CHAPTER XXXII 

THE WEIGHT PROBLEM IN AERONAUTICS 

     The design of the transatlantic airship was carefully made. It was symmetrical, well-bal­anced, effective engineering.' Everything was taken into account—the distance, the speed of the ship, the probable effect of the winds, the total lifting force, the quantity of fuel that would be needed. To meet all these requirements the balloon was enlarged in the spring of 1910. Forty-one feet were added to its length in the mid-section, increasing the volume 87,000 cubic feet, and the total lifting force nearly three tons. With this enlargement we calculated upon being able to carry 9,000 pounds of gasoline, the life­boat, a crew of six men, in addition, of course, to the ship and all her machinery, and to start with not more than one-half of the equilibrator upon the sea. 

     For one who knows the aeronautic art and the mathematics of it in all its branches, it is not difficult to prepare a good plan. My design was good. The difficult thing is the execution of it. In an airship, even more sharply than in a steamship or land vehicle, limitation of weight is the essence of life and success. If you can­not build within the predetermined weights perhaps you would do better not to build at all; for then you will escape much trouble and disap­pointment. 

     Probably it is possible to find mechanics and constructors who can take a rational engineering plan and carry it out pretty close to the schedule of weight and cost, but I have never been for­tunate enough to find one. When the work is finished, it is invariably found that weights have overrun, and cost has greatly exceeded estimates. In both particulars one learns to allow a fair margin, but even a liberal margin does not seem to assure protection against having good plans marred or spoiled by faulty execution. 

     From an airship voyage over the Arctic Ocean in August, 1909, to a steamship race up the White Nile almost to the equator in March, 1910, was a rather quick transition, a pretty far cry. 

     After the plan of our transocean voyage had been agreed upon, and the actual work started, it was necessary for me to go up the Nile to meet ex-President Roosevelt. In the course of that journalistic assignment it became a part of my duty to hire a special steamer and race rival newspaper men several hundred miles above Khartum for the satisfaction of being the first to meet the ex-President—a race which I won with several hours to spare. Col. Roosevelt and I had breakfasted together aboard his steamer going down the Nile, after breakfast had sat down and settled all the affairs of all the nations to our mutual satisfaction, and I had written my cablegram describing the race and my lit­tle triumph before the smoke of my rivals' boat was seen down the river, puffing toward us as fast as she could with a party of very much dis­comfited journalists aboard her. 

     While up the Nile with Roosevelt a cable message informed me something had gone wrong with the arrangements for our transatlantic airship trip. A misunderstanding had arisen which free use of the cable at fifty cents per word did not serve to straighten out. It was not till after I had accompanied the ex-Presi­dent all through Europe to London, and myself reached America early in June, that the misun­derstanding was removed. This delay cost us dearly. Mr. Vaniman, who had been in charge of our construction work, though not an engi­neer in the true sense, is a clever mechanic and foreman, and had done the best he could under the discouraging circumstances. Being com­pelled to build hurriedly, perhaps it is not sur­prising that he was not as careful about the weights as he should have been, and as he prob­ably would have been under other and more favorable conditions, though, like all mechanics executing the designs and working to the cal­culations of another, he is naturally more keen about strength than for adhering closely to a weight schedule. 

     For important parts of the mechanical and aeronautic equipment he was compelled to rely upon contractors and various factories, and when they overran the stipulated weights no time was left for rebuilding to cut weights down. An example is found in the weight of the lifeboat carried upon the America. I had stipulated that its weight should not exceed 1,000 pounds. The builder undertook to keep within that limit; the boat when finished was reported to weigh 800 pounds. When we put it upon the scales at Atlantic City we found its weight was just twice as much! 

     So it went with many things—so many that by the time the great airship had been assembled and made ready for a voyage it was found she was about 4,000 pounds short of the net lifting force the designs called for. Instead of carry­ing 9,000 pounds of gasoline for the motors, the total was about 5,500. And much of that was in the tanks of the equilibrator, from which not a gallon was ever drawn during the voyage. 

     Worse still, in order to have enough lifting force to carry gasoline in the big steel reservoir of the car—its capacity was 1,300 gallons, and we started with the reservoir about one-third full—it was necessary to lift less of the serpent than the plan called for; and thus we began the voyage with almost all of the equilibrator down upon the water, instead of only one-half of it. 

     These facts are cited, not in any effort to es­cape my individual responsibility, nor as an apology, but only to show how circumstances sometimes press one into a venture with the preparations falling far short of his plans and ideals; and how duty at times compels a man to take an imperfect apparatus, and without a word of explanation or reproach or repining, go out with it and do the best he can, no matter at what cost or risk. 

     Long before we were ready to leave Atlantic City for the voyage over the ocean it was real­ized the plan had not been adequately executed, and that we must start under this great handicap of overweight. It was impossible to change the construction; and the overload must be endured. Still, there was not the first or faintest thought of failing to start. In fact, eagerness to be off instead of hesitation to go, was the predominant note from first to last. All the tales told in the press to the contrary were fantastic fakes created wholly out of the imagination without the slight­est 'basis or foundation in fact or incident or word. 

     It did take a long, an unexpectedly long time to prepare the America for her voyage. It is not surprising that many spectators became im­patient as the weeks dragged along. But the work was complex and difficult, and required patience. It was not easy to find skilled me­chanics, though we paid high wages and scurried right and left for efficient men. In July, Mr. Vaniman had cabled me from Paris he could have the America ready for a voyage in six days after his arrival in Atlantic City, provided he could have two more weeks in Paris. I gave him one more week in Paris, and then he shipped the balloon, the unfinished car and machinery to the United States. He and his experts and a large staff of general helpers 'began the work of assembling August 9th. But so many and great were the difficulties in the way that the task was not completed and the airship ready to be taken out till the afternoon of October 12th. Through­out all this period every one of us worked with all possible energy to hasten the operation, and it was rather unkind, to say the least, of the "fake and snake" part of the press to represent us as seeking delay when we were breaking our hearts because things did not go faster. 

     The America started on her voyage within 60 hours after she was ready. 

     She started from a huge balloon house which had been erected at a cost of $12,000 by the enterprising members of the Aero Club of At­lantic City. These men had invested their money for the promotion of a great scientific project. They did not expect to get their money back from the small admission fee, and in fact they did not. During all the long period of prep­aration they were patient and fair. They were more interested in the attainment of a scientific success than in the commercial side of the ven­ture.

      The cause of aeronautic progress owes much to such men as Joseph W. Salus, Albert T. Bell, Harry B. Cook, Daniel S. White, John J. White, J. Haines Lippincott, Louis Kuehnle, Henry W. Leeds, Charles D. White, Walter J. Buzby, Dr. J. B. Thompson, Walter E. Edge, P. E. Lane, John Vogler, S. P. Leeds and many others. They are fine types of American busi­ness men—men who have broad views and a gen­erous public spirit.