Download or read book Hawker Aircraft Since 1920 written by Francis K. Mason and published by . This book was released on 1961 with total page 488 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A history of the company's development, with an examination of each distinct Hawker aircraft type ever flown.
Download or read book Hawker s Secret Projects written by Christopher Budgen and published by Air World. This book was released on 2023-12-21 with total page 250 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Hawker Aircraft Ltd at Kingston was arguably the most successful and long-lasting manufacturer of military aircraft in Great Britain and Europe. In its various evolved manifestations – Hawker Aircraft, Hawker Siddeley Aviation, British Aerospace – its output of war winning aircraft, mainly fighters, was unsurpassed. From the Hart and Hurricane through the Hunter, Harrier and Hawk, the company consistently produced aircraft that the UK fighting services wanted. But some designs, for whatever reason, failed to reach flight or were declined by the services. With their sometimes advanced aerodynamics and technology, these aircraft could have had successful service careers but instead were abandoned, their stories failing to reach mainstream consciousness. Having not received their just dues, the present book seeks to redress this omission. The reasons for failure are many and varied, often financial or political, but in each case the reasons behind the failure of the design are examined. In a wide-ranging investigation that documents the origins of Hawker Aircraft Ltd and its famous Project Office, this work, the third in Christopher Budgen’s investigation of the inner workings of Hawker Aircraft, is a fitting tribute to the many who made the company the success it was.
Download or read book Aircraft of the Royal Navy written by David Hobbs and published by Seaforth Publishing. This book was released on 2024-11-30 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a comprehensive study of every aircraft type ordered for the Royal Navy since 1908. It includes fixed and rotary-wing aircraft, rigid and non-rigid airships, unmanned aircraft and pilotless target aircraft together with many designs that were ordered but not built so that the importance placed on them by the Naval Staff or their potential technological impact on carrier design and operations can be explained. Every type – even unsuccessful single prototypes – is described; the majority are illustrated by photographs, many of which come from the author’s own collection, and the fifty most significant aircraft have detailed drawings. The Australian and Canadian Fleet Air Arms operated RN aircraft types for many years after their formation and these are included together with other types they have operated subsequently to give a more complete overview. The book describes over 400 different types of aircraft built by over 100 different manufacturers to offer the most detailed coverage of RN aircraft ever produced. Research for the book took over forty years and reference material included Admiralty Archives and an array of material in the public domain including manufacturers’ data, individual aircraft pilot’s notes and a wealth of published sources. David Hobbs is uniquely well placed to write this book having served in the RN for thirty-three years and retired with the rank of Commander. He flew both fixed and rotary-wing aircraft and his log book contains 2300 flying hours with 807 day and night deck landings. He served in seven British aircraft carriers and spent four years within RN Director General (Aircraft) Department where he was closely involved with Sea Harrier carrier trials and introduced new visual landing aids for night recoveries and liaised with the USN on carrier operating techniques. This is his eleventh book for Seaforth Publishing.
Download or read book The RAF and Aircraft Design 1923 1939 written by Colin Sinnott and published by Psychology Press. This book was released on 2001 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This work describes the vitl role of the Air Ministry in the development of the RAF's fighters and bombers before WWII.
Download or read book Jet Pioneers written by Tim Kershaw and published by The History Press. This book was released on 2004-03-18 with total page 110 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In April 1941 Britain's first jet left the ground at a grass airfield 4 miles from Gloucester Cathedral. It was the start of a revolution in air travel, military and civilian. During the 1940s Britain's first-ever jet aircraft, the world's first jet fighter in squadron service and the first jet to hold the world air-speed record were all designed, built and flown in the Gloucester and Cheltenham area. The story of Frank Whittle's invention and dogged development of the jet engine is well known. But the account of how his invention was put into the air has never been fully told. This book tells the story of how the men and women of north Gloucestershire made Whittle's engine fly.
Download or read book The RAF and Aircraft Design written by Colin S Sinnott and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-05-22 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This work examines the evolution of the RAF's operational requirements for its home defence air force - for bombers to mount a deterrent counter offensive and for fighters to provide direct defence of Britain. It discusses the management processes, policies and decisions relevant to operational requirements on the basis of a detailed study of Air Ministry papers of the time. By tracing the development of operational requirements, the author exposes the thinking behind the RAF's quest for effective fighter and bomber aircraft. He describes the ideas and concepts of air warfare that were adopted in the 1920s, and shows how these evolved into the Air Staff's requirements for the aircraft which the RAF entered and fought in World War II.
Download or read book International Warbirds written by John C. Fredriksen and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2001-08-01 with total page 407 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In depth descriptions and photographs of the aircraft of 21 nations presented with a unique human dimension that goes behind the machines to the people involved. Invaluable for specialists, accessible to enthusiasts, International Warbirds: An Illustrated Guide to World Military Aircraft, 1914–2000 puts the most legendary fighter aircraft of the 20th century developed outside the United States on vivid display. It offers 336 illustrated "biographies" of the most significant warplanes used in squadron service from World War I to the Balkan conflict, including numerous models from Great Britain, France, Russia, and Japan, as well as notable machines from Israel, Canada, China, India, Brazil, and other nations. Entries span the history and scope of military aircraft from bombers and fighters to transports, trainers, reconnaissance craft, sea planes, and helicopters, with each capsule history combining nuts-and-bolts technical data with the story of that model's evolution and use. Together, these portraits offer an exciting, well-researched tribute to visionary designers and builders as well as courageous pilots and crews across the globe, and tell a vivid tale of how air power became such a decisive factor in modern warfare.
Download or read book Aircraft written by David Pascoe and published by Reaktion Books. This book was released on 2004-09-03 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In his celebrated manifesto, "Aircraft" (1935), the architect Le Corbusier presented more than 100 photographs celebrating airplanes either in imperious flight or elegantly at rest. Dwelling on the artfully abstracted shapes of noses, wings, and tails, he declared : "Ponder a moment on the truth of these objects! Clearness of function!" In Aircraft, David Pascoe follows this lead and offers a startling new account of the form of the airplane, an object that, in the course of a hundred years, has developed from a flimsy contraption of wood, wire and canvas into a machine compounded of exotic materials whose wings can touch the edges of space. Tracing the airplane through the twentieth century, he considers the subject from a number of perspectives: as an inspiration for artists, architects and politicians; as a miracle of engineering; as a product of industrialized culture; as a device of military ambition; and, finally, in its clearness of function, as an instance of sublime technology. Profusely illustrated and authoritatively written, Aircraft offers not just a fresh account of aeronautical design, documenting, in particular, the forms of earlier flying machines and the dependence of later projects upon them, but also provides a cultural history of an object whose very shape contains the dreams and nightmares of the modern age.
Download or read book A History of Aviation at Brooklands in 100 Objects written by Nigel Spooner and published by Air World. This book was released on 2024-06-30 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: At the dawn of the twentieth century mankind had not yet achieved powered flight. The main motive power then was provided by steam engines – heavy, dirty and inefficient. If one wanted to travel ‘over seas’ one had to travel on them. A journey from London to New York, by steam-driven train and ship, took more than 6 days. By the time the same century drew to a close in December 1999, air travel was the normal choice for long journeys. Millions of people every day flew comfortably and safely in pressurised aluminium airliners propelled by simple, clean and efficient gas turbine engines. The same journey from London to New York could be achieved at supersonic speed in less than 6 hours. For much of that century, many of the extraordinary developments that moved aviation from fragile wood and fabric biplanes to supersonic transports were achieved on 330 acres of low-lying former estate farmland in Surrey, England. The estate was called Brooklands. Those marshy acres were transformed from 1907 into the world’s first custom-built motor-racing circuit, then a rapidly developing aerodrome, and finally one of the country’s largest aircraft factories, employing tens of thousands of people. Nearly 19,000 aircraft of many different types were built at Brooklands during nine decades of peace and war. By the 1980s however it was being eclipsed by larger manufacturing sites elsewhere, with longer runways and better communications links; its owner, by then called British Aerospace, finally closed the factory in 1989. This book tells the history of those amazing developments through 100 of the key aircraft, engines, places and other objects that can still be seen, either in or near Brooklands Museum or in other locations around the country. It also highlights the stories of six designers whose inspiring creativity produced aircraft, engines and weapons ranging from Camel to Concorde, Fury to Harrier, Wellington to Viscount, Merlin to Olympus. Between them, Thomas Sopwith, Barnes Wallis, Rex Pierson, Sydney Camm, Stanley Hooker and George Edwards were responsible for much of what was designed, built and flown, not only at Brooklands but elsewhere too. The book is arranged in successive historical episodes but the many links between the objects and the designers should allow readers to follow different paths if they so wish. It is not intended as a technical reference but rather to inspire the reader to seek out the objects and discover more about them.
Download or read book In Turbulent Skies written by Peter Reese and published by The History Press. This book was released on 2020-01-24 with total page 390 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1945 confidence in British aviation was sky-high. Yet decades later, the industry had not lived up to its potential. What happened? The years that followed the war saw the Brabazon Committee issue flawed proposals for civil aviation planning. Enforced cancellations restricted the advancement of military aircraft, compounded later on by Defence Minister Duncan Sandys abandoning aircraft to fixate solely on missiles. Commercially, Britain's small and neglected domestic market hindered the development of civilian airliners. In the production of notorious aircraft, the inauspicious Comet came from de Havilland's attempts to gain an edge over its American competitors. The iconic Harrier jump jet and an indigenous crop of helicopters were squandered, while unrealistic performance requirements brought about the cancellation of TSR2. Peter Reese explores how repeated financial crises, a lack of rigour and fatal self-satisfaction led British aviation to miss vital opportunities across this turbulent period in Britain's skies.
Download or read book Political and Military Leadership in the World Wars written by Carl Cavanagh Hodge and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2021-03-16 with total page 189 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book approaches the World Wars and the decades between them as a single unit in modern history. It is impossible to understand either the cause or conduct of the 1939–45 war without an appreciation of the issues not wholly answered in the conflict of 1914–18. Bridging the World Wars was the establishment, revision, and ultimate collapse of the Versailles settlement and the League of Nations system between 1919 and 1939. The 1919 settlement was contested in the 1920s by Fascist Italy and began to unravel irreparably in 1931 with Japan’s incursion into Manchuria. The strategic thought of the interwar years is therefore especially instructive in assessing the prosecution of WWII, as the military ventures of these two revisionist powers pointed toward future developments even before Germany thrust a new way of war upon Eastern and Western Europe. Meanwhile, Britain, France, and the United States began an incremental conversion to new approaches to war in the air and on the sea in particular. The interwar decades are best understood as a period of calibrated rearmament by all the powers based on assumptions about the probability of a future war and the nature of its prosecution.
Download or read book They Spread Their Wings written by Alastair Goodrum and published by The History Press. This book was released on 2013-01-01 with total page 331 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What turns an ordinary man into an extraordinary one? The answer lies in the stories of six teenage volunteers for Second World War aircrew who exchanged school uniform for Air Force Blue and took a giant step into the unknown. Based on original research from flying log books, diaries and family archives, this collection of true tales describes the men's training for those coveted 'Wings'; the nervous excitement of that first sortie over enemy territory; and flying into the hell of an enemy flak barrage and fighters. From the skies over Europe to jungles and deserts, all endured hardship, adventure and danger. They experienced action under enemy fire, wounds, burns and crash-landings, escape and evasion in occupied territory, and the privations of life as a POW. Seventy years on and these brushes with death are by any measure hair-raising encounters that turned adolescents into men – some of whom survived the war, while others paid the ultimate price.
Download or read book The experience of suburban modernity written by Michael John Law and published by Manchester University Press. This book was released on 2014-12-01 with total page 297 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The experience of suburban modernity looks at the history of the London suburbs in the interwar years. It shows that, contrary to those accounts that portray suburbia as static and boring, these suburbs were in fact at the heart of the adoption of private transport and new mobilities. Wealthier middle-class suburbanites enjoyed driving at speed on new arterial roads, visiting roadhouses for a transgressive night out, taking five-shilling flights from the local airport, and joining cycling and motorcycle clubs. All this fun came at a price for some in the form of thousands of deaths in road accidents, plane crashes on suburban housing and in the despoiling of the countryside through road development. This book will be welcomed by academics and students working in suburban studies, historical geography and interwar British history and can also be enjoyed by anyone interested in the history of London.
Download or read book Journal of the Royal Aeronautical Society written by and published by . This book was released on 1962 with total page 962 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Ten Squadrons of Hurricanes written by Adrian Stewart and published by Pen and Sword. This book was released on 2016-08-31 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For many years the importance and contribution of the Hawker Hurricane was eclipsed by the Spitfire but statistically the Hurricane was superior in the majority of cases. Thanks to Tommy Sopwiths initiative and gamble the Hurricane was ready at the outbreak of the Second World War and in service throughout.As this superbly researched book reveals by examining the roles, actions and personalities of ten Hurricane squadrons, this iconic aircraft was not only exceptionally robust but astonishingly versatile. We track its performance from the Battle of France and Britain through the Middle East, Italy and on to Burma. It excelled as day and night interceptor, intruder and importantly as a rocket firing tank buster.The Hurricane inspired great loyalty among its pilots and their colourful personalities and thrilling experiences make this splendid book an informative and entertaining read.
Download or read book Britain s Glorious Aircraft Industry written by J Paul Hodgson and published by Air World. This book was released on 2021-03-03 with total page 588 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “The rich and diverse history of the British aircraft industry is captured in superb detail by the author in this weighty tome.” —Aviation News Great Britain’s aircraft industry started in 1908, with the first formally registered organization in the world to offer to design and build an aeroplane “for commercial gain.” This book tells the complete story of the 110 years since the start, all the companies formed and the aircraft they produced, highlighting the advances in aeronautical ambition and technology. It is the story of the creation, survival and decline of all one hundred and twenty-three of the aircraft design and construction companies formed between 1908 and 2018. The exhilaration of success and the magic of aviation technology are vividly illustrated by the technical and political birth stories of iconic projects, such as the Cirrus/Gypsy Moths, the Tiger Moth, the flying boats of Imperial Airways, Spitfire, Lancaster, Viscount, Vulcan, Harrier, Buccaneer and many more. The rotary wing industry is not forgotten. The birth of the jet turbine engine and the quest for supersonic speed is included. The stories of the disappointments of failure and disaster, such as the Brabazon, Comet, Princess, Rotodyne and TSR-2, and the growth of international collaboration in Concorde, Tornado, Airbus, Eurofighter Typhoon and other projects are included, in the context of the international scene and domestic politics. The conclusion highlights the prominent reminiscences and speculates on the future of the aircraft industry in Britain. “An outstanding reference book and a thoroughly enjoyable canter through the decades, from the days of wood and fabric to the modern composite structure of the wings of the A400 Atlas.” —RAF Historical Society
Download or read book Journal of the Royal Aeronautical Society written by Royal Aeronautical Society and published by . This book was released on 1962 with total page 1164 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
