During the year 1895 but two field-trials were made with the steam aerodromes, and neither of these was successful; but a great step forward had been taken in the construction, guying and arrangement of the sustaining surfaces. The wings had been made stronger with no increase in weight per unit of area. On the contrary, the ratio of weight of sustaining surfaces to area had been actually reduced from 43 to 28 grammes per square foot, so that the surfaces were both lighter and stronger. Two longitudinal ribs had taken the place of the single one before used, a second wing clamp had been added to correspond to the midrib, the difficult problem of torsion had been effectually solved, the system of guying greatly improved, and it appeared that in the next trial the wings might be expected to bear the weight of the aerodrome without serious distortion. 1896 In January, 1896, two new pairs of wings were designed for No. 6, and in order to give a greater efficiency to the rear wings, they were made larger than the front ones, the area of the latter being 22 square feet, and of the former 27 square feet, and whereas the width of each wing had formerly been one-third of its length, it was now increased to two-fifths to correspond to those of No. 5. The progress made in construction and guying is shown by the fact that when on January 28 one pair of the wings of No. 5 was inverted and sanded, the yielding at the tip was less than 5° greater than at the root, whereas at one time it had been 65°. A similar test applied to a pair of wings of No. 6 on March 4 gave even better results, as the yield at the root was but 1° 45′, and at the tip 2° 30′. The successive stages of the development of the wing clamps are shown in Fig. 16. In its final form the front wing clamp, or that which held the main front rib, shown at ‹AB› (1896), had adjustable sliding pieces, by means of which the wings could be set at any desired angle of elevation, the wing as a whole revolving about the rear wing clamp, shown at ‹CD› (1896). The general system of guying the wings, as shown in Plate 17, had been greatly improved. In the present form a bowsprit and guy-posts firmly attached to the midrod furnished points of attachment for the piano wires with which the wings were guyed and held rigidly in place, other wires being stretched across from wing to wing so as to maintain them at a constant diedral angle of about 150°. The clamps by which the guy-posts were attached to the midrod, are shown at ‹EF› (Fig. 16). In the successful flights of No. 5 on May 6, the completed wings already described weighed together 1950 grammes (4.29 pounds), and had a total sustaining area of 6.4 square metres (68.8 square feet), the flying weight of the [p090] aerodrome was 11,775 grammes (26 pounds), and the sustaining surfaces therefore amounted to 2.6 square feet to the pound, which, as the event proved, was amply sufficient.