Re: Ornithopter

["James R. Cunningham" <jrccea@bellsouth.net>]

Dinogeorge@aol.com wrote:
> 
> In a message dated 98-06-25 03:06:23 EDT, kazmer@hotmail.com writes:
> 
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>  Those of us that have a strong interest in the history of
>  aviation are very familiar with Ornithopters.It is a
>  FAILED flying machine from the 1920's. It had an
>  airplanes' fuselage and a large series of whirling
>  circular banded blades that pumped up and down vigorously
>  while spinning

snipped

George wrote
snipped
 
> Ornithoptering is the kind of flying that extant birds do, as distinct from
> the kind of flying that, say, flying squirrels or flying fish do. Just because
> people couldn't build a working mechanical ornithopter doesn't mean nature
> can't make a living ornithopter.

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Ed Spencer (son of the designer of the Spencer rifle developed in the
1860's), designer of the Republic SeaBee and the Spencer Air Car, also
designed and built many sucessful flapping ornithopers that flew quite
well.  Ornithopters were not unsucessful, and were named to reflect that
their flight mode imitated bird flight.  I find it amusing that we are
now encouraging a double reflection of the derived term back to describe
the original mechanism.  I'm not in favor of doing so.
                        Best wishes,
                                JimC