THE LIFE OF THE WRİGHT BROTHERS

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16 Feb 2024

Orville Wright Born : August 19, 1871 in Dayton, Ohio, USA. Died: January 30, 1948
Wilbur Wright Born : April 16, 1867 in Dayton, Ohio, USA Death : May 30, 1912
The first US brothers to fly a piloted and powered airplane (on December 17, 1903).

The Wright Brothers, brothers Orville and Wilbur Wright, were born in Dayton, Wright, Ohio, USA. They were famous brothers who were actually bicycle craftsmen and built the first motorized airplane. Wilbur Wright was born on April 16, 1867 and died on May 30, 1912. His brother Orville Wright was born on August 19, 1871 and died on January 30, 1948.

Wilbur and Orville Wright had no scientific education and did not attend a higher school after high school. In 1892, they opened a business where they repaired, manufactured and sold bicycles. This shop served as both a workshop and a financial source for the flight research they were interested in. In 1899, they began to systematically study anything that might give them clues about how birds fly. They carefully followed the writings of Otto Lilienthal, Octave Chanute, Samuel P. Langley and others who had published in this field. However, while advancing their studies in the field of flying, they also advanced their own scientific aspects to the point of preparing a scientific work on this subject thanks to hundreds of experiments they conducted with model airplanes, kites, man-carrying gliders. They even built a wind tunnel to test more than 200 different types of wings. Then they turned their attention to the engine. However, the internal combustion engines available on the market at the time weighed too much to be used in a flying machine. With the help of a technician, the Wrigh brothers succeeded in building a lightweight engine for use in an airplane. The engine they produced was both lighter (77 kg) and had better performance than the engines designed by other manufacturers up to that time. In addition, the Wrigth brothers designed and built the propeller they used in the airplane. The propeller they used in 1903 was 66 percent efficient.

The first of the reasons that led the Wright brothers to success was their work together and their excellent cooperation with each other. The second was that they decided to learn the technique of flying before they started building an airplane with an engine. The Wright brothers first learned to fly by building and using gliders. In 1899, they started working with kites and gliders. The following year, they took their glider, which they designed and built in a size that could hold a person, to Kitty Hawk in North Carolina to test it. The result was not very satisfactory. With some changes, they built and tested the second glider in 1901 and the third glider in 1903. The third glider incorporated important changes they had made, some of the patents they applied for in 1903 were related to the methods they applied in this glider. They made more than a thousand successful flights with the third glider. The Wright brothers had gained a lot of experience in glider flight before they started building airplanes. They successfully applied this experience in airplane construction.

The first flight of the Wright brothers was made on December 17, 1903 at Kill Devil Hill, a place near Kitty Hawk in North Carolina, on December 17, 1903, the first plane to take off under Orville's control, adhering to the aerodynamic sound theory.

This plane had a gasoline engine and two propellers. It weighed 335 kg with the pilot. There are five eyewitnesses to this flight. Orville flew for 12 seconds on the first attempt. and covered a distance of only 37 meters. On his last attempt that day, the time increased to 59 seconds and he flew a distance of 280 meters. That was the first time the sky had seen a gasoline-powered airplane that could fly. Later on, they improved their airplane and in 1904, they succeeded in landing at the point where they took off by making the airplane make turns in the air and turn back.

Their plane, which they named "Flayer 1", cost around a thousand dollars, had a wingspan of 20 meters and weighed 700 kg. The engine of their own design on it was 12 horsepower and weighed 77 kg. This two-propeller plane is on display at the National Aerospace Museum in Washington.

The Wright Brothers had created an airplane that could fly, but they didn't know how to fly it. There was neither a book nor a teacher who could show them how. The Smithsonian Institution continued to correspond with leading aviators Louis Mouillard, Gabriel Voisin, John J. Montgomery, Louis Blériot, Alberto Santos Dumont and Percy Pilcher, and passed on all the information it had obtained to the Wright Brothers. These first flights did not attract much attention. After a while, the Wright brothers designed the "Flayer II" model. They made 105 flights with this airplane in 1904. They improved this model and built the "Flyer III" model, a very useful model, in 1905. Despite their flights near Dayton, people could not believe that a flying machine had been built.

Airplane design remained stagnant for a while until others came to the level of the Wright brothers. A number of things were essential, such as a place for the pilot to sit down, rather than leaning over the wing. The Wright brothers designed an airplane in which the pilot could sit. They also built a landing gear, freeing themselves from the wheeled jack and monorail they carried with them on their first flight.

On June 4, 1908, Canada's Glenn H. Curtis made the first 'official' flight of the United States in a plane he named June Bug, which could take off without outside help. This flight was America's first official "Heavy Aircraft and Flight". Glenn H. Curtis held Pilot License No. 1, while the Wright Brothers held licenses No. 4 and 5

In 1908, they set out to promote the airplane. Wilbur Wrigth took one of the airplanes they had built to France to give public flying demonstrations and made a deal with a company that would market his inventions in Europe. Meanwhile, Orville Wrigth, who remained in America, was organizing demonstrations similar to those in France. On September 17, 1908, he had a plane crash. One of the passengers was killed and Orville was injured. Meanwhile, successful flight trials led the United States government to make an agreement with the Wrigth brothers to purchase airplanes for the war department. This purchase ensured the continuation of aircraft production.

Wilbur Wright contracted typhoid fever and died in 1912 at the age of forty-five. Orville Wrigth, who sold his shares in the aircraft company in 1915, lived until 1948.