• Current opened records

  • Aeronautical Research Council

Trade, professional and other related organisations
Location:

  • Teddington, London

History:
  • The Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (ACA) was established in 1909 to undertake, promote and institutionalise aeronautical research. Its creation was the idea of Richard Haldane, Secretary of State for War, with the support of Prime Minister Herbert Asquith who described the Committee as ‘for the superintendence of the investigations at the National Physical Laboratory and for general advice on the scientific problems arising in connection with the work of the Admiralty and War Office in aerial construction and navigation.’ The aim was to bring some cohesion to the investigations being undertaken by a number of government bodies. The physicist Lord Rayleigh was appointed president and Richard Glazebrook, director of the National Physical Laboratory, became chairman. Seven of the 12 original members were Fellows of the Royal Society. The administrative base of the Committee was Bushy House, Teddington, London, home of the National Physical Laboratory. The Advisory Committee for Aeronautics coordinated research during the following years and produced a series of annual technical reports, the first of which summarised the purpose of the committee as ‘the scientific study of the problems of flight, with a view to their practical solution’. It also issued technical papers known as ‘reports and memoranda’ and later ‘current papers’. The Committee initially reported directly to the Prime Minister, but upon the creation of the Royal Air Force reported to the Secretary of State for Air. In 1919 it was renamed the Aeronautical Research Committee (ARC) and from 1920 reports were made to the Air Ministry, although its scope continued to be both military and civil applications. During the 1920s the Committee focused on research into areas found problematic during the war, including flutter, spinning and scale effects.  In 1933 Glazebrook was replaced as chairman by Sir Henry Tizard and one of the Committee's most important decisions was to support the development of a national system of air defence based on radar. In 1945 the Committee's name was changed to the Aeronautical Research Council and thereafter the Council reported directly to the Ministry of Supply and its successors. The Aeronautical Research Council was disbanded in 1979.
Publications:
  • A R Collar, ‘Tizard and the Aeronautical Research Committee’, Journal of Royal Aeronautical Society, 71 (680), 1967, pp.529-38; T Hashimoto, ‘The Wind tunnel and the emergence of aeronautical research in Britain’, in P Galison and A Roland, eds, Atmospheric flight in the twentieth century (2000), pp.223-9; A Nahum, ‘Two-stroke or turbine? The Aeronautical Research Committee and British aero engine development in World War Two’, Technology and Culture, 38 (2), 1997, pp.312-54; J L Nayler, ‘Early days of British aeronautical research’, Journal of Royal Aeronautical Society, 72 (696), 1968, pp.1045-54.
Records 1:
Records 2:

  • Cranfield University Library

    Aeronautical Research Council reports: annual (4) 1910-13, reports and memoranda (1,386) 1918-80, current papers (1,393) 1948-78.

Records 3:

  • Farnborough Air Sciences Trust Museum

    Aeronautical Research Council reports: reports and memoranda (3,850) 1910-80, current papers (1,393) 1950-80, other (6,135) 1928-79; Advisory Group on Aerospace Research and Development reports, monographs, lecture series and conference proceedings, advisory reports (2,466) 1954-98.

Records 4:
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