1903 Wright Flyer Simulation | |
Peter Whalley |
Kevin Quick |
Ben Hawkridge |
Jon Linney |
| | ||||||
I always get mad whenever I have a great idea about something, then someone else gets there first. Even worse is when they not only do it faster than I did, but did it better than I could have ever hoped to do.
I've long wanted to provide a simulation of the 1903 Wright flyer, but simply haven't had the resources to pursue this project. Now I find that a simulator has been put online by someone in the UK. What do you say to a group that beat you to the punch, created a superb simulation of the 1903 flyer, are are kicking in a simulator of the Wrights' wind tunnel experiments to boot? I can only say "Absolutely Fabulous!" I'm sure you will agree.
The First Flight site has a terrific set of materials online. We have a "sister site" relationship under development, as I have with the Octave Chanute Pages.
First Flight is located in England. We are proud to be a mirror site for their 1903 Wright Flyer simulation. North American visitors may find it faster to download the simulation from here. The simulator requires a Shockwave plugin, and is not for the memory-impaired browser. Buy more memory if you have to.
First Flight also has simulations of Cayley's whirling arm and his gunpowder-based ornithopter. We will mirror these in the near future. But on the web, distance is nothing, so check their site out!
|
The 1903 Wright Flyer SimulationThis simulation is based on the well-known work of F. J. Hooven, published in 1987, but goes far beyond Hooven's simulation in representing the scene from the pilot's point of view.Download simulation (~500K) |
 |
Coming soon: a shockwave simulation of the Wright's wind tunnel
experiments. (Will these Brits stop at NOTHING?) As a sneak-preview, check out their illustration of wind tunnel simulation |
