R.G Smith

May 7, 1914  -  May 29, 2001

The XC-99—Convair's Very Heavy Transport

     Air travel is taken for granted by most people, especially in the United States. The current family of air passenger giants are graceful and part of aviation travel. The Boeing 747 "Jumbo" jet introduced oversize and comfort to the traveling American public. The United States Air Force pioneered in the development of very large transport aircraft to move men and heavy pieces of U.S. Army equipment, especially tanks, directly to the battle area. The recent North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) air campaign against the military forces of Serbia, in response to that country's attacks on the civilian Kosovo Albanian population and the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), was supported by United States Air Force (USAF) transport aircraft. Two of these (both four-turbojet engine aircraft), the Lockheed C-5A/B Galaxy and McDonnell Douglas C-17A Globemaster III are classified as heavy lift transports. Two early piston-powered Globemasters (the C-74 and C-124), long-range transports were the first in series produced heavy lift (for that time period), long-range transports. Almost unforgotten was the largest of the piston-powered transports, the Convair XC-99 (Consolidated-Vultee Aircraft Corporation became Convair in 1954). The Convair XC-99 was developed from the company's long-range B-36 Peacemaker Very Heavy (VH) strategic, long-range (intercontinental), nuclear capable bomber. Although the aircraft was not series produced, it set engineering standards which provided the needed emphasis to build up the USAF's airlift capabilities.
    The B-36 bomber program began after the United States Army Air Corps (USAAC) became concerned over the German . . . . . 

E.A. "Ed" Gillespie - The World's Oldest Test Pilot? - Part II

   Edward Allan Gillespie was born July 28, 1928, in Ann Arbor, Michigan, to Arthur and Rhea Gillespie. An Eagle Scout, Ed graduated from Ann Arbor High School, was president of his class and lettered in swimming, track and football. His flying career began at the age of 12, with a neighbor who was a photographer. Young Ed would hold the Piper Cub steady while his neighbor took aerial pictures. Ed worked evenings and weekends at the University of Michigan to earn money for flying lessons at the local airport. Ed soloed September 8, 1944, at the age of sixteen. While still in high school, he joined the Navy's very selective Holloway Plan Midshipman Program. Ed attended Syracuse University where he studied engineering and later transferred to Western Michigan College at Kalamazoo. He entered flight training as an Aviation Midshipman at Pensacola in Class 17-48 receiving his wings May 1950. Ed, as a member of the Navy's Red Rippers (VF-11), served on aircraft carriers around the world including 80 combat missions flying McDonnell's F2H Banshee in Korea. After his tour of combat duty, Ed was accepted at the Navy's Test Pilot School at Patuxent River, Maryland, and graduated February 1953. He has been an active test pilot ever since. The ancient expression, " There are no old, bold pilots " certainly does not apply to Ed Gillespie. Since Test Pilot's School, he has accumulated 10, 000 plus hours flying single-cockpit, relatively short, very intense flights in high-performance airplanes. He has been on continuous flight status in military airplanes for over 50 years. He is a Fellow of the Society of Experimental Test Pilots. After ten years of active military duty and 26 years in the Naval Reserves, Ed retired as a captain. Currently he is Consultant Test Pilot with the Sabreliner Corporation and performs all test flights and deliveries of the Navy's T2C Buckeye.

To Become a Test Pilot or Get the Blues — Larry Flint, who became Skipper of the Red Rippers when Denny Philips was killed in Korea, recommended Ed for Test Pilot's School at Patuxent River Naval Air Test Center. As it turned out, Ed didn't make the first twenty pilots selected. He was the first alternate. In the meantime, his first Skipper, "Bull" Wemer, had taken over as the officer-in-charge of the Blue Angels. He was . . . .

Braniff International Airways - 1930 to 1982 — Part I, Propeller Aircraft 

       Includes mergers with Long and Harmon (January 1, 1935), Mid Continent Airlines of Kansas City, MO (August 15, 1952) and Panagra (February 1, 1967). On June 4, 1948, the name was changed from Braniff Airways (BNF) to Braniff International Airways. On May 12, 1982 it shut down.
    The first Braniff was founded on June 20, 1928 by brothers Thomas E. and Paul R. Braniff. The company's name was Paul R. Braniff, Inc. The first service was a daily round trip, with a five-place 90 mile-per-hour Stinson Detroiter, flying the 116 mile route between Tulsa and Oklahoma City. "Tulsa-Oklahoma City Airline" was painted on the side of it fuselage. By the end of 1929, a second Detroiter, three Travel Airs and a Ryan B-l were added to the operation. In May 1929 the company was merged into Universal Aviation Corp which went on to become American Airways, then in 1934 American Airlines.
    On November 3, 1930 a new airline was incorporated as Braniff Airways with T. E. Braniff as president. Ten days later it started operations with two Lockheed Vegas over its 1928 route plus the addition of the Texas city of Wichita Falls. In May 1934, the first major growth began with the Air Mail Route 9 (AM 9) award to Braniff between Dallas and Chicago with stops in Kansas City, Wichita and Tulsa. This route had been flown by United Air Lines prior to the cancellation of the Air Mail routes and U.S. Army taking over the Air Mail for 78 days in the winter of 1934, Long and Harmon Airlines was acquired on January 1, 1935, which extended Braniff to the Texas Gulf and northwest to the Texas Panhandle. This merger gave the carrier ten Texas cities and assets included two . . . . .

They called them Flying Laboratories

     Flying Laboratories, that's what they were called in articles put out by the company's publicity department. A bit of hype intended to impart some glamour to the jet engine test bed aircraft used by GE in its engine development programs. To the people who operated them they were workhorses; interesting, challenging and sometimes dangerous.
     In 1941, having in essence been commanded by General 'Hap' Arnold to do so, GE started work on producing an American version of the Whittle jet engine at its Lynn, Massachusetts plant. The company, of course, already had a background of experience with turbo superchargers and gas turbines. From the original I-A of 1250 lbs thrust (which powered the P-59A) through the I-14 to the I-16 with 1650 lbs thrust, the GE engines were basically the Whittle design, albeit with many significant improvements. The next step up, a big one, was the GE designed I-40 (later designated the J33) with a thrust rating of over 4000 lbs. It was earmarked for the Lockheed P-80. The company began design of the I-40 in June 1943 and just six months later was test running the first engine. At the time there was no way of testing engines under actual flight conditions short of flying them, a situation that later changed with the advent of more sophisticated ground test facilities and more advanced engineering. Using an experimental engine as the test airplanes' primary power source was both impractical and risky. The obvious answer was to modify an aircraft to carry the I-40 as an extra engine, preferably an airplane with the capability of also carrying extra fuel, a lot of instrumentation . . . .

043 with all four engines feathered.

Guinea Pigs With Wings, Tennessee's Women's Research Instructor School   

     Nineteen forty-two was a dark period for the United States. The long feared war had arrived in bloody fashion with the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Thousands of Americans had been killed and much of the Pacific Fleet destroyed. This was just the beginning as the seemingly invincible Japanese were advancing at will across the Pacific and the Far East. Germany and Italy had joined Japan in declaring war on the United States, greatly increasing the threat. The U.S. military was desperate for pilots to help stop the advance of the enemyon two fronts. Large numbers of experienced pilots, including many flight instructors, had enlisted immediately after Pearl Harbor. Others were rapidly being inducted by local draft boards, often with little or no concern for their aviation qualifications. Many of the young men assigned to instructor duties were volunteering for combat assignments further depleting the already critical pool of skilled flight instructors. Civilian contractors were unable to hire enough qualified flight and ground instructors to meet the demands even for basic instruction. Some predicted that a number of training schools would be forced to close due to lack of certified instructors ("Women May Have," 1942). As the instructor bottleneck tightened, the Civil Aeronautics Authority began to search for solutions. The situation was grave and the concern grew. One very original proposal for solving the problem came from Tennessee Bureau of Aeronautics.
     The Tennessee Bureau of Aeronautics under the chairmanship of Mr. W. Percy McDonald formulated a plan for the Aviation Research Instruction School. This was to be a . . . . .

Development of Transport Airplanes and Air Equipment, Part VI, Four-Engine Transports, 1940-1945

     Of all the types of transport aircraft utilized by the Air Corps during the early period of World War II, the greatest deficiencies existed in the four-engine, long-range class. This was due principally to the fact that at the beginning of hostilities, current thinking regarding military aerial transportation was in the short-range, low-payload stage with emphasis on two-engine craft. The commercial airlines' concept of long-range transport was not much further advanced. Consequently, when the Air Corps was confronted with the problem of shuttling personnel and cargo to the scattered theaters of war, it found few developed commercial airplanes suitable for either purpose. The most feasible solutions to the perplexing transportation difficulty were the conversion of bombers to transports and the continuation of the design and production of the carriers planned by the airlines.

     As an immediate expedient capable of "breaking the transportation bottleneck" the Air Corps turned to the B-24. As early as November 1941, Consolidated Aircraft Corporation suggested to the Materiel Division that the Air Corps should procure a troop transport version of the B-24, suitable for hauling personnel, troops, and cargo on long missions. The Materiel Division reacted unfavorably to the proposal, however, and requested that Consolidated cease all studies relating to the project. After the disaster at Pearl Harbor, it was necessary to place increased emphasis on bomber construction. Consolidated Aircraft, for example, was notified that "any surplus . . . . . 

The Martin M-130 Clippers of Pan American Airway

    The 1930s were an exciting and historic time for Pan American Airways. They established a series of refueling and passenger layover accommodations at Honolulu, Midway, Wake Island, Guam and Manila in the Philippines for a transpacific airline.
    Pan American awarded a contract to the Glenn L. Martin Co. of Middle River, Maryland, to build three large, long-range flying boats for the San Francisco-Manila flight. These Clippers had a wing span of 130 feet, four radial engines with a total of 3320 hp and a large fuel capacity for the 2400-mile San Francisco-Honolulu leg of the transpacific flight.
    The first of the Clippers to be completed at Middle River was the Hawaii Clipper which rolled out on November 30, 1934. The Hawaii Clipper had the registration number NC 14714. The second ship, the Philippine Clipper was delivered to Pan American at their Alameda, California, base on Nov. 14, 1935 and carried the registration, NC 14715. The most famous of the trio was the third ship, the China Clipper, NC 14716. The China Clipper was delivered on October 10,1935. The China Clipper inaugurated the world's first transpacific air mail service, 22-29 November 1935. The Hawaii Clipper inaugurated the first transoceanic airplane scheduled passenger service on October 21,1936.
    The Clippers were elegant in design and very photogenic. They captured the imagination of the U.S. public during this time of history-making over water . . . . . .

Martin M-130 Hawaii Clipper.

Thomas-Morse MB-4

    The Thomas-Morse Aircraft Company of lthica, New York, never succeeded in getting any of their fighter designs into WWI combat. After WWI, the Army Air Service used their MB-3 biplane fighter. The irony was that, although Thomas-Morse developed the MB-3 and got a contract for 50 aircraft, they couldn't mass produce it to make their development effort pay off. 
    In those days, the Air Service owned the design they backed and could have it built by any lowest bidder. The Air Service sent out a request for bid for 200 MB-3A models and the fledgling Boeing Aircraft Company won with a low bid of $1,448,000 for the 200 aircraft ($7,240 per aircraft), thereby shutting out the designer/developer Thomas-Morse. This was the largest aircraft order placed by the Air Service since WWI and put Boeing into the fighter business.
    In looking around for inexpensive ways to keep going, Thomas-Morse hit on the idea of developing a twin-engine mail plane using as many standard MB-3 assemblies and systems as they could. They were already developed and they were set up to produce them.
    The result was the MB-4 that was designed, built, and ready for flight testing on I March 1920. The MB-4 used the MB-3 engine package forward of the firewall and the entire aft fuselage assembly, including the complete tail assembly, of the MB-3. All that remained was connecting the engines in a central tractor-pusher nacelle, providing a cockpit in the forward end of each tail boom, and designing a new broad chord biplane wing of larger area to handle the increased load. The fuel tanks were located in the center of the engine nacelle between the engines. Ailerons were used only on the upper wing.
    The end result certainly had utility, but it was not what you would call clean nor an aeronautical advancement. It did the job and could haul the intended load at a reasonable speed for those days on two engines. . . ..