On Fri, 12 Dec 2003 13:49:41 -0600, "Jim" wrote
in Message-Id: :

One interesting thing about Langley's Aerodrome was that it's engine weight
was about the same as the Wright's but it produced roughtly 90 horsepower.

Unfortunately, Langley's was a steam engine! Imagine stoking the
furnace of your Cessna. :-)

However, Glen Curtiss was a wizard with internal combustion gasoline
engines. It was his 80 HP engine that permitted him to nose out
Bleriot in France and win the speed prize. And, as is quite evident
today, his use of ailerons was vastly superior to the Wright's wing
warping for controllability. In all, Curtiss's designs out performed
the Wright's by a considerable margin, but there's no doubt that
refining an existing design commands nowhere the respect as developing
the original.