The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1919-05-24
DESIGN A|RPLANE TO CROSS OCEAN
 IN HALF A DAY

New York, May 24.-(Special Cor respondence)-An aerial leviathan of the bat-wing type, without a stay-wire, expected to travel at the rate of 250 miles per hour, has been designed. and may be in process of construction, according to William Dinwiddie, an unofficial investigator of the aircraft industry. The project is cloaked in much secrecy, but MT. Dinwiddie in an article on Air Travel Possibilities in the June Cen tury. reveals some of the details of the design of the huge plane, which, because it has no parasite resistance from struts and wires, could probably cross the Atlantic in 12 hours
 "A three -hundred-foot wing-span bat-wing, cantilever atrplane would be capable of lifting an effective load of from fifty to seventy thousnd pounds; that Is, dead-weight freight closely and carefully packed to ap- proximately 25 tons could be trans ported in the monster. Twelve hoers. or even less for transatlantic flightI may sound like the romances- of Mum Chhausen, but the non-parasite-re- sistance airplane of the bat-wing type, or some modification of Its form, is firmly believed by certain air en- gineers to be the final solution of the air-speed problem.
 There are a number of very radi- cal plans inthe hands of designers of aircraft that are expected to revo- lutionize the whole art of flying, and which, it Is hoped by the more en- thusiastic leaders, will give us air transportation on a truly economic basis. The designs embrace the double conception of reducing air resistance and thereby decreasing gas consump ton, together with construction which will give strength and freight-carry- ing capacity.
 "The best of these ideas. and the one which will probably be next in the rapid advance of the art of fly ing is apparently a huge monoplane,
 without q strut or a stay wire or a fuselage or an undercarriage visible in flight. It is just a mammoth wing or wings, if you like, something in the nature of d bat with its head re- moved.
 Tt is to be built on the cantilever bridge principle. At the nose of the forward center of the plane, this bridge work will be five or six feet high, tapering each way to the ex- tremities of the wings. From the front to the hack or from the head to the tail the same cantilever-bridge 
 the machine narrows, or 1t may be cut out into a definite tail feature. ike the present planes. The tail of the machine is equipped with the usual balanced rudder and elevators
 The engines and propellors are spaced equally apart from the nose of the machine. The radiators, in stead of being vertical, are placed in a nearly horizontal position, so that they offer little resistance to the air, and the wind rushing over them sucks the air through them, instead | of pushing it through as in an or l dinary plane.
 The undercarriage, or landing l wheels. make their appearance only | when the machine is on the ground | or about to land. Once in the air, | they are promptly pulled up into the | body of the machine, to reduce wind | resistance. The whole of this struc- l ture is covered with fabric or metal | sheets.
 Tn flight we have a huge, headless | pair of wings. with the front edge | rounded in a graceful curve, stretch- | ing sidewfse to almost feathe lii C | edges on the ends, and backward ir | a slightly bowed curve to the tai l controls. As it purringly cleaves the | air there will not be a thing in sight | except the furnished wings of thi. ] monster. The cantilever plane can bt | built water-tight, so that except il | extremely severe weather, it car | float safely on the surface of the
 ocean indefinitely. if diversity force!
 a watery landing"