Spirit of St. Louis

For other uses, see The Spirit of St. Louis (disambiguation).

Template:Infobox Aircraft The Spirit of St. Louis was a custom airplane used by Charles Lindbergh to make the first non-stop trans-Atlantic flight on May 20 and May 21, 1927.

Charles Lindbergh took off from Roosevelt Airfield in Long Island, New York and made a successful touchdown at the Le Bourget Aerodrome in Paris, France. The flight lasted for 33 hours, 30 minutes and 29.8 seconds.

Design and development

Officially known as the Ryan NYP, the aircraft was designed by Donald A. Hall of an aircraft manufacturer named Ryan Airlines in San Diego, California. The plane was loosely based on the Ryan M-2, a mail-carrier built in 1926, to cut design time. However the Spirit represented a "new design" considering the Ryan M-2 could not be redesigned to make the 3,600 mile flight. Donald A. Hall elaborated on these facts in the "Engineering Data on the Spirit of St. Louis" (originally published in The Spirit of St. Louis by Charles Lindbergh).

At the time, the company was totally owned by Benjamin F. "Frank" Mahoney, who had founded the company as an airline in 1925 with T. Claude Ryan and retained him as manager after buying out his interest in 1926. Although designed for its successful New York to Paris flight and built in San Diego, it was named after the city of St. Louis, Missouri because Lindbergh's financial investors lived in that city. The flight was inspired by the $25,000 Orteig Prize for the first non-stop flight between New York and Paris. On May 21st, the plane touched down in Le Bourget, Paris, France winning the Orteig Prize.

Hall and the Ryan Airlines staff worked closely with Lindbergh to design and build the single-seat, single-engine monoplane in just sixty days, for a cost of just over $10,000 (though the actual cost isn't clear, since Mahoney offered the plane "at cost"). In the spring of 1927, several other pilots and aircrew were also preparing to make the Transatlantic flight to compete for the Orteig Prize.

Technical specifications

Lindbergh poses with the famous plane

Lindbergh believed that the more engines a plane had, the greater the possibility of engine failure. He was of the opinion that single-engine planes traveled farther, and thus decided to purchase one. To increase fuel efficiency, the Spirit of St. Louis was one of the most streamlined aircraft of its era.

Lindbergh was convinced that a flight in a small airplane, designed around the dependable Wright J-5C, stood the best chance of completion. The Ryan NYP was very different from others since it had extra fuel tanks, in order to travel a much greater distance non-stop. The large main fuel tank was placed in the forward section of the fuselage, in front of the pilot, which improved the center of gravity of the aircraft. Locating fuel tanks at the front of the aircraft had an additional significance: in the event of a crash during takeoff, the pilot would be in a dangerous position if the engine and the fuel tanks were behind him, since he would be crushed to death.

As a result of this design decision, there was no front windshield. This meant that the pilot's view was limited to the windows on either side of the plane. To overcome this limitation, a periscope was installed and fastened to the plane's left-hand side to provide a forward view. This was mainly used as a precaution to avoid hitting ship masts while flying at low altitude over harbors and sea coasts. It is unclear whether this was actually used during the flight, however. Lindbergh also used special navigation instruments such as the Earth Inductor Compass, which was the plane's main instrument, allowing Lindbergh to account for the magnetic deviation of the earth.

Lindbergh sat in a cramped and tiny cockpit which was 94 centimeters wide by 81 centimeters long and 130 centimeters high. The cockpit was so small, Lindbergh couldn't even stretch his legs. The Spirit of St. Louis was powered by a 223-horsepower, air-cooled, 9-cylinder Wright J-5C "Whirlwind" engine. The engine was rated for a maximum operating time of 9,000 hours (more than one year if operated continuously), and had a special mechanism that could keep it clean the whole New York-to-Paris flight. Mass/power ratio was: 23 lb/hp (10.4 kg/hp).

The race to be first across the Atlantic did require design trade offs. The original wingspan of the Ryan M2 was increased by 10 feet and redesigned to create a surface area large enough to lift 450 gallons (1,703 liters) of fuel (carried in five fuel tanks: left wing, right wing, mid wing, nose and in available payload space) along with the lone pilot and minimum necessary gear.

However, Hall decided that the tail and control surfaces of the aircraft would not be altered from his original Ryan M2 design, thus minimizing redesign time that was not available without delaying the flight. The result was a less stable aircraft which the experienced Lindbergh nevertheless approved. There is dispute regarding whether Hall also preferred this design since the estimated 40-hour flight would be very challenging in terms of pilot fatigue. More than likely, Hall and Lindbergh together weighed the advantages and disadvantages of this setup, determining that an unstable aircraft would help keep Lindbergh awake. This indeed resulted in a plane with unstable flight characteristics, with a tendency to curve, dip, and bank at random times. The stiff wicker seat in the cockpit was also purposely uncomfortable, though custom fitted to Lindbergh's tall and lanky frame. Lindbergh later wrote about how the plane woke him various times during the flight in his book, The Spirit of St. Louis.

Lindbergh also insisted that all extra weight be eliminated. For example, he carried no radio in order to save weight. Radios were quite unreliable at the time in any case. Also, although he was an airmail pilot, he refused to carry souvenir letters on the transatlantic journey, insisting that every spare ounce be devoted to fuel. The aircraft fuselage was made of treated fabric over a metal-tube frame. The wings were made of fabric over a wood frame.

A swastika was painted on the inside of the nosecone of the Spirit of St. Louis along with the names of all the Ryan Aircraft Co. employees that built the airplane. It was a message of good luck prior to Lindbergh's solo Atlantic crossing as the swastika was a popular good luck charm and symbol with early aviators. The inside of the nosecone can be viewed on the original Spirit of St. Louis at the National Air and Space Museum.

Legacy

Lindbergh's transatlantic flight made him an instant celebrity and media star. He subsequently flew the Spirit of St. Louis to Belgium and England before President Coolidge sent a Navy cruiser to bring Lindbergh and his airplane back to the United States. Lindbergh then flew the Spirit of St. Louis on promotional and goodwill tours across the United States and Latin America. The final flight of the Spirit of St. Louis took place on April 30, 1928, when Lindbergh flew from St. Louis to Bolling Field, Washington, D.C., where he presented the historic aircraft to the Smithsonian Institution.

Charles Lindbergh wrote the book WE about his 1927 epic transatlantic journey from New York to Paris only weeks after the flight. The title "WE" refers to Lindbergh and the Spirit of St. Louis being together and the only two on the flight. In 1953, he wrote The Spirit of St. Louis which won the Pulitzer Prize in 1954.

Disposition

The original Spirit of St. Louis is currently on display at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC, in the main atrium on the same side as the Bell X-1 and SpaceShipOne. The aircraft was presented to the Smithsonian Institution by Lindbergh in 1928. A large number of replicas have been made — both static and flying. The Experimental Aircraft Association, for instance, owns two such replicas, both of which were registered under the original's NX211. Other examples are found at the Lambert-Saint Louis International Airport, the Missouri Historical Society, the Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport, San Diego Aerospace Museum, and San Diego International Airport.

Three replicas of the Spirit of St. Louis were built for 1957 film The Spirit of St. Louis starring James Stewart. One example is on display at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan and a second replica is at the EAA AirVenture Museum in Oshkosh, Wisconsin.

Specifications (Ryan NYP)

Data from

General characteristics

• Crew: One
• Airfoil: Clark Y

Performance

References

• Hall, Donald A. Technical Preparation of the Airplane "Spirit of St. Louis" N.A.C.A. Technical Note #257. Washington: National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, July 1927. Spirit Access date: 18 May 2007
• Hardwick, Jack and Schnepf, Ed. "A Viewer's Guide to Aviation Movies." The Making of the Great Aviation Films. General Aviation Series, Volume 2, 1989.
• Lindbergh, Charles A. We. New York: Grosset & Dunlap Publishers, 1927.
• Schiff, Barry. "The Spirit Flies On: Remembering the Flight that Changed the Course of History." AOPA Pilot, May 2002. Spirit of St. Louis Access date: 18 May 2007.

External links

• Spirit of St. Louis at the National Air and Space Museum
• The Spirit of St. Louis
• Lindbergh's Transatlantic Flight: New York to Paris Timeline, May 20-21, 1927
• Photo Archive by Donald A. Hall: Designer of the Spirit of St. Louis

Gallery

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  The Spirit of St. Louis on display in the National Air and Space Museum
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  Nose of the Spirit of St. Louis, with the Wright Whirlwind Radial engine visible
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  Spirit of St. Louis
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  Spirit of St. Louis
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  Spirit of St. Louis nose cone
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  Spirit of St. Louis nose cone
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  Spirit of St. Louis model
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  The Spirit of St. Louis as displayed at the National Air and Space Museum. Image enhanced.