GENERAL I ARTICLE

How Two Bicycle Mechanics Achieved the

World's First Powered Flight
Roddam Narasimha

The Background.

On 17 December 1903, two bicycle mechanics from Dayton,

Ohio in the United States helped a powered aircraft (they called
it a 'Flyer') along a wooden rail in a desolate, wind-swept, sandy
plain called Kitty Hawk in North Carolina, and flew the craft for
almost a minute (Figure 1). By doing this the Wright brothers,
Orville (1871-1948) and Wilbur (1867-1912) (Figure 2), had R o d d a m N a r a s i m h a is a n
aerospace scientist,
accomplished a feat that much of mankind, including some of its
c u r r e n t l y at t h e E n g i n e e r -
greatest minds, had considered impossible for thousands of ing M e c h a n i c s U n i t of the
years. Famous among the more recent of such skeptics had been Jawaharlal Nehru Centre
Lord Kelvin, who had said as late as 1896, 'I do not have the for A d v a n c e d Scientific
R e s e a r c h a n d at t h e
smallest molecule of faith in aerial navigation other than bal-
National Institute of
looning '. There were many others who would have agreed with A d v a n c e d Studies. M u c h
Kelvin, and indeed it was common to say at that time about of h i s earlier p r o f e s s i o n a l

anything considered impossible that it could not be done - 'man life w a s s p e n t at the
Indian Institute of
might as well try to fly'.
Science and the National
Aerospace Laboratories.
How did the two bicycle mechanics accomplish what so many H i s scientific r e s e a r c h
others could not? That is a natural question to ask, but as posed h a s b e e n chiefly in fluid
it is misleading, because although the Wright brothers ran a m e c h a n i c s , in p a r t i c u l a r
flow t r a n s i t i o n s . In r e c e n t
cycle shop in Dayton, it is clear that they were no ordinary
y e a r s h e h a s also b e e n
mechanics. Indeed the striking thing about their aviation project k e e n l y i n t e r e s t e d in the
was how extraordinarily systematic, analytical and ingenious history o f s c i e n c e and
they were. Although neither of the two brothers had even passed technology.

high school, they were both well educated in the true sense of the
word. In particular the elder brother Wilbur was very well read,
and had to drop out of high school just before he could have
graduated only because his father decided at that very time to
shift from Indiana to Dayton; Wilbur wanted to go to Yale but Keywords
could not afford it and had obligations to the family which he Wright brothers, biplane, air-
felt he had to discharge. Father was a bishop of independent and craft control.

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 GENERAL J ARTICLE

Figure 1. One of the most famous photographs of history, showing the first flight of the Wright Flyer
at Kitty Hawk on 17 December 1903. The person looking on at the right is Wilbur; Orville is piloting
the plane, in a prone position. (This position was necessary because a sitting pilot would have
added considerably to the drag of the vehicle; the prone position was also considered safer- in case
of a crash the pilot got off with only minor bruises and mouthfuls of sand.)

Note the single rail which constitutes the runway. A sled fixed below the wings moved along the
rail as the aircraft did its take-off run: there were no wheels or landing gear yet/ Somebody (like
Wilbur in the picture) had to hold up the wing-tip during the run to prevent the aircraft from tipping
over.

The plane was driven by two counter-rotating propellers driven by a 12 hp gasoline engine, located
on the lower wing to the right of the piloL Both engine and propeller were specially designed for the
p l a n e - in fact Wilbur pioneered propeller technology; counter-rotation nulled out the torque that
would otherwise act on the air frame. The two horizontal surfaces in front constitute the elevator
in a 'canard' configuration - in current designs it would normally be part of the tail plane of an
aircraft. The elevator gives control in pitch (nose up or down). The two vertical surfaces at the back
constitute the rudder, used for turning the plane left or right, One of the major innovations in the
Wright plane was the provision of control for rolling the plane during a turn; this was achieved by
warping the wings (see Box 3).

The Wright Flyer was a biplane- L e. had two wings. The Iow speed of flight demanded a large wing
area, and the structural technology of the time did not permit the single large wings that we see in
current monoplanes.

strongly held views; both father and mother were teachers. So

the children grew up in a domestic atmosphere of learning and
debate.

Before the Wright Brothers got started on the project (which was
in 1896), there had indeed been human flyers of some kind. Such
flight usually took the form of ballooning (i.e. lighter than air

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 GENERAL I ARTICLE

vehicles), most spectacularly in the work of the Montgolfier

brothers in France, who demonstrated the first practical balloon
in 1783. There had also been gliders, i.e. aircraft which were
unpowered, and so had to rely on upcurrents in the atmosphere
to sustain flight. Indeed some striking gliding feats had already
been achieved, beginning with George Cayley's ideas in En-
gland (1773-1857) and going much further with Otto Lilienthal
(1848-96) in Germany (whose work the Wrights closely fol-
lowed). There was also a very visible American project run by Dr
Samuel Pierpont Langley (after whom the NASA Langley Cen-
tre in Hampton, Virginia is now named); around 1900 Langley
was Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC
and had a generously funded project (worth $50000) for making
what he called the 'Great Aerodrome' (a word he used for his
powered flying vehicles - not for landing fields). Langley had
earlier built scaled models, which had in fact shown very prom-
ising performance.

However, sustained powered flight had proved beyond human

reach. Both distinguished scientists like Kelvin and Langley as
well as outstanding engineers like Lilienthal had found it diffi-
cult or impossible. There was of course the old Greek legend
Figure 2.
about Icarus, who stuck wings on his shoulders (using wax) and
tried to fly; his failure (because in part the wax was supposed to
have melted as he approached the sun) has been part of Western
myth for a long time. Many cultures have been fascinated by the
idea and vision and dream of human flight; we have had our own
myths ofpushpaka vimanas, for example.

One legitimate question that arises therefore is why the Wright

brothers were so rash as many thought at the time to take on
their project, and what led them to it. Wilbur appears not to have
been impressed by the kind of opinion that Kelvin and others
had expressed because he saw that flight was common in the
animal world: his own optimism was based on the idea that
'while thousands of most dissimilar body structures, such as
insects, fish, reptiles, birds and mammals are flying with plea-
sure, it was reasonable to suppose that man might also fly.' That

RESONANCE [ December 2003 63

 GENERAL[ ARTICLE

still leaves open the question whether flapping is necessary for

flight, but after all not all birds flap vigorously, and George
Cayley had already identified the basic technological problem of
human flight as one involving the presence of wings to generate
enough lift, a power unit to generate the thrust required to
overcome the resistance to flight (or the drag of the vehicle), and
a system that provided ability to control the flight of the vehicle.
(See Box 1.)

There was a more mundane reason as well. The Wright brothers

had begun to look for something beyond their bicycle business,

64 RESONANCE J December 2003

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which they had set up during a boom in the early 1890s, but the
market had since declined. Although the Wrights had acquired
a considerable reputation for the bicycles they made, including
their own 'Wright Special', and had even made a fair bit of
money out of their enterprise, their income was dwindling so
they had to look for new business. Finally, in the year 1896 two
of Langley's unmanned model aerodromes had made successful
flights. The famous inventor of the telephone, Alexander Gra-
ham Bell, had been very optimistic about the possibility of
human flight and had supported Langley's projects. Lilienthal,
who had made some very interesting flights on his glider, died in
an accident the same year. Strangely this accident seemed to
have been the turning point in the Wrights' thinking, Wilbur
decided to go ahead to look at aviation very seriously. He had
some money of his own, made from the cycle business, and his
father agreed to part with a sum of one thousand dollars to each
of the two sons to support their venture. So the brothers started
off.

T h e First E x p e r i m e n t s

It is remarkable how, once these thoughts crystallized in Wilbur's

mind, he set about his project in what may be called a very
scientific way. In 1896 when he was contemplating the project
the objective had primarily been research, 'to help the future
worker who will attain final success'. So he first collected all the
information that was available in published form. He wrote to
Langley, and to the civil engineer Octave Chanute who had a
deep and scholarly interest in flying. He studied in detail the
work of Lilienthal and of the pioneering British engineer John
Smeaton, who in the 1750s had made tests to help design better
He made a thorough
windmills. He made a thorough and critical analysis of this
and critical analysis
international literature, and regretfully concluded that 90% of it
of this international
was false! It seems astonishing now that the earlier data had
literature, and
never received such careful scrutiny before. Nevertheless by
regretfully concluded
1899 Wilbur came to the conclusion that achieving human flight
that 90% of it was
was only 'a question of energy and skill', and so decided to go
false!
ahead. He first calculated everything he could, checking other

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 GENERAL I ARTICLE

workers' results for consistency. In 1901 the brothers made

gliding tests with models at Kitty Hawk, and realized that better
scientific data was needed. Kitty Hawk is located some 60 miles
north of Cape Hatteras in a few-mile strip of North Carolina land
stretching south into the Atlantic Ocean. The site was selected
by the Wright Brothers after a careful survey of many alterna-
tives, its advantages being the weather and the sandy terrain that
enabled test vehicles to make a soft landing. Wilbur's negative
assessment of previous data was discouraging, and on the way
back home from Kitty Hawk after the 1901 tests he told his
brother, "Not within a thousand years would man ever fly".

The brothers' experiments however had already caught the

attention of perspicacious observers, among whom Chanute was
one. Chanute played an interesting role in the Wright brothers'
projects: often a helpful and encouraging scholar and curious
spectator, sometimes a self-appointed mentor, sometimes a con-
descending patron (spurned firmly by the Wrights), and occa-
sionally announcing himself as a 'collaborator' with his capable
'pupils'. Those announcements caused consternation and out-
rage in the Wright brothers, who promptly, firmly but politely
declined all his offers of material support and ideas for projects.
Chanute however frequently invited the Wright brothers to
write and lecture about their work, and in 1901 Wilbur let
Wilbur noted that the himself be persuaded to speak to the Western Society of Engi-
flying machine neers at Chicago about his work. Wilbur started once again by
required wings for lift, noting that the flying machine required wings for lift, a power
a power unit to move unit to move it forward and adequate control to sustain flight.
it forward and His assessment was that the first two problems had been solved,
adequate control to and that it was the third that was the main obstacle. He realized
sustain flight. He that it was necessary to control an aircraft in three dimensions,
realized that it was in particular around all three axes. (See Box 2.) That was not the
necessary to control standard view at the time (although it appears obvious to us
an aircraft in three now); before the Wrights it was considered that pitching and
dimensions, in yawing (or turning) were all that was required, a view that was
particular around all held for example by Langley. This view was inspired by an
three axes. analogy with ships; if a ship could turn by the use of only a

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rudder, it was assumed that an aircraft should be able to do the

same. Wilbur was the first to understand that this cannot be,
because by and large a ship moves in two dimensions whereas an
aircraft flies in three. Wilbur reasoned from his experience with
cycling and by watching birds, and came to the immediate
conclusion that control was required for pitch and yaw as well as
for roll. It turned out that this fundamental insight was what set
the Wright brothers apart from all the other enthusiasts of
the time, and was eventually what was responsible for their
success.

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The brothers then Success

built new gliders in
The realization that the available data were so unreliable led the
1902 using their
Wright brothers to make their own tests, and this they pro-
own aerodynamic
ceeded to do with meticulous care and ingenuity. They made
data, and found
some tests by mounting small wing surfaces on a horizontal
that they worked
cycle rim and comparing differential forces between the sur-
extremely well; in
faces. (The rig they set up for the purpose was very clever. A flat
fact during their
plate and a short wing were mounted vertically on the horizontal
campaign that year
rim in such a way that if the forces on them were equal the rim
they broke all
should not rotate in wind - or when it was ridden on a bicycle.
previous records
The observed rotation thus provided an indication of force
on gliding.
differentials between the surfaces.) They then went on to build
their own wind tunnel, testing wings for the pressures and forces
acting on them. They made such careful analysis of their data
that they could pin-point the precise errors in previous work.
The brothers then built new gliders in 1902 using their own
aerodynamic data, and found that they worked extremely well;
in fact during their campaign that year they broke all previous
records on gliding. Using the new numbers that he had gener-
ated and could now trust, Wilbur calculated the parameters
required for successful powered flight and wrote the 'specifica-
tions' for their Flyer, as shown in Box 3. As they were doing this
Wilbur's estimate of the time required to achieve powered flight
underwent a dramatic reduction from thousand years to fifty!

As Wilbur began to think powered flight was feasible, the

brothers collaborated with a friend to design a special light
engine of their own - of the new internal combustion type
(running on gasoline, not steam as Langley's aerodromes did).

Box 3. W i l b u r ' s specifications

1902 estimates 1903 Flyer; values

Wing area 520 sq. ft. 510 sq. ft

Weight of machine 625 Ib 605 Ib
Engine power 8-9 hp 12 hp
Weight of engine, propeller transmission -200 Ib

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As they gained experience with the new engine their optimism Indeed Wilbur
soared, and they began to wonder whether powered human Wright had now
flight would be feasible within two years! become -
unknown to the
After return from the successful 1902 glider tests in Kitty Hawk,
rest of the world -
the Wright brothers built a new wind tunnel and made more
the most
tests; and their confidence in their estimates was now vastly
knowledgeable
enhanced. Indeed Wilbur Wright had now become - unknown
applied"
to the rest of the world - the most knowledgeable applied
aerodynamicist.
aerodynamicist. (By the way there was no useful theoretical
aerodynamics at all at the time, but it was born in the following
decades. [5]) He used this knowledge also to design his propel-
lers, which significantly out-performed earlier designs. On 23
March 1903 the brothers decided to make the first application
for a patent (they had held back till that point of time in spite of
the repeated injunctions of their friend Chanute), and as they
did so the brothers knew that they should now be able to fly. In
June Orville wrote to a friend, "Isn't it wonderful that all these
secrets have been preserved for so many years just so that we
could discover them?" The Wrights then made their craft and
took it to Kitty Hawk as usual. Just before they started their tests
in December reports arrived of the spectacular failure of Langley's
machine; his Great Aerodrome took off from a platform on the
river Potomac, and plunged immediately into the water, virtu-
ally ending the project and throwing great doubts in the public
mind about the possibility of powered flight. But the Wright
brothers were unfazed, for they had already known (based on
their own data) that Langley could not possibly have succeeded,
and so were neither surprised nor disturbed by his failures.
Indeed, after tests on 14 December, which were technically not
successful but technologically very encouraging, Wilbur real- "Isn't it wonderful
ized that there could no longer be any question about final that all these
success. On the 17th Orville made the first attempt (the brothers secrets have been
usually tossed a coin to decide who would go up first) and flew preserved for so
for 12 seconds. This may not mean much, but for the Wright many years just so
brothers it was decisive; for they knew now for certain that their that we could
design parameters were almost right. The last flight of the day, discover them?"

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Wilbur knew that the made by Wilbur, covered a distance of 852 feet and lasted 59
problem of human seconds. Wilbur knew that the problem of human powered
powered flight had flight had been solved - if with one minute's flying training he
been solved - i f with could make a minute's flight, a little more flying experience and
one minute's flying some improvements in design were all that were required for the
training he could conquest of air to be a reality. Orville sent a telegram to his
make a minute's father:
flight, a little more
Success four flights thursday morning all against twenty
flying experience
one mile wind started from level with engine power alone
and some
average speed through air thirty one miles longest 57
improvements in
seconds inform Press home Christmas.
design were all that
were required for (There is a curious and unexplained discrepancy of 2 seconds in
the conquest of air the reported duration of flight.) Shown that message by the
to be a reality. father, an Associated Press reporter said,

"Fifty-seven seconds, hey? If it had been fifty-seven

minutes then it might have been a news item."

In retrospect it is surprising how long the world took to notice

properly the significance of the extraordinary feat of 17 Decem-
ber. As far as the Wright brothers themselves were concerned
they were now so supremely confident that they immediately
and quietly set about their future projects, absolutely certain
that they had already achieved success where all others had
failed.

The Flyer that had been used on 17 December was also inciden-
tally responsible for the first aircraft accident in history, as at the
end of the day the machine was overturned by a violent gust and
severely damaged; John Daniels, a local volunteer who took the
historic photograph of the first flight, was injured in the process.
The machine was never flown again.

The Wright Approach

At this point it is interesting to ask what the key factors were in
the Wright brothers' extraordinary success. First and foremost,

70
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 GENERAL I ARTICLE

it appears to me, was Wilbur's attitudes, which were those of a Wilbur was perhaps
superb engineer: He was systematic in everything he did, read more the thinker, and
critically all published material, made his own tests wherever he Orville more the
had doubts, designed and built the equipment necessary for tinker - and the two
conducting those tests, always made preliminary estimates and covered the spectrum
calculations before embarking on design, modified the design from research
soon after testing the vehicle, and analysed the flight data in real through design and
time (as we would say today - he could do this because he had the development. The
numbers at his finger tips and could right away interpret ob- Wright brothers set
served performance in terms of design parameters). And the the style and method
brothers together were ingenious in mechanical design and of aircraft design that
fabrication, and in fixing the problems as they were encoun- is followed to this
tered. Between the two Wilbur was perhaps more the thinker, day.
and Orville more the tinker - and the two covered the spectrum
from research through design and development. Indeed one can
say that the Wright brothers set the style and method of aircraft
design that is followed to this day; only our tools are now vastly
more powerful.

But, apart from the methodology they followed, the major tech-
nological contribution they made was to realize the importance
of achieving control in all three dimensions, in particular lateral
control. (See Box 4.) This was a crucial departure from all
previous work on flight. To the Wrights, so familiar with
bicycles, it was obvious that if the aircraft had to turn it would
have to bank as well, just as if you want to veer left on your
bicycle you will tilt left as well. So they set about designing a
mechanism by which, as rudder was applied to yaw the aircraft
left, a rolling moment would be applied as well on the aircraft to
bank it in the appropriate sense. This they did by warping the
wing, i.e. by applying a torque at the wing tips, through cable
and pulley, inducing them to twist in such a way that the lift on
the right wing was higher than on the left and the aircraft would
roll in the right direction. It took considerable effort on their
part to get the warping right (recall that their wings were light
and flexible), but once they had done it they could easily make
the aircraft go around in circles or even in figures of eight.

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Box 4. How Active Lateral Control Works by Wing Warping

To see how an aircraft rolls, consider a simple monoplane.

Roll
higher lift

lower lift

To roll as shown, the right wing has to generate more lift than the left. This was done in the Wright Flyer
by twisting the two wings: the trailing edge of the right wing is twisted down, increasing the lift on it, and
that of the left wing twisted up, decreasing the lift on it. This provides the torque required for rolling the
aircraft. An alternative (commonly used in modern designs) is to use small control surfaces called ailerons,
mounted near the trailing edge of the wing outboard (i.e. towards the tips). The right aileron deflected
down increases the lift on the right wing, and, with the left aileron deflected up, produces the required
torque.

In the Wright Flyer the wing was warped by applying appropriate forces on the wing tips through cable
and pulley. The cable was pulled from a cradle which the pilot (who was resting on it) swung with his hips,
but as he moved the rudder was swung as well through other cables, giving the aircraft a gracefully banked
turn.

As explained in the text, the Wright Flyer's control system was active. The principle of active control is
easily illustrated. A stick hanging down from a pivot is stable, for after a small lateral deflection it
eventually returns to the equilibrium position (vertically down). The same stick swung up by 180 degrees
(with pivot at the bottom) can be in equilibrium, but this position is so unstable that the stick quickly falls
over. However a pole resting on the palm of one's hand can be kept vertically up by juggling its base by
moving the hand appropriately - i.e. by moving the palm in such a way that the overturning motion of the
pole is counteracted by translating its base. The pole is thus given 'artificial' stability by 'active' control.
The Wright Flyer had artificial lateral stability through the active control provided by the pilot as he swung
the cradle he was resting on.

For active control to be effective the time constants of the control system must match the dynamics of the
vehicle. The Wright machine was slow and light, so human agility was fast enough and human forces large
enough to control the 'fractious horse' that the aircraft behaved like. With the very much bigger and faster
aircraft of today the technological parameters attainable by modern control systems determine the bound
for the acceptable stability characteristics of the aircraft.

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Spectators of their later flights were invariably stunned by the The idea of the
graceful way in which the Wright flyers could circle over the aileron itself was
airfield. Today's aircraft induce a bank by allowing the pilot to also something
deflect ailerons, which are relatively small flaps located towards that the Wrights
the wing tips: what the Wright brothers achieved by continuous had thought o f -
warping of the wing, rather like what birds do, is now done by indeed it was part
deflecting a discrete part of a much more rigid wing. Inciden- of the patent they
tally the idea of the aileron itself was also something that the took out in 1903.
Wrights had thought o f - indeed it was part of the patent they
took out in 1903.

By the way this control was what we would today call 'active', i.e.
it was achieved by exerting appropriate forces and moments on
the craft to correct or counter whatever deviant motion it was
developing at the time (see Box 2). Active control is to be
distinguished from passive control, where the system is basically
stable, and any small perturbation automatically decays return-
ing the system to equilibrium - no human or other intervention
is required. Most modern aircraft today, especially the military
ones (including for example the LCA), are basically unstable,
and require a complex flight control system consisting of sen-
sors, actuators and computers to keep them flying safely. (Active
controls are preferred especially on a combat aircraft as they
make it lighter and more agile.) Most modern aircraft
today, especially the
The Aftermath military ones
The character of the story changes dramatically after the 1903 (including for
achievement. The brothers went ahead to make several planes example the LCA),
during the following years, sought money from the US Army are basically
(which at first rejected their offer), negotiated with various unstable, and require
bankers, entrepreneurs and industrialists - from whom they a complex flight
never obtained terms that satisfied them, started fighting legal control system
battles with others who infringed their patents, and generally consisting of
had a hard time protecting their intellectual property (as we sensors, actuators
would put it now) against a variety of smart poachers. The story and computers to
of these years is often bitter. Eventually the Wrights sold their keep them flying
inventions in France, and in 1908 Wilbur travelled there with safely.

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Wilbur was not his machine to demonstrate its abilities to the skeptical and
happy as a sophisticated aeronautical community of that country. (The
businessman, and French thought that they were the pioneers of human flight, and
said he looked did not always take kindly to the Wright brothers' claims.) As
forward to the time Wilbur waited for good weather, Paris newspapers screamed
when they could that the Wright brothers were bluffing, and that their demon-
retire to devote stration would be a flop. But Wilbur kept his cool, and when the
themselves again weather cleared made a flight that took away the breath of the
to scientific spectators and instantly converted them. The President of the
research. Aeronautical Society of Britain, Maj Gen Baden-Powell (brother
of the founder of the Boy Scout movement) immediately under-
stood the significance of that flight in Paris, and said: 'That
Wilbur Wright is in possession of a power which controls the
fate of nations is beyond dispute'.

In succeeding years the world heaped praise and honours on the

Wright brothers; they became wealthy as well, making shrewd
business deals both in the US and in Europe. Interestingly
however Wilbur was not happy as a businessman, and said he
looked forward to the time when they could retire to devote
themselves again to scientific research. In 1912 he died after an
attack of typhoid, and control of the business now vested solely
in his brother. Orville was basically an ingenious tinker, happy
making and fixing anything - from printing presses to aircraft to
gadgets at home, but he did not see himself as one who would
devote a life time to making better aircraft. In any case, once the
Wright brothers had shown that powered flight was possible,
In a matter of years the number of people attempting to surpass their performance
all those spectacular went up enormously, and in a matter of years all those spectacu-
records that the lar records that the Wright brothers had established were shat-
Wright brothers had tered by inventors and engineers in both Europe and the United
established were States. The Wright patents expired in 1917, and Orville sold his
shattered by interests at the right time to make a fortune, and virtually retired
inventors and from the aircraft business. He continued to be honoured widely
engineers in both by the world, and served as an adviser to NACA, the US National
Europe and the Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (the predecessor of today's
United States. NASA).

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But there was one dispute with the Smithsonian Institution that The Smithsonian
took a long time to settle. They refused to recognize that the first Institution refused
powered flight had been made by the Wright brothers, claiming to recognize that
that Langley had shown the capability of flight (although he had the first powered
not achieved it) even before the Wrights. A long and bitter flight had been
dispute erupted between the two parties, and in 1928 Orville made by the
sent the original Wright Flyer to the Science Museum in Wright brothers
Kensington, London, as apparently nobody in his own country
seemed to want it. This led to a public furore in the US, and
shocked many Americans into realizing that justice had still not
been done to the Wrights. It was only in 1942 that the new
leaders of the Smithsonian made appropriate settlements with
Orville, who eventually asked for the return of the Flyer that he
had loaned to Kensington. When Orville died in 1948 the
original Wright Flyer made its way home, and is now preserved
at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington.

Thus ended the story of the invention of one of the greatest

technological marvels in human history.

Suggested Reading

[1] T Crouch, The Bishop's Boys: A Life of Wilbur and Orville Wright, New
York W W Norton & Company,1989.
[2]F ECCulickand SDunmore, On Great White Wings: The WrightBrothers
and the Race for Flight. New York: Hyperion, 2001.
[3] O G East, Wright Brothers National Memorial. WashingtonDC: Na-
tionalPark Service/USGovernmentPrintingOffice,1961/I991.
[4] R Govindarajan, Turbulence and FlyingMachines,Resonanee,Vol. 4,
No. 11, 54-62, 1999.
[5] JaywantH Arakeri and P N Shankar,LudwingPrandtl and Boundary
Layers inFluidFlow,Resonance, Vol.5,No.12,pp.48-63,2000.
[6] S P Govindarajn,Role of WindTunnelin Aircraft Design, Resonance,
Vol.8,No.I,pp.72-76, 2003. I
Address for Correspondence
Roddam Narasimha
National Institule of
Advanced Sludies
Bongalore ,560 012, India.
Email:
[email protected]

RESONANCE J December 2003 75