Earlier Airships

[wkwillis]

Aircraft are about strength to weight and power to weight ratios. Hydrogen is actually superior to helium in lifting ratio. Doped silk has a decently high strength to weight ratio if you use it as a blimp instead of just as a skin for dirigibles. For power to weight ratio, maybe pulsejets? Not energy efficient at low airspeeds, but the power to weight ratio is adequate.
We had doped silk in 1860. We could have built pulsejets. We had volatile fuels like naptha and ethanol to run them.

If we kept them below 15,000 feet we could operate pretty well. Around the world in two weeks, great visibility, simple technology, not that expensive, prestigious as hell, covers land and sea, immune to sea ice and jungles, etc.

 

[NapoleonXIV]

Aircraft are about strength to weight and power to weight ratios. Hydrogen is actually superior to helium in lifting ratio. Doped silk has a decently high strength to weight ratio if you use it as a blimp instead of just as a skin for dirigibles. For power to weight ratio, maybe pulsejets? Not energy efficient at low airspeeds, but the power to weight ratio is adequate.
We had doped silk in 1860. We could have built pulsejets. We had volatile fuels like naptha and ethanol to run them.

If we kept them below 15,000 feet we could operate pretty well. Around the world in two weeks, great visibility, simple technology, not that expensive, prestigious as hell, covers land and sea, immune to sea ice and jungles, etc.

Could pulsejets really be built in 1860? And would you like a big flaming exhaust slung below a hydrogen blimp?

Why not use alumininum reciprocating engines, like the Wright Brothers designed? Not actually that much safer but at least it doesn't look so dangerous.

I remember seeing this idea some years ago. Neat image of Indians futilely chasing one across the Plains.

 

[Mike Stearns]

Could pulsejets really be built in 1860? And would you like a big flaming exhaust slung below a hydrogen blimp?

Why not use alumininum reciprocating engines, like the Wright Brothers designed? Not actually that much safer but at least it doesn't look so dangerous.

I remember seeing this idea some years ago. Neat image of Indians futilely chasing one across the Plains.

Yeah, I don't see pulse jets in 1860 either. Have you considered that earlier airships would have changed and probably accelerated the settlement of the West? Why spend 6 months sailing around the tip of South American to reach the gold fields of California, Alaska and the Yukon when you can fly there in 3 or 4 days.

 

[wkwillis]

Flow cells can have high power densities. One of the first airships was battery powered.
Giant flaming pulsejets below the hydrogen lifting cells is not so bad because Hydrogen leaks up. It's fires in the lift structure and the gondola you have to worry about.
Tourism would do well, faster mail service, exploration and trade, etc. If we had enough contact with central interior Africa, AIDs might have gotten loose much faster than in OTL.