LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, PRINTS & PHOTOGRAPHS DIVISION, (LC-DIG-PPPRS-00639) The First Practical Airplane Part II: The season of success H.G. FRAUTSCHY sing all they knew from the lie Taylor had been serving as their very hard to control. Picture. 105 flights made with the “airport manager,” overseeing and A couple of explanations are 1904 Flyer II, the Wrights participating in the construction needed at this point. Each flight completed the Flyer III of the 1904 and 1905 sheds, and was timed by the pilot, in this case Uover the winter of 1904-1905, using working on the revised engine de- Orville Wright, as well as at least the hardware and engine from the sign. Still using the basic horizontal one observer on the ground. For previous airplane. It took some time four-cylinder design they had used this event, Wilbur Wright timed the for the craft to be assembled, and for the 1903 Flyer, it could now flight, and Charlie (C.E.T.) made an poor weather hampered their start produce 16 hp and would eventu- observation about the current con- in 1905. By early summer of 1905, ally produce 20 hp during the 1905 ditions, presumably with an ane- they were ready to resume flying at season. At one point during testing mometer. It also mentions a 45 Huffman Prairie. it produced 22 hp for a short time. crosswind. The items in brackets With revisions to the machine, By June they were ready, and on denote sentence fragments added which they thought would cure June 23, they pulled the weight up from Orville’s diary. The troubles the pitch instability, the new craft to the top of the derrick, and Orville from the previous year continued weighed 850 pounds, including piloted the first attempt that Friday: to dog them, and the next day, an- enough water and fuel to run the Wilbur Wright’s Diary F, 1905, other type of accident took place. engine for an hour. To remedy the pages 1-3: Wilbur continued in his Diary F: odd characteristic they encountered Friday, June 23, 1905 While getting ready for first start when the airplane slid sideways in (1.) First flight. O.W. Time 9-1/2 the anchor stake was pulled from the a turn, they added a pair of vertical sec. WW. 8-3/4”, C.E. T. 76 Ft. ground and the machine ran down semicircular vanes between the for- wind [at 45° ]. Distance 272 ft. over the track with O.W. doubled over the ward rudders’ twin surfaces. ground. The left wind was struck in front handle riding backwards. For- They had built a new shed build- landing and four ribs were cracked at tunately no serious damage to man ing closer to the Simms Station in- rear left corner. [Power insufficient. or machine. terurban trolley rail stop that ran Missing explosions.*] The machine It was the second time the ma- along the road along the north- was fitted with two semicircular ver- chine’s restraining stake had got- west side of Huffman Prairie. Char- tical front vanes (7 sq. ft.), and was ten loose, and the Flyer had been 10 SEPTEMBER 2005 Lead Photo: The beginning of the tempted on July 14, 1905. that flying at speeds approaching flying season, 1905. Orville Wright Wilbur Wright’s Diary F, 1905, 35 to 40 mph could be dangerous, is at the controls of the Flyer III pages 6-7: but this accident was a close call, on June 23. Wilbur appears to be Friday, July 14, 1905 and they knew it. Amazingly, once running alongside, while Charlie Wind N.W. 6-7 miles [straight again Orville came out of the ac- Taylor stands to the far right. On ahead] cident with nothing more than the extreme right, the weight-driven (9.) First flight. O.W. Distance 568 bumps and bruises. They had to catapult derrick is visible. This is the ft. Time about 12 sec. Anem.—251 come up with a solution to the sta- first photograph taken by the Wrights meters. The machine seemed to steer bility problem that had persisted of that apparatus. With the engine all right laterally, but after attaining since December of 1903, or the un- developing a misfire, the flight lasted high speed began to undulate some- dulations they regularly encoun- only 9-1/2 seconds and covered 272 what and suddenly turned downward tered would prevent them from feet. The Flyer III was hard to control and struck at a considerable angle making an airplane that could be and landed heavily on the left wing, breaking front skids, front rudder, up- considered safe to fly. breaking four wing ribs. per front spar and about a dozen ribs, In the 1912 disposition men- and lower front spar and one upright. tioned in part I of this story, Wilbur pulled down the rail before one of The machine rolled over on front edge. wrote about the risk: the brothers was ready to fly. Both O.W. was thrown violently out though “In 1905 we built another machine times Orville leapt to the front of the broken top surface but suffered no and resumed our experiments in the the Flyer, and at least one time he injury at all. same field near Dayton, Ohio. Our par- depressed the lever for the forward In repairing machine a number of ticular object was to clear up the mystery rudder so the machine wouldn’t changes were made. F[ront] rudder in- which we had encountered on a few oc- rear up at the end of the rail and creased to about 84 ft. and placed 12 casions during the preceding year. Dur- smash itself into the prairie. ft. from front edge of machine. Turns ing all the flights we had made up to this While photos were taken that upward 31° and downward 26°. Total time we had kept close to the ground, day, the control difficulties ap- weight about 870 lbs. Owing to very usually within ten feet of the ground, peared to preoccupy the brothers, hard rain the field became flooded and in order that, in case we met any new as no other photos appear to have delayed us several weeks. and mysterious phenomenon, we could been taken until September. The That was it. make a safe landing. With only one life ninth flight of the season was at- Both brothers had long known to spend we did not consider it advisable LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, PRINTS & PHOTOGRAPHS DIVISION, (LC-DIG-PPPRS-00638) September 7, 1905. Flight 23. After suffering a nearly disastrous crash on July 17, the brothers completely redesigned the forward rudder (elevator), moving it further out in front of the machine and increasing its surface area. The changes paid off, and by this flight, they were able to control the airplane consistently. Orville made two complete circles with the Flyer III during a 2-minute, 45-second flight. VINTAGE AIRPLANE 11 had to endure the ever-increasing undulations that would end in an abrupt landing, which often meant repairs, some major, would have to be made. Their confidence in solv- ing the riddle began to relax them as well. In one entry concerning a flight on Wednesday, August 30, 1905, by Orville, Wilbur wrote that the flight was “A very comical performance.” Orville’s landing resulted in break- ing the ends of four wing ribs. There was one more problem that kept them from making even longer flights. Their accidents were not re- stricted to the problems with pitch stability. A curious loss of speed and a subsequent “arrival” in the hum- mock-filled pasture was still happen- ing with annoying frequency. LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, PRINTS & PHOTOGRAPHS DIVISION, (LC-DIG-PPPRS-00695) Wilbur wrote in his 1912 dispo- The 41st flight, the second of two flights on September 29, 1905. After the sition: Wrights’ warm-up flight of one circle in the morning, Torrance Huffman, the “The machine had reached the owner of the prairie the Wrights had borrowed for their flying experiments ground, in the peculiar cases I have in 1904 and 1905, was present for this flight, which lasted an astounding mentioned, too soon for us to deter- 14 circles of the field, traveling 19,570 meters in 19 minutes, 55 seconds, mine whether the trouble was due to according to Wilbur’s stopwatch time of Orville’s flight. The Flyer III averaged slowness of the correction or whether 36 miles per hour. Wilbur took 12 photographs of the flight, which lasted until it was due to a change of conditions, Orville ran the Flyer III’s gas tank dry. which would have increased in in- tensity, if it had continued, until the to attempt to explore mysteries at such more controllable. One other aspect machine would have been entirely great height from the ground that a fall of the flights proved to be noteworthy overturned and quite beyond the con- would put an end to our investigations enough that Wilbur felt it needed to be trol of the operator. Consequently, it and leave the mystery unsolved.” mentioned. At the end of his diary en- was necessary, or at least advisable, Even while keeping close to the try for that day, he jotted down, “Noth- to discover the exact cause of the phe- ground and rarely exceeding 20 feet ing broken in any of these three flights.” nomenon before attempting any high in altitude, accidents were happen- That was a big change from their previ- flights. For a long time we were un- ing on a regular basis to both O.W.