The Jet Age
Jet propulsion has been one of the greatest steps in the history of transport and has of necessity evolved in stages. In 1791 Britain led the field when John Barber patented a gas turbine and by the early 20th century Britain, Germany, France, Italy and the United States were all investigating the possibilities of jet propulsion. The credit for the idea of an aircraft gas turbine powerplant rightly belongs to Dr A. Griffiths at R.A.E Farnborough who in 1926 showed that metallurgy was no longer a limiting factor in turbine blade design. In 1928 Frank Whittle wrote a thesis on future aircraft development while at RAF Cranfield which included the use of jet propulsion in future aircraft design. He filed for a patent of his design in 1930 which was granted in 1932, he then went on to form "Power Jets Ltd" to develop the design although there was little official interest in the concept.
It was not until 1935 that Whittle received enough financial support to begin to build his first engine. This was built by the B.T.H company with construction starting early in 1936 and the engine ready for its first bench tests in April. The first engine (U1) consisted of a single stage, centrifugal double sided compressor driven by directly coupled single stage turbine, air from the compressor was drawn into a large U shaped cylinder, mixed with fuel, ignited. The turbine ejected the hot gases from a long jet pipe.
The engine ran for the first time on the 12th April 1937 and was an awesome site due to its poor combustion with the curved chamber glowing bright red and smoke and flames pouring from the jet pipe. Meanwhile in 1930 Professor Prandtl in Germany had started research on gas turbine compressors which also led to a patent for Hans von Ohain of Junkers in 1935. Othian-Heinkel ran a test unit in 1937, by 1939 contracts had been placed by both the British and the German governments for turbojet units.
The Germans were the first to fly with the HE178 on 27th August 1939, this was much less successful than Britain's E28/39 Pioneer built by Gloster which flew for the first time on the 15th May 1941. The United States ended the jet age by a side door when they were sent Whittle's engine and full design details, they used this to power their first jet aircraft the Bell XP-59A on October 2nd 1942. Their second jet aircraft the P-80 Shooting Star was also designed around a British built engine the Halford H1 also known as the Goblin.
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