https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Trimotor
The Ford Trimotor (also called the "Tri-Motor", and nicknamed "The Tin Goose")
was an American three-engined transport aircraft. Production started in 1925 by
the companies of Henry Ford and ended June 7, 1933. A total of 199 Ford
Trimotors were made.[1] It was designed for the civil aviation market, but also
saw service with military units. The Ford Trimotor was sold around the world.
The story of the Ford Trimotor began with William Bushnell Stout, an
aeronautical engineer who had previously designed several aircraft using
principles similar to, and originally devised by Professor Hugo Junkers, the
noted German all-metal aircraft design pioneer.
In the early 1920s, Henry Ford, along with a group of 19 other investors
including his son Edsel, invested in the Stout Metal Airplane Company. Stout, a
bold and imaginative salesman, sent a mimeographed form letter to leading
manufacturers, blithely asking for $1,000 and adding: "For your one thousand
dollars you will get one definite promise: You will never get your money back."
Stout raised $20,000, including $1,000 each from Edsel and Henry Ford.
In 1925, Ford bought Stout and its aircraft designs. The single-engined Stout
design was turned into a multi-engined design, the Stout 3-AT with three
Curtiss-Wright air-cooled radial engines. After a prototype was built and
test-flown with poor results, and a suspicious fire caused the complete
destruction of all previous designs[citation needed], the "4-AT" and "5-AT"
emerged.
The Ford Trimotor using all-metal construction was not a revolutionary concept,
but it was certainly more advanced than the standard construction techniques of
the 1920s. The aircraft resembled the Fokker F.VII Trimotor (except for being
all-metal which Henry Ford claimed made it "the safest airliner around"). Its
fuselage and wings followed a design pioneered by Junkers during World War I
with the Junkers J.I and used postwar in a series of airliners starting with the
Junkers F.13 low-wing monoplane of 1920 of which a number were exported to the
US, the Junkers K 16 high-wing airliner of 1921, and the Junkers G 24 trimotor
of 1924. All of these were constructed of aluminum alloy, which was corrugated
for added stiffness, although the resulting drag reduced its overall
performance. So similar were the designs that Junkers sued and won when Ford
attempted to export an aircraft to Europe. In 1930, Ford countersued in Prague,
and despite the possibility of anti-German sentiment, was decisively defeated a
second time, with the court finding that Ford had infringed upon Junkers'
patents
Role Transport aircraft
Manufacturer Stout Metal Airplane Division of the Ford Motor Company
Designer William Bushnell Stout
First flight June 11, 1926
Introduction 1926
Status 18 in existence as of 2012
Primary users about 100 airlines
United States Army Air Corps
United States Navy
Royal Canadian Air Force
Number built 199
Unit cost about $42,000 in 1933 (about $736,000 in 2013)
Variants Stout Bushmaster 2000
A total of 199 Ford Trimotors were built between 1926 and 1933, including 79 of
the 4-AT variant, and 116 of the 5-AT variant, plus some experimental craft.
Well over 100 airlines of the world flew the Ford Trimotor.[1] From mid-1927,
the type was also flown on executive transportation duties by several commercial
nonairline operators, including oil and manufacturing companies.
The impact of the Ford Trimotor on commercial aviation was immediate, as the
design represented a "quantum leap over other airliners." Within a few months
of its introduction, Transcontinental Air Transport was created to provide
coast-to-coast operation, capitalizing on the Trimotor's ability to provide
reliable and, for the time, comfortable passenger service.
As of 2012, there are 18 Ford Trimotors in existence, eight of which have
current FAA airworthiness certificates
Specifications
Ford 4-AT-E Trimotor
General characteristics
Crew: 3 (Pilot, co-pilot, flight-attendant)
Capacity: 8 passengers
Cost:
Length: 49 ft 10 in (15.2 m)
Wingspan: 74 ft 0 in (22.6 m)
Height: 11 ft 9 in (3.6 m)
Empty weight: 6,500 lb (2,950 kg)
Loaded weight: 10,130 lb (4,595 kg)
Max. takeoff weight: 21,985 lb (9,972 kg)
kW) each
Performance
Maximum speed: 132 mph (213 km/h, 115 kn)
Cruise speed: 107 mph (172 km/h, 93 kn)
Stall speed: 57 mph (92 km/h, 50 kn)
Range: 570 mi (918 km, 495 nmi)
Service ceiling: 18,600 ft (5,670 m)
Rate of climb: 920 ft/min (4.67 m/s)
Power/mass: lb/hp (kg/kW)
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