naca

NACA

Logo

The official seal of NACA, depicting the Wright brothers' first flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina Agency overview Formed March 3, 1915 Dissolved October 1, 1958 Superseding agency NASA Jurisdiction Federal government of the United States

The National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) was a U.S. federal agency founded on March 3, 1915 to undertake, promote, and institutionalize aeronautical research. On October 1, 1958 the agency was dissolved, and its assets and personnel transferred to the newly created National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). NACA was pronounced as individual letters, rather than as an acronym.

The name remains familiar in the automotive world for the NACA duct, a type of air intake, or to those in the aircraft industry, as several series of NACA airfoils and NACA cowling are still being used in new design. Contents [hide] 1 Origins 2 Research at NACA 3 Special Committee on Space Technology 4 Transformation into NASA 5 NASA Advisory Council 6 List of NACA wind tunnels 7 List of NACA Chairmen 8 Footnotes and references 9 Further reading 10 External links //

Origins The inscription on the wall is NACA's mission statement: ...It shall be the duty of the advisory committee for aeronautics to supervise and direct the scientific study of the problems of flight with a view to their practical solution... By an Act of Congress Approved March 3, 1915

NACA began as an emergency measure during World War I to promote industry/academic/government coordination on war-related projects. It was modeled on similar national agencies found in Europe. Such agencies were the French “L’Etablissement Central de l’Aérostation Militaire” in Meudon (now Office National d'Etudes et de Recherches Aerospatiales), the German “Aerodynamical laboratory of the University of Göttingen” and the Russian “Aerodynamic institute of Koutchino”. However, the most influential agency upon which the NACA was based was the British “Advisory committee for aeronautics”.

In December 1912, President William Howard Taft had appointed a National Aerodynamical Laboratory Commission chaired by Robert S. Woodward, president of the Carnegie Institution of Washington. Legislation was introduced in both houses of Congress early in January 1913 to approve the commission, but when it came to a vote, the legislation was defeated.

Charles D. Walcott – secretary of the Smithsonian Institution from 1907 to 1927 – took up the effort, and in January 1915, Senator Benjamin R. Tillman, and House Representative Ernest W. Roberts, introduced identical resolutions recommending the creation of an advisory committee as outlined by Walcott. The purpose of the committee was "to supervise and direct the scientific study of the problems of flight with a view to their practical solution, and to determine the problems which should be experimentally