Their inner trailing edges were directly controlled by the pilot, who sat over the central beam-wing spar joint. The wing spars were also circular, solid and wooden, set with strong dihedral which took their tips to the height of the extreme nose so that the foreplanes, elevators or jibs could be attached between these three points. A solid, circular section wood beam was inserted into this steel tube, extending it rearwards. A curved, circular cross-section steel tube reached from the nose at least as far aft as the welded sockets which received the ends of the main wing spars. The Platz glider was built around a central, two part boom.
After some preliminary experiments with simple paper models, Platz designed the one-man canard glider which was then named after him. Just as the sloop could be controlled by adjusting its jib, the glider could be controlled by foreplane trimming. He reasoned that the same stability he saw in that boat might be achieved by a similarly rigged glider with a small forewing and a larger rear plane. Platz recalled sailing a sloop rigged boat, which had been very stable upwind and capable of maintaining its course without rudder input. Reinhold Platz, the chief designer for Fokker's after June 1916, perceived a role for a glider that was cheap to buy, costing less than "one good pedal cycle", and cheap to maintain, while being robust and capable of being transported, by train or otherwise, and rapidly erected by one man. As a result, there was a rapid increase of interest in gliding. In Germany, just after the end of World War I, the 1919 Versailles treaty imposed a ban on powered flight. Platz glider being transported Design and development
0 kommentar(er)
