May 28, 2025
“Did you read about the Wright Brothers? Don’t
you think we
could do better than they did?”
“What?”
“Their design’s been published. We know what
they did and
what they discarded. Based on their experience, using the same
materials and
tools, shouldn’t we be able to do better?”
“What are you driving at?”
“There are many ways to get a flying machine
into the air.
You could start it on an inclined ramp, heading into a prevailing
wind. You
could set it on a frame and pull it with horseless carriages, with
the wings at
the optimal angle for lift and the ground motion generating wind.
And then,
when it starts to lift, you could detach it from the frame and
turn on the
engine to start the propeller. And you wouldn’t even need
horseless carriages.
Keep it simple. Use horses to pull it until lift-off. Or you could
launch it
with a catapult or a device like a cross bow. If you get lift-off
that way, you
could use a smaller and lighter engine that burns less fuel.”
“But wouldn’t it be cheating to use an external
source of
energy to get it started?”
“This isn’t a game, a contest with rules and if
you break
the rules, you won’t win the prize. Nonsense. The objective is to
build and
launch a self-propelled flying machine. Forget rules. Use your
imagination. You
could even use a hot-air balloon to get it off the ground. Then
turn on the
engine and cut it free.”
“But that’s like trying to reinvent the wheel.
We already
have airplanes — huge and powerful ones.”
“Imagine what we might learn from trying, first
with the
same constraints they had, and then without them. If we weren’t
limited to the
tools and materials the Wright Brothers had in 1903, what kinds of
flying
machine could we build? And isn’t it about time we reinvented the
wheel?”