To return however to the task in hand, we touched upon Beverley Shenstone's last resting place in Cyprus but the hi-res image thereof has not been forthcoming; he was however responsible for the ellipsoid planform of the Spitfire's wing, practically all else in British aviation besides. And tho' Sheffield did not come out all that well from a recent post, it was the birthplace of Vickers: a company which underwrote development of the aircraft and has probably done more than any other to advance British means of transport on land, sea and air.
I've read a couple of books on Mitchell, the lead in the design, and learned a couple of things in doing so. Principally it is that no matter how well-read you are during a course of long life, invariably you will only remember one key feature from any book at the end of it all: which leaves you questioning its value altogether.
For example from the last book I read about Mitchell I learned only this: they said at Vickers that the tea he made tasted of piss, and so one day he filled the tea-pot with his own prior to dishing it out.
From the most recent, however, this. The test-pilot tasked with the Supermarine seen here (in model form by the legendary Tony Nijhuis) reported that it required the use of full rudder throughout the take-off run... which is astonishing given the efflux its Rolls Royce power-plant would have produced.
There is more too, however. Such was the torque of its engine, each float differed in two ways: one would be largely filled with fuel whilst the other was not, and each was designed using a different shape to further compensate for its effects.
Gyroscopic considerations and the reaction from the tail-fin aside, this would likely be because opposition to rotation of the propeller would drive one float further into the water than the other, so that the thrust-line would act around the pivot that it would effectively produce.
This has ramifications for our own project, in so far as it raises the question as to whether a craft can be steered by torque-effect: absent any moveable surface? If this were the case, it would certainly simplify the design of any maritime drone or ground-effect aircraft with a pair of propellers rotating in opposite directions.
Happily (or sadly depending on your point of view) this might be tested more easily on a catamaran than a mono-ski.
So shall we reconsider one such design, and see what can be achieved at a kitchen-table prior?
As would Mitchell with his colleagues, as his medical condition advanced.
His was cancer, mind, mine just a missing mojo.
Viewed from the cockpit propellers rotate clockwise in US, but anti-clockwise in UK aircraft like the Spitfire. The airframe of the S6b reacting in the opposite direction would unload the left float and load the right. This would off-set the centre of drag to starboard, pulling the aircraft in the same direction. The S6b like foregoing types was modified with water-rudders in addition to that on the tail-fin, tho' whether this was to address this specific issue is lost to conjecture.
