Trans-Atlantic Airplane Flights in 1933

[rjcurrie]

Maybe someone can help me. I'm trying to find out what airplanes would likely be used for trans-Atlantic flights in 1933. Primarily, I'm interested in the speed and range of such aircraft. I'm not interested in commercial flights (if they had even started yest), but rather a plane that would be privately chartered for such a flight.

[Comic]

Re: Trans-Atlantic Airplane Flights in 1933

 

Well, it's not an airplane, but the Hindenburg started crossing the Atlantic commercially in the mid-30's, and could complete a return trip in about six days, travelling about 80 mph. The ship carried about 50 passengers and almost as many crew.

 

My choice? I'd have taken one of these: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_247

[Mantis]

Re: Trans-Atlantic Airplane Flights in 1933

 

Maybe someone can help me. I'm trying to find out what airplanes would likely be used for trans-Atlantic flights in 1933. Primarily' date=' I'm interested in the speed and range of such aircraft. I'm not interested in commercial flights (if they had even started yest), but rather a plane that would be privately chartered for such a flight.[/quote']There weren't many in 1933, and they were all seaplanes. Well, Alcock and Brown had crossed the Atlantic in a Vickers Vimy in 1919, but that's not exactly a reliable conveyance. The most common aircraft crossing the Atlantic in 1933 was the Savoia-Marchetti S.55 - General Balbo led a large formation from Italy to Chicago in 1933 as an exercise in "showing the flag". The S.55 had a cruising speed of about 150 mph and a range of about 2,000 miles and IIRR staged through the Azores, common for trans-Atlantic flights in the 1930s.

 

The earliest commercial trans-Atlantic flights were made by Sikorsky flying boats in 1935, modified Empire flying boats in 1937, and the Short Mayo Composite in 1938.

 

In WWII, long-range aircraft such as the Hudson, Liberator and Flying Fortress were flown across the Atlantic and IIRR they staged through Greenland and/or Iceland. It was these flights, under the aegis of RAF Ferry Command, that made trans-Atlantic air crossing routine.

[Lawnmower Boy]

Re: Trans-Atlantic Airplane Flights in 1933

 

The first heavier than air commercial flights across the Atlantic were by four-engined flying boats in the summer of 1939.

The first "survey" flights took place in 1937, and there was an abbreviated experimental flying season in 1938 involving various highly colourful aircraft.

Before that there was plenty of transatlantic stunt flying ranging from ridiculous to tragic, or in some cases both. The aircraft used were pretty unusual.

 

For example, in 1934, the Mollisons flew nonstop from London to New York in a D.H. Moth, the direct ancestor of the tiny, tiny little WWII secondar trainer. Basically, skilled pilots who knew how to nurse their engines could persuade these tiny little civilian aircraft to fly pretty incredible distances --with luck. I wouldn't even want to gues what the "range" of a DH Moth would be in the hands of pilots like the Mollisons, but basically 0.48lb gas/hp.hour is far too high for any engine of the era (that is, assuming 86 octane), .41 too low. The skill here consists of making the engine run at low output. 33% of the maximum listed hp output in your handy guide would be the absolute, very best.

The amount of fuel carried you can guess from a maximum loaded weight of say, twice dry weight on the ground, but only the most skilled of pilots could take off with that load.

[Lawnmower Boy]

Re: Trans-Atlantic Airplane Flights in 1933

 

I'm sorry that I'm being lazy about looking this up, because there were a great many heroic (in a goofy, goofy way) things done over the Atlantic between 1927 and 1939.

But I did take a peak at the Wikipedia article on Amy Mollison (nee Johnson), which incidentally incorrectly identifies the plane that she and James Mollison flew from London to Connecticut as a De Havilland Dragon Rapide.

Probably because no-one believes that a Puss Moth could make the trip. But believe it. This single engined three seater with an empty weight of only 1,265lb, a.u.w. of 2050lb and a De Havilland Gipsy Six inline air-cooled engine of 120hp made not one but many trans-Atlantic flights. I know that the numbers I gave in my posting above are not exactly GM-friendly, but the Wikipedia article on the Puss Moth gives it a maximum range of 300 miles!

If it helps, the bracketting long-distance open-course records of 7400 and 8100 miles were set by the RAF Long Range Flight in 1931 and 1938, with the next record set by a B-29 in 1946, of somewhere upwards of 9000 miles.

Note that none of these records were set by seaplanes, even though they are often creditted as being the best long distance performers of the era. In fact flying boats and floatplanes were usually chosen for this kind of thing for operational reasons. Since there was no good airfield at Midway, or on the Azores or Newfoundland when various flights were made, a flying boat was the only choice.

[Lawnmower Boy]

Re: Trans-Atlantic Airplane Flights in 1933

 

Spam, spam, spam, spam.....

Oh, look, I killed the thread.

But, yeah, I know far more about this stuff than is good for me, and I assume that someone cares. Transatlantic flying has some tangential importance to the pulp era, after all.

Types of Transatlantic planes

1) Really Big conventional big flying boats

The basic idea is that the bigger the F/B, the more efficient it becomes vis-a-vis the land plane. The definitive "pulp" Atlantic crossing was by the legendary Dornier Do. X in (1931 I think?). Twelve engines set back-to-back in traditional Dornier style and a very conventional and overweight structure. It might have been the first F/B with a tunnel in the wing to allow the flight engineer to manually adjust the idle screw, although a similar feature shows up as late as the Consolidated PBY Catalina. With endless waits in various ports, it took the Do X almost a year to cross the Atlantic. So not a complete success. Still, the legwork in '39--41 was done by Pan Am in a perfectly conventional Boeing F/B. Imperial was going to go that way too, as soon as the civil Hercules was uprated to allow the new "G" boats (original civil version of the Short Shetland) to takeoff with a "safe" amount of fuel. Obviously Pan Am showed that Imperial was being a little pessimistic in that regard. France, Italy and Germany were already working on RBC F/Bs, inclusing a German Dornier boat with six conventional engines.

2) Unconventional F/Bs

RAF prototypes under test in 1939 included one with a retractable hull and a high gull wing (to bring propeller blades out of the spray), but already in operation were Short boats with mid-air refuelling (Imperial's conventional service) and Lufthansa diesel-powered Blohm und Voss mail boats that used a ship-mounted catapult to take off in the Azores. Tom Clancy types figured that ship-catapult-launched-F/Bs would be the next big thing in ocean merchant raiders. The diesel thing turned out to be a step too far as far as Jumo was concerned, although the basic design was eventually made to work by British licensee Napier.

2) Conventional landplanes

Focke Wulf and de Havilland both had mailplanes that could cross the Atlantic, but the 4E landplanes of the late 30s tended to be either disappointingly heavy or too small. British firm Fairey was working on a 4E type that could carry passengers and cargo from London to Newfoundland against the worst winds, the basic requirement for a continuous trans-Atlantic service that would be London-Montreal in ideal weather.

3) Unconventional landplanes

Basically, the higher you fly, the less fuel you use. Many people were working on a pressurised stratospher 4E type in 1939, and Short was supposed to deliver in 1941. I wonder if the Short brothers ever saw Glenn Martin's account of how the crew would deal with a cabin breach. "Everyone can just stay calm until someone arrives with a patch."

4) Now that's Just Weird

One entry that just won't go anywhere else, the Maia-Mercury composite, in which a stripped down Short F/B lifts a light floatplane into the air. They separate, and Mercury goes on to fly from Britain to Montreal or whatever. Mercury had the seaplane range record at the outbreak of war, but this was a little disappointing to its designers.

I'm not going to edit this since I doubt anyone cares. If you need details of weight and dates, Wikipedia is pretty good these days, if sometimes erroneous.

[G_K_Zhukov]

Re: Trans-Atlantic Airplane Flights in 1933

 

Maybe someone can help me. I'm trying to find out what airplanes would likely be used for trans-Atlantic flights in 1933. Primarily' date=' I'm interested in the speed and range of such aircraft. I'm not interested in commercial flights (if they had even started yest), but rather a plane that would be privately chartered for such a flight.[/quote']

 

1933 you say? Mmmm... Let's see...

 

Arc-en-ciel, a Couzinet 70 land-based monoplane aircraft crossed the Southern Atlantic in 14 hours flying at an average 230 kph (143 mph). At the time it was a world record of aerial speed, and the flight was a big step ahead in the establishment of an air postal service between Europe and South America.

 

The same year Spanish aviators Collar and Barberán set a new world record of aerial distance over water when they flew from Seville (Spain) to Camagüey (Cuba) in their Spanish-built CASA-Breguet XIX GR (Súper Bidón), a biplane named Cuatro Vientos after the pioneer air force base near Madrid. Unfortunately, the two brave pilots disappeared never to be found during the second stage of their aerial journey (which should have taken them from Cuba to Mexico).

 

 

It is very sad and a reflection of the sorry state of the aeronautical history of my country that this feat is virtually unknown nowadays, both in Spain and abroad.

[Lawnmower Boy]

Re: Trans-Atlantic Airplane Flights in 1933

 

And just a quick note.... Flight (Flight -Airline Industry news....) magazine has just opened its archives to online search. I just ran over there and checked out the Arc-en-Ciel and pulled up four or five pages from 1928 to 1935. As a card-carrying techno-moron I don't know how to paste in the link, but it should be easy enough to find on Google.

(It is also available in a complete microfilm edition from UMI at your nearest municipal library, but that's another story.)

[Narratio]

Re: Trans-Atlantic Airplane Flights in 1933

 

So, back at rjcurries question. Privately chartering a flight to go across the Atlantic in 1933 is a tough and expensive thing to do. Not many aircraft could do it and the pilot would have to be a barnstormer.

 

You don't mention how big the party of PC's will be. But, if you've got PC's with the money available (millionair playboys have to be good for something\), then hiring one of the above as a means to help finance a small start up mail company or an inventor working to improve engine efficiencies sounds like a good plot hook.

[Lawnmower Boy]

Re: Trans-Atlantic Airplane Flights in 1933

 

Although there were a number of chartered transatlantic flights in 1933/34, the one that sticks in my mind was one by an American couple, the Hutchinsons, who were billed in the tabloid press as the "Flying Family." They weren't the first themed trans-Atlantic fliers, but they were the most irresponsible, something that took a lot of doing after the "Florence Nightingale" episode.

See, their gimmick was that they had two young children.

Whom they brought along for their flight.

Plus a videographer to take home movies in flight so that they would have something to sell to the newsreels.

Whoops, I mean, "some cherished memories of the family outing."

Anyway, it was a multihop flight. They arrived on Anticosti Island on 25 August 1934, intending to do a Canada-Newfoundland-Greenland-Iceland-Britain route. But since they were not exactly burning road, and there was a lot of publicity, various authorities were alert and eager to stop them. A _lot_ of people died trying to cross the Atlantic in those days, and the killjoys thought it wasn't really a child-appropriate activity.

In spite of this, they reached Greenland, refuelled at a supply depot set up by Charles Lindbergh, and proceeded across the ice cap. There were a bunch of weather and aviation expeditions active on Greenland's east coast at the time (that's a whole 'nother story, and very pulpish, since some of them were half-seriously looking for lost Vikings) and the Hutchinsons presumably aimed to meet up with them or something.

Instead, they crashed their 'plane (a Sikorsky twin-engine amphibian) and had to be rescued, apparently costing the life of one of the rescuers. I say apparently because IIRC it was someone named "Udet," and the death report was never confirmed. I don't know Ernst Udet's biography well enough to be sure, but Greenland air expeditions are something he would have been involved in at the time.

The Hutchinsons were last seen in family court, arguing for custody...

[rjcurrie]

Re: Trans-Atlantic Airplane Flights in 1933

 

So, back at rjcurries question. Privately chartering a flight to go across the Atlantic in 1933 is a tough and expensive thing to do. Not many aircraft could do it and the pilot would have to be a barnstormer.

 

You don't mention how big the party of PC's will be. But, if you've got PC's with the money available (millionair playboys have to be good for something\), then hiring one of the above as a means to help finance a small start up mail company or an inventor working to improve engine efficiencies sounds like a good plot hook.

 

It's a con adventure and the team leader is well-off. Chartering a flyging boat with a barnstorming avaitrix as pilot is the root I went.

[st barbara]

Re: Trans-Atlantic Airplane Flights in 1933

 

A flying boat is the most likely type of aircraft to be chartered I would think. In 1939 Consolidated built a patrol aircraft with four engines known as the PB2Y-1, a four engined, double tailed amphibian with a top speed of 220 MPH and an estimated range of 5000 miles. The Martin PBM-1(the prototype for the "Mariner" flying boat) also appeared in 1939 and had a 5000 mile range. (Source :"The Ships and Aircraft of the U S Fleet" - James C Fahey (copyright 1969). Either of these flying boats COULD have been around as some sort of "advanced design" a bit earlier. Maybe your PC's (or a friendly NPC) could have helped develop them !