Farnborough History Continued.
When war broke out in 1914 Farnborough had for the first and only time a fourfold function; to combine the main supply of aeronautical information with the conduct of official tests, with design, and with manufacture of prototype engines. The period of official neglect swung suddenly to its opposite, a scramble to create the first breed of fighting aeroplane. This had to be done initially through Farnborough. It was well that a man of O'Gorman's calibre was in charge; it was well, too, that he could command recruits from the universities. His bag of young men was a mixed one, of those committed to aviation and those who were not mathematicians, physicists, engineers, biologists, professional and amateur pilots. They had to invent not only aeroplanes which could stay a few hours in the air, but also a number of instruments with which they could be navigated and could fight. This is the legendary period of great improvisation which is recollected later in these pages by some of those who shared it. It was, perhaps, only muddling through. The list of vital jobs that somehow got done is a ragged one. But at the end of it stands S.E.5, a war winner.
The spirit of efficient team work was shared by all who worked at Farnborough; it sprang from a sense of being the leaders in a new field of science and engineering. As the importance of air warfare increased, so did the Factory's consciousness of being a corps d'elite in the country's war effort.
In spite of these achievements the criticism which had originated in 1912, that Farnborough was a Government monopoly detrimental to private enterprise, increased in scope so that by the end of 1915 it had become sharply recriminatory. It led to the change of policy mentioned previously. This change was accompanied by a change of leader: Henry Fowler took over from O'Gorman in 1916 when the latter completed his seven years' contract. Many of the senior staff of Farnborough were directed to Industry on the score of national economy. This was perhaps an anticlimax for Farnborough but not for aviation as a whole. Of the O'Gorman period Sir Roy Fedden wrote: "There is no doubt that history has shown that this was a unique place, and you can hardly turn anywhere in British aviation without finding that the good things that were done on aircraft between the two wars stem almost entirely from engineers who had been at this remarkable place and who were inspired by an outstanding leader"
But Air War I was, with all its triumphs, only an initial sortie into the air when viewed in a scientific perspective, and the men of Farnborough were now released to get to more leisurely work.
Farnborough's experience in the years after World War I was no exception to the general trend of retrenchment due to industrial depressions and national stringency. War is the spur of aeronautics ; the curves of expenditure and manpower at Farnborough fall on an ebb tide from the flood of 1918 and rise on a second flood as 1939 approaches.
Sydney Smith, who had succeeded Henry Fowler as Superintendent in 1918, proceeded to adjust the internal organisation. to meet the new era, and the Royal Aircraft Establishment's family tree began to assume a familiar shape. The Aerodynamics, Engine Experimental, Physics and Instruments, Metallurgical, Mechanical Test and Chemical and Fabrics Departments were re-established or brought into being. In 1922 the Wireless and Photographic Departments arrived from Biggin Hill and Airworthiness and Contracts from the Air Ministry. This organisation was not materially changed in 1928 when A. H. Hall became Chief Superintendent, to steer the R.A.E. through the worst period of the economic depression and later to deal with the slow and then rapid expansions of the rearmament period. Throughout the inter-war years Farnborough's co-operation with the aircraft industry grew until it was an established practice for aircraft firms to evolve and develop their designs with the help of the accumulated experience and facilities at Farnborough. In the aircraft equipment field material advances were made in bombsighting and navigational instruments. The work on pilotless, radio-controlled aircraft (particularly the LARYNX of 1927-30) laid the basis for aircraft automatic pilot control and led steadily towards the possibilities of guided weapons.
The lean years were however, big with the beginnings of two revolutions, in both of which Farnborough played some part. The angular biplanes of 1918 had the air of not belonging to the medium which suffered them. A long period of development based on Melvill Jones's classic work on drag reduction was to change all that and lead to the beautiful fitness of the streamlined monoplane.
This spectacular decrease in drag was to be matched by an equally spectacular increase in propulsive thrust. In this period, many of the ideas which were later to triumph in Whittle's jet engine were germinating.
In this period, too, the Farnborough radio engineers were preparing a contribution to the shape of things to come by the design of short range pilot operated radio-telephone equipment working on very high frequencies. Without this means of learning quickly and continuously what our radar system knew of the whereabouts of the approaching bombers, our pilots would have been in poor shape for the Battle of Britain. Throughout the war this VHF communication system was used in all allied air forces. It now forms the basis of systems for operational control of fighter aircraft and for the approach and landing control of all types of military and civil aircraft.
Next - World War 2.