Home > Henri Coanda

Henri Marie Coanda ( June 7, 1886 - November 25, 1972) was a Romanian inventor, aerodynamics pioneer and the parent of the modern jet aircraft.

1 Life

Born in Bucharest, Coanda was the second child of a large family. His father was General Constantin Coanda, a mathematics professor at the National School of Power and Roads. His mother, Aida Danet, was the daughter of French physician Gustave Danet, and was born in Brittany. He was later to recall that even as a child he was fascinated by the miracle of wind.

Coanda studied at the Petrarche Poenaru Communal School in Bucharest, then at the Liceu Sf. Sava ( 1896). After three years ( 1899), his father, who desired a military career for him, had him transfer to the Military Liceu in Iasi. He graduated from that institution in 1903 with the rank of sergeant major, and he continued his studies at the School of Artillery, Military, and Naval Engineering in Bucharest. Sent with an artillery regiment to GermanyThe Federal Republic of Germany ( German: Bundesrepublik Deutschland is one of the world's leading industrialized countries, located in the middle of the European Union. It is bordered to the north by the North Sea, Denmark and the Baltic Sea, to the east ( 19041904 is a leap year starting on Friday (link will take you to calendar). Events January 7 The distress signal " CQD" is established only to be replaced two years later by " SOS. February 7 A fire in Baltimore, Maryland destroys over 1,500 buildings in 30), he enrolled in the Technische HochschuleTechnische Hochschule (acronym TH is, what a university of technology (i. a university focusing on engineering sciences) used to be called in German speaking countries, before most of them changed their name to Technische Universitat (acronym: TU in the 1 in CharlottenburgCharlottenburg is an area in Berlin, formerly a borough now part of Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf. It is known for the Schloss Charlottenburg, the largest palace in Berlin., BerlinBerlin [ bɛrˈliːn ] is the national capital of Germany and its largest city, with 3,387,404 inhabitants (as of September 2004); down from 4. 5 million before World War II. Berlin is located on the rivers Spree and Havel in the northea.

Coanda graduated as an artillery officer, but he was more interested in the technical problems of flight. In 1905Events January-April January 22 Massacre of Russian demonstrators at the Winter Palace in Saint Petersburg, one of the triggers of the abortive Russian Revolution of 1905. January 26 The Cullinan Diamond is found near Pretoria, South Africa at the Premier, he built a missile-airplane for the Romanian Army . He continued his studies ( 1907Events January events January 6 Maria Montessori opens her first school and daycare center for working class children in Rome Casa dei Bambini in San Lorenzo). January 14 An earthquake in Kingston, Jamaica kills more than a 1,000 January 23 Charles Curtis- 1908) at the Montefiore Institute in Liège, Belgium. In 1908 Coanda returned to Romania to serve as an active officer in the Second Artillery Regiment. However, his inventor's spirit did not comport well with military discipline; he solicited and obtained permission to leave the army, after which he took advantage of his renewed freedom to take a long automobile trip to Isfahan, Teheran, and Tibet. Upon his return in 1909, he travelled to Paris, where he enrolled in the newly founded École Nationale Superieure d'Ingenieurs en Construction Aeronautique; one year later ( 1910) he graduated at the head of the first class of aeronautical engineers.

With the support of engineer Gustave Eiffel and the mathematician, politician, and aeronautical pioneer Paul Painlevé, he began experimenting the aerodynamic techniques: one of this experiments was mounting a device on a train running at 90 km/h so he could analyse the aerodynamic behavior. Another experiment used a wind tunnel with smoke and an aerodynamical balance to profile wings to be used in designing aircraft. This led to the discovery of the aerodynamic effect now known as the Coanda Effect.

In 1910, using the workshop of Joachim Caproni , he designed, built and piloted the first ' thermojet' powered aircraft, known as the Coanda-1910), which he demonstrated publicly at the second International Aeronautic Salon in Paris. The powerplant used a 4-cylinder piston engine to power a compressor, which fed to two burners for thust, instead of using a propeller. It would be nearly 30-years until the next thermojet powered aircraft, the Campini Caproni CC.2. (See also Jet engine)

At the airport of Issy-les-Moulineaux near Paris, Coanda lost control of the jet plane, which went off of the runway and caught fire. Fortunately, he escaped with just a good scare and some minor injuries to his face and hands. Around that time, Coanda abandoned his experiments due to a lack of interest and support on the part of the public and of scientific and engineering institutions.

Between 1911 and 1914, he worked as technical director of Bristol Aeroplane Company in the UK, where he designed several airplanes known as Bristol-Coanda airplanes. In 1912 one of these planes won the first prize at the International Military Aviation Contest in UK.

In 1915, he went again to France where, working during World War I for Delaunay-Belleville in Saint-Denis, he designed and built three different models of propeller airplane, including the Coanda-1916 , with two propellers mounted close to the tail; this design was to be reprised in the " Caravelle" transport airplane, for which Coanda was a technical consultant.

In the years between the wars, he continued traveling and inventing; inventions included the first jet-powered sleigh, and the first de luxe aerodynamic railroad train. In 1934 he was granted a French patent related to the Coanda Effect; in 1935, he used the same principle as the basis for a hovercraft called " Aerodina Lenticulara ", which was very similar in shape to the flying saucers later developed by Avro Canada before being bought by USAF and become a classified project.

In 1969, during the first years of the Ceausescu era, he returned to spend his last days in his native Romania, where he served as director of the Institute for Scientific and Technical Creation(INCREST) and in 1971 reorganized, along with professor Elie Carafoli, the Department of Aeronautical Engineering of the Polytechnic University in Bucharest, spinning it off from the Department of Mechanical Engineering.

Coanda died in Bucharest November 25, 1972 at the age of 86.

Bucharest's Henri Coanda International Airport is named after him.