1. The First Man to Fly

2. Who are Wright Brothers?
Two Americans brothers.
Inventors of the world's first successful airplane.
The Wright brothers, Orville (August 19, 1871 – January 30, 1948) and Wilbur (April 16, 1867 – May 30, 1912), were two Americans who are generally credited[ with inventing and building the world's first successful airplane and making the first controlled, powered and sustained heavier-than-air human flight, on December 17, They are also officially credited worldwide through the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale, the standard-setting and record-keeping body for aeronautics and astronautics, as "the first sustained and controlled heavier-than-air powered flight." In the two years afterward, the brothers developed their flying machine into the first practical fixed-wing aircraft. Although not the first to build and fly experimental aircraft, the Wright brothers were the first to invent aircraft controls that made fixed-wing flight possible.
The brothers' fundamental breakthrough was their invention of three-axis control, which enabled the pilot to steer the aircraft effectively and to maintain its equilibrium.This method became standard and remains standard on fixed-wing aircraft of all kinds.From the beginning of their aeronautical work, the Wright brothers focused on unlocking the secrets of control to conquer "the flying problem", rather than developing more powerful engines as some other experimenters did. Their careful wind tunnel tests produced better aeronautical data than any before, enabling them to design and build wings and propellers more effective than any before.Their U.S. patent 821,393 claims the invention of a system of aerodynamic control that manipulates a flying machine's surfaces.
Wilbur and his brother Orville

3. Wright Brothers Journey
– Wright Brothers made research on how things fly.
– Wright Brothers tested their wings using wind tunnel.
– Wright Brothers developed the first flight control systems.
Wright Brothers developed propulsion system (generate thrust by engine and propeller)
17th December 1903, finally successful

4. (1899 - 1902) – Wright Brothers made Research on how things fly.4
( ) – Wright Brothers made Research on how things fly.
Wright Brothers made a research to find out the state of aeronautical knowledge at their time
They read about the works of Cayley, and Langley, and the hang-gliding flights of Otto Lilienthal
Studied the problems which had been encountered by previous flyers and they talked about possible solutions to the problems

5. 1900: Test the Lift force
This is a picture of the 1900 kite taken by Orville. It flies just fine … but there is no one on board. The brothers found that in a 20 mph wind, the kite could lift itself, but not carry a pilot. Something was wrong in their design. They measured the wind speed using an anemometer that they borrowed from Octave Chanute. The brothers also measured the forces in the control lines and the angle at which the kite flew. They flew the craft with the tail in front and the tail in back and even without the tail. They put chains on the craft to determine how much the craft could lift for a measured wind speed.

6. (1901 - 1902) – Wright Brothers Tested Their Wings using Wind Tunnel6
( ) – Wright Brothers Tested Their Wings using Wind Tunnel
Built a wind tunnel and they tested over two hundred different of wing and airfoil models to improve the performance of their gliders.
Today, aircraft engineers use sophisticated models and wind tunnels to study a variety of problems associated with modern aircraft design

7. 1901: Built a Wind Tunnel Test 200 shape of airfoil
This is a picture of the back of the tunnel. It has a large opening to let the wind out. Modern engineers would call this a “free return” design. It’s not a loop like most modern tunnels. Because it is free-return, any moving things in the room outside the tunnel can effect the results inside. So the brothers had a very strict procedure for taking data. One of the brothers would run the motor, and the other brother would stand by the side of the tunnel and look in the top to observe the test and record the data.

8. This is a picture of the actual data and graphs used by the brothers to determine the wing design for the 1902 aircraft.

9. Wind Tunnel: research tool to study the effects of air moving past solid objects.
NASA wind tunnel with the model of a plane.

10. 1901: Built the Hangar to store the aircraft
The brothers decided that they needed more room to work on their aircraft in 1901, so they built a hangar in which to store the aircraft. The sides of the hangar could be lifted to ease the aircraft in and out. They also dug a well out on the dunes so that they wouldn’t have to trek in water. Chanute and some of his co-workers visited the brothers as shown in the figure. Chanute is at the left on the cot and Wilbur is standing.

11. 1901: Make 50 Glides, but unsatisfied Performance
Here is Wilbur being launched on a glide from the side of a sand dune. That’s Dan Tate (Tom’s Uncle) on the left and one of Chanute’s friends (Huffaker) at the right. If you look close, you can see small struts sticking up from the lower wing. The brothers used these to twist the shape of their airfoil when they determined that the wing was not generating the predicted lift. Wilbur got about 50 glides during Orville hadn’t flown yet. You’ll notice that Wilbur lies on top of the bottom wing, not hanging beneath like Lilienthal. Orville was a champion bike rider, and most people that ride bicycles very fast know that it is harder to move through the air upright than to bend over in a biker’s stance. The brothers decided to cut the drag on the aircraft by having the pilot lie flat on the wing.

12. 1901: Wing design proved to be faulty
This is picture of Orville and the 1901 aircraft. You can see how much thicker the wing has become. You will also notice that the brothers have not included a rudder on the aircraft. They didn’t believe that they needed one (“birds don’t use rudders”). The weight of the aircraft has grown to about 100 pounds while Orville remains at 150 pounds.

13. 13
( ) – Wright Brothers developed the first flight control systems
Ideas for control were tested on a series of unpowered between 1900 and 1902 – kites to obtain aerodynamic performance
Flying object had to be controlled about all three primary axes; roll, pitch, and yaw
Their aircraft were built with movable surfaces on the wing, elevator, and rudder
The first Wright brothers correctly understood that there was a another problem that had to be solved before heavier-than-air flight was possible. The aircraft must provide some system for stability and control. Stability and control are actually opposing concepts. An aircraft can be designed to be very stable (if disturbed it will return to its original flight conditions). But a stable aircraft is hard to control. In order to maneuver the airplane, you have to overcome its stability. The designs of Lilienthal and Maxim included some aspects of stability, but the pilots could not control them during transients. The brothers decided to “make a small contribution” to the study of flight by designing an aircraft that was just marginally stable, but would rely on the skill of the pilot to control the aircraft in flight. The pilot would no longer be a passenger, but would have an active roll during flight.

14. 1902: Solve the control problem………
With the wind tunnel designed aircraft, and the new flight controls, the brothers take to the air in Both brothers fly. During the next four weeks, the brothers break all the world records for gliding; time aloft (25 sec), length of glide (650 feet), size of aircraft (30 foot wing span), weight (110 pounds of aircraft, 150 pounds of pilot), and airspeed (over 35 mph). They make over a thousand flights. At the end of the 1902 flying season, the brothers are the most experienced pilots in the world; they have learned how to fly. And they realize that all that remains for the invention of the airplane is add a motor to this glide. (Of course, they will have to make the aircraft larger to lift the motor and they will have to add propellers to generate thrust)

15. As an object moves through the air, it is free to rotate about its center of gravity in three directions. We can draw three axes through the center of gravity to describe the motion. The ROLL axis runs from front to back. Rotation about this axis is called ROLL and it occurs when the wing tips move up and down. The PITCH axis runs through the wings and a PITCH motion occurs when the nose moves up and down. The YAW axis is perpendicular to the other two axes and points down. A YAW motion occurs when the nose moves from side to side. The brothers correctly surmised that an aircraft has to be controlled about all three axes. They decided to build moving surfaces into their aircraft to allow the pilot to change the amount of force on the surface which would create a torque about the center of gravity and rotate the aircraft.

16. Roll Around Longitudinal Axis

17. Pitch Around the Lateral Axis

18. Yaw Around the vertical Axis

19. (1903 - 1920's) - Wright Brothers Developed Propulsion Systems
First to fly a self-propelled, heavier than air machine
The thin, high speed propellers which they designed were based on wind tunnel tests and were unlike any other propellers being used at that time
Between 1903 and 1913 the engine power increased from 12 horsepower to nearly 75 horsepower

20. Move from 1902 Glider to the 1903 powered aircraft. Add a engine.
To move from the 1902 glider to the 1903 powered aircraft, the brothers had to add a motor. They knew the performance requirements of their motor because they knew the drag of their aircraft based on their wind tunnel results. The engine must develop 8 horse power. They estimated the weight of the engine (200 pounds) and asked several auto manufacturers if they could produce an engine to meet these specifications. No one responded. So the brothers designed and built their own engine. It is a marvel! A gasoline powered, internal combustion, 4 cylinder engine, which they designed and built in 6 weeks. They had some help from their bicycle mechanic, Charles Taylor, and had the block cast at a local foundry, but this engine was built using only the tools found in their bicycle shop. It produced 12 horsepower and weighed about 200 pounds. This is a picture of a model of the engine which was built in the 1920’s. No plans of the actual engine remain. This is a picture of the front of the engine (from the front of the airplane). The cylinders are arranged in-line and lay on their side. The timing chain is visible on the front of the engine, as are the radiator tubes connected at the top. The chains to the propellers are seen at the rear, behind the large flywheel on the back of the engine at the left. The large tube sticking out the top of the engine is the air intake.

21. December 17, 1903) - The First Flight21
December 17, 1903) - The First Flight
December 17, 1903, near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, Wilbur and Orville Wright made the world's first successful powered, free, controlled, sustained flights in a heavier-than-air craft. Their first flight went 120 feet (37 meters) and lasted only about 12 seconds.

22. Breakthrough
1894 Sir Hiram Maxim built huge steam powered flying machines but never successfully flew them. Experimenters were learning there are three main requirements for powered flight: sufficient power and lift, and control. Source, Jepperson Sanderson
10:35 a.m. December 17th The Wright machine Flyer took to the air from a 40 ft wood rail under its own power for a flight of 120 ft in 12 seconds. They made four flights before noon; the longest covered 852 ft in 59 seconds. The Flyer was then damaged by a gust of wind before the fifth flight could be made. The Wright’s no-risk, methodical approach to flying had paid off. The success of this powered flight was in no small way aided by the light petrol engine the brothers had developed over the previous winter. Source: Strickland

23. 17th December 1903, finally successful
This is the most famous aviation picture of all time. It was taken December 17, by John Daniels of the life guard station. It shows Orville Wright on the wing of the flyer (it was his turn after losing the coin toss on the 14th) and Wilbur running alongside. In the foreground you can see the smooth sand which marks where the wing was at the time of the engine run-up. The 60 foot launch rail is seen as well as the dolly at the end of the rail below the airplane. Orville has taken off, under his own power and will land 12 seconds later at 120 feet from the end of the rail. That’s 40 yards in 12 seconds (only three times slower than a modern football player!). The flight was in a straight line and never got more than 10 feet off the ground. At the end of the flight, the plane was brought back and Wilbur took his turn, with very similar results. Orville got the next flight and staid in the air for about 250 feet. Wilbur flew the last flight of the day for 59 seconds and almost 850 feet.

24. Summary Wright Bro. Solved 3 Problems
How to obtain LIFT FORCE using the wing.
How to make 3-axis aircraft control possible.
How to produced THRUST force using engine.
For any object to fly, we have to overcome the pull of gravity on the object. We note the pull of gravity by a FORCE called WEIGHT. The weight force is always directed towards the center of the earth and will accelerate an object towards the surface of the earth according to Newton’s laws of motion. For an airplane, we overcome the weight by generating an opposing force called LIFT. This force is generated by the wings of the airplane as it moves through the air. The air resists this motion. So there is a force opposed to the motion which we call DRAG. To overcome drag, we install a propulsion system on the airplane which generates THRUST. Flying then becomes a “tug-of war” between these four forces. The motion of the airplane through the air is governed by Newton’s laws of motion with the net external force acting on the airplane determined by the relative size of the four forces.

25. Here’s a computer drawing which compares the various aircraft designed and built by the brothers. Notice how similar they are. The brothers evolved their design … they didn’t just scrap everything and start over when the early aircraft did not perform properly.

26. (1904 - 1907) - Flight Development
Continued to perfect their machine with a series of aircraft built between 1903 and Flight testing from kitty hawk to their home town of Dayton, Ohio
New, more powerful aircraft, they were able to stay aloft for up to a half hour, to fly figure eights, and to even take passengers up for a ride

27. This is a computer drawing which compares the designs of the Wright aircraft from 1903, 1904, and Notice the elevator changes on the 1905.

28. Heavier-Than-Air Definition

29. After 1903…….
The brother write to the war department to try and obtain a contract for a “practical flying machine” but are turned down.
They decide to halt flying operations until they get a contract and the patent rights.
They won’t be seen in the air again until but they continue to work on increasing the power of their engines.

30. 1908…formed the Wright Company
Finally in 1908 the War Department signed a contract for a Wright Flyer, provided it could meet certain tests.
A month later a plan was instituted for the formation of a Wright company in France.
After the successful development of the first airplane, the Wright Brothers continued to be involved in aerospace technology.
Orville was one of the original members of the National Advisory Council on Aeronautics (NACA) which is the parent organization of the current NASA.

31. Wright Brothers Contribution
Transportation change dramatically.
By mid-century air travel was common
By late 1950s it had replaced the train and stream ship as the preferred mode of transport.
By the last quarter of the 20th century, with large, efficient jet-powered aircraft, air travel was commonplace and affordable to all.
Flying has become second nature to hundreds of millions of people and it is impossible to imagine a world without it.

32. Wright Brothers Contribution
Airplane also rapidly developed as weapon of war.
The advent of jet power, and sophisticated electronics perfected during and after Cold War, has now turned the aircraft into a feared weapon.
Today, aviation and spaceflight are critical tools for the improvement of human conditions and powerful instruments of positive change.
The political, social and economic challenges are different.