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Demonstration of Wright Flyer Replica Engine Planned at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University’s Wright Flyer Monument

Aviation Festival Commemorates Wright Brothers’ Mechanic Charles Taylor

Replica Engine Daytona Beach, Fla., Oct. 13, 2008 -- One hundred years after the Wright brothers made history in 1903 with their Wright Flyer, a replica of the aircraft’s engine was painstakingly built by Terry Hesler, owner of Hesler Machine Tool in Dayton, Ohio. Hesler’s accomplishment in creating a true working engine was so significant that it was documented in a History Channel special, The Wright Challenge.

Since completing the replica engine in 2003, Hesler and his wife, Vickie, have been sharing their love of aviation history by demonstrating the replica engine to thousands of people across the nation, showcasing the achievements of Orville and Wilbur Wright and especially those of Charles Taylor, the machinist who worked in the Wright brothers’ bicycle shop and constructed the 187-pound, 12-horsepower internal combustion engine that made the historic flight at Kitty Hawk, N.C., possible.

On Friday, Oct. 17, at 2 p.m., Hesler will demonstrate the engine near the Wright Flyer monument in front of Jack R. Hunt Library at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, Daytona Beach, 600 S. Clyde Morris Blvd. Hesler and other aviation experts will speak, followed by questions and answers. The Embry-Riddle community and the general public are invited to attend.

The engine demonstration is part of the Charles Taylor Commemorative Aviation Festival presented by Embry-Riddle’s Charles Taylor Department of Aviation Maintenance Science (AMS) for AMS students. All events will be held in the AMS hangar and ramp areas.

At 9:30 a.m., Hesler will speak to AMS students about the original 1903 Wright engine and his replica engine, followed by presentations on the helicopter industry by officials from Bristow Academy. Located in Titusville, Fla., and Concord, Calif., Bristow Academy is the only helicopter flight school approved to provide helicopter flight training to the commercial pilot level by both the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration and the European Joint Aviation Authority. The Bristow Academy speakers will arrive in a Schweizer 300 helicopter that will be on display most of the day.

Between 11 a.m. and 1 p.m., the following aviation equipment will be on display: a Wright Flyer simulator and a Wright wind tunnel built by AMS faculty members; a Piper Cherokee airplane used as a trainer by Embry-Riddle in the 1980s and now owned by an AMS faculty member; a powered parachute; and an early hang glider.

Also on display will be a Velie engine from a Monocoupe aircraft purchased by Embry-Riddle in 1929. The engine, which was restored by the Embry-Riddle engine repair station, belongs to the Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome in New York. The display was designed by Kevin Montgomery, Embry-Riddle director of university archives.

Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, the world’s largest, fully accredited university specializing in aviation and aerospace, offers more than 30 degree programs in its colleges of Arts and Sciences, Aviation, Business, and Engineering. The university educates more than 34,000 students annually in undergraduate and graduate programs, with accreditation pending for Embry-Riddle’s first doctoral programs, in Aviation and in Engineering Physics. Embry-Riddle educates students at residential campuses in Prescott, Ariz., and Daytona Beach, Fla., through the Worldwide Campus at more than 130 campus centers in the United States, Europe, Canada, and the Middle East, and through online learning. For more information, visit www.embryriddle.edu.