Rebuilding the Genius Machines

Back in 1901, the Wright brothers could never have anticipated the reverence future generations would have for their work. It was a year of failures, one in which they felt bitterly frustrated. "1901 was probably their most critical year," says Hyde. "They talked about giving up. But they didn't give up."


PROBLEMS, PROBLEMS, PROBLEMS
Wilbur did the flying that summer of '01 at Kitty Hawk, a location the Wrights chose after carefully studying Weather Bureau data from around the country. Kitty Hawk had steady winds-and sand to cushion crash landings. It had only been five years since Wilbur and Orville decided to try to build the world's first powered airplane. The death of a renowned German glider pilot, Otto Lilienthal, in an 1896 crash, reported in newspapers around the world, had captured the brothers' attention. They were working as bicycle mechanics and builders in Dayton, with their own high-priced line of Wright special models. Talented and restless, they were eager to devote their lives to a grand dream. Wilbur, born in 1867, was the oldest, and usually the spokesman. The two lifelong bachelors were extremely close, and incredibly productive.


Beginning in 1899 with the construction of biplane kites, they progressed to building biplane gliders capable of carrying one pilot, lying flat on the lower wing, in flights of 300 feet or more. In 1901, they built the largest glider ever made: It had a 22-foot wingspan. They based it on data gleaned from Lilienthal's published research.


Their big glider flew, but not the way it should have. The Wrights had expected to be able to fly in 18-mile-per-hour winds. But the glider refused to remain airborne unless the winds exceeded 23 miles per hour. And when it did fly, the plane was dangerously difficult to maneuver. One crash threw Wilbur right through the elevator, cutting his face and bruising him badly. "When they got home after the disappointments of that summer, they started thinking that maybe Lilienthal's tables were wrong," says Hyde. "That was unheard of, because this was a man who was the father of gliding. It would almost be like questioning Einstein's authority today."


But the Wrights saw no alternative. They began to devise tests, crude at first but increasingly sophisticated, to measure the performance of different wing cross sections, or airfoils. Naturally enough, their first experiments involved a bicycle.


In Hyde's hangar, just opposite the '03 flyer, is an unusual bicycle, a replica of the one the Wrights used in their early airfoil tests. The bike looks like a classic old English-style men's three-speed, except for the wheel mounted horizontally across the handlebars. Attached to upright rods on the rim of that horizontal wheel are two small metal plates, one flat, one slightly convex. The convex plate is the airfoil; it presents the same profile to the wind as does the wing of a glider.