>Sometimes the non-glamorous lab work is absolutely crucial to the success of a project. - Wilbur Wright
>Since the 18th century, engineers had been using Smeaton’s coefficient to calculate the density of air. After running over 50 simulations using their wind tunnels, the brothers determined its value to be 0.0033, and not 0.005.
>They also used the data from wind tunnels to design wings with better lift-to-drag ratio and used them to build their 1902 flying machine, which performed significantly better than their previous gliders.
The wind tunnel work was crucial to their success, arguably the single most important element. It enabled them to iterate their designs and compare them quickly. In today's language, it helped them to fail fast.
Had they been better funded, they might have committed the error of trying to iterate mostly with full-sized fliers, which would have drastically slowed down iteration.
It's also amazing to read about the many pilots who died trying to cross the Atlantic before Charles Lindbergh did it. The journey nearly cost him his life as well, and it took some time before such flights were safe enough to routinely attempt.
Early aviators had some serious guts.
Here, here!
On this note, I must recommend Fate is the Hunter by Ernest K. Gann. It's a terrifying and honest account of his experiences in the early days of commercial aviation (Gann's narrative starts in the '30s).
Wikipedia citation, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fate_Is_the_Hunter
I hope you're not suggesting that Lindbergh was the first. First non-stop solo flight, yes; but Alcock and Brown flew it 8 years earlier: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/extra/bM5diyl48K/alcock
You just described their contemporary competitor Samuel Pierpont Langley. This is great example to cite when someone complains they don’t have enough GPUs to compete with BigCos.
(also, I’m aware meta comments are frowned upon, but your comment would read exactly the same without the quotes, they are a bit of an eyesore on mobile and not necessary)
[1] https://www.amazon.com/Wright-Brothers-David-McCullough/dp/1...
http://www.wright-brothers.org/History_Wing/History_of_the_A...
[1] https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/eb92/1d44112fbdd04532f56cb2...
[2] http://www.wrightexperience.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/161...
This just makes me think that Alberto Santos-Dumont also "invented" heavier-than-air flight, only 3 years later and it was better.
Wouldn't we still have the same flying ability if the Wrights never pursued flying?
Previous discussion on Santos-Dumont: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9542480
I'm a firearms enthusiast and have spent some time studying the development of small arms. If transported back to the late 18th Century, I could explain and document the mechanism for an automatic rifle suitable for use by infantry like an AR or AK - but I likely could not produce one, and certainly could not produce them on an industrial scale. The metallurgy simply wasn't up to the task, nor was the machinery of the day. The metallic cartridge would't even make a lot of sense; as the percussion cap hadn't yet been invented. Even a manually-operated mounted Gatling gun wouldn't be possible without it.
Once a stable, impact-sensitive explosive suitable for use as a primer was invented, everything was in place for the invention of the metallic cartridge - and that's exactly what happened. Metallic cartridges lead to breech-loading firearms, which lead to the bolt action, which in turn lead to automatic and then semi-automatic actions. Neither of the last two made much sense until the invention and adoption of smokeless powder, as traditional gunpowder leaves so much residue that it would only work for a few shots before "fouling".
All that said, there are individuals that push the state of the art forward a great deal through their contributions. John Moses Browning, for instance. He created the first gas-operated machinegun and several of his designs remain in use (essentially unchanged) by major militaries around the world more than a century later.
Hmm, now you've got me curious. I'm not exactly a firearms history scholar, but the earliest automatic firearm I know of (not including civil war era Gatling type guns, which aren't actually automatic) is the Mannlicher 1886, which was also produced as a semi-automatic at the same time. So I was under the impression that we got fully and semi auto firearms at exactly the same time.
As always you see farther than others by standing on the shoulders of giants.
In a nutshell, most others of the era (not counting Santos-Dumont!) were striving to get more power with an assumption that once aloft with sufficient power that flight would "just 'happen."
Meanwhile, the Wrights knew more power was coming, and instead focused on the more important truth that if the operator couldn't control the ship it didn't matter at all how much power was available, how much lift was generated or how efficient the propeller was.
To this day the three-axis controls they settled on are fundamental to all conventional aircraft. (Though the weird "twisting wing" solution for roll control couldn't scale and so the aileron mechanism was a huge improvement.)
I'm not discounting their innovation, just stating that it depending on propulsion. Once propulsion was there it was inevitable that someone would figure out control in a few years when they realized more power wasn't enough.
