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Aviation History
1937
1937 - 3592.PDF
640 FLIGHT. DECEMBER 30, 1937. (Left) Equipping a large proportion of our latest fighters and bombers, the Merlin II, in large-scale production dur ing 1937, is the most recent Rolls - Royce liquid - cooled unit. (Below) Two Napier Dagger E.108 24-cylinder " H - shaped " engines were specified during 1937 to power a new medium bomber to be built by Short and Harland. features demanded for carrier operation, such as folding wings. Flaps are fitted hot only to improve the landing charac teristics but to aid in keeping the speed down in a dive. Technically, one of.the most interesting departures is the un orthodox tail in which the fin and rudder are forward of the tailplane. Like the Shark T.S.R., the Skua has a watertight fuselage. As the new types park at the R.A.F. Display bore witness, the year has been a bumper one for trainers. Miles, de signing round the Rolls-Royce Kestrel XVI engine, conceived the 295 m.p.h. Kestrel Trainer, which, quite apart from being an admirable vehicle for the instruction of pilots for service in fighters and high-per formance bombers, can be adapted for use as a general- purpose machine or multi-gun single-seater fighter. De Havillands produced the Don with Gipsyking (Gipsy Twelve) engine, and received, a substantial contract from the Air Ministry for machines of this type. With its lower power the Don is not so fast as the Miles machine, but has the virtue of side-by-side seating. A gun turret and bomb racks are specified, and such refinements as a con stant-speed airscrew, retractable undercarriage and the new D.H. cooling system are included. For twin-engine, training the Service will be issued with Airspeed Oxfords, the prototype of which appeared during 1937. Essentially a development of the Envoy, the Oxford has dual controls, provision for a gun turret and bomb racks, and mounts two of the new Siddeley Cheetah X radials driving D.H. v.p. airscrews. For ab initio work the Miles Magister was developed from the Hawk Trainer and adopted as a standard Service type. In response to a demand for wireless-controlled target aircraft of higher performance. Airspeeds produced the Queen Wasp floatplane with Siddeley Cheetah engine. Highly tapered wings and generally clean design should make the Queen Wasp a worthy target for any " Archie." 1 J The Bristol Pegasus XVIII (left) is an advanced poppet-valve radial with two-speed supercharger. On the right is the two-row sleeve-valve Hercules, the most powerful type-tested radial in this country.
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