These experiments soon came to an end. The time was not ripe for further developments. No airships or aeroplanes were as yet in use in England, and all available energy had to be concentrated on producing wireless telegraphy sets for the use of the army. In October 1909 Captain H. P. T. Lefroy, R.E., was placed in charge of all experimental work in wireless telegraphy for the army. This appointment he retained until the outbreak of the war. He had been commissioned in the Royal Engineers in 1899, and had begun to study wireless at Gibraltar in 1905. Approaching the question from the service side, he was able to do much to adapt wireless telegraphy to the new conditions presented by the conquest of the air. As soon as the army airship _Beta_ was available he had her equipped with wireless apparatus, and on the 27th of January 1911 went up in her from Farnborough. Many messages were sent from the airship to the ground station up to a range of thirty miles, and for a short time, while the airship engine stopped running, it was found possible to receive messages from the ground. In the roar of the engine nothing could be heard. In the summer of 1911 Captain Lefroy spent much of his time in designing a transmitting apparatus for aeroplanes. In January 1912 he went up with Mr. Geoffrey de Havilland in the first B.E. machine, to test its suitability for wireless. In May 1912 he set about fitting the same machine, which was then being flown by Major Burke, with a generator driven from the engine crank-shaft by bicycle-chain gear. These experiments prepared the way for later achievement.