FRANK WHITTLE - Key Persons
Job Titles:
- Chairman & Managing Director, Rolls - Royce
Job Titles:
- Engineer
- Fellow
- Pilot Officer
Sir Frank Whittle aeronautical engineer and inventor of the jet engine, gives instructions in its workings to the journalist Clifford Troke, 1948.
Nearly two years earlier and unknown to the Allies, the work of a young German academic and engineer Hans von Ohain, working with the support of Dr Ernst Heinkel and his company, had resulted in the first flight of a gas-turbine jet propelled aircraft. The Ohain engine was splendidly simple - incorporating a single-sided centrifugal compressor back-to-back with a centripetal turbine. However this attractively uncomplicated form never led to a useful aero-engine and, after much modification, the project was dropped in 1941 or 42. In the meantime, after some unhelpful interference by the German Air Ministry (RLM), axial compressor versions of the turbojet came under development at Junkers and BMW - the former designated Jumo 004 and the latter designated BMW 003. The 004B became the chosen engine for the futuristic Messerschmitt Me.262 jet fighter that began operational service with the Luftwaffe in October 1944.
Before the E28/39 had even flown, orders were placed with Gloster for a twin-engine fighter, the Gloster Meteor, to be powered by the W2B. Then, in October 1941, when the United States had yet to enter the war, the W1X and plans for the W2B were sent across the Atlantic. With matchless enthusiasm, the General Electric Company then began work on their own turbojet - becoming known as the A-I. In May 1942, Whittle went over to visit the GE plant to help overcome development problems, staying in America until early August. The A-I had begun testing just six months after the W1X was delivered. The first American turbojet-powered aeroplane flew in October the same year. Thus was laid the foundations of the US turbojet industry.
Whittle, in uniform, and its designer George Carter, far right, in front of a Meteor I
Job Titles:
- Minister of Aircraft Production
Whittle working with his trusty slide rule (No compact electronic computers in those days!)
Meanwhile much of Power Jets work was being transferred to Whetstone and its total staff had risen to over 1000. On 24th October 1943, Cripps told Whittle that Power Jets alone would be nationalized and that its future role would be to carry out research and development for exploitation by private industry. Whittle was awarded a CBE in the 1944 New Year Honours. 6 days later, bowing to US pressure, the jet engine was made public, thus making Whittle a reluctant national hero.
Although they could not thwart it, the nationalization of Power Jets alone proved unacceptable to Whittle, his fellow directors and many of his colleagues. The government would pay its shareholders no more than £135,000, but Whittle himself received none of this as he had surrendered his shares, as a serving officer, to the Ministry of Aircraft Production and his patent rights to the nation. In March 1944, Whittle was admitted to hospital and remained there for six months suffering from nervous exhaustion. He then returned to the nationalized Power Jets (R&D) Limited but sensed that the enthusiasm and drive that had been such a feature of the Lutterworth days was draining away.