BRITAIN'S AIRFLEET.

Auckland Star, Volume XLI, Issue 66, 18 March 1910, Page 5

BRITAIN'S AIRFLEET.

THREE DIRIGIBLES READY. (By —Press Association.Copyright) ((Received 8.50 a.m.) LONDON, March 17. Colonel 0. Gorman, manager of the Army aerial factory at Farnborough, states that should the need arise, lie was able to commission three airships adequately manned ready for their work. The three dirigibles referred to are probably the Nulli Secundus 11., which recently underwent a short trial run, the Clement Bayard, and the huge airship being built by the Vickers-Maxim Co. ai Barrow for the Navy. Describing a visit to the Clement Bayard works, a writer says:—The first impression you would get, if you did not know what it was, would be that a battleship was in course of construction here. In the middle are the engines, the captain's bridge, the passengers' deck. Forward and backward from these sweep long, harmonious lines of metal. In front the framework, fifty yards long in all, ends in a pointed nose with a strong light attached to it foi signalling. At the rear are the great rudders, worked by two wheels on the bridge. These govern both the direction and the upward or downward movement. Let mc note now, as an indication of the precautions which have been taken ii every respect, that the wires which wort the rudders are in duplicate, with separate pulleys, and with an ingenious contrivance for clipping them down into the pulleys, so that they cannot break loose Most impressive are the gigantic propel lers. High up on either side of the en gines they hang smooth and shining. O. polished walnut they are made, by Chan viere, the famous designer of helices ;anc covered "with a special varnish which pre vents them from being weakened" by wet Nearly twenty feet long they are, mori than three times the height of an excep tionally tall man. You can see thel: power "by the hurtling past of pieces p: paper and waste when they are set going The wind they create is tremendous. Yei so cleverly are .they, placed- that on thi bridge one feels very Tittle of it. I die not even have to hold my hat on. An other surprise I had' .when the engines were started—the two beautiful. motor of 130 n.p\"eac&'"* There was scarcely «anj vibration.