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HISTORY OF TECHNOLOGY, TECHNOLOGY, OBJECTS AROUND US
Voyager plane. History of invention and production
Directory / The history of technology, technology, objects around us Voyager Model 76 is the first aircraft to fly non-stop around the globe without refueling. Chief designer - Bert Rutan. The aircraft was piloted by Dick Rutan, the designer's older brother, and Jeana Yeager. The plane took off from the 4600-meter runway at Edwards Air Force Base in Mojave on December 14, 1986 and landed safely on it on December 23, 9 days, 3 minutes and 44 seconds later. During the flight, the aircraft covered 42 km (FAI credited a distance of 432 km) at an average altitude of 40 km. This record finally broke the previous one set by a US Air Force B-212 crew that covered 3,4 miles (52 km) in 12. This aircraft was designed for a long journey. Therefore, he was given the name "Voyager" - "traveler". The record flight by American pilots on Voyager cannot but arouse admiration. The aircraft was flown by test pilot Dick Rutan and 34-year-old sports pilot Gina Yeager. For nine days and four minutes they were in the air, landing at Edwards Air Force Base in the United States on December 23, 1986, from where they began their flight. Voyager covered a distance of 40 kilometers in nine days. Experts claimed that he could fly another 500 kilometers.
Man at all times sought to conquer new frontiers. The world's first flight distance record was set at the beginning of the 220th century by the Brazilian Alberto Santos-Dumont, who flew on an aircraft of his own design ... 25 meters. The ANT-1937, developed by the Soviet aircraft designer Andrei Nikolaevich Tupolev, can be considered a peculiar predecessor of Voyager. Chkalovsky records, fantastic for those times, were set on it, which gave a powerful impetus to the development of Soviet science. The whole world applauded the Soviet pilots, who in XNUMX made a non-stop flight from the USSR through the North Pole to America. Voyager's voyage attracted the attention of the Pentagon as well. His spokesman recalled that the previous world straight-line flight record had been set in 1962 on a US Air Force B-52 bomber. Then the American "flying fortress" took off in Tokyo and landed at the US Air Force base in Spain, flying over twenty thousand kilometers. The most prominent representatives of experimental aircraft made of composite materials were two aircraft designed by designer Bert Rutan: the Boeing executive aircraft Beechcraft Starship-1 and the record-breaking long-range aircraft Rutan Voyager. The first of these aircraft, produced in 1983, was designed with the help of a computer, while carbon fiber with increased technical indicators was used as the main construction material. According to the scheme, the Beechcraft Starship-1 aircraft was a twin-engine "duck" aircraft, and the spaced vertical tail was located at the ends of the wing, simultaneously performing the functions of end washers. In 1981, Rutan began work on the Voyager aircraft, which was intended to fly around the world non-stop. The modest living room of Bert Rutan's house in Mojave, California, became the headquarters for flight preparation and served this purpose for five whole years. His brother Dick and Gina Yeager, a former draftsman, worked with him. And in hangar No. 77 at the local airfield all this time there was no end to volunteers. Many local residents expressed their desire to help in the construction of the aircraft. The brothers were especially proud of the fact that they put their idea into practice at their own expense, without receiving a single cent from the government. But it would be a mistake to suspect them of complete disinterestedness. With the formation of Voyager Aircraft Incorporated, the Rutans set out a program to get their money back and even profit from show flights and advertising. For example, the Mobile Oil Corporation provided a new synthetic oil for Voyager's engines, in exchange for acquiring the right to use the image of the aircraft on its product brochures. The first test flight, made in June 1984 by Dick, lasted 30 minutes. The maximum estimated flight time of the aircraft without landing was 14 days, the length was 45060 kilometers. But the absolute distance record - a flight without landing and without refueling - took place two years later. The flight range depends primarily on the ratio of fuel weight to aircraft takeoff weight. The mass of the empty Voyager aircraft was only 840 kilograms with a mass of fuel of 4052 kilograms. Takeoff weight was 5137 kilograms. 72 percent of Voyager's takeoff weight was fuel! By comparison, today's long-range passenger aircraft have a relative fuel weight of about 40 percent, while the ANT-25, a marvel of the 1930s, had 52 percent. Not without reason in the American press it was dubbed the "flying gas tank". Increasing the fuel supply is a particularly difficult problem for small aircraft. After all, they do not have enough internal volume to accommodate such a large supply of fuel. On Voyager, the volumes for fuel were increased through the use of a two-beam layout scheme. In addition to traditional containers, primarily in the wing, as well as in the fuselage and horizontal tail, additional containers of these two beams were used. Another important task was to reduce the weight of the empty aircraft. Reducing the weight of the structure was facilitated by the use of the latest composite materials with the highest characteristics. So, the main used carbon fiber is five to ten times stronger than steel and much lighter than conventional aluminum alloys. The applied two-beam layout also helped to reduce the weight of the structure, since these beams, as they say, "unloaded" the wing (reduced the bending moment along the wing from aerodynamic forces due to loading the wing with a moment in the opposite direction, down, from the weight forces of the beams with contents). The weight of the power plant, equipment, equipment has decreased. All this contributed to a reduction in the required thrust or engine power, and hence their weight and fuel consumption. Another way to increase the flight range is to improve the aerodynamics of the aircraft. This allows you to choose a less powerful and at the same time lighter engine with lower fuel consumption. Since Voyager is a low-speed aircraft, a significant proportion of the aerodynamic drag is the so-called induced drag, which is caused by vortex formation at the wing tips and decreases with increasing wing span. To combat it, an extremely long wing with an aspect ratio of 33,8 (the ratio of the span to the average chord - width) was installed on the aircraft, while in modern passenger aircraft the wing aspect ratio, as a rule, does not exceed 10. The gondola with the cockpit and two piston engines were located on the wing. The 130 horsepower air-cooled front engine with a pulling propeller worked for takeoff, while the 110 horsepower rear liquid-cooled engine was used for main flight. The engines were manufactured by Teledine Continental for Pentagon unmanned reconnaissance aircraft. "... The biggest find of the designer B. Rutan," writes V.A. Kiselev in the journal "Technology and Science", "is the development and application of the concept of two engines on Voyager. It has already been noted that to save fuel, you need to use an engine minimum power. But in the process of flying to a distance, the weight of the aircraft is reduced due to fuel depletion. Voyager also has a record decrease - by 5 times! Therefore, it is desirable to reduce the power plant power by these 5 times. To reduce power due to such a significant throttling and reducing the number of engine revolutions is unprofitable; specific fuel consumption increases; it is desirable to fly at revolutions close to the calculated ones. In such a situation, it was very beneficial to use two working engines in the initial period of the flight and only one - in the rest of the period, when fuel consumption reduced weight airplane." As a result, Voyager's fuel consumption averaged only 91 grams per kilometer. This is about the same as the consumption of ordinary passenger cars of the Zhiguli type. But the plane is several times heavier and, moreover, did not drive, but flew at an average speed of 185 kilometers per hour. Two engines, this is not only fuel economy, but also increased safety. They also allow you to increase power in an emergency if you need to overcome a thunderstorm front or mountain peaks. Apparently, it was the concept of two engines that was the last link that eventually made it possible to achieve success. “It is impossible to place two engines on the wing,” Kiselev continues, “after all, only one works for a significant part of the flight and it will create asymmetric thrust. This means that both screws must be located along the axis of symmetry of the aircraft. Use two coaxial screws, each of which rotates with its own engine, bad: you need a long and heavy shaft from the rear engine to the propeller; one stopped propeller will reduce the efficiency of the other. Then, maybe, spread the propellers and engines along the ends of the fuselage? This solution will not work, because during landing and takeoff, the rear propeller will either touch the ground, or to avoid this, long and heavy landing gear would be required, which is clearly unprofitable.Then let's move the rear propeller forward, shortening the fuselage, but not moving forward the horizontal tail unit (GO), without shortening its shoulder.This can be achieved by fixing the GO on two additional fuselage beams.The resulting layout already satisfies the considered concept of two engines.But let's pay attention to the optimal shapewing of Voyager. It is very long and narrow (with a small chord). On such a small chord, it is difficult to ensure the rigidity of the fastening of the fuselage and two beams; relative deformations of the GO and the wing will be significant, which will worsen the stability and controllability of the aircraft. In addition, there is a GO in the flow from the propellers, which, although it can improve handling, will reduce propeller thrust. The last circumstance for an ultra-long-range aircraft has a more significant negative value. In this situation, B. Rutan finds an original solution: to swap the wing and the GO, that is, from the usual aerodynamic scheme with a tail, go to the "duck" scheme, in which the GO is in front of the wing. Now the front GO connects the beams and the fuselage itself, that is, it is an additional support for the fuselage beams. Such a scheme provides greater rigidity and less angular deformation of the GO relative to the wing. Now nothing slows down the flow from the propeller of the main rear engine. Therefore, the solution found by B. Rutan is the most profitable, optimal." When an aircraft was first rolled out of Hangar No. 77 at the Mojave airfield, the assembled experts and journalists were struck by its strange resemblance to a giant fossil bird - a pterodactyl. On December 14, 1986, Voyager, having run up the runway to a speed of 70 miles per hour (later on, Voyager's flight speed ranged from 90 to 150 miles per hour), could not take off for some time. The wing, fully loaded with fuel, despite the increase in its flexural rigidity, gave a very large deflection. At the end of the aircraft takeoff, when strong elastic bending oscillations of the wing began, several impacts of the oscillating ends of the consoles on the surface of the runway occurred. The wing end shields came off: the left one on the ground and the right one in the air. However, because of these "little things" it was decided not to interrupt the flight. V. Biryukov spoke in detail about the Voyager flight in the journal Nature and Man: “...Dick spent the first two days of the flight at the helm of Voyager almost invariably. the flight over the Pacific Ocean did not present any particular difficulties, then further, over Malaysia, over the Indian Ocean, and most importantly over the territory of Africa, travelers encountered zones of strong atmospheric unrest ... ... The crew was forced to change course abruptly (sometimes up to 90 degrees), and hastily go down or up, fleeing from insidious turbulent flows. On the third day of the journey in the area of the Philippine archipelago, there came a rare moment when, at the insistence of the expedition doctor, who remained at the airfield in Mojave, the autopilot was turned on. Dick and Gina got a chance to rest. The cockpit is so small - 70x210x140 centimeters that Dick was dozing with his head back in the pilot's seat, and Gina was lying down, to the right of him, surrounded by numerous instruments and items necessary for the flight. What was not in the cockpit: fuel tank switches (there were only 16 on board), an emergency manual fuel pump, automatic and forced refueling of engines with oil, a walkie-talkie, navigation instruments, two cans of drinking water (40 liters), containers with provisions. And one more difficulty that accompanied the travelers all nine days of the flight was the deafening noise of the engines. Flight controllers on the ground in Mojave maintained radio contact with Voyager via satellites or used the services of airliner relays that happened to be in close proximity to travelers. They reported that Dick and Gina did not immediately respond to radio requests. It often took at least five minutes for the pilots to gather their thoughts. As Voyager was flying over the central Atlantic Ocean, heading for the coast of Latin America, a red light suddenly lit up on the cockpit instrument panel. The rear engine is very hot, the oil pressure has dropped. And soon the engine, sneezing several times, stalled. Ground controllers sent aboard: "Attention! Prepare for an emergency landing" - and began to figure out which of the Brazilian airfields can make it, Gina and Dick, who were allowed a little rest by the tailwind over the western part of the Atlantic, were overwhelmed by unpleasant news. But a few minutes later the crew joyfully informed the ground that the flight would continue. Tired of fighting the elements, the pilots forgot to add oil to the engine in time. The error was corrected, the engine was able to start. At the final stage of the route, when Voyager, after literally sneaking between cyclones along the west coast of the United States and Mexico for almost a day and a half, and approaching Edwards Air Force Base, the fuel supply suddenly stopped. And in the same ill-fated rear engine. Gina climbed waist-deep into the right wing, turned off the automatic pump, and began to feed the fuel with the help of a manual one. But the misadventures did not end there - the starter failed. Dick turned on the autopilot and climbed to the left wing, where the fuses for the electrical system were located. Only then did the starter start working, and then, after a bit of a fuss, the motor also started working. Then the automatic fuel pump turned on, and Gina was able to return to her seat in the cockpit. In the end, Dick and Gina made it through the arduous nine-day ordeal of continuous noise, harsh churn and the inconvenience of a small cockpit and completed this historic flight with honors at Edwards AFB. Author: Musskiy S.A.
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