Harry Harper, Technical Secretary of the Civil Aerial Transport Committee, writes in a Home paper:
A_ vista so wonderful that our whole conception of the place of aircraft in the scheme of transport may have to be altered. Such is the promise of the new "pulsating" wing of the Austrian scientist Professor Raimund Nimfuhr.
The basis of the theory has just been investigated by experts of such; repute as Herr Schwengler, chief of the Zeppelin works, and Herr Bkopik, head of the designing staff of the Fokker works, Both have indicated their belief that Professor Nimfuhr is on: right lines by joining the directorate of thei '"Nimfuhrsche Segelflug Syndikat.""
The theory on which Professor Nimfuhr has been working is that we should concentrate attention on the populsive methods of birds and insects. Aeroplanes with fixed wings and an engine driving a propeller can, according to this line of research, be shown vastly inferior in relative performance to either a bird or an insect.
Tf one could take a. bird like an albatross and increase it in size till it was as big as a medium-sized present-day biplane, it would, it is claimed, exert not more than the equivalent of about 10-h.p. in propulsion, whereas the biplane would require about 200-h.p. A giant gnat, big as an aeroplane, it is averred, would fly with infinitely less exertion of power than is required for any of our existing machines.
The Nimfuhr principle is to imitate mechanically, so far as it is possible to do_so, the methods of Nature, in the wings of birds and insects. The Nimfuhbr "pulsating wing" relies upon an extraordinarily rapid vibrating or stroke action upon the cushion of compressed air which in flight is former beneath a sustaining plane.
The actual Nimfuhr wing, as constructed for a full-sized machine, will, it is understood, be hollow, with a flexible membrane on the under-side. By pneumatic mechanism this membrane is set pulsating or vibrating with such rapidity that waves of atmospheric pressure are generated which shall, it is intended, not only sustain, but also propel the machine. Air-screws will, in fact, be eliminated.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.