Engineering:Loving WR-1 Love
| WR-1 Love | |
|---|---|
| |
| The WR-1 on display | |
| Role | Racing aircraft |
| National origin | United States |
| Manufacturer | Wayne Aircraft Company |
| Designer | Neil Loving |
| First flight | 7 August 1950[1] |
The Loving/Wayne WR-1 Love is a single seat, midget racer built in the 1950s.[2]
Design and development
The WR-1 is a single place, gull-winged aircraft with conventional landing gear. The fuselage uses wood truss construction with aircraft fabric covering. The all-wood, plywood covered gull-wing features faired, fixed landing gear at the lowest point. The design was submitted and approved by the professional racing pilots association in 1948 with construction starting in January 1949.[3]
Operational history
In the 1951 National Air Races pilot Neal Vernon Loving qualified with a 266 mph (428 km/h) dive. The aircraft's spinner separated, damaging the propeller.[4]
In December 1953, Loving flew the WR-1 2200 miles from Detroit to Kingston, Jamaica, an unusually long trip for a new experimental design of the era.[5]
In 1954, the design was the winner of the Most Outstanding Design award at the Experimental Aircraft Association Fly-in at Rockford, Illinois.
Specifications (WR-1)
Data from EAA, Air Trails
General characteristics
- Crew: 1
- Length: 17 ft 2 in (5.23 m)
- Wingspan: 20 ft (6.1 m)
- Height: 4 ft 4 in (1.32 m)
- Wing area: 66 sq ft (6.1 m2)
- Empty weight: 613 lb (278 kg)
- Gross weight: 815 lb (370 kg)
- Fuel capacity: 15
- Powerplant: 1 × Continental C85 4-cyl. air-cooled horizontally-opposed piston engine, 85 hp (63 kW)
- Propellers: 2-bladed
Performance
- Maximum speed: 187 kn (215 mph, 346 km/h)
- Cruise speed: 135 kn (155 mph, 249 km/h)
- Stall speed: 50 kn (58 mph, 93 km/h)
- Range: 390 nmi (450 mi, 720 km)
- Service ceiling: 18,000 ft (5,500 m)
- Rate of climb: 2,100 ft/min (11 m/s)
References
- ↑ Betty Kaplan Gubert; Miriam Sawyer; Caroline M. Fannin. Distinguished African Americans in Aviation and Space Science. p. 202.
- ↑ Air Trails: 78. Winter 1971.
- ↑ "Loving/Wayne WR-1". http://www.airventuremuseum.org/collection/aircraft/Loving_Wayne%20WR-1%20Love.asp. Retrieved 2 September 2013.
- ↑ Charlie Cooper; Ann Cooper. Tuskegee's Heroes. p. 33.
- ↑ Experimenter. June 1954.
External links
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