Bell Textron

During its rich history, Bell has produced more than 35,000 helicopters. In constructing its reliable machines, the company has benefited from the experience it has gained over the years.

Bell Textron Inc. is an aerospace and defense company that designs and manufactures helicopters for critical solutions in extreme scenarios. They break through barriers to keep people safe in transportation, medical, rescue and military services.

More than 300 million years old and revered in cultures around the world, the dragonfly (with the company's logo) is quick to react and quick to adapt. At Bell, they are also never content to remain still. A staff of people works hard to maintain momentum and evolve - always thinking ahead. Like these aerial creatures, Bell engineers are constantly reaching for ever greater heights.

Company history

Bell Aircraft Corporation was an American aircraft manufacturer, designer of several types of fighter aircraft for World War II, but best known for the Bell X-1, the first supersonic aircraft, and the development and production of civilian and military helicopters. Bell also developed the reaction control system for the Mercury spacecraft, the North American X-15 and the Bell Rocket Belt. The company was purchased in 1960 by Textron and still exists today as Bell Textron.

As a pilot, Larry Bell saw his first airplane at an air show, which began a lifelong fascination with aviation. Bell dropped out of high school in 1912 and joined his brother in the burgeoning aerospace industry at the Glenn L. Martin Company, where he became workshop manager in 1914. By 1920, Bell was vice president and general manager of the Martin Company, which was then headquartered in Cleveland. Feeling that he deserved co-ownership, he issued an ultimatum to Martin in late 1924. Mr. Martin refused and Bell resigned.

Bell spent several years outside the aerospace industry, but in 1928 was hired by Reuben H. Fleet at Consolidated Aircraft in Buffalo, New York, where he was guaranteed a stake in the company. Bell soon became CEO, but he still wanted to run his own company. Although he could raise local capital, he knew he would not be able to compete with either Consolidated or Curtiss-Wright, two major aircraft manufacturers also based in Buffalo. Fortunately, in 1935, Fleet decided to relocate Consolidated Aircraft to San Diego, and Bell remained to start his own company, Bell Aircraft Company, on July 10, 1935, based at Consolidated's former facility at 2050 Elmwood Avenue in the North Delaware area of Buffalo .

Bell was the third major aircraft manufacturer to occupy the site. The factory complex was originally built in 1916 for the Curtiss Airplane & Motor Company, and during World War I it was considered the largest aircraft factory in the world.

Bell's first military contract came in 1937 with the development of the ill-fated YFM-1 Airacuda, an unconventional bomber-destroyer powered by two Allison-powered pusher propellers. The YFM-1 used groundbreaking technology for the time, including a gyro-stabilized weapon sight and a thermionic fire control system. A total of just 13 Airacuda aircraft were produced with the prototype, which served only limited service in the USAAC before being scrapped in 1942.

The following year, Bell had great success with the development of the single-engine P-39 Airacobra, of which 9588 were produced. Using its previous experience with Allison engines, the P-39 placed the engine in the middle of the aircraft, with the propeller driven by a long shaft, on which a 37mm cal. cannon was also mounted, firing through the propeller rotor. Due to continuing development and production problems, the original turbocharger was removed from production models, replaced by a single-stage, single-speed supercharger, which was standard on all other Allison-powered products except the P-38.

The P-39 performed poorly at high altitudes compared to newer late-war designs. Most Allied forces considered the Airacobra effective only in ground attacks, as demonstrated by several units of the U.S. Army Air Forces that flew P-39 aircraft, such as the so-called Cactus Air Force on Guadalcanal in 1942-43. However, the Soviet Air Force used P-39 Lend-Lease aircraft mainly in air-to-air combat, where they found they excelled as front-line fighters against some of the Luftwaffe's top pilots and aircraft. The P-39 planes flown by the Soviets were the main reason they are credited with the highest number of individual kills attributed to any type of US fighter.

A slightly larger and more powerful version of the P-39 was produced shortly before the end of World War II. This combat aircraft, dubbed the P-63 Kingcobra, fixed many of the P-39's shortcomings, although it was produced too late in the war to make any significant contribution. Between 1943 and 1945, 2971 P-63 aircraft were built, many of them delivered to the Soviet Union. By that time, the Army Air Force already had the better P-47 Thunderbolt and P-38 Lightning bomber fighters.

In October 1942, the twin-engine P-59 Airacomet jet built by Bell was the first American jet aircraft to take to the air. Unfortunately, performance was below expectations, roughly comparable to that of contemporary propeller-driven aircraft, a fact generally attributed to the extremely short development times required by the USAAF, as well as the intense secrecy imposed on the project. Design began in September 1941, with Bell's team guided mainly by theory, as General Electric did not complete and begin testing the first engine until March 1942. General Henry "Hap" Arnold also banned the use of wind tunnels to test and optimize the design, but later relented somewhat, allowing the group only to use the low-speed tunnel at Wright Field, Ohio. Bell engineers could only guess at performance characteristics. Originally conceived as a production aircraft, the P-59 nevertheless became an important testing ground for jet technology, providing invaluable data for the development of later jet aircraft.

During World War II, Bell also built heavy bombers under license from other aerospace companies at a plant near Marietta, Georgia, northwest of Atlanta. By mid-1943, the new plant had produced hundreds of Consolidated B-24 Liberator and Boeing B-29 Superfortress bombers. In mid-1944, B-24 production was merged from several different companies (including several in Texas) into two large factories: the Consolidated Vultee in San Diego and the Willow Run Ford Motor Company plant near Detroit, Michigan, which was specifically designed for B-24 production. For the rest of the war, Bell's Marietta plant, headed by Carl Cover and James V. Carmichael, focused on B-29 production, producing 668 units until the contract expired in the fall of 1945. Bell ranked 25th among United States corporations in terms of the value of wartime production contracts.

After World War II
As the post-war defense industry dwindled, Bell consolidated its operations at the Wheatfield plant near Buffalo. The aircraft factory in Marietta later became the property of the Lockheed Corporation, which used it to produce the C-130 Hercules, C-141 Starlifter and C-5 Galaxy transport aircraft. Although Bell designed several other fighter aircraft projects during and after World War II, none of them ever entered mass production.

XP-77 was a small fighter using non-strategic materials; it failed. The XP-83 was an escort fighter with a layout similar to the P-59, production of which was canceled. The Bell XF-109 was a supersonic vertical takeoff fighter whose production was canceled in 1961.

Perhaps Bell Aircraft's most important contribution to the history of fixed-wing aircraft development would be the design and construction of the Bell X-1 experimental rocket plane, the world's first aircraft to cross the sound barrier, and its successor, the Bell X -2. Unlike the usual U.S. aircraft designations, the X-1 models were successive (mostly identical) units of the X-1 program: the X-1, X-1A, X-1B, X-1C, X-1D and X -1E.

In the 1950s, Bell designed and produced several different experimental aircraft. They helped the US Air Force and the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) explore the limits of aircraft design and paved the way for the founding of NASA and space exploration. The X-2 Starbuster reached speeds of Mach 3 (2,100 miles per hour) and an altitude of 50,000 feet in 1955, blazing a technological trail in spacecraft development.

Bell played a key role in the development of rocket propulsion after World War II, under the leadership of such top minds in rocket science as Walter Dornberger (former commander of Nazi Germany's Peenemünde Army Research Center) and Wendell Moore. Bell developed and launched the world's first air-to-ground maneuvering missile with a nuclear warhead, the GAM-63 RASCAL, in 1957. Wendell Moore developed the Bell rocket belt, using peroxide monopropellant rocket motors. Although the rocket belt was not developed commercially, the rocket technology proved invaluable to future Bell programs. Bell's crowning achievement in rocketry was the Agena rocket engine. The Agena was a dual-fuel rocket with 12,000 pounds of force, still considered one of the most reliable rockets ever built. Since the late 1950s, 360 units have been produced and were responsible for launching most of the satellites launched by the United States in the 1960s.

Helicopter development began at Bell Aircraft in 1941, when the Bell Model 30 first flew in 1943. Bell Helicopter became the only part of Bell Aircraft that continued to produce aircraft when Bell was purchased by Textron Corporation. That part of Textron is now known as Bell Helicopter. After a series of successful helicopter designs, the UH-1 Iroquois became the most famous helicopter of the Vietnam War, and Bell Helicopter continues to design and manufacture helicopters.

Lawrence Bell died in 1956 and for several years the company was in financial difficulty.

Textron bought the Bell Aerospace division on July 5, 1960. Bell Aerospace consisted of three Bell Aircraft divisions, including a helicopter division. Bell Aerospace Textron continued to play a significant role in NASA's mission to land humans on the moon in the 1960s. Bell designed and built the reaction control system for Project Mercury's Redstone command module, and a similar system was used on the North American X-15 spaceplane. NASA selected Bell to develop and build the LLRV lunar landing test vehicle, three of which were built in the early 1960s to train Apollo program astronauts to land on the moon. Bell also designed the rocket engine used in the Apollo LEM Ascent propulsion system, which was responsible for getting NASA astronauts off the moon.

source; WIKIPEDIA

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell_Aircraft

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