The Spruce Goose – Howard Hughes’ Dream Machine
The monster aircraft designed and constructed by Howard Hughes, affectionately known as the “Spruce Goose”, was intended as a flying boat to transport American troops and supplies over the Atlantic Ocean during WW II, avoiding the danger of the German U-Boats, which had wrecked so much havoc on American supply ships. Henry Kaiser, the wartime industrialist who built the “Liberty” ships, teamed up with Hughes and received an $18 million contract from the federal government to construct three of these “flying boats”.
Kaiser teamed with Hughes because of his larger-than-life reputation as an aviator, aeronautical engineer, movie producer and all around eccentric. The plane Hughes and his engineers designed was likewise larger-than-life, capable of transporting 750 troops with wings that exceeded the length of a football field by 20 feet. The prototype was dubbed HK 1, indicating Hughes-Kaiser’s first design.
It comes as no surprise that engineering such a mammoth aircraft held immense challenges, and called for new concepts in flying control surfaces, large hulls, and power boost systems. The engineers designed an “artificial feel system” so that the pilot would have the feeling he was piloting a much smaller plane, but with a multiplied force, times two hundred. This meant that for each pound of pressure that the pilot exerted on the yoke, the elevator took 1,500 pounds of pressure.
Because the government had insisted that the aircraft not use any materials that were critical to the war effort, such as aluminum and steel, this flying boat was constructed of wood impregnated with plastic, and Hughes used this “Duramold” construction material in virtually every part of the aircraft. This process entailed fusing layers of wood laminate, laid crosswise of the adjacent layer’s grain. Plastic glue applied to each layer was then shaped and heat-cured, resulting in an amazingly strong material, both stronger and lighter than aluminum.
Trouble dogged the project, the seaplane was years behind schedule and ran way over budget and Kaiser withdrew, and Hughes chose to take personal responsibility for the design and building of the aircraft. When the war ended in 1945, criticism mounted and the US Senate investigated the suspected misuse of funds. Hughes chose to invest $7 million of his personal fortune in order to keep going on the mammoth project. Following the senate’s interrogation of Hughes, he set out to demonstrate what his Flying Boat could do, and ordered the seaplane to undergo taxi testing.
In November, 1947, six years after the project’s inception, with observers and reporters breathlessly watching Hughes sat at the controls. He taxied smoothly across the harbor and cruised to 90 mph. To everyone’s surprise, Hughes ordered the flaps lowered and the giant plane lifted off the harbor water and flew just over one mile at 70 feet off the water. The short flight took only about a minute, but did prove to the world that the “Spruce Goose” could fly!
Vintage War Aircraft in Cinema