A message on the development of aeronautics. History of aeronautics
People have always looked at the sky and dreamed of free flight. The wings of Icarus, the stupa of Baba Yaga, a flying carpet, a winged horse, a flying ship, a motor with a Carlson propeller and the Nimbus 2000 broom of the young wizard Harry Potter - countless myths and fairy tales reflect the centuries-old dream of man - to rise into the air.Russian Icari
The history of the first experiments in aeronautics traditionally begins with the Greek myth of Icarus, who scorched his wings made of feathers and wax in the sun. For a very long time, inventors tried to take to the air, always equipping their designs with bird wings. The experiments of the first Russian aviators aroused the wrath of the supreme rulers and the church. “Man is not a bird, he does not have wings. This is not God’s work, but from evil spirits,” said Ivan the Terrible in the 16th century after observing the flight of the slave Nikita on homemade wooden wings. Nikita's head was cut off and his wings were burned, but people continued their attempts: 100 years later, in the 70s of the 17th century, the archer Ivan Serpov made large wings and “wanted to fly, but only rose 7 arshins (5 meters), somersaulted in the air and fell on the ground". And in 1729, a Ryazan blacksmith took off. He put long soft wings strung on wire on his sleeves, on his legs, on his head. He flew for a short time, and when he went down to the roof of the church, he received curses from the local priest, who also burned his homemade wings.
18th century hot air balloon and helicopter
In 1731, according to documents from the office of the Ryazan governor, clerk Kryakutnoy made a ball, literally: “like a big ball, he inflated it with foul and stinking smoke, made a loop from it, sat in it and the evil spirit lifted it higher than a birch tree, and then hit it on the bell tower , but he grabbed the rope, which is what they call, and remained alive."
It turns out that the Russian self-taught inventor flew in a hot air balloon 52 years before the creators of the balloon, the Montgolfier brothers.
Of course, not only talented enthusiasts, who often lacked education, but also real scientists were studying the possibility of flight. The great Russian naturalist M.V. Lomonosov not only for the first time substantiated the principles of flight of bodies heavier than air, but also in 1754 built a model of a helicopter (helicopter) powered by a clock spring.
From balloons to airplanes
In the summer of 1783, in the French city of Annonay, the Montgolfier brothers launched a balloon filled with hot air, made of linen and paper. Animals became the first air passengers, and in the fall of the same year, a hot air balloon lifted the first people to the sky
The first Russian to fly in a hot air balloon as a passenger in the balloon of the Frenchman Andre Garnerin was Infantry General S.L. Lvov in 1803. And the first Russian aeronaut was the staff physician I.G. Kashinsky, who made an independent flight over Moscow in 1805. Balloons reigned supreme in the skies for almost 100 years. They were the only means of air transportation. Their design was improved, they began to use hydrogen instead of warm air, and rubber instead of fabric and paper. Then hot air balloons were equipped with gas burners, which heated the air inside the balloon and allowed them to fly longer and higher. However, scientists were never able to make a controlled balloon. The balloon flew only where the wind was blowing. Even the advent of airships - balloons with engines - did not solve all the problems. They turned out to be too slow, clumsy and unreliable.
Alexander Mozhaisky - creator of the first Russian aircraft
The invention and improvement of the steam engine led to attempts to create aircraft with a steam engine. In 1881, naval officer Alexander Fedorovich Mozhaisky, observing the flights of birds and kites, was able to determine the size of the lifting area of the aircraft and created working models of the aircraft. In the summer of 1882, at a test field in Krasnoye Selo near St. Petersburg, Mozhaisky’s plane separated from the ground and flew some distance. For the first time in the world, an aircraft with a person on board was able to take off! The famous American aircraft designers, brothers Wilbur and Orville Wright, made their first flight only in 1903.
The works of Russian scientists N.E. Zhukovsky and S.A. Chaplygin, who laid the theoretical foundations of aerodynamics, played a huge role in the development of world aviation. “The Father of Russian Aviation” Nikolai Egorovich Zhukovsky, the author of more than 220 scientific works, wrote: “A man will fly relying not on the strength of his muscles, but on the strength of his mind.”
20th century - the century of aviation
Thanks to scientific achievements and the growth of technological progress at the beginning of the 20th century, the design of the first aircraft was constantly improved, and pilots set more and more records. If the first flights lasted no more than a minute, then by 1908 the planes stayed in the air for more than two hours.
Russian engineers and designers developed new airplanes that were in many ways superior to foreign models.
Suffice it to name the biplanes of Y.M. Gakkel, the flying boats of D.P. Grigorovich and the multi-engine heavy aircraft of I.I. Sikorsky “Russian Knight” and “Ilya Muromets”, which opened the way for transport aviation. In the photo below, the BIS-1 aircraft of Igor Sikorsky: Already in 1922, the Central Airfield was opened on Khodynskoye Field in Moscow, and a year later the first passenger airline Moscow-Nizhny Novgorod began operating. In the 1920-1930s, designers designed the first Soviet military and civil aircraft, such as Polikarpov's famous U-2 "maize" aircraft.
During World War II
With the active participation of S.V. Ilyushin, the Il-4, Il-28 bombers and Il-2, Il-10 attack aircraft were born. V.M. Petlyakov - Pe-2, Pe-8 bombers. The famous fighters MiG-1, MiG-3 (pictured) were built with the participation of aircraft designers A.I. Mikoyan and M.I. Gurevich. The design bureau (KB) of A.S. Yakovlev developed the best fighters of the Great Patriotic War - the Yak-1, Yak-9, Yak-3 (pictured),
Even the founder of astronautics, Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky, predicted that propeller-driven airplanes would be replaced by jet airplanes. The second half of the twentieth century completely confirmed the guess of the brilliant scientist. The development of science and technology has made it possible to create reliable jet aircraft engines.
Russian aviation in peacetime
After the Second World War, design bureaus began to actively develop aircraft for civil aviation. In 1955, the team of A.N. Tupolev’s design bureau made the world’s first jet passenger aircraft, the TU-104 brand. The design bureau under the leadership of O.K. Antonov developed a number of transport aircraft of the An series. The most famous of them is the An-2 light transport aircraft. Yakovlev Design Bureau created the Yak-42 passenger aircraft for short-haul and local airlines in our country.
Interesting records:
The fastest passenger airliner is the Tu-144, whose maximum flight speed reaches 2587 km/h (for example, the maximum speed of the European Concorde is 2333 km/h). The heaviest aircraft is the AN-225 Mriya, its standard take-off weight reaches 600 tons; with a crew of 7 people, it lifted a load of 156,300 kg. to a height of 12410 meters.
Since time immemorial, man has followed the flight of birds, dreaming, like them, to rise into the sky. Logic dictated that if the relatively weak muscles of birds could lift them into the air and maintain flight, man, with his much stronger muscles, could also do it. No one suspected how complex the combination of the functions of muscles and tendons, the work of the heart and the respiratory system is in an ordinary bird. No one could imagine any other device for flight than a moving wing of variable curvature. For thousands of years, people have tried to fly like birds, and countless lives have been lost in such attempts.
The name of the first “bird-man”, who put on wings and jumped from a cliff with the intention of flying, has not been preserved for centuries. Each failed attempt asked the ancient balloonists new and new questions. Why don't wings powered by hand flapping work? What's wrong with them? Philosophers, scientists, and inventors proposed various solutions, but no one managed to provide a person with wings that would allow him to rise into the air and soar like a bird. Leonardo da Vinci filled the pages of his notebooks with sketches of various flying machines, but his ideas still had the same common flaw - adherence to the principle of “bird-like” wings (Fig. 1-1).
In 1655, mathematician, physicist and inventor Robert Hook came to the conclusion that human muscular strength was not enough to fly with the help of artificial wings. He concluded that some additional driving force is required for flight.
The search for a solution went in different directions. In 1783, brothers Joseph and Etienne Montgolfier first tested a balloon filled with hot air with a person on board. The ball stayed in the air for 23 minutes. Ten days later, Professor Jacques Charles took to the skies in a balloon filled with gas. Balloons captured the attention of the public so much that for a long time flights were associated exclusively with lighter-than-air devices. But for all its splendor, the balloon was nothing more than a large piece of fabric, flying wherever the wind blew.
Hot air balloons finally allowed man to take to the air, but this was only one of many problems that balloonists had to solve. The balloon did not allow you to control the speed and direction of flight. This problem was solved by a kite, a toy that had been known in the East for more than two millennia, but appeared in the West only in the 13th century. Even in ancient China, snakes were used to survey the area and determine the direction of the wind in navigation (in the human-controlled version), as well as as signaling devices and for entertainment (in the uncontrolled version). Observing the movement of a kite has made it possible to answer many questions regarding the possibility of flight of heavier-than-air devices.
One of those who believed that experiments with kites would help unlock the secrets of controlled aeronautics was Sir George Cayley. Born in England ten years before the flight of the Montgolfier brothers, Cayley spent his life developing a heavier-than-air vehicle equipped with kite-shaped wings (Fig. 1-2). Dubbed the “father of aeronautics,” Cayley discovered the basic principles on which modern aviation is based, built a working model of an aircraft, and even tested the first human-piloted airplane in history.
For fifty years after Cayley's death, scientists and inventors worked towards creating a powered flying car. Thus, the English inventor William Samuel Henson designed a huge monoplane, which was driven by a steam engine located inside the fuselage. The German engineer Otto Lilienthal proved in practice that human flight in a heavier-than-air apparatus is possible. And finally, the dream was realized by Wilbur and Orville Wright in the American city of Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, on December 17, 1903.
The Wright brothers, owners of a bicycle shop, spent four years experimenting with kites, a homemade wind tunnel, and various engines for their biplane. Their significant achievement was a scientific rather than a purely practical approach to solving a problem. The Flyer biplane created by the brothers was an example of bold design and brilliant engineering (Fig. 1-3). On that historic day, the Wright brothers made four flights, spending a total of 98 seconds in the air. The era of aviation has begun.
Today we will talk about the first step of humanity in the development of the “Fifth Ocean” - the Earth’s atmosphere, i.e. about invention of the hot air balloon.
Despite the fact that the history of aeronautics goes back a little over two hundred years, man’s desire to break away from the Earth and fly up like a bird manifested itself in ancient times.
The most important event that influenced the development of aeronautics was the discovery and research by Henry Cavendish in 1766 of hydrogen, or, as it was called then, “combustible air.” Due to its low density, it was immediately considered as a carrier gas for balloons.
In 1783, Joseph and Etienne Montgolfier's observations of clouds led them to the idea of using water vapor for a balloon (see also). But the first experiments were unsuccessful due to the shell being too heavy and the steam condensing quickly. Then they decided to use the smoke generated by burning wool and damp straw. According to the brothers, smoke had electrical properties, and they attributed to electricity the ability to be repelled from the surface of the earth.
After a series of failures, success came - one shell, filled with smoke, broke away from the holding ropes and rose to a height of about 300 meters. After ten minutes in the air, the shell collapsed to the ground.
On June 5, 1783, the new apparatus was officially tested. In the presence of spectators, a smoke-filled shell with a volume of 600 m 3 rose to a height of about two thousand meters and then fell at a distance of two kilometers from the place of rise. Thus began the era of aeronautics.
On August 27, 1783, Professor Charles' balloon flight took place in Paris. Unlike the Montgolfier apparatus with a fabric chamber lined with paper on the inside, Charles's balloon was made of silk impregnated with rubber. Its volume was 35 m 3. But the main difference was that the shell was filled with hydrogen. Charles's apparatus quickly rose to a height of 950 meters and disappeared into the clouds. Due to excess pressure at high altitude, its shell burst; the villagers, frightened by an incomprehensible object that fell from the sky, hastened to destroy the ball.
After this flight, balloons filled with hot air or smoke began to be called hot air balloons, and those filled with hydrogen - charliers.
On September 19, 1783, a hot air balloon with a cage suspended on chains took off into the air. It contained the first “balloonists” - a rooster, a duck and a ram. They survived the flight safely. Now it has become possible to lift a person in a balloon.
On November 21, 1783, Pilatre de Rozier and Arland took off in a hot air balloon. Their device, having covered 8 kilometers, landed in the suburbs of Paris. During the flight, they almost died due to a fire.
On November 1 of the same year, Professor Charles, together with like-minded Robert, took off in a balloon of his own design. They stayed in the air for 2 hours and 15 minutes, flying 40 kilometers during this time.
It should be noted that the design of the charlier was more advanced than the hot air balloon. The first had greater lifting force. In addition, the disadvantage of the hot air balloon was the high fire hazard due to the proximity of open fire and a flammable shell.
Hot air balloon flights became increasingly popular. Since the beginning of the 19th century, they began to be used for scientific purposes.
In 1887, D.I. Mendeleev made an independent flight to observe a solar eclipse.
In the first scientific flights, aeronauts managed to rise to a height of seven thousand meters or more.
In 1894, the German Berson in the Phoenix balloon rose to a height of 9150 meters, and in 1900, during the World Exhibition in Paris, the Frenchmen de la Vaux and Costellon in the Centaurus balloon covered a distance of 1922 kilometers in 35 hours 45 minutes, landing in the Kyiv province.
In the 20–30s of the XX century. stratostats were created - balloons with a sealed gondola for studying the upper layers of the atmosphere. They reached a height of 20 kilometers.
Currently, balloons have found application in meteorology for launching automatic weather stations to high altitudes. The advent of modern durable gas-tight materials and gas burners, which allow maintaining a high temperature inside the balloon for a long time, made it possible to create balloons for sports purposes.
The invention of the hot air balloon allowed humanity to begin the journey of mastering the atmosphere of our planet and preparing for space exploration.
For better assimilation of the material presented, we suggest watching a video about the history of the invention of the Hot Air Balloon and the first flight of a man in a hot air balloon.
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The jubilation with which the invention of the balloon by the Montgolfier brothers was greeted was soon replaced by a pragmatic and sober analysis of the prospects for the development of aeronautics. Already after the first test ascent of Pilâtre de Rosier on a tethered hot air balloon, performed on October 15, 1783, Joseph Montgolfier thought about the possibility of controlling the movement of a balloon, but very soon came to the conclusion that it was not so simple. In his letter to brother Etienne, he writes: “Please, my good friend, think, calculate carefully: if you use oars, you will need to make them either small or large; if they are large, they will be heavy; if they are small, then the smaller they are, the faster they will need to be moved. Let’s do the calculation on a ball with a diameter of 100 feet...” And, having done the calculation, he comes to the conclusion that the strength of 30 people, who cannot withstand even 50 minutes of continuous work without rest, is not enough to do two miles per hour. “I see no other valid means of control,” continues Joseph, “except by studying the various currents of air; It’s rare that they don’t change in height.” It is surprising that this idea was expressed at a time when there was practically no information about the movement of air masses and layers.
At the initial stage of airspace exploration, the idea of controlling the movement of a balloon using oars was very common. One of the first aeronauts who tried to solve the problem of controlling a balloon using these simple devices was the Frenchman Blanchard, who made his first attempt on March 2, 1784 on the Champ de Mars in Paris.
On April 25, 1784, Guyton de Morveau and his friend, de Verly, took to the air in a balloon that was specially designed for conducting experiments in control. Four oars, two sails and a rudder were attached to the equator of the ball, which were driven from the gondola using ropes. The gondola itself also had oars. Half of these devices failed during the climb, but both balloonists were confident that they managed to control the balloon in a targeted manner. On June 12 of the same year, in order to continue the experiments, friends (Abbé Bertrand was also with them) ascended to Dijon in the Dijon Academy balloon, equipped with oars and a rudder. The maximum they achieved was a slight rotation around the balloon’s own axis.
On October 16, 1784, Blanchard tested in the air the operation of a six-bladed propeller, which was installed in the gondola of the Charlier balloon and was driven manually, and became convinced of its ineffectiveness. Along with Blanchard on this flight was the English aeronaut James Sadler, who got off the gondola halfway through the flight.
One of the most serious attempts at controlled flight was made by the directors of a large chemical raw materials factory, Alban and Valle. In their experiments, they used a balloon in the gondola of which a four-bladed propeller, similar to the wings of a windmill, was installed. “In calm weather,” Alban and Valle later said, “we were able to move the balloon in different directions within the factory territory, and even sometimes make a circle.” On one of the flights they landed at the royal palace in Versailles, and in the presence of Louis XVI made three controlled descents and ascents without releasing gas or dumping ballast. However, despite all the efforts of the aeronauts, even a slight breeze negated their attempts to resist it.
Physicists, Abbé Miolan and de Janin, proposed using the reaction of a stream of hot air emerging from the side hole of the shell, but this attempt ended in fire. Blanchard's competitor in fair balloon performances, Testu-Brissy, used multi-blade paddle mill wheels, which did not produce any results.
Along with these, even imperfect projects at that time, there were also ingenious technical solutions that anticipated a number of basic ideas for future airship construction. An example of this is the idea of General Meunier, which he outlined in his report to the French Academy of Sciences back in 1783, when he was then a lieutenant.
From the first tests of hot air balloons, which proved the possibility of man rising into the air, Meunier was inflamed by the idea of controlled aeronautics. It can be said with all certainty that it became the motivating motive for his entire future life. He, as befits an engineer, approached the solution to this problem systematically. First of all, Meunier examined the shape of the balloon shell and came to the absolutely correct, from the point of view of aerodynamics, conclusion - it should be elongated. Further, Meunier noticed that when the balloon ascends and descends, its shell changes its shape, and dents often form on its surface. As a result, he came up with the decision to cover the shell with the carrier gas with another shell, called a ballonet, and pump air into the gap between them. The ballonet ensured the maintenance of a constant shell shape and, in addition, could be used to control movement in height (this became known later). In his research on optimizing the design of a controlled balloon, Meunier found that the gondola suspension system that existed at that time required serious modification. The gondola, according to Meunier, should form a single whole with the shell, or at least be connected to it as rigidly as possible. To carry out the forward movement of the balloon, Meunier proposed using air currents of the appropriate direction, which could be caught during the vertical movements of the balloon. In addition, with the help of three propellers located between the shell and the gondola and driven by the muscular power of the crew members, Meunier hoped to move the balloon in a direction perpendicular to the movement of the wind. One can only be amazed at how the talented engineer Meunier completed his research with a complete project - his ideas laid the practical basis for the creation of controlled balloons, and this is his historical merit.
In 1789, a dragoon officer, Baron Scott, published in Paris a design for a controlled balloon, the shell of which had an elongated fish-shaped shape. According to the Baron's idea, by changing the angle of inclination (trim) of the shell to the incoming air flow, it was possible to achieve movement of the apparatus in the horizontal direction. This was the first, not yet realized (intuitive) proposal to use the lifting force effect. The author of the project intended to tilt the device and move it vertically using three ballonets placed inside the shell.
In 1799, an extremely funny essay by the Austrian Jacob Kaiserer appeared: “On my invention to control a balloon with the help of eagles.” It must be said that this idea was quite popular among dreamers - even at the beginning XX century, one German “aeronautics researcher”, with tenacity worthy of other uses, defended his project of using trained pigeons for these purposes.
In 1812, Viennese watchmaker Jacob Degen built an aircraft that combined a hot air balloon and wings attached to a gondola. On June 10, Degen made a long flight in Paris, during which he worked intensively with his wings as much as he could. He was absolutely sure that the device obeyed his will, but eyewitnesses unanimously stated the opposite and nodded towards a tailwind. In October of the same year, the restless Degen decided to repeat the experiment and widely advertised it in the press. On the appointed day, a huge crowd of spectators gathered at the launch site. For some unknown reasons, most likely, the balloon was poorly prepared for flight; the device was unable to take off from the ground. No matter how hard Degen tried to lift him into the air with the help of his wings, it was all useless. The aeronaut was cruelly ridiculed by the public.
In 1825, the French physicist Edmond-Charles Guenet, who emigrated to America during the revolution, published a design for a rather interesting controlled balloon. The device moved with the help of two large wheels, like mill wheels, driven by two horses. Thus, the author for the first time pointed out the possibility of using muscular strength much greater than that of humans. In addition to the crew and horses, the gondola housed a device for producing hydrogen, which was necessary to compensate for gas losses during the flight.
In 1834, a concrete attempt was made to implement the idea of General Meunier. The physician Berrier of Le Havre and the Earl of Lennox teamed up in an effort to build a large controllable balloon. Soon Berrier, convinced of the futility of the project, retired. However, the count did not think of giving up. He prepared and published a project for the Eagle airship, whichhad to be set in motionpassengers. By mid-August 1834, the balloon was ready for testing. Early in the morning of August 17, the Eagle was taken to the launch site on the Champ de Mars. During transportation, a gust of wind seriously damaged the shell, which required a lot of time to repair it. A large, excited crowd of people gathered for this interesting spectacle and demanded an immediate rise. When it became clear that the flight demonstration might not take place, the crowd broke through the barrier and, smashing everything around, destroyed the balloon. Powerless before the fury of the crowd, Earl Lennox silently watched the collapse of his hopes.
The balloon, built in 1839 by the aeronaut Eubryo, had one interesting feature, which in the future became standard for devices of soft and semi-rigid construction. The shell had an asymmetrical shape with a thickening of the front part. Two “mill” wheels, driven by crew members, were used as propulsion. In October 1839, Eubryo attempted to make a controlled flight, but this venture ended in complete failure.
The first real results in the use of mechanical propulsion were demonstrated on a model of a controlled balloon, which was built in 1850 by the Parisian watchmaker Julien. His apparatus consisted of an elongated spindle-shaped shell 7 m long, to which a small gondola was suspended by means of a net. The mover, which was a compressed spring like a clockwork, rotated two propellers located on the sides of the shell in its front part. On November 6, on the territory of the Paris hippodrome, in the presence of a few spectators, Julien tested his device. The press promptly responded to this event: “At three o’clock in the afternoon, Mr. Julien demonstrated, first in the arena, and then in the amphitheater of the hippodrome, a small elongated balloon with a simple mechanism. The device moved briskly in the right direction. For an arena sheltered from the wind, this behavior of the balloon was quite understandable and did not cause much delight. Our surprise surpassed all imaginable boundaries when the apparatus, in the open air, easily changing its flight direction, successfully moved against a strong southwest wind.” The director of the hippodrome promised Julien to help him build a larger machine, but did not keep his word.
Here we should briefly touch upon, how shall I put it, the technical requirements for an engine that is minimally suitable for the purposes of controlled flight of a balloon. We will not delve into the calculations, but will only say that in order to give a balloon with a volume of 1500 m 3 and a cross-sectional area of 40 m 2 a speed of 7 m/sec, an engine with a power of at least 8 hp is required. With. In those days, a steam engine of such power weighed (including the boiler) no less than 1000 kg, so our balloon simply could not lift, along with the weight of the apparatus itself and the crew, such a weight.
In 1850, the French mechanical engineer Henri Giffard made an unexpected announcement that he had managed to create a steam engine weighing 48 kg (without a boiler) and producing 5 hp. s., and he intends to begin construction of a controlled balloon. The aircraft project he created together with the young engineers David and Sciam was a step back compared to the advanced ideas that Meunier proposed. Giffard rejected the need for a ballonet - perhaps this was caused by the desire to make the design of the balloon as light as possible. The length of the airship was 44 m, the largest diameter was 12 m, and the volume was 2500 m 3. The entire design of the aircraft was quite primitive for its time, but Giffard did not strive for perfection. The main task was to test a steam engine, which was located in a gondola on a special platform, and make a controlled flight. Together with the boiler, the engine weighed 160 kg and had a power of 3 liters. With. On September 24, 1852, the first flight was made at the Paris hippodrome, which fully confirmed the calculations of the talented inventor. On this flight, Giffard could not even return to the starting point. However, he managed to turn the balloon around and move perpendicular to the wind.
In 1855, he built another controlled balloon, which was equipped with the same engine. In order to reduce air resistance, the diameter of the shell was reduced to 11.2 m. At the same time, in order to maintain the required volume (4440 m3), its length had to be increased (78 m), which led to an increase in air friction force and “ate up” the gain from the reduction in force air resistance. This was convincingly demonstrated during the first test flight. A slight breeze was blowing and the balloon, on board of which were Giffard and Gabriel Ion, successfully resisted it for some time. Then the wind intensified, and the device began to drift away from the launch site. Giffard decided to sit down. During descent, the long shell lost its elasticity and unexpectedly wrinkled (the lack of a ballonet had an effect). The carrier gas collected at one of its ends, causing the entire structure to tilt dangerously. The mesh with the gondola attached to it slipped off the shell and fell to the ground, and the lightweight shell, rising at high speed, disappeared into the clouds. Due to the fact that the accident occurred close to the ground, the aeronauts in the gondola were practically unharmed.
Giffard's projects were the first truly successful attempts to build controlled balloons capable of moving through the air at the will of the aeronaut. With Giffard's controlled balloon, which can rightfully be called an airship, a new stage in the history of aeronautics begins - the stage of the use of mechanical engines.
Despite the fact that the scientific and technological progress of that time, and the first encouraging experiments of Giffard, prepared good ground for the further development of controlled aeronautics, enthusiasts of using muscular power for these purposes have not yet died out. During the siege of Paris, naval engineer Stanislas Dupuy de Lôme, born in 1816, creator of the first ironclad, presented the government with a project for an airship, with the help of which he proposed to establish reliable communication between the capital and the rest of France. The plan was approved and 40,000 francs were allocated for its implementation.
The design of the airship had undoubted continuity with the ideas of General Meunier, and therefore was more advanced compared to Giffard’s projects. First of all, Dupuy de Lome, mindful of Giffard’s failure, used a ballonet in the shell design, with which it was possible to maintain the constant shape of it. The gondola was suspended from the mesh, firmly attached to the so-called catenary belt of the shell, using two special sling systems. The new diagonal method of hanging the gondola turned out to be extremely successful. It eliminated the possibility of the mesh slipping off the shell and gave the entire structure of the apparatus the necessary strength and stability.
The volume of the airship shell was 3500 m 3, its length was 36.1 meters, and its largest diameter was 14.8. This rather impressive structure was supposed to be driven by a giant propeller with a diameter of 9 m, which was supposed to be rotated by eight people, developing a total power of about two horsepower, while the speed of the propeller was 21 rpm. Such power, as we already know, was clearly not enough to implement the planned plan, but the enthusiasm of the defenders of Paris was so enormous that no one paid attention to such a “trifle.” During a test flight on February 2, 1872, the airship reached a speed of only 2.5 m/sec. Nevertheless, the constructive ideas of Dupuy de Loma were very fruitful and played a significant role in the further development of airship construction. In modern soft balloons and airships, catenary suspension, proposed by Dupuy de Lom and improved over time, is widely used.
In 1870, the German engineer Paul Henlein put forward a design for an airship, in which some promising ideas were implemented. First of all, Henlein gave the airship shell, made of rubberized fabric, a very perfect form from the point of view of aerodynamics: a cylinder with pointed ends. Henlein's excellent idea was to place the rigid frame (the prototype of the keel truss) in close proximity to the shell, and to bring the gondola as close to the frame as possible. This solution made it possible to give the entire structure of the airship greater rigidity and improve its response to the rudder.However, the main advantage of the airship was the four-cylinder gas engine of the Lenoir system. The fuel used in this engine was illuminating gas, which was taken directly from the shell of the airship. In December 1872, Henlein made several flights on his airship near Brno (Moravia), in one of which a speed of 5.2 m/sec was achieved, exceeding everything previously achieved. Lack of funds forced the inventor to refuse to continue his work.
In France they went their own way. In 1883, the famous aeronauts Tissandier brothers, having hardly collected 50,000 francs, decided to build an airship, based on the design of Dupuy de Loma, and equip it with a Siemens dynamo, which could develop a power of 1.5 liters. With. The current consumed by the engine was generated by a battery of batteries weighing about 200 kg. On October 8, 1883, the first flight was made, which, as one would expect, ended in failure.
The commander of the Central Aeronautical Park in Chalet-Meudon, Captain Charles Renard, his brother Paul and Renard's assistant Krebs systematically approached the creation of their airship. First of all, they conducted a study of the configuration of the airship shell and came to the absolutely correct conclusion that it should be asymmetrical (“fish-shaped”) in shape. The volume of the shell was 1860 m 3 , length - 50.4 m, maximum diameter - 8.4 m. A ballonet with a volume of 438 m 3 was built into the shell. An electric motor with a power of 9 liters was placed in the middle of the gondola. With. and a battery of batteries. In addition to the two-blade propeller with a diameter of seven meters, which was located in front of the gondola, the engine also rotated a fan designed to pump air into the balloon.
The first flight took place on August 8, 1884 from the Chalet-Meudon training ground. There was calm weather, which had been expected for several weeks. The airship smoothly took off from the ground and, amid the cheers of the crowd, headed south towards Villacoublay, made a turn there and after 23 minutes, having covered 7.5 kilometers at an altitude of 300 m, returned to the starting point. This was the success that had been awaited for so long. The news of this flight quickly reached Paris, causing complete delight among the public. The next ascent was made on September 2. Soon after the launch, a fairly strong wind blew, which began to blow away the airship. To top it all off, the engine failed and Renard decided to land urgently.
The third flight took place on November 8. At 12 o'clock in the afternoon, the airship of Renard and Krebs took off and headed for the railway bridge near Meudon. Next he walked over the Seine. Here it was decided to turn off the engine to determine the speed and direction of the wind. Five minutes later the engine was started and the airship, obedient to the steering wheel, having described a semicircle, headed towards the start. The movement of the airship was stable, it held its direction well. 45 minutes after the rise, he landed safely at the launch site. On this day another flight was made. During the year, the airship made seven flights and returned to the launch site on five occasions.
Thus, the airship of Renard and Krebs, called "France", demonstrated a significant step forward in improving the design of airships. This was the long-awaited victory of the human mind over the air elements.
The history of the development of aeronautics, it would seem, is completed. Today helicopters, airplanes and many other strange means of transportation have appeared in our lives. However, the magic and romance that are associated with such an interesting activity as flying in a hot air balloon will forever remain in the hearts of people. And today people travel on it. Many would be curious to know how it all began. The history of the development of aeronautics will be briefly discussed in this article.
Bartolommeo Lorenzo
Bartolommeo Lorenzo, a Brazilian, belongs to the pioneers whose names have not been forgotten by history. However, their major scientific achievements have been questioned or remained unknown for centuries.
Bartolommeo Lorenzo is the real name of a man who went down in the history of aeronautics as Lorenzo Guzmao, a Portuguese priest, the creator of a project called "Passarola", which until recently was perceived as a fantasy. In 1971, after a long search, it was possible to discover documents explaining the events of this distant past.
They began in 1708, when, having moved to Portugal, Guzmao entered the university in Coimbra and was inspired by the idea of making a flight that would reveal the history of aeronautics. Physics and mathematics, in which Lorenzo showed great ability, helped him in this. He began his project with an experiment. Guzmao designed several models that became prototypes of his future vessel.
First demonstrations of the Guzmao vessel
In 1709, in August, these models were shown to the royal nobility. One such balloon flight turned out to be successful: a thin shell with a small brazier suspended underneath it lifted off the ground almost 4 meters. Guzmao began his Passarola project that same year. Unfortunately, no information has been preserved about his test. However, in any case, Guzmao was the first who, based on the study of natural phenomena, was able to find a real way to rise upward, and also attempted to implement it in practice. Thus began the history of the development of aeronautics.
Joseph Montgolfier
From Joseph, his older brother, Etienne Montgolfier, who owned a paper factory in a small French town, received a note in 1782 in which his brother suggested that he prepare more ropes and silk fabric in order to see one of the most amazing things in the world. This note meant that Joseph had finally found what the brothers had talked about more than once during their meetings: a way to rise into the air.
A shell filled with smoke turned out to be this remedy. As a result of one simple experiment, J. Montgolfier noticed that a box-shaped fabric shell sewn from two pieces of fabric rushed upward after it was filled with smoke. This discovery captivated not only the author himself, but also his brother. Working together, the researchers created two more aerostatic machines (they called theirs that way). One of them was demonstrated among friends and family. It was made in the form of a ball, the diameter of which was 3.5 meters.
Montgolfier's first successes
The experiment was a complete success: the shell stayed in the air for about 10 minutes, rising to a height of about 300 meters and flying through the air for about a kilometer. The brothers, inspired by their success, decided to show their invention to the general public. They built a giant balloon, the diameter of which was more than 10 meters. Its shell, sewn from canvas, was reinforced with rope mesh and also covered with paper in order to increase its impermeability.
In 1783, on June 5, it was demonstrated in the market square in the presence of many spectators. The ball filled with smoke rose upward. All the details of the experiment were certified by a special protocol, which was sealed with the signatures of various officials. Thus, for the first time, an invention was officially certified, which opened the way for aeronautics.
Professor Charles
In Paris, the flight of the Montgolfier brothers in a hot air balloon aroused great interest. They were invited to repeat their experience in the capital. At the same time, Jacques Charles, a French physicist, was ordered to demonstrate the aircraft he had created. Charles assured that smoky air, hot air balloon gas, as it was then called, was not the best means for creating aerostatic
Jacques was well aware of the latest advances in chemistry and believed that it was much better to use hydrogen, since it was lighter than air. However, having chosen this gas to fill his apparatus, the professor encountered a number of technical difficulties. First of all, it was necessary to decide what to make of a lightweight shell capable of holding volatile gas for a long time.
Charlier's first flight
The Robey brothers, mechanics, helped him cope with this task. They produced material with the required qualities. To do this, the brothers used light silk fabric, which was covered with a solution of rubber in turpentine. In 1783, on August 27, Charles's flying machine took off in Paris. He rushed upward in front of about 300 thousand spectators and soon became invisible. When one person present asked what the point was in all this, Benjamin Franklin, a famous American statesman and scientist who also observed the flight, replied: “What is the point of bringing a newborn into the world?” This remark turned out to be prophetic. The “newborn” was born, and a great future was destined for him.
First passengers
However, Charles's success did not stop the Montgolfier brothers from their intention to demonstrate their own invention in Paris. Etienne, trying to make the greatest impression, used his talent as an excellent architect. The hot air balloon he built was, in a sense, a work of art. Its shell was barrel-shaped, the height of which was more than 20 meters. It was decorated on the outside with colorful ornaments and monograms.
The balloon demonstrated by the Academy of Sciences aroused admiration among its representatives. It was decided to repeat this show in the presence of the royal court. Near Paris, in Versailles, a demonstration took place in 1783, on September 19. True, the balloon that aroused the admiration of academicians did not live to see this day: its shell was washed away by rain, as a result of which it became unusable. But this did not stop the Montgolfier brothers. Working diligently, they built the new ball on time. It was in no way inferior in beauty to the previous one.
In order to produce the maximum effect, the brothers attached a cage to it, in which they put a rooster, a duck and a ram. These were the first balloonists in history. The balloon rushed upward and, having traveled a distance of 4 km, 8 minutes later it safely landed on the ground. The Montgolfier brothers became the heroes of the day. They were awarded various awards, and from that day on, all balloons that used smoky air to create lift were called hot air balloons.
Man flying on a hot air balloon
With each flight, the Montgolfier brothers came closer to the cherished goal that they pursued - human flight. The new ball they built was larger. Its height was 22.7 meters and its diameter was 15 meters. A ring gallery was attached to its lower part. It was intended for two people. The creation of this design continued the history of aeronautics. Physics, on the achievements of which it was based, at that time allowed the construction of only very simple aircraft. A fireplace for burning straw was suspended in the middle of the gallery. It radiated heat while in the shell under the hole. This heat warmed the air, allowing for a longer flight. He even became somewhat manageable.
In the history of flights you can find a variety of interesting facts. Aeronautics is an activity that brought great fame and glory in the 18th century. The creators of the aircraft did not want to share it with others. However, Louis XVI, King of France, forbade the authors of the project to take personal part in the flight. In his opinion, this life-threatening task should have been entrusted to two criminals who were sentenced to death. However, this caused protests from Pilatre de Rozier, one of the active participants in the construction of the hot air balloon.
This man could not come to terms with the fact that the names of the criminals would go down in the history of aeronautics. He insisted on participating in the flight himself. Permission was eventually granted. Another “pilot” went on a trip in a hot air balloon. It was the Marquis d'Arlandes, a fan of aeronautics. And so in 1783, on November 21, they took off from the ground and made the first flight in history. The hot air balloon stayed in the air for 25 minutes, flying about 9 km during this time.
Flight of a man on a charlier
In order to prove that the future of aeronautics belongs to the Charliers (balloons with shells filled with hydrogen), Professor Charles decided to carry out a flight that was supposed to be more spectacular than that arranged by the Montgolfier brothers. In creating his new balloon, he developed a number of design solutions that would be used for centuries to come.
Charlier, built by him, had a mesh that covered the upper hemisphere of the balloon, as well as slings that held the gondola suspended from this mesh. There were people in the gondola. A special vent was made in the shell to allow hydrogen to escape. A valve located in the shell, as well as ballast stored in the nacelle, were used to change the flight altitude. An anchor was also provided to make it easier to land on the ground.
Charlier, whose diameter was more than 9 meters, took off on December 1, 1783 in the Tuileries Park. Professor Charles set off on it, as well as Robert, one of the brothers who took an active part in the construction of the Charlier. They landed safely near a village, having flown about 40 kilometers. Charles then continued his journey alone.
Charlier flew 5 km, while climbing to an incredible height for that time - 2750 meters. After spending about half an hour in this sky-high height, the researcher landed safely, thus completing the first flight in the history of aeronautics in a balloon with a hydrogen-filled shell.
A balloon that flew over the English Channel
The life of Jean Pierre Blanchard, the French mechanic who made the first balloon flight across the English Channel, is remarkable in that it illustrates the turning point that occurred in the development of aeronautics at the end of the 18th century. Blanchard began by implementing the idea of flapping flight.
In 1781, he built an apparatus whose wings were driven by the force of his legs and arms. Testing it suspended on a rope thrown over a block, this inventor rose to the height of a multi-story building, while the counterweight was about 10 kg. Delighted by the first successes, he published in the newspaper his thoughts on the possibility of flapping flight for humans.
The air travel made in the first balloons, as well as the search for flight controls, again brought Blanchard back to the idea of wings, but already used to control the balloon. Although the first experiment ended unsuccessfully, the researcher did not give up his attempts and was increasingly carried away by the ascent into the heavenly expanse.
In 1784, in the fall, his flights began in England. The researcher had the idea to fly across the English Channel in a balloon, thereby proving the possibility of air communication between France and England. In 1785, on January 7, this historic flight took place, in which the inventor himself, as well as Dr. Jeffrey, his American friend, took part.
The Age of Aeronautics
The history of the development of aeronautics was short-lived. From the beginning of the age of airships and balloons to its complete completion, it would seem that a little more than 150 years have passed. The first free balloon was lifted into the air by the Montgolfier brothers in 1783, and in 1937 the LZ-129 Gindenburg, an airship built in Germany, burned down. This happened in the USA, in Lakehurst, on a mooring mast. There were 97 people on board the ship. Of these, 35 died. This disaster shocked the world community so much that the great powers were inclined to stop building large airships. Thus ended an era in aeronautics in which the last 40 years had seen the development of rigid airships called zeppelins (one of their main creators was Ferdinand von Zeppelin, a German general).
The hot air balloon designed by the Montgolfier brothers was uncontrollable. It was not until 1852 that Henri Giffard, a French designer, created a controlled balloon.
Engineers have long tried to solve the problem of aircraft rigidity. David Schwarz, an Austrian designer, came up with the idea of making their body metal. In Berlin in 1897, the Schwarz balloon took off. Its body was made of aluminum. However, due to engine problems, an emergency landing was made.
Count Zeppelin
Count von Zeppelin, having become acquainted with David's works, saw their promise. He came up with a frame made of lightweight box trusses, which were riveted from aluminum strips. The holes in them were stamped. The frame was made from ring-shaped frames. They were connected by stringers.
A hydrogen chamber was placed between each pair of frames (1217 pieces in total). Therefore, if several internal cylinders were damaged, the remaining ones maintained volatility. In the summer of 1990, the cigar-shaped eight-ton giant Zeppelin (an airship whose diameter was 12 meters, length - 128) made a successful 18-minute flight, turning its creator, who was then considered almost a city madman, into a national hero.
The country, which recently lost the war with the French, received the general’s idea of this miracle weapon with a bang. Zeppelin is an airship that began to be actively used in military operations. For the First World War, the general designed several machines, the length of which was 148 m. They could reach speeds of up to 80 km/h. The airships that Count Zeppelin designed went to war.
The 20th century further democratized flying. Modern aeronautics has become a hobby for many people. In July 1897, Solomon Auguste Andre made the first ever flight to the Arctic in a hot air balloon. In 1997, in honor of the centenary of this event, balloonists held a balloon festival at the North Pole. Since then, the most daring teams fly here every year to take to the skies. The aeronautics festival is a fascinating spectacle, which many people come to admire.
