NEW BRITISH AIRSHIP.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 19838, 7 January 1928, Page 9

NEW BRITISH AIRSHIP.

♦ CONSTRUCTION OP EIOO. PROPOSED ATLANTIC FLIGHT. DETAILS OF ACCOMMODATION. By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright. (Britiish Official Wireless.) A. and N.Z. RUG-BY, Jan. 5. The airship RIOO, which is under construction for the Ministry of Air at the Howden works of the Airship Guarantee Company, is expected to be completed about April After undergoing home trials she will probably make a demonstration flight across the Atlantic. Commander C. D. Burney, M.P., will next week leave for America, where he will discuss plans for the future operations of the airship. It is suggested that the vessel, which will be the largest in the world, should carry passengers across the Atlantic. The journey would occupy 48 hours, and the fare would be approximately £l2O. . , The airship is'7o9ft. long, and is to be driveu by engines developing a totai of 4200 borse-power. She will have accommodation for 100 passengers and a crew of 50.

In October, 1924, a contract was placed by the Government with the Airship Guarantee Company, Limited, with whom Messrs. Vickers, Limited, are associated, lor the construction of a passenger-carry-ing airship of 5,000,000 cubic feet capacity, while at the same time the Royal Airship Works, at Cardington, were authorised to proceed with the construction of a similar airship. Work on the former, which is known as the RIOO, is now well advanced at Howden, Yorkshire. The work of construction was actually commenced in August, 1926, the two previous years having been occupied in preliminary design and experimental'work, and although considerable delay resulted from the industrial troubles of 1926, it is expected that the work will be completed by April next. The RIOO is 709 ft. in length and has a maximum diameter of 130 ft., while the displacement is giver) as 156 tons. The hull is streamlined throughout, without any parallel portion, and from the dimensions stated, it will be seen that it is much bluffer than the earlier airships, which, taking the case of the R36 as an example, had a length to diameter ratio of about 8.5 to 1. The designed speed of the RIOO is 82 miles per hour, and accommodation is provided for 100 passengers, and a crew. The former will be accommodated in two-berth and fourberth cabins, and a restaurant, capable of seating 50 persons at a time, is arranged for in the design, which also provides for promenade decks having a maximum width of 14ft. The passenger accommodation, which is arranged on three floors, is contained entirely inside the envelope, in, order to keep the hull resistance down to a minimum.

The power plant will, at first, consist of six Rolls-Royce engines running on petrol, and each developing 700 h.p. Two engines are carried in each of the three gondolas, of which two are mounted symmetrically on the lower part of the hull just aft of amidships, and the other is mounted on the centre line farther aft.

It is proposed, at a later date, to replace the petrol engines by lierht Diesel engines, for which heavy oil will be used as fuel. As already stated, the displacement is 156 tons, and of this the useful lift available for fuel, ballast, passengers, crew and freight is 73 tons. About 30 tons of fuel will be carried, and this ouantity of netrol would permit a cruising sneed of 75 miles per hour to be maintained for 50 hours, i.e., a distance of 3750 miles could be covered in still air. The-nnvino: load, under these conditions, would include 10 tons of freieht, in addition to 100 passengers, calculated on the basis of seven passengers to the ton.