A Recollection: Early Aircraft Construction, the Prerogative of Wood Craftsmen

Abstract

In this article, the author tried to consider the place and role of wood processors in the early period of the aeronautical industry, approximately 1910-1940, when most aircraft were built of wood. The professions in this field and the woodworking tools or machines used at that time are brought back to attention. Starting from the accounts of a first-rate craftsman who worked during the WWII at the Romanian Aeronautical Industry Plants in Braşov, Romania (going through the hierarchy from carpenter to foreman) and from the way the Bristol and Colonial Airplane Company in Filton, United Kingdom works (as reflected in the aerospace museum from Filton), but also from a technical regulation imposed by the United States War Department on factories that produced and repaired military aircraft, the author tries to reconstruct the form of organization and work during the pioneering period of aviation and during the first factories in the field. It can be considered that this article is a tribute to these woodworkers, but also a reconsideration of how the aeronautical industry developed and a remember of its beginnings for those of today. The author also tries to give pertinent answers, in his opinion, related to the causes of wood replacement as the main material for the construction of aircraft. Later days steel and aluminium, then fiberglass, modern composites, and, nowadays, the nanomaterials have taken its place, but it can never be forgotten or ignored. This year is the half-centenary of the death of Henri Coanda, a Romanian scientist, one of the pioneers of jet aviation, since 1910. This article is intended to be the first in a series of homage articles, designed to bring the work and personality to this genius.