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NewsletterRoyal Aeronautical SocietyHatfield Branch

Branch Chairman: David Philpott President: Mike Ramsden September 2011

From the Chairman

W elcome to a new season with the Hatfield Branch of the Royal Aeronautical Society and thank you

for all your support over the past year. We had a very varied and well attended lecture programme and our thanks go to the University for continuing to provide such marvellous facilities to host our activities.

We start the new season at 7pm on Wednesday 28th September with a lecture by Rob Morris on the 146/RJ, 30 years on. On 19th October, Kevin Hackett, ex BAE (Hatfield) and QinetiQ, will be talking about his work on the solar-powered Zephyr UAV that achieved a non-stop flight of 14 days.

During the past year members of the main Society were hit by the large increase in membership fees and some felt they were unable to continue membership. If you are one of these, please be assured that you will still receive a warm welcome at branch lectures and events. For those who are not members of the main Society, Branch membership is now £10 per annum.

Maintaining and increasing the Branch membership is of constant concern. With the help of Fadl Isa, one our student representatives on the committee, we have compiled a list of local aerospace-related companies and intend to use this to circulate news of our activities to a wider audience. Please do your bit in encouraging your own friends and families to come along. We also intend to build further on our good relationship with the University and encourage wider participation by both staff and students.

This is your Branch. Please feel free to contact us with comments and suggestions. Perhaps you could help by, for example, writing something for the next Newsletter, talking to others about the Branch and giving them a copy of the Newsletter and lecture programme, sug-

gesting future lecture topics and other Branch activities, or even in some other way not yet thought of!

I look forward to seeing you all again on 28th Sep-tember.

David PhilpottChairmandavid@philpott.demon.co.uk

The 2011/2012 Lecture Programme

September 28th 7:00pm Room A154, Lindop Building The 146/RJ30 Years On

O ur new lecture programme gets off to an apt start with a talk on the 146/RJ.

Rob Morris of Falko Regional Aircraft (formerly BAe Asset Management) is marking the 30th Anniversary of the first flight of the 146 here at Hatfield. He will argue that, despite the aircraft’s age, it still can look forward to a great future.

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Royal Aeronautical Society, Hatfield BranchNewsletter Editor: Ray WilkinsonEmail: R.Wilkinson@herts.ac.ukProduced by Ray Wilkinson and Maurice James

follow the children’s science programme ‘Bang Goes the Theory’ you will know that Richard is heading up the organisation to build a jet/rocket car to exceed 1,000 mph. Richard has already held the World land speed re-cord with Thrust 2, which he drove himself, and went on head up the project that broke the sound barrier with Thrust SSC driven by Andy Green.

Not content with that, the goal now is to beat the record yet again so it should be an interesting tale of determination and innovation.

Incidentally, our branch past Chairman, Ray Wilkin-son, is involved in the programme to develop the Rocket Motor (toffee powered no doubt!)

The 6:45 start gives time for the mince pies and wine.

January 18th 7:00pm (Room TBA) Aerodynamic Efficiency

Dr Raj Nangia is coming to talk all about how we could go about meeting the future demands of reducing the environmental impact of the aircraft industry by 50% over the next quarter of a century.

Dr Raj argues that traditional evolutionary develop-ments aimed at drag reduction and engine SFC improve-ments will have limited effect and, what is needed are new operational concepts. Among these novel ideas are in-flight refuelling and formation flying.

Geese know best!

October 19th 7:00pm (Room TBA) Aerodynamic Design of Zephyr Hale UAV

Kevin Hackett, who used to work at Hatfield on the 125 and Airbus projects and now works for the Engineering Sciences Data Unit in London, will discuss the World re-cord breaking UAV known as the Zephyr. This remark-able vehicle is solar powered and is being developed for ultra long missions lasting, not hours or days but several MONTHS!

Kevin will describe the Electrical power generation/storage problems and aerodynamic efficiency challeng-es that are critical to the viable performance of solar aeroplanes.

November 16th 7:00pm (Room TBA) Simulators in Education

Simulators are a big thing at the University of Hertford-shire. They now have at least three in the simulator lab-oratory where your committee gather for their regular meetings. The first one to be installed was the Merlin and Chris Neal of Merlin Flight Simulator Group will talk about the huge benefits to students in their quest to un-derstand the mysteries of the aeroplane.

December 14th 6:45pm (Room TBA) The Bloodhound 1,000mph Car

Richard Noble OBE has agreed to come and give us our Christmas lecture. If, like me you have grandchildren and

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Annual General Meeting 2011

M inutes of the 2010/11 Annual General Meeting, University of Hertfordshire, held on Wednesday

18th May 20111. ApologiesNone received.2. Minutes of 2009/10 AGMAll actions quoted were carried out and there were no points of accuracy raised. There were no further matters arising from the minutes.3. Hon. Secretary’s ReportThe Secretary presented his report which is attached as Appendix 1.

There were no matters or actions arising:Acceptance of the Secretary’s report was proposed

by Alan Dobson, seconded by Tony Newton and passed unanimously.4. Hon. Treasurer’s ReportThis year’s treasurer’s report is attached as Appendix 2.

It was made clear that the report was being present-ed pending audit (See paragraph 5 below)

Acceptance of the report was proposed by Brian Rolfe, seconded by Ken Pye and passed unanimously.5. Election of AuditorThe Treasurer announced that Don Dykins was unable to audit the accounts due to ill health and a vote of thanks for Don was proposed by Steve Rogers, seconded by Dave Philpott and passed unanimously.

The treasurer also took an action to write a letter of thanks to Don on behalf of the membership, for all his good work in the past.

Mr Ray Cherry was proposed to be the new audi-tor by Maurice James, seconded by Henry Geering and passed unanimously.6. Acting Chairman’s RemarksThe Acting Chairman’s Report is attached as appendix 3 and no issues were raised.7. SubscriptionsThe Committee recommended that the subscription for friends of the Branch be raised to £10 per annum as it had remained unchanged at £8 for several years. A pro-posal was put before the membership by Steve Rogers, seconded by Les Bray and passed unanimously.

February 15th 6:45pm (Room TBA) Volcanic AshEx Hatfield Flight Test Engineer, and now Head of Air-worthiness at the UK Civil Aviation Authority, Podrhaic Kellerher is giving our ‘Partners Evening’ lecture on the well known topic of Volcanic Ash.

Clearly, we can never know when the next eruption will be so it will be interesting to see what lessons have been learnt from the Eyjafjallajoekull eruption last year.

Don’t forget that ‘Partners’ evening means that food and drink will be provided.

March 21st 7:00pm (Room TBA) Student Lecture Competition

This will be the third year of the resurrected and succes-full lecture competition when 4 brave students present a short lecture on a variety of topics.

Once again the competition will be kindly sponsored and judged by Goodrich Electrical Power Systems of Pit-stone.

The details of our last two lectures are still being sorted but I am sure that you will be impressed with the topics. We will obviously keep you informed in plenty of time.

The Dates are:April 18th at 6:00pm The Sir Geoffrey de Havilland

LectureMay 16th at 6:45pm Our Final lecture and AGMHon. Sec.

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ed with 4 excellent lectures on GPWS by Manuella Ca-sissa and Cameron Stewart, on Fifth Generation Fighters by Mukti Limby, on Supercruise by Haris Ali Qazi and on Anti Tank Weapons by the winner of the competition Fadl Isa.

The Committee are deeply grateful to Goodrich Pow-er Systems who are keen to continue to sponsor this event and we are in the throes of producing a perma-nent trophy.

The Sir Geoffrey de Havilland lecture passed off well with a turnout of just under 100 people for the lecture. The main Society president, Air Vice Marshal David Couzens, and the Chairman of the Sir Geoffrey de Havil-land Flying Foundation, Air Marshal Ian Macfadyen, have sent letters of thanks to our President, Mike Ramsden.This year, in response to member’s requests, an effort was made to explain in more detail, the achievements of the prize winners at the presentation.

Once again, it was a disappointing turnout for the dinner which, nevertheless, was thoroughly enjoyed by all present and the committee thank Nigel Price for his efforts in organising much of the event.

The John Cunningham and John Houlder Flying

8. Election of Committee.a. Chairman

The president, Mr Mike Ramsden, took over the Chair and carried out the vote for Dave Philpott as our new Chairman.

The proposal was made by Steve Rogers and sec-onded by Stan Kimm. It was passed unanimously by the membershipb. Committee members

The following Committee Members were obliged by the Constitution to resign after serving for two years. Both were willing to continue in office:

• Steve Rogers, (Treasurer) was proposed by John Holmes-Walker and seconded by Henry Geering.

• Maurice James (Secretary) was proposed by Eric Dobson and seconded by Tony Newton.

Both were voted in unanimously by the members.9. AOBJohn Holmes-Walker asked if there had been any reac-tion by the branch to the increase in the Main Society fees. Mike Ramsden stated that he had attended the meeting in Hamilton Place and had expressed dissatis-faction with the proposals. A defence of the need for the increase was argued very strongly by the Main So-ciety President although it was conceded that the issue could have been better handled.

M R JamesHon. Secretary.

10. Appendix 1 – Secretary’s ReportLecture Programme 2010/11

As seen below, the attendance at this season’s Lecture Programme is holding up well against the annual re-cords. Hopefully, this is an indication that members are finding the programme interesting.

Suggestions for future lecture topics are always wel-come and all you need do is speak to any committee member.

The record for the individual lectures for this last season is shown below and firstly we apologise that it became necessary to cancel the January lecture as no speaker was available. The other disappointment was the turnout for the March event. This was the student lecture competition and it is a shame that the members do not support this event with more enthusiasm. Once again the members who did attend were amply reward-

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has not been well and has been unable to audit the ac-counts this year. Ray Cherry has agreed to step into the breach but due to business commitments, he was un-able to do this before this meeting. The accounts are therefore not fully signed off.This year, the accounts show that the Branch made a loss of £2443, compared to a profit last year of £695.

The main cause of this loss was the decision to fund two significant presentation pieces for the John Cun-ningham & John Houlder scholarship awards. These one off costs totalled well over £2000. The Committee has agreed to increase our claims to the Main Society to re-cover these costs, but this will be done over a number of years.

Our two main sources of income remain the sub-scriptions from local branch members and the generous support, which we get from the Main Society. We bid for this money each year, based on the costs of running the branch. Local branch subscriptions are slightly up this year.

On expenditure, the net cost of the de Havilland din-ner was slightly up at £645. This covers the costs of the branch guests, a subsidy on ticket prices and the fact that we failed to sell the minimum number of tickets. The committee recognises that the cost of the dinner is quite high and in 2010, we maintained the level of subsidy. Although the dinner is enjoyed by those who attend, getting people to come remains a challenge and the committee are considering alternate formats. The other major area of expense remains the cost of run-ning the lecture programme. We are grateful to the Uni-versity who provide the lecture theatres and facilities for committee meetings at no charge. We do have to pay for the Fielder Centre for the de Havilland lecture. Although this cost is high, it does offer a high quality facility for a prestige lecture. We also pay for entertain-ing the lecturers and this has included some overnight and travel expenses. At the partners evening and at the December lecture, we do provide refreshments.

As in previous years, the University have kindly un-dertaken the printing and distribution of the newsletter and we are very grateful for the University’s generous contribution.

The Main Society recommends that Branches should maintain a balance of between 12 and 18 months ex-

ScholarshipsThe winner of the third John Cunningham flying schol-arship was Tom Atherton and that of the second John Houlder award was Alex Flood. Both could not be pre-sent for the presentation as, this year, the event fell dur-ing the Easter holiday. The committee will try to avoid this clash in future.

The Secretary has been informed by Air Marshal Ian Macfadyen, Chairman of the Sir Geoffrey de Havilland Flying Foundation, that the two flying scholarships will be available for this year which is excellent news.

We are also glad to announce that Ian Macfadyen, Maurice James and Stan Kimm paid John Houlder a visit to thank him for his award and to show him the mag-nificent carving that Stan produced for the John Houlder Scholarship. The reports for the students were read out to John and he was very grateful for the opportunity to see and discuss the scholarship in person.

University SupportThe Committee are most grateful to the Head of

School, Reza Sutodeh, who will shortly call a meeting with the Chairman and Secretary to explore further ways to co-operate with the University. The outcome of this meeting will be followed up by the committee and reported via the newsletter.

Sir Geoffrey de Havilland PlaqueTake a look at the wall opposite the reception desk in the entrance hall of the College Lane Campus and you will at last see the magnificent plaque carved by Stan Kimm together with the list of ‘FIRSTS’ compiled by our President, Mike Ramsden. It has taken a lot of work to get this plaque, which replaces an original that was sto-len.

Committee HelpI would like to add my thanks to our student representa-tives, Manuela Cassissa, Cameron Stewart, Scott Moffat and Fadl Isa for their impressive initiative and energy and finally once again I stress that any other volunteers to help the committee would be most welcome

M JamesHon. Secretary, May 2011

Appendix 2 – Treasurer’s ReportI must start with an apology. Don Dykins has acted as our Honorary Auditor for many years. Unfortunately he

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tremely high and the success of the evening was due, in no small part, to the efforts of our University committee representatives.

There was a very large attendance at the excellent Sir Geoffrey de Havilland Lecture, given by Miguel Santos on the Dreamliner. However, the number attending the dinner has been declining in recent years and, although this is a very successful social event, it is proving expen-sive to run.

A concern of the committee is the relatively small number of students attending lectures on a regular ba-sis. Our student representatives are currently examin-ing ways in which the University web site, used to com-municate with students on a day-to-day basis, can be used to improve the visibility of the Branch’s activities and emphasise the relevance of these activities to their studies and subsequent careers. In order to extend our audience further, a list of organisations with the Hatfield area having aerospace interests has been compiled, which will be used to promote our Branch activities in a targeted fashion.

Finally thanks to all members for your continued support. Our Branch offers a unique opportunity for in-teraction between those about to qualify to enter the profession and current and past practitioners. This op-portunity must be used to support the industry which draws us all together. Sometimes we seem to be sur-rounded by doom and gloom but, according to the Daily Telegraph (12th May 2011), “Britain has the big-gest aerospace industry in Europe, and is second only to the US worldwide. There are 2,600 manufacturers and service companies ranging from the likes of Rolls-Royce and BAE Systems to small businesses”. Last year exports were £22.2bn, an increase of 5.4%.

David PhilpottChairman

penditure. You can see from the balance sheet that, ex-cluding the one off award costs, we are now towards the bottom end of this range, although the year end fig-ure is only a snapshot.

In summary, the finances of the Branch remain healthy, although we need to continue to rebuild our reserves.

The RE Bishop account is very simple. We award an annual cash prize of £250. There is also the cost of pro-viding a small memento, as we do not let them take Stan Kimm’s magnificent trophy away.

The fund stands at a very healthy £57826 and al-though income from interest payments remains very low, given the current annual outgoings, we can sustain the award for many years to come.

Steve RogersTreasurer

Appendix 3 – Chairman’s ReportI assumed the role of acting chairman of the branch in October 2010, following Ray Wilkinson’s resignation. I would like to convey both my personal thanks and the thanks of the Branch to Ray for his enormous contribu-tion as Chairman, his very effective work for the Branch within the University and his continuing support in the production of the Newsletter.

We are also grateful to Prof. Reza Sotudeh, of the School of Engineering and Technology, for his support and to Dr. Raj Calay for agreeing take over as Univer-sity staff representative on the committee, following Ray’s resignation. We were also very encouraged by the number and enthusiasm of our student representatives, Fadl Isa, Manuela Cassissa, Scott Moffat and Cameron Stewart. Our cooperation with the University is great-ly enhanced by the John Cunningham and John Houl-der awards, offered to students for flight training, the Bishop award for design work and the Student Lecture Competition award. Our thanks go to the Sir Geoffrey de Havilland Flying Foundation and Goodrich for the sup-porting these activities.

This year saw a varied and interesting lecture pro-gramme with generally good attendance and tonight we welcome Brian Kitson from EADS to deliver the fi-nal lecture of the season on the A400M. The Student Lecture Competition (sponsored by Goodrich) was one of the year’s highlights. The standard of entries was ex-