Testing Time traces the development of the combined art and science of test piloting throughout the whole fifty years of powered flight. Constance Babington-Smith, though not a pilot herself has for years been closely associated with aeronautics and Photo Intelligence. Free download: https://wz.d-ld.net/3f22fc570a Beginning with John Villiam Dunne's experiments in aeronautics and plane design in the early years of the century, Miss Babington-Smith follows ith the story of Samuel Franklin Cody, improviser and showman, a character out of an Anerican Vild Vest show who took British citizenship Vilfred Parke, the first Englishman who after recovering f rom a spin was able to analyze how he had done so Harry Hawker, first loop-the-looper; Sir Henry Tizarcl who laid the foundation of RAF est flying; an other pioneers and adventurers to the present, ending with Roland Beamont's experiments with the Lightning, the first of a completely new line of manned fighting machines. The last chapter surveys the whole incredibly swift evolution of powered flight and the new challenges which jet engines, vastly increased speeds, and other late developments present. Here is a book with not only exactly tales of bravery and endurance but also with definite historical and reference value in the fuel of aeronautics.

Eventually, however, a day arrived when Dunne decided the moment had come to go ahead. A special sloping plankway had been set up, a few feet off the ground, to aid the launching ; the idea was that the rubber-tyred trolley would thus gather speed much more quickly than on the grass. But alas—the trolley gathered speed too quickly, before the preventer ropes had been loosed, and the aircraft went sliding off onto the ground, where it finished up a broken mess. After this fiasco no further attempts at flight were made that year, and Dunne and his helpers returned to Farnborough. By this time it was October, and Percy Gurr recalls that it was much too cold to be camping out in the Highlands. Back at ‘ the Factory Dunne worked away through the winter, and then on through the spring. The original machine was rebuilt, fitted with a new engine, provided with a wheeled undercarriage, and renamed the D.4 (the D.3 was a scaled-down glider for practice flights, and the D.2 a design that was not constructed). By the summer of 1908 it was decided to return to the Scottish testing site, and on September 2nd the party from Farnborough again arrived at Blair Atholl. This time Lieutenant Lancelot Gibbs, of the Royal Field Artillery—a talented skier—came with them to act as ‘ test pilot ’. The first of the 1908 experiments that Gibbs made, at the old camp up the Tilt between September 20th and October 16th, were entirely concerned with gliding practice in the D.3. This ‘ model ’ of the Dunne biplane had no undercarriage at all—Gibbs was harnessed into it like a ‘ bird man 5—and the take-off run was simply a run by Gibbs on his own feet, with two men running along, one on either side, to steady the wing tips till he left the ground (a method resembling the technique of Lilienthal). As before, the strong easterly winds made things very difficult, but the new ‘ trials ’ were much more successful than those of the previous year. Dunne was by no means satisfied, however. On September 30th he wrote to Capper. ‘ Although we have done lots of glorified jumps with the glider, and one or two skims down hill with the man's feet touching occasionally, we have done no long glides/ But soon after this Gibbs did very much better. On October 12th Dunne wrote again to Capper : Gibbs has broken all records by doing a perfectly steady glide in a wind of over 30 miles an hour. Distance 132 feet. Height 6 ft. Slope (taken with clinometer) 1 in 5.6. Landing so gentle that he scarcely knew he was down. Then, towards the end of the year, when they were joined by Captain A. D. Carden of the Royal Engineers (Capper’s assistant for experimental work), they moved to a site near Blair Castle, in the Duke of Atholl’s private grounds. And at ‘ the lower camp ', as they called it, between November 16th and December 10th, new attempts at powered flight were made, as recorded in a detailed diary that was kept by Carden. With a new engine which was supposed to yield 30 horsepower (but seldom did), and the new undercarriage ‘ which ran on four wheels, fitted on to a rather sensitive spring framework to lessen the shock of landing ’, Gibbs succeeded in remaining airborne on eight occasions. The longest distance he covered was forty yards on December 10th, 1908, as measured by the tracks of the wheels. It was an encouraging feat, but Dunne later described it as ‘more a hopper than a flier’. Capper, in his report to the War Office, also indicated that no powered controlled flight had taken place. On only a few occasions did she leave the ground, and then only when the planes were forced up when she was going at high speed. . . . The ground is somewhat rough and the engine could never get up sufficient speed to fly. Nevertheless, it is of considerable interest that all the first hops and flights in British aeroplanes—the machines of Dunne, Cody, and Roe—took place within the same six months of 1908. At last Britain was making her first baby-steps in powered flight, while America and France were striding ahead. During the winter of 1908-9 Wilbur Wright was in Europe, astonishing everyone with his masterly aviating, and it so happened that Dunne’s father and his younger brother made a visit to France during this time, and they went to Pau to witness one of the exhi¬bitions. General Dunne had been briefed by ‘ Ian ’ to ask Wilbur Wright some questions if he got the chance, so after the demonstra¬tion he approached the great man and addressed him in a loud clear voice. Wilbur looked a little surprised but was very courteous. ‘ My son said the General, ‘ has been trying to get off rough ground in an aeroplane with wheels.’ ‘ Tell him ’, replied Wilbur, ‘ he won’t do it ’.