The Birmingham age-herald., 1924-03-16
By Had.

section and rear section. All sections are made of steel tubing. The wings fare of. standard box beam and built-up rib construction. The upper wing is made in; three panels. The lower wing l is made in two panels. The wings may be folded, fhns requiring small storage space. The vertical fin and horizontal stabilizer are of standard eye-beam and built-up rib construction. The elevator and rudder are made of steel tubing. The axles are made of alloy steel tub ing, heat-treated after fabrication. The struts are steel tubes, lstreamlined with wood. The landing gear (water typel consists of twin floats of built-up wood construction. The top covering is three. ply veneer the bottom planking being two plies of mahogany.
 | .9 Water Or Air
 The world cruisers are biplanes. AS a seaplane,, empty, it weighs 0,l00 pounds. As a landplane, empty, It weights 4,300 pounds. As seaplane it has disposable load (men, equipment, gasolene, fuel. oil etc.), of 2,615 pounds. \ AZ a landplane it has a disposable load of 2,ef5 pounds. Its gross weight as a seapiane is 7,715 pounds. As a land. plane it has a gross weight of 6.915 pounds. Its speed as landplane, there fore, will be faster than as seaplane. 1t has gasolene capacity of 450 gall Ions. A wing loading of 1O,0 pounds per square foot as seaplane, and Of 9.7 per square foot as landplane. 1t has load as seaplane of 1S.3 pounds for each horse power, and as a land
 plane of 1ti.3 pounds per horse power.
 The Liberty engine is of the usual
 100 horse power. The wing span, both upper and lower, is 50 feet. The span of the Airpiane with wings folded Is POO feet 2 inches. The height over all is 13 feetS7 inches. The length oyer all.is 35 feet 6 inches. As seaplane 1t has normal altitude of 1000 feet, a normal maximum speed of 100 miles aIi hour and q landing speed of 35 miles an hour. As landplane it can climb to 10000 feet, travel 103 miles an hour, and land at 63 miles an hour.
 From the foregoing it will be seen that, as O Mndplane, with a greater height, it will De. able to negotiate sue. cessfully high mountain ranges, and as a seaplane it will be able to land at a slower rate of speed in waters which may either be rough orstrewn with ice.
 Supervision Of Construction
 Lieut.. Erik H. Nelson, air service, has been assigned to duty for the past two months at the Douglas airplane factory at Santa, Monica, Cal, supervising the construction Of a special airplane for this flight. Lieutenant Nelson was the engineering officer on the Alaskan flight and, also, on the last years flight of six army airplanes from San Antonio, Tex, through the West Indies to Porto Rico and return to Washington, D. c. Through his efforts there has been built a very successful around -the-world cruiser, capable of remaining in the air for over twenty hours.
 PontOonss Versus Wheels
 Upon arriving at Seattle, Wash, the Douglas world cruiser will be fitted with p3ntoons sk the. plant of the Boeing Airplane1 compahy. Water landings will be made in sheltered harbors along the coast of British Columbia, Alaska and through the Aleutian Islands :; down into Japan. The present plan con- templates the removal of the pontoons and the use of landing gears from Tokio, Japan, or from Calcutta, India, depend ing upon conditions which the flight encounters en route. Landing gears will be used across Asia Minor and Europe as far as Hull, England, where pontoons VIII dSe1I Uc pldGOu Oi thG diA pAauUc anu used until the flight reaches Montreal. or. Newport, N. J., at one of which points the p0ntoons will again be replaced by landing gears for the completion of the flight. The last replacement of pom toors will, be, made by the Aeromarine Plane and Motor company at Newport.
 Preparations For Flight
 The most careful preparations for the flight around the world have been made by the army air service. It has been assisted by the Aeronautical Chamber of Commerce of America. Through the Aeronautical Charmer of Commerce sev. eral score American business corpora. tions, with representatives abroad, have cordially lent their assistance by pro- viding letters of credit or personGl let ters of introduction which will faciii- tate the advance officers of the actual pilots themselves in case of emergency.