The Birmingham age-herald., 1919-05-18
Airplane Developments Like Accomplishment of an
 Impossible Task
By Associated Prss

Washington, May 17.-Admission that
 both military and civilian experts over
 estimated the country's capabilities in
 setting out in 1917 ito accomplish the impossible task' of producing 22,0O0 air.
 planes in 12 months is made in the off
 cial history of the governments efforts to build up the industry made public to- day by the War Department Realization
 of this error resulted almost immediately
 in the placing of contracts in France for
 os'5 planes of the Spad, Nieuport and Bregeut types.
 The report shows that by May 2s. 1918. American factories had delivered 5270 planes, or 24 per cent of the ambitious programme, while the French had deliv- cred a per cent of the number promised
 on that date. Up to November Il a total of n,364 airplanes had been pfo-
 duced in America, but these were largely training machines, fighting planes com- pleted during the war period totaling only ss2s.
 Broadly stated the history says, 'the United States produced for her army alone in her second year of manufacture as many airplanes as England produced for her army and navy in her third year."
 Organization of the manufacturing in- AaotAy iS oCNldiCQ lO nave DceH tle SIndlJ- est of the air services problems, an alarming shortage of cloth and varnish. or dope" for the wings developing at the very start Lack of an adequate supply of linen was overcome quickly through the assistance of the United States bureau of standards, which evolved special cotton fabric with a square inch. Production of this material the a n i H00 O00 rdS month.
 Cotton proved to be not only an ad- mirable substitute for linen, but even a better fabric than the original cloth" the report says. No matter how abund- ant the supply of flax may be, it is un- likely that linen will ever again be used in large quantities for airplane wings" Search for a varnish to protect air plane wings resulted in the establish ment of 10 large chemical plants to pro. duce acetone, the principal ingredient. Had the war continued says the his tory, these new plants would have taken care of all American and allied military needs, allowing the production of pr1- vate plants to go exclusively to fill com mercia1 needs"
 Development of aircraft was so rapid that frequent changes in models and de signs were before the service experts for consideration. At the time of the arrTl- stice the whole production machinery had been, or was about to be, turned over to putting out new De Haviland, known as 9-A; the Lepere, two-seater built around the Liberty engine, and the great Handley-Page machine for bombing W ork. Experiments also were under way with the Italian Caproni to be driven by three Liberty engines.
 But American invention was able to bring out a strictly American bombing plane that promised to supercede all oth- CT types in existence" says the report. This was the Martin plane which, with a wing spread of 5 feet, attained a speed of 11S miles per hour against 100 for the Handley-Page and Caproni Where the foreigners required 4s minutes to climb 15,ooo feet. the Martin craft took 30 minutes"