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Aviation History
1945
1945 - 1921.PDF
FLIGHT SEPTEMBER 27TH, D.H." (CONTINUED FOR RECORDS : Above 1Sir Alan Cobham landing his D.H.50J. on the Thames afterhis flight to Australia and back in 1926. by the fact that at about that time a wealthy young sports-man by the name Alan S. Butler, approached the firm to build for him a two-seater (D.H.37) for his personal use.Mr. Butler put ^7,500 into the company, became a director and, in 1922, chairman of the firm, a position which hestill holds. Next to achieve fame was the D.H.50, a lour-passengerbiplane with Siddeley Puma engine (a development of the original B.H.P. engine). The pilot sat aft of the mainplanes. This machine was entered for a competition held in connection with the Gothenburg aero show and wonfirst place with 999 points out of a possible 1,000. It was piloted by Mr. (now Sir Alan) Cobham, who later mademany famous flights in other versions of the " 50," includ- ing London to North Africa in a day and a flight toAustralia and back. In Australia Col. Brinsmead flew 8,000 miles around Australia in 25 days. Private Owner Types For the light aircraft trials at Lympne in 1923 de Havil- lands designed the 53, a tiny single-seater with a Black- burne motor cycle engine. The firm did not consider that the small single and two-seaters with tiny engines were the right answer to what the private owner wanted, and decided to produce their own idea of what was really wanted. Major Frank Halford had, in the meantime, designed the Cirrus engine for the Aircraft Disposal Company, and the prototype Moth was fitted with this. It was a four-cylinder, in-line air-cooled and developed 65 h.p. I shall always remember my first flight in the original Moth. There was a demonstration at Stag Lane but, as was not infrequently the case, the field was waterlogged and Capt. Hubert Broad, who was then de Havilland^s chief test pilot, took the machine ofl solo and flew it across the few yards to Hendon, where 1 climbed on board and was taken for a flight. The little machine gave a feeling of intimacy which I had never experienced in larger types, and the gentle purring of the Cirrus was very different from the almost unbearable noise of the more powerful engines to which one had become accustomed. The Moth progressed through various stages of development and was fitted with many dif- ferent engines. Thereby hangs a tale. The de Havilland company decided to build their own engines, presumably because the Aircraft Disposal Company would not reduce the price of their Cirrus engines to what was considered a reasonable figure. Be that as it may, de Havillands commissioned Major Halford to design an engine for them, and the Gipsy I was the result. This was an upright engine of the four-cylinder in-line air-cooled type and provided the power for nearly all the early Moths operated by flying clubs. In fact, it may be said that the Moth made the many flying clubs possible. (Above) " The Comet.; Oneof these won the race from England to Australia in 1934(Left) The 130 h.p. Tiger Moth which exceeded 186 m.p.h. From the light aircraft market de Havillands turned tothe commercial with the design of the D.H.66, which was by far the largest machine they had undertaken up till then(15,600 1b. loaded). A "large" order was received from Imperial Airways (five machines!) for the Cairo-Basraroute. At the other end of the scale, de Havillands built thetiny little Tigei Moth monoplane. It was 71 in the D.H. series and had a wing span of only 22ft. 6in. So smallwas it that it used to be said that Hubert Broad was the only pilot who could get into the cockpit. That was anexaggeration, and I believe the machine was flown by Hereward de Havilland, but it certainly was small. Onit Capt. Broad established a world's speed record over 100 km. with an average of 300.1 km. (1.186.47 miles)per hour. By this time the de Havilland business was growing byleaps and bounds In addition to the home market the firm was doing an excellent export trade, and it was de-cided to form branches. The Australian branch was founded in 1926, and a year or so afterwards the Canadiancompany was formed. At home the expansion of business was such that Stag Lane was rapidly becoming quite inade-quate. The airfield at Hatfield being used for testing, and in the financial year 1929-30 de Havillands acquired thesite. The firm had been made a public company and gradu- ally all flying and some of the works were transferred there. Reverting to the design' side, in 1929 was produced whatwas to become the forerunner of a series of monoplanes in- tended for the private owner. The first machine was knownas the Moth III from the fact that it had the first invent-a Gipsy engine. This was very like the Gipsy II, but insteadof the cylinders being above the crank case they were below it, an arrangement that has since become standard. One con-siderable advantage was that the pilot got a better view for- ward over the crank case.While catering for the private-owner market, de Havillands 'did not lose sight of the importance of flying training, ibeiTiger Moth (not to be confused with the little D.H.71) \V;is^ produced as a Moth replacement. Although maintaining many CIVIL AND MILITARY: The 12/18-seater Flamingo with two 900 h.p.Perseus XVI engines. It was also used as a military transport and named the Hertfordshire.
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