because my recollection is that not once, but TWICE, he was flying a home-built or kit-built biplane - not in a show - and suffered a significant wing failure in flight!

...and ... managed to side-slip into the damage to make a hard off-airport landing - but one that he and passenger survived with few or no injuries.

Helluva pilot?

Maybe not so good a builder?

My own flight instructor, CFII, AMELS, Air Transport, ex 40-Mile Air, and more, and the more experienced pilot yet, said that if Tony was REALLY that good, he would never have left the ground in either one of those two aircraft!

Best you ask Tony directly! He is on faceplant and such.
 
May want to give Brent Taylor a call at Antique Aircraft Association in Ottumwa IA. They have some tech info in their library, or possibly he knows some owners
 
I can always reverse engineer them, but would feel better knowing factory specs.

well, , even if you find "factory specs", I wouldn't necessarily consider them to be the "holy grail".

remember, this was built before we figured out how to really keep the wings on a plane. (well, by '29, we at least had a handle on it..) that was a pretty common type of failure on early aircraft, the builders not having even CONCEIVED of some of the things the barnstormers were doing with their craft.

Lincoln Beachey learned that the hard way in 1915, and had wing separation over San Francisco bay (in an early monoplane prototype, I think). didn't make it outta that predicament.
 
You might also contact the Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome, to see if they have any info, or can steer you to someone who has.
 
well, , even if you find "factory specs", I wouldn't necessarily consider them to be the "holy grail".

remember, this was built before we figured out how to really keep the wings on a plane. (well, by '29, we at least had a handle on it..)
Not as much as we needed to have. DeHavilland had issues until end-of-days.

F-W Condors could shed wings. Rockwell singles cracked their main spar with great regularity, Lockheed should most definitely have seen the Electra's "tear-the-wing-off oscillation" coming before it left the drawing board. So, too the "Vee tailed Doctor killer"'s vulnerability to deadly flutter from as minor an imbalance as a new paint job done unevenly.

What made flight possible for a great many of the aircraft of the ragwing era wasn't so much brilliance or extreme attention to build quality. It was simply the chasing of very low stress.

Folks learned a great deal 1903 - 1943, went into that war still using wood, still using doped fabric. That was changing, and changing FAST by then. One pioneer who had once reinforced a used JN-4's upper wing with black-iron gas pipe so he could outright shed a damaged lower wing must have learnt SOMETHING useful from it he could apply:

"https://militaryhistorynow.com/2015/04/20/the-jug-10-cool-facts-about-the-p-47-thunderbolt/"
 
I doubt if these plans will show geometric curve generation formula's. I would think they will just have a pretty picture of a cutaway view of what someone,at the time, thought looked like a nice curve that would work well.
Bill D.
 
Thanks for all the posts and links. After looking at some of the drawings of other planes from that era, I'm afraid Bill D. is right and I'm just going to end up with an "approximation" of a curve. Maybe thats why they put two wings on the things. I did get a link to a facebook group that flies them. I have not persued all the links yet. The hunt continues.
thanks and have fun!
i_r_
 
Thanks for all the posts and links. After looking at some of the drawings of other planes from that era, I'm afraid Bill D. is right and I'm just going to end up with an "approximation" of a curve. Maybe thats why they put two wings on the things. I did get a link to a facebook group that flies them. I have not persued all the links yet. The hunt continues.
thanks and have fun!
i_r_

NACA Langley "then", NASA and "many places" much later, did research on airfoil shapes and under what circumstances they worked best, wings and propellers alike, even streamlined bracing wire shapes - a vibration-reduction issue more than drag.

Spars and such need to support those shapes as a wing is "skinned", fabric, wood, OR metal.

FWIW, Orville Wright headed NACA when Dad - and Jim Webb - were still twenty-somethings.
I don't know when those airfoil shapes started being published. The 1931 or so "FST' was not NACA's first wind tunnel, only the first Full Scale Tunnel.

Once the research was published, most builders used a NACA airfoil # <such and such> shapes because only Langley had the FST and other test tunnels. It would be quite a while before builders had much of anything of their own to test with but "suck it and see". "Time slots" were scheduled on NACA tunnels, instead.

Those NACA shapes are still "out there", Big Bang onward, but are basicall end-on cross-section curves. The length of the wing, how it might taper (or not) and/or transition along its length from one NACA wing shape to another, hve good laminar flow characteristics, be "super critical" or not were all other matters, most of them awaiting higher speeds, loadings, and power that "biplanes' other than a Staggerwing Beech - or a fighter interceptor "pursuit" plane much cared about.

A good example for visual comparison is basically same-same airplane, different wings.

A Piper Cherokee with the short and stubby "Hershey Bar" wing had near-as-dammit identical shape full span, hence the nick-name.

The Cherokee Warrior on-up had a longer wing with a cranked taper outboard, were sometimes called "Cessna winged" Pipers.
 
Here is a neat shot from old dusty Burbank (at what would eventually become the B1 plant) - the gents at Lockheed are admiring their wood spar for one of the low wing retract ships like ORION - about 1933
 

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NACA Langley "then", NASA and "many places" much later, did research on airfoil shapes and under what circumstances they worked best, wings and propellers alike, even streamlined bracing wire shapes - a vibration-reduction issue more than drag.

Spars and such need to support those shapes as a wing is "skinned", fabric, wood, OR metal.

FWIW, Orville Wright headed NACA when Dad - and Jim Webb - were still twenty-somethings.
I don't know when those airfoil shapes started being published. The 1931 or so "FST' was not NACA's first wind tunnel, only the first Full Scale Tunnel.

Once the research was published, most builders used a NACA airfoil # <such and such> shapes because only Langley had the FST and other test tunnels. It would be quite a while before builders had much of anything of their own to test with but "suck it and see". "Time slots" were scheduled on NACA tunnels, instead.

Those NACA shapes are still "out there", Big Bang onward, but are basicall end-on cross-section curves. The length of the wing, how it might taper (or not) and/or transtion along its length from one NACA wing shape to another, hve good laminar flow characteristics, be "super critical" or not were all other matters, most of them awaiting higher speeds, loadings, and power that "biplanes' other than a Staggerwing Beech - or a fighter interceptor "pursuit" cared about.

A good example for visual comparison is basically same-same airplane, different wings.

A Piper Cherokee with the short and stubby "Hershey Bar" wing had near-as-dammit identical shape full span, hence the nick-name.

The Cherokee Warrior on-up had a longer wing with a cranked taper outboard, were sometimes called "Cessna winged" Pipers.

Thermite you know too much you must have read many things to be as wide a opining which you do.
Dont take me wrong I find your posts interesting, yet I do suggest you go fishing some to just have fun.
 
Thermite you know too much you must have read many things to be as wide a opining which you do.
Dont take me wrong I find your posts interesting, yet I do suggest you go fishing some to just have fun.

LOL!

Not as hard as it seems, nor as time-consuming. I'd guess it takes me about the same item to read ten thousand books as it takes the average guy to read but one thousand, so I've had LOTS of time to hunt, fish, fly, cook, eat well, sightsee, fix barns, cars, or houses, earn a crust, f . .'er "shag" in between turning pages!

Cheating in any case. Coupla hundred hours. 400 or so landings in PA28-180D and PA28-150, fewer than 8 hrs in a 172-RG, not a great deal more AA5B, and that's ALL of it for left-seat. Mind - it includes "Big Island" Hawaii circling, and a legally cleared low-level route up Hong Kong harbour, so.., always glad I rented, never owned.

Biplanes? Aerobatic rides as a passenger to decide whether I even WANTED to go for a license.

Scariest one was when I paid the fee and the barker at Flying Circus shouts out load clear down the flight line to a greying War Two bomber pilot who'd rebuilt himself a Boeing Stearman:

"Hey TEX! You got a paying customer! Put your parachute on and take one of your HEART PILLS!"

They ain't no Joyce stick in the front hole for flights with newbs who might mistake it for the grab rail on a roller-coaster.. Just an empty socket, down at deck level...so... sure hoped that heart pill was the right dosage!
:)

Highly recomend that as "starter", BTW.

If.. by the third flight, you are not well-past shutting OFF yer gut and too-damned-slow human sense of balance in the ears (we ain't birds) in favor of eyeballs on controls, wings, horizon and a primitive panel so as to grok what the guy in the back seat is doing to make those acrobatics HAPPEN? You WILL have trouble on "unusual attitude recovery". I simply annoyed some rather good instructors, instead by how rapidly I "got it", zero drama.

Earl: "Bill! You fly better under the hood on partial panel than most guys do full panel heads-up! How TF do you DO that?"

"Well, Earl, since all the hell you left me this go was the tachometer, VSI, and whiskey compass, I guess it must just be fewer damned DISTRACTIONS?"

:)
 
"remember, this was built before we figured out how to really keep the wings on a plane. "

Complete bullshit. The Fokker DVII of WWI (1917) was capable of over 10Gs with tapered box spars. 99.9%of the time the planes that shed wings, as in Lincoln Beachy, were generally being pushed past their intended design limits. As long as the wood isn't rotten, wooden wings are actually far superior to metal. They don't fatigue.

Chances are this Travel Air has simple spruce spars, just big huge boards stood on end. The challenge and expense is going to be finding big enough pieces of aircraft grade clear vertical grain quarter sawn sitka spruce to make those huge spars. I second the EAA, AAA and museum contacts. The info is out there somwewhere.
 
The folks who sell the stuff, Aircraft Spruce, Might be able to tell you where to find someone with the plans. I agree with ir, there ain't nothing like a real airplane. Round engines, tail wheels, open cockpits, OH YEAH!!! My first time, there was a small airport near our house. They did sky diving, gliders, the fun stuff. There had been a guy there with a WACO who gave aerobatic rides . I wanted one ( OK more than one). We drove up there and no WACO. There was a beautifully restored Stearman. It belonged to a guy with a carpet company and he towed banners advertising his business and wrote off all expense on his taxes. He said " aerobatic ride? No problem. $45 bucks for 4 maneuvers. Cheap bastard that I was back then, I said I only had 35 bucks. OK he says, lets go. Off we go and The stick was there, "don't touch it". A Stearman is a tough airplane but with the 220 HP continental it has to dive to get enough speed to do a loop and that was the first one. When he pulled back on the stick it was like some one had jumped from a building and landed on my shoulders. Next a 4 point roll, snap roll, and a slow roll. We landed and he says " if you can get your wife in here I'll take her around the field. So I convinced her, Probably couldn't do that today, and she was alarmed when they started strapping the chute on. Aerobatic flight requires all occupants to have a parachute. They laid it on thick, "it's never been used, we don't even know if it works", and she went around the field and back. Then he taxied to the fuel pump and put in over 48 bucks worth. I felt bad, a little.
 
I do not know much about hydrodynamics but I doubt if any mathematically developed curve is the ideal curve for a wing or anything else. A parabola is a perfect reflector if, there was really was a single point light source. Other then that I think hydrodynamics is more art with trial and error.
A simple problem would be the ideal shape for a bullets nose and look at the variations available.
Bill D
 
I do not know much about hydrodynamics but I doubt if any mathematically developed curve is the ideal curve for a wing or anything else. A parabola is a perfect reflector if, there was really was a single point light source. Other then that I think hydrodynamics is more art with trial and error.
A simple problem would be the ideal shape for a bullets nose and look at the variations available.
Bill D

The famous David Taylor Model Basin was a "wet" equivalent to NACA's wind tunnels.
And oh, is there EVER "math". Look up Prandtl-Meyer function. And its age.

FWIW odd surprises dept? Some humans did these things "in their head". Quite some years ago now, USS Constitution was soooo fully restored she was taken out for actual sea trials under full sail for a short while. "Instrumented", even.

"Super Frigate" Constitution proved considerably faster than all the modern science could explain.

Another part of the mystery was discovery of secret orders for 60,000 thinly clad "powder" bags. Made of lead, rather than linen or silk.

Paul Revere's metal works had made it possible for her and her sister ships to rapid reload a hot carronade with still glowing residue in the bore without wet-swabbing.

Product? ISTR she shattered one of her opponents from the "right up close and personal" range her quilt-bolted live-oak hull made safe-enough.....in well-under two wall-clock minutes of rapid fire. Iowa class of her age, and had not a lot of actual influence on the war.

Around 400 small privateers did that. Took fish right off English menus by selling every English watercraft as dared leave shore to buyers in France and Holland.

England had a lot of warships called "First Class". They could almost never be in the right place at the right time. It got hard to feed folks or move raw materials or finished goods by sea. Bad time to be snarled up that way, what with the cost of Bonaparte's wars still on the reckoning.

For all the battles and heroism, land and sea 1812-1815? As with Rome vs Carthage it was actually an economic war, Hannibal but a 13-year long distraction until Rome could strangle Carthage itself. One draw. One victory.
 
I do not know much about hydrodynamics but I doubt if any mathematically developed curve is the ideal curve for a wing or anything else. A parabola is a perfect reflector if, there was really was a single point light source. Other then that I think hydrodynamics is more art with trial and error.
A simple problem would be the ideal shape for a bullets nose and look at the variations available.
Bill D

Bill Gunston, who was a jet engine designer for Rolls Royce, describes the process. They first calculated the root, midpoint, and tip of a blade and did a spline to blend the three cross sections. Then they made the blades and used the test data to refine the program. After many iterations and greatly increased computer power, they were taking so many slices that it was effectively continuous and the blades did exactly what they were calculated to do.

In the homebuilt world, composites have allowed people to make shapes that were almost impossible during the fabric era and prohibitively expensive to form in the aluminum period. Interestingly, the new planes are almost the same shape as a goose's body. Millennia of trial and test results (like outrunning predators) came to the same conclusion.

The very early aircraft builders like the Wright brothers and Glenn Curtis used thin curved airfoils, which seems silly until you consider that the wind tunnels they had were slow and the wing shapes they developed were correct for the speed. I had the same problem trying to test an airfoil by holding it out a car window. Almost any shape acted like it was laminar flow. I finally realized that holding the airfoil and driving with the other hand, I wasn't getting up to highway speeds and was working at such a low Reynolds number that the flow stayed attached no matter what.

Re parabolas, I was once a consultant for a fiber light design. The existing design had a projection bulb that focused a small percentage of the light on the fiber optic bundle and wasted the rest on the case, in the process creating far more heat than was desirable. I explained over and over about capture angles and changes of the focused spot size with different reflectors but couldn't make a dent in them. The answer, and from a practical standpoint the only answer, was to find a bulb with a smaller filament.

Bill
 








 
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