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AMERICAN INSTITUTE OF AERONAUTICSAND ASTRONAUTICS

Historic Aerospace Site

Bendix Aviation Corporation, Eclipse-Pioneer DivisionTeterboro, New Jersey

American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics

Bendix Aviation Corporation, Eclipse-Pioneer DivisionTeterboro, New Jersey

A snowy March day in Teterboro.

AMERICAN INSTITUTE OF AERONAUTICS & ASTRONAUTICS

HISTORIC AEROSPACE SITE

Bendix Aviation Corporation, Eclipse-Pioneer DivisionTeterboro, New Jersey

The Bendix Aviation Corporation actuallystarted with a starter – a car starter, to beexact. Up until 1914, one of the biggestproblems car owners faced was getting themstarted. Cars used a hand crank, which was

difficult, and often dangerous, to use. Vincent Bendix hada better idea, and he invented an electric starter he called“a transmission device for the starting of explosivemotors.” To help with the manufacture of his starters, hejoined forces with John Ferguson of the Eclipse MachineCompany to produce the starters. The first cars to usethem were the 1914 Chevrolet Baby Grand touring car andthe Willys Overland vehicle; 5,500 starters were producedthat year. By 1919, production had risen to over 1.5million, and almost every car in the U.S. had a Bendixstarter.

Not content with his success, Bendix procured the licenseto build an internal expanding shoe brake invented by aFrench Engineer, Henri Perrot, and the BendixEngineering Works was formed in 1923. The next year,the company offered public stock and the BendixCorporation was born. The first plant, in South Bend,Indiana, grew from 20,000 to more than a million squarefeet by 1928. By this point, the explosive growth of theauto industry firmly entrenched the company in thedefinitive segment of America’s economy. Soon after,Bendix actually acquired the Eclipse Machine Companythat had given him a start.

Bendix still did not stop there. A rising interestin aviation meant a demand for starters, generators, andother electronic devices for aircraft that doubled theEclipse Company’s production. Determined to strengthenhis position in the aviation industry, Bendix formed theBendix Aviation Corporation, combining the old BendixCorp. and Eclipse Machine, as well as the Electric AutoliteCompany, the Stromberg Carburetor Company, and theScintilla Magneto Company. Shortly thereafter, BendixAviation acquired the Pioneer Instruments Corporation,which had recently introduced the earth inductor compass– credited by Charles Lindbergh as critical to his success ofhis famous solo flight over the Atlantic.

The 1930s proved a difficult time for Bendix, as it did forso many companies; the stock price plummeted from ahigh of $400 per share to as little as $5 per shore. VincentBendix chose to continue to expand and move forward,with much research and development that helped thecompany in future years. Bendix also became well knownas the sponsor of the Bendix Transcontinental Air Race,

which encouraged the participation ofdaring and glamorous pilots and thedesign and development of better,faster aircraft.

In an effort to consolidate andstreamline its operations, and havingoutgrown production facilities in EastOrange, New Jersey, and Brooklyn, thecompany decided to build a new plantin a reclaimed New Jersey marsh justwest of New York City.

Teterboro, New Jersey had a strongaviation heritage from the 1920s;Anthony Fokker had operated thecountry’s largest aircraft plant there.The popular Gates Flying Circus wasbased there, as well as many of theworld’s most famous pilots, includingEddie Rickenbacker, ClarenceChamberlin, Amelia Earhart, andCommander Richard Byrd.

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Original logosfrom BendixAviation andEclipse-Pioneer.

THE BENDIX AVIATION TROPHY

In 1931, a pilot named Cliff Henderson had an idea for a transconti-nental race to attract the best and most daring pilots of the time. Heconvinced Vincent Bendix to sponsor the proceedings and lend hisname. Bendix gave a $15,000 purse for the race and commissioneda large, art deco bronze trophy that became the ultimate dream forpilots for decades to come.

The first Bendix race began at Burbank Airport and ended at the Cleveland Municipal airport, inconjunction with the National Air Races, also organized by Cliff Henderson. Eight pilots competedin the race, and Jimmy Doolittle ultimately won, with an average speed of 223 miles per hour.

In 1933 the race became coast-to-coast, and was won by Roscoe Turner, who set a New York toL.A. speed record of 11 hours, 30 minutes. In 1935, Amelia Earhart was the first woman to fly inthe race, finishing fifth; Louise Thaden was the first woman to win, in 1936.

By 1946 a “jet” division was added to the race, and by 1951 the race was jets only. The lastBendix race was in 1962, won by USAF Captain Robert Sowers and his crew, Robert MacDonaldand John Walton.

AlliedSignal revived the trophy in 1998 as the AlliedSignal Bendix Trophy for Aviation Safety.

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By the late 1930s, however, Teterboro had fallen on hard times. Sohard, in fact, that when Bendix purchased 100 acres of land to build afactory, 25 of Teterboro’s 26 citizens voted to change the town’s name toBendix. It lasted only five years, due to confusion by the post officebetween the town and the plant.

And then came the most powerful industrial growth engine the UnitedStates had ever seen – World War II.

By 1939, large military orders were coming in from France and GreatBritain, and the U.S. was beginning its own massive military buildup.The emphasis on research and development that had taken thecompany through the Depression, along with a brand-new plant inTeterboro, now put it in a perfect position to support this buildup.Production at Teterboro swelled from a monthly sales volume of$625,000 in 1939 to a peak of $30,650,000 in 1945. At the end of 1943,Eclipse-Pioneer and its subcontractors had reached a monthly output of375,000 products consisting of 70 basic types of aircraft instrumentationand engine components.

In recognition of the company’s efforts, Bendix received 20 Army-Navy“E” awards during the war.

After the war, Teterboro suffered heavily from the cancellation ofcontracts, subcontractors, and government facilities. Managementdecided to no longer rely on military sales, and they began to developcommercial products in the late 1940s. This work included automaticpilots, flight path controls, oxygen regulators, and turbine starters forthe commercial air transport market.

The most important project was the PB-10 electronic autopilot, adaptedfrom military models including the P-1 for the U.S. Navy and the F-1for the Air Force. In 1947, the PB-10 was installed on a Chicago &Southern Airlines DC-4, the first electronic autopilot to be used inscheduled commercial operations.

VINCENT HUGO BENDIX

Bendix was born in 1882 to Swedishimmigrants in Moline, Illinois. He

was always mechanically inclined,and left home at 16 to seek hisfortune in New York. He workeda series of day jobs and studiedmechanical engineering atnight. In 1901, he designed andbuilt a unique spring frame

motorcycle that landed him a jobwith Glenn Curtiss, builder of

Triumph motorcycles.

Returning to Chicago in 1904, Bendix became asalesman in the “auto buggy” business. In 1907, heformed his own motor buggy company and sold severalthousand before folding in 1909. With his experience,he knew that automobiles would never become popularwithout an easier way to start, and so he invented theBendix Starter Drive. His company and success took offfrom there.

He was constantly on the lookout for new ideas. By1931, over 5500 U.S. patents had been granted to hisvarious enterprises. He was a man of intense energy andflamboyant appetites, and he was twice married anddivorced. He often spent time on his production floorsand was known to hand out $20 gold pieces at randomto employees he met on those visits. His parties forvisiting dignitaries and celebrities were legendary.

In 1929 he purchased the Potter Palmer mansion for $3million, spanning nearly a block on Chicago’s LakeShore Drive. He also that year purchased the estate ofClem Studebaker in South Bend, and an ocean frontestate in Palm Beach, Florida.

Unfortunately, he could not sustain his opulent lifestyle,and he filed for personal bankruptcy in 1939. Histroubles continued in business, where General Motors,who was the controlling investor of the Bendix AviationCorporation, installed two GM executives on the BendixBoard of directors to end Vincent’s personal influenceon day-to-day operations. He was named chairman ofthe Board in 1942, but resigned later that year amidallegations, never proven, of ties with Nazi Germany.

He quickly formed a new company, Bendix Helicopters,and planned to go into production after the war.Unfortunately, he did not live to see this happen. Hedied in 1945 at the age of 62. He was rumored to havemade more than a million dollars in his final venture.

For his work in the aviation field, Victor Bendix wasinducted into the Aviation Hall of Fame in 1991.

A certificate of appreciation fromthe Byrd Antarctic Expedition tothe Pioneer Instrument Companyfor helping to equip theexpedition.

When Bendix purchased 100 acres ofland to build a factory, 25 of Teterboro’s26 citizens voted to change the town’sname to Bendix.

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America’s first post-war airliner flew in 1947 – a DouglasDC-6. Featuring a full complement of Eclipse-Pioneerequipment, the United Airlines “Mainliner 300” set a newairline speed record, traveling form Los Angeles to NewYork in six hours, 47 minutes. United officials credited thePB-10 for the smoothness of the flight. By 1950, 24 airlinesused the PB-10 autopilot.

With the start of the Korean War in 1950, Bendix was oncall again for military production. E-P developed positionsensors and various types of gyroscopes. Other productsthroughout the decade included Air Data Computers,Vertical Scale Displays, Dead Reckoning Computers, andthe next-generation PB-20 Flight Control System.

Air Data Computers sense environmental elements outsidean aircraft in flight and provide precise calculations of airspeed, air temperature, etc. for use by flight control,navigation, and fire control systems. Vertical ScaleIndicators provided pilots more vital aircraft and engineperformance information in less space on “thermometer-style” dials that were easier to read than conventionalround indicators. Dead Reckoning Computers arenavigational aids that deduce current location by reckoningthe direction, time, and distance flown for the startingpoint. Sales to military customers approached half a billiondollars during the 1950s.

E-P also developed integrated systems for the supersonicB-58 Hustler aircraft, which led to managing highlycomplex projects in the future. Autopilot systems werereplaced by adaptive control systems, which were thenreplaced by precision approach systems and all-weatherlanding capabilities. Bendix received certification for theworld’s first automatic landing system in 1965.

During the 1960s, a separate organization was establishedto handle the new potential in the general aviation market.Bendix purchased the aviation electronics assets ofMotorola in 1963 and assumed responsibility for the

company’s L-2 (developed by Lear) and M-4 autopilotlines. This division eventually transferred to FortLauderdale.

Today, the emphasis is on digital systems. These includehighly advanced digital flight controls, mission computers,remote map readers and digital “moving map” systems,color displays, flat-panel displays and fully integratedcockpits and avionics systems. From guiding airplanes, theEclipse-Pioneer Division (known as E-P) made a naturalsegue into guided missiles. Their first major missileproject was for the LOKI program. Then in 1958, E-P wasselected by the U.S. Army to provide the internal guidancesystem for the Pershing Ballistics Missile Program. Therewere many other guided missile projects: Minuteman,Poseidon, Hawk, NIKE-Hercules, and others. The Army’sMultiple Launch Rocket System has been a mainstay ofthe Teterboro site since the late 1970s.

At the end of 1943, Eclipse-Pioneerand its subcontractors had reacheda monthly output of 375,000products consisting of 70 basic typesof aircraft instrumentation andengine components.

THE ARMY-NAVY“E” AWARD

In 1906 the Navy instituted an internalaward for excellence known as the Navy“E.” First given for excellence in gunnery,the E award was expanded to includeoutstanding performance in engineering

and communications. During World War II, the Navy “E” wasextended to plants and industrial organizations that showedexcellence in producing weapons, ships, and equipment for the Navy,and the Army joined the Navy in giving the award. Bendix Aviationreceived 20 “E” awards during the war, believed to be the mostreceived by any wartime supplier.

At left: Charles Lindbergh(center) visits Teterboro.

SOME OTHER BENDIXPRODUCTS

The 1934 Bendix Automobile

While Bendix is, of course, best known for theircontributions to aviation, they also supplied automotiveproducts and Vincent Bendix decided to showcase thoseproducts in the Bendix SWC, a four-door sedan built in1934 as a traveling showcase. The SWC stood for SteelWheel Corporation, the name used to disguise theproject. It had a number of unusual aspects for thetime, including four-wheel hydraulic brakes, front-wheeldrive, and independent suspension. Due to faultysuspension and unreliability as a demonstration car, itwas soon retired. Today the car is on display at theStudebaker Museum in South Bend, Indiana.

Bendix Appliances

In 1936 the Bendix Corporation allowed two inventorsto use the factory to refine a unique automatic washingmachine they had invented. The company lent its name,and received 25 percent of the stock in Bendix HomeAppliances, Inc. This innovative, high-quality washerquickly became a commercial success, but thecompany was more interested in aviation and disposedof its stock in 1940.

Most of the text in this brochure was taken from PioneeringSafer Skies – The Bendix Aviation Legacy.

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An award from the Navy for a Bendix flight control system.

(Left) In the summer of 1942, all magazine publishers wereasked to feature the American flag somewhere on the cover ofevery magazine published. This is that patriotic cover onFlight Control, The Bendix in-house magazine.

(Right) The handbook for using the PB-10 automatic pilot.

Teterboro also supplies the RangeSafety Distributor “black boxes” onthe Space Shuttle Program. Three ofthese boxes are used in each shuttleflight – one on each of the two SolidRocket Boosters and one on theExternal Fuel Tank.

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From missiles to rockets is a small step. In the early 1960s, E-Pwas chosen to provide the ST-124 stabilized platforms that wouldguide Saturn Rockets in space, and in 1966 the division wasrenamed the Navigation & Control Division. This division alsoprovided a throttle actuator for the Lunar Excursion Module /Descent Engine and a range rate indicator for the Lunar Module.

Since then, the division has ben involved in dozens of projects,providing guidance, control, and other systems for Skylab, earlyscientific satellites, and others. Teterboro provided a set of fourControl Moment Gyros that stabilize and control the InternationalSpace Station. Teterboro also supplies the Range SafetyDistributor (RSD) “black boxes” on the Space Shuttle Program.Three of these boxes are used in each shuttle flight – one on eachof the two Solid Rocket Boosters (SRBs)and one on the ExternalFuel Tank. If any problems arise, the Range Safety Officer canorder the destruction of the SRBs and the External Fuel Tank afterreleasing the Orbiter. The RSDs provide the power to detonateexplosive charges on command. Another device on board, theIntegrated Electronic Assembly, provides vital interface with theOrbiter and commands separation and recovery of the SRBs.

In 1982, Bendix Aviation joined with AlliedSignal to become AlliedBendix Aerospace; and was renamed AlliedSignal in 1985. At theend of the 1990s, Teterboro became known as Defense & SpaceSystems, and AlliedSignal merged with Honeywell and took on theHoneywell name. But the Bendix heritage will long live on in thisreclaimed New Jersey meadow.

FOR MORE INFORMATION ON BENDIX AVIATION

Clements, Manafee. The King of Stop and Go.

Dwiggins, Don. They Flew the Bendix Race. J.P. Lippincott Co.,1965.

Flight Control – the Teterboro Facility’s in-house magazine,published from August 1942-June 1966.

Pioneering Safer Skies – The Bendix Aviation Legacy. HoneywellCommercial Electronic Systems, 2000.

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Julie A. Albertson

Christine M. Anderson

John C. Blanton

Lawrence O. Brase

Philip W. Cheney

Klaus D. Dannenberg

David S. Dolling

Catherine M. Downen

Wilson N. Felder

Michael D. Griffin

Philip D. Hattis

Wayne M. Hurwitz

John E. LaGraff

Christian Mari

Laura J. McGill

Ajax B. Melo

Joseph S. Morano

Alan R. Mullaly

George C. Nield

Edward J. Peak

Charles R. Saff

Merri J. Sanchez

Gerry E. Schneider

A. Tom Smith

Eric H. Thoemmes

David A. Throckmorton

Susumu Toda

James D.A. Van Hoften

Robert C. Winn

Susan X. Ying

James V. Zimmerman

THE AIAA HISTORIC AEROSPACE SITES PROGRAM

For over 65 years, the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) has served as the principal society ofthe aerospace engineer and scientist. Formed in 1963 through a merger of the American Rocket Society (ARS) and theInstitute of Aerospace Sciences (IAS), the purpose was, and still is, “to advance the arts, sciences, and technology ofaeronautics and astronautics, and to promote the professionalism of those engaged in these pursuits.” Today, AIAA hasmore than 30,000 professional and 4500 student members.

In addition, AIAA sponsors many technical conferences, seminars, and short courses per year, and publishes AerospaceAmerica, the AIAA Student Journal, and seven archival technical journals (including one online journal). The Institutealso publishes conference papers and proceedings, technology assessments, position papers, audiovisual informationpackages, many books, and a variety of career-related educational materials. The Institute conducts a rigorous publicpolicy program and works closely with other societies and governments in broad areas of mutual concern.

AIAA established the Historic Aerospace Sites Program in January 2000 to promote the preservation of, and todisseminate information about, significant accomplishments made in the aerospace profession. In addition to Bendix,other sites recognized by the committee include the Boeing Red Barn, Seattle, Washington; Kitty Hawk, NorthCarolina; the site of the first balloon launch, in Annonay, France; and Tranquility Base, on the moon.

AIAA BOARD OF DIRECTORS 2004–2005Donald W. Richardson, President

AIAA HISTORIC SITES COMMITTEE 2004Anthony M. Springer, Chair

Ranney G. Adams

John D. Anderson

Charles M. Ehresman

Mark S. Maurice

J. Michael Murphy

Christopher B. Root

John M. Swihart

“The Rocket Site” Edwards AFB, California

The First Aerojet Manufacturing Plant, Pasadena,California

Dutch Flats Airport, San Diego, California

Air Force Flight Test Center, Edwards AFB,California

Goddard First Liquid Rocket Launch Site, Auburn,Massachusetts

Tranquility Base, The Moon

Allegheny Ballistics Laboratory, Rocket Center, West Virginia

Rocketdyne Santa Susanna Facility, Canoga Park,California

NASA Langley Research Center, Hampton, Virginia

First Balloon Launch Site, Annonay, France

Oakland Municipal Airport, Oakland, California

Arnold Engineering Development Center, Tullahoma,Tennessee

NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville,Alabama

Naval Air Station North Island, San Diego, California

The Boeing Red Barn, Seattle, Washington

Huffman Prairie, Dayton, Ohio

College Park Airport, College Park, Maryland

Kitty Hawk, North Carolina

Thiokol Chemical Corporation, Elkton Division

Bendix Aviation Corporation, Teterboro, New Jersey

Farnborough, England

Purdue University Airport, W. Lafayette, Indiana

Louisiana Purchase Exposition AeronauticalConcourse, St. Louis, Missouri

Site of the First Canadian Motorized Flight, Baddeck, Nova Scotia

White Sands Missile Range, White Sands, NewMexico

Reaction Motors Inc., New Jersey

AIAA HISTORIC SITES CHOSEN 2000-2004

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