Wilhelm Otto Biography

Otto began to pull into the air even before he was drawn to school. The father of the future glider was engaged in the sale of fabric and had a good condition, so the boy grew up in abundance. The young Otto not only “looked into the sky”, but also sculpted from clay well for his years, so the parents brought their son to the school of artisans in Potsdam.

Otto committed the first attempt to soar over the ground, being a fourteen -year -old teenager. Having built its wings, the flying fly from the roof. It was a success that he did not break anything, but received only a few bruises, and, of course, the first experience.

In the year, Liliental went to Schwarzkopf for ... Practice to the plant, showed himself well and was invited to the place of the designer. Otto was not the only Liliental who dreamed of flights. He infected his brother with this hobby, and together they made their first successful gliders. Otto even participated in several battles of Franco - the Prussian war.

Upon returning to his homeland, after the service, the next, adult stage of the main hobby in life begins. But first, Liliental strengthened the soil underfoot. In order to earn on his experiments, Otto Liliental opens an enterprise for the manufacture of boilers in the German capital. The case quickly went on the way, so soon the company formed a unit concentrated precisely in the manufacture of aircraft.

Conditionally, this period can be divided into three unequal, but, in its own way, important stages. This began in the m year, Liliental explores the most suitable materials and design for flights, the result of the experiments can be assumed that devices with a not completely flat surface fly better. At the next stage, there was a theoretical justification of the possibility of flying, and practical sorties were also carried out, this was done mainly for observing and describing flights.

The result of the work of the innovator was the emergence of a book in which it was the bird flight that was taken as the basis of the art of flying. The work was significant in the world market, many colleagues in the workshop praised the book. Among them, one can distinguish the Russian inventor of Zhukovsky, French researchers Ferber, and of course the Wright brothers, famous American mechanics.

The time of the third and most important, and of course an interesting stage has come - the introduction of the theory in mortal practice. The scientist believed that from every experience it is necessary to take something to improve, so he set out each step of his developments and experiments in the diary in the diary. The nineties were marked by the appearance of monoplaners, on which the tester made jumps that can be called flying.

Then Liliental reached the need to stabilize the flight and, for this purpose, introduced the keel into the aircraft. With an increase in knowledge and skills, and the scope of the construction of devices. Gradually, the area of ​​wings reached ten square meters. And finally, near the capital, a transition to a new era of aeronautics took place. Otto overcame almost 25 meters through the air.

The search for experimental sites was constantly going on, which led the Liliental brothers to Lichtenfeld, not far from which there was a suitable place, about a tall of meters. From the hill, it was possible to fly in different directions and perform flight exercises up to one hundred meters. In the year, the designer tried to double the size of his creation. The device came out bulky and heavy, with strong gusts of wind, it was completely unable to take off.

The scientist concluded that at the moment the optimal size of the wings is about seven meters. For even greater convenience of flights, the Liliental brothers designed the starting tower. With her, everything in the same year was the first flight. The new design weighed about twenty kilograms, the area of ​​the wings had about a square meters and even folded.

Finally, Otto flew outside the limits of a hundred meters and landed near a two hundred meter mark. The developments, although they demanded a lot of funds, also brought a good income from photographs and advertising. In addition, the boilers produced at the enterprise of the Liliental brothers continued to succeed successfully. Additional money brought Otto's trips with lectures.

For more than twenty years of unrestent works, Otto Liliental invented, built and tested 18 of his devices, and personally flew up about two thousand times. The German scientist has accumulated many followers and people who considered themselves his students. He often came to adopt experience. The followers of Otto came from America, developing the same direction in the country in the science of Leningli, Pilcher and Goering.

Later, it was Leningli who created the model of the first airplane. This is very spurred by Liliental, because this machine could be attached to this apparatus for steaming in the air. The first engine was supposed to work on natural gas and rotate 6 propeller blades, the next model worked on the principle of a steam engine on a carbon dioxide, and developed up to 2.5 forces. But the power of both engines lacked to disperse or raise such a mass into the air.Of course, in his research, Otto is worried not only about the range of flights, but also about the security of the pilots.

So, releasing the ninth model of his glider, the designer introduced in the bow of the apparatus a parachute from several elastic rails, this implied that if the glider enters the peak, then the pilot will be able to protect himself a little when landing. From the eleventh device, the glider were with rudders. In the year, monoplans turned into biplanes, that is, the wings were divided, while even increasing the supporting properties of wings with a decrease in the area of ​​the working surface.

At the same time, the tester introduced the concept of gosh, for which he came up with special hoses, in order to change the curvature of the wing during planning. The following year, a physicist Wood came to visit Otto, arranged a photo shoot of a German scientist, and also experienced filming during the flight. Upon impression, he bought that apparatus from Liliental.

The date of the end of life and career was August 3rd, when the scientist experienced a biplane with a height of height. The device sharply gained height and at a certain moment, after a second hanging in the air collapsed from a thirty -meter height. As a result of the fall, Otto Liliental broke his neck and could not save him, and the scientist himself died, like the mythical predecessor Ikar, in flight to his dream.

Detailed biography.