Traveling light, traveling easy

Airplane manufacturers have always tried to avoid unnecessary weight-and today's materials and design tactics combine for stronger structures with less weight.

Power, strength, and mass-from the earliest days, aircraft design has attempted to maximize the first two while minimizing the third.

In 1902, facing an almost impossibly tight ceiling on their Flyer's weight, Orville and Wilbur Wright, and assistant Charlie Taylor, opted to make the block of their home-built engine out of expensive and exotic cast aluminum.