FAST WARPLANES

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22493, 10 August 1936, Page 6

FAST WARPLANES

BRITAIN'S NEW CEAFT [THE SUPERMARINE SPITFIRE POLISHED AND STREAMLINED [from our own correspondent] LONDON, July 15 Sir Philip Sassoon's proud claim that the equipment of Britain's expanded Air Force will be second to none in the world is justified b.v the extraordinary quality of the new warplanes that are now emerging from behind the curtain of official secrecy. The aircraft listed for assembly at Hendon on the occasion of the Royal Air Force display included fighters and bombers of astounding abilities—fighters faster than any aeroplanes in the world except a very few racers And bombers capable of carrying immense loads at great speed over many hundreds of miles. At a recent demonstration of six types of aeroplane designed and built by the Yickers and Supermarine companies throe of the aircraft —a singleseat fighter and two bombers—were especially notable for flying performance and the use of novel methods of construction.

Fastest In World The fighter is the Supermarine Spitfire 1., a low-wing monoplane powered with a Rolls-Royce Merlin 12-cylinder liquid-cooled engine. It is the fastest warplane in the world, capable of .a speed considerably higher than 300 miles an hour. Tt does not carry as heavy a load as the Hawker monoplane fighter, which also exceeds SOO miles an hour. Both the Spitfire and the Hawker monoplanes have been ordered in numbers for the equipment of fighter squadrons of the Royal Air Force. Designed by Mr. R. -J. Mitchell, designer of the racing seaplanes that secured Great Britain permanent possession of the Schneider Trop'jy, the new fighter is a beautifully streamlined craft with a highly-polished metal skin. A retractable undercarriage diminishes head resistance in flight. W ing flaps enable the machine t« glide in eteeply and land comparatively slowly.

Long-range Bombers Equally notable is the new Vickers twin-engined bomber, constructed on the geodetic system invented by Mr. B. N. Wallis and developed by him in conjunction' with the Vickers Company during the past four years. This is a mid-wing monoplane, deriving power from two Bristol Pegasus air-cooled radial engines. In flight the undercarriage units retract into recesses. This new bomber is the second type of warplane built entirely to the geodetic formula, advantages of which ere lightness of structural weight, with corresponding gain in useful load, and a degree of quiet in its passage through the air, which is exceptional in a bombing aeroplane. The new Vickers bomber has no special silencing arrangements, other than those embodied in the efficient exhaust-gas collector rings of the Pegasus motors, but it flew past with little of the noise generally associated with high-powered aircraft. The twin-engined machine can carry an enormous load in bombs and fuel, and is designed to cruise at. high speed over long distances.