C.Barnes Short Aircraft since 1900 (Putnam)
Short-Wright Biplanes
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Horace Short designed and manufactured the Short-Wright glider at Battersea in four weeks during the spring of 1909, taking it to Shellbeach in June for fabric covering and final rigging; Rolls attempted his first launch, unsuccessfully, on 1 August and achieved his first glide the following day. Thereafter he practised regularly and with increasing proficiency till 10 October.
The Short-Wright glider had plain rectangular warping wings, with a forward biplane elevator and twin aft rudders exactly similar to the Wright glider of 1902-3, except that the pilot sat upright with a control lever in each hand; the left-hand lever moved fore-and-aft to control the elevator, and the right-hand lever moved sideways for warping and fore-and-aft to control the rudder. It was hand-launched from a trolley on a rail laid downhill on a slight eminence near Leysdown, and Rolls achieved soaring flights of several hundred yards in suitable weather. Rolls did not dispose of his glider until March 1910, when he offered it for sale in good condition, together with its shed and rail and the lease of the site.
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Glider - Span 32 ft 10 in (10 m); length 18 ft (5-5 m); area 325 sq ft (30 m2).
M.Goodall, A.Tagg British Aircraft before the Great War (Schiffer)
Deleted by request of (c)Schiffer Publishing
SHORT-WRIGHT glider S9 (CSR.1)
This was a copy of the Wright glider of 1902-1903, the structure of which was made at Battersea for C.S. Rolls in the spring of 1909, and was then taken to Leysdown for covering. The machine was completed by the end of July and Rolls commenced testing immediately, using a rail on a slope near Leysdown. A number of glides were made terminating on 10 October 1909 when, having acquired sufficient experience of handling the glider, Rolls offered it for sale in March 1910. A second order for a glider, S12, was apparently not completed but may have covered work for a later powered glider.
The glider had equal span two bay wings with warping control, a front biplane elevator and twin rear rudders. It differed from the original Wright in that the pilot sat upright controlling the machine with a lever on the right hand side operating the elevator and one on the left operating both the warp and the rudders. Fins, known as 'half-moons', were added between the biplane elevators during the time that the glider was in use.
Data
Span 32ft 10in
Area 325 sq. ft
Length 18ft
P.Lewis British Aircraft 1809-1914 (Putnam)
Short-Wright Glider
After Eustace Short witnessed Wilbur Wright flying at Le Mans in 1908 he decided that the most promising future of aeronautics lay in the heavier-than-air sphere. He and his brother Oswald were engineers and balloon makers to the Aero Club, and they prevailed upon the third brother, Horace, to relinquish his work on experimental steam turbines with the Hon. C. A. Parsons in Newcastle and to join them at Battersea. Their first product was a glider version of the Wright Biplane, completed in 1908 and tested successfully by Alec Ogilvie and by Hon. C. S. Rolls, who is shown flying the machine.
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M.Goodall, A.Tagg - British Aircraft before the Great War /Schiffer/
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| Short-Wright glider S.9 as delivered to Rolls in July 1909 for practice prior to completion of his powered Short-Wright.
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C.Barnes - Short Aircraft since 1900 /Putnam/
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| Short-Wright Glider, as first tried without rudders, July 1909.
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P.Lewis - British Aircraft 1809-1914 /Putnam/
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Журнал - Flight за 1909 г.
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| Preliminary to his recent successful flights on his Short-Wright flyer, the Hon. C. S. Rolls obtained considerable proficiency in soaring with a man-carrying glider, also built by Messrs. Short Bros., by special permission of the Wright Bros., early last year. This was the first made with proper seat for the operator to sit in an upright position, and levers working like the full-size power machines, in fact a miniature reproduction minus the power plant. Mr. Rolls has sent us a couple of unpublished "snaps" of his glider practice which helped him so much in manipulating the full-sized machine.
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M.Goodall, A.Tagg - British Aircraft before the Great War /Schiffer/
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| Short-Wright glider S.9 at Leysdon in August 1909 after rear rudder and 'halfmoons' had been fitted.
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