Читать книгу H. G. Hawker, airman: his life and work онлайн

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“‘I was quite snug and warm inside the little body that had been provided, and the weather throughout was ideal. The engine ran splendidly, and I can truthfully say that it never made a single misfire for the whole period of 8 hours 23 minutes.

“‘I occupied most of my time in keeping one eye on the clock and one on Raynham, who was flying below me, and on several occasions he quite appeared to be “taxi-ing” along the ground. I always noticed that he never came to rest, however, and concluded that he must be flying low. Once he shot across my path about some 150 feet under me, giving me quite a start for the second. On several occasions I lost sight of him for half an hour at a time, and was sometimes worried by wondering whether I was going to give him my backwash or whether I was getting into his.

“‘I had a Thermos flask of cocoa on board, some chocolate, and some sandwiches, all of which I found useful in either passing the time away or relieving the monotony by giving me something to do. I did not look at the exact time that I started, but I knew that I had about an hour and three quarters to do after Raynham had finished. Everything was plain sailing with regard to the petrol supply and oil. The petrol was gravity-fed and the oil pressure-fed. I had a twenty-gallon petrol tank just behind my back, which was coupled directly to the carburetter, and above that I had a twelve-gallon tank, both being full. The twelve-gallon tank was connected by a pipe to the larger tank, and after I had been flying for four hours I turned on the tap in the twelve-gallon tank and allowed the contents of this tank to flow down to the larger one. I discovered afterwards that the pipe from the twelve-gallon to the twenty-gallon tank was not large enough, because when I came down in the evening I could hear the petrol still slowly trickling into the large tank. For the oil, I had a glass gauge in the sump of the motor and a five-gallon tank also behind my back, I started off with two gallons in the sump, and occasionally pumped up a little pressure in the oil tank, opening the tap between the tank and the sump to keep the oil level in the sump somewhere within sight. As the petrol was used and the weight lessened I closed the throttle slightly, the engine running equally well at all speeds.