The Bristol Aeroplane Company, originally the British and Colonial Aeroplane Company, was both one of the first and one of the most important British aviation companies, designing and manufacturing both airframes and aircraft engines. Notable aircraft produced by the company include the 'Boxkite', the Bristol Fighter, the Bulldog, the Blenheim, the Beaufighter, and the Britannia, and much of the preliminary work which led to Concorde was carried out by the company. In 1956 its major operations were split into Bristol Aircraft and Bristol Aero Engines.
In 1959, Bristol Aircraft merged with several other major British aircraft companies to form the British Aircraft Corporation (BAC), which subsequently went on to become a founding component of the nationalised British Aerospace, now BAE Systems. Meanwhile Bristol Aero Engines merged with Armstrong Siddeley to form Bristol Siddeley, which was subsequently purchased by Rolls-Royce in 1966, who continued to develop and market Bristol-designed engines.
The Bristol works were at Filton Airport, about 4 mi north of Bristol city centre. BAE Systems, Airbus, Rolls-Royce, MBDA and GKN still have a presence at the Filton site where the Bristol Aeroplane Company was located.
History
Foundation
The British and Colonial Aeroplane Company, Ltd was founded in February 1910 by Sir George White, chairman of the Bristol Tramways and Carriage Company, along with his son Stanley and his brother Samuel, to commercially exploit the fast-growing aviation sector. Sir George met with the American aviation pioneer Wilbur Wright in France in 1909 by chance, during which he became aware of aviation's business potential.[1]
Unlike many aviation companies of the era, which were started by enthusiasts with little financial backing, British and Colonial was well funded from its outset.[1] Sir George chose to establish a separate company from the Bristol Tramway Company, as the venture might be seen as too risky by many shareholders, and the new company's working capital of £25,000 was subscribed entirely by Sir George, his brother, and his son. The affairs of the two companies were closely connected, and the company's first premises were a pair of former tram sheds used for aircraft manufacture at Filton leased from the Bristol Tramway Company.[2]
Archives
A small number of records from the early history of this company are held within the papers of Sir George White at Bristol Archives (Ref. 35810/GW/T) (online catalogue). Other records at Bristol Record Office include the papers of Lionel Harris, an engineer at the Bristol Aeroplane Company in the 1940s (Ref. 42794) (online catalogue)
Bristol Engine Company
The Bristol Engine Company was originally a separate entity, Cosmos Engineering, formed from the pre-First World War automobile company Brazil-Straker. In 1917, Cosmos was asked to investigate air-cooled radial engines and, under Roy Fedden, produced what became the Cosmos Mercury, a 14-cylinder two-row (helical) radial, which they launched in 1918. This engine saw little use but the simpler nine-cylinder version known as the Bristol Jupiter was clearly a winning design.
With the post-war rapid contraction of military orders, Cosmos Engineering went bankrupt and the Air Ministry let it be known that it would be a good idea if the Bristol Aeroplane Company purchased it. The Jupiter competed with the Armstrong Siddeley Jaguar through the 1920s but Bristol put more effort into their design and, by 1929, the Jupiter was clearly superior. In the 1930s, and led by Roy Fedden, the company developed the new Bristol Perseus line of radials based on the sleeve valve principle, which developed into some of the most powerful piston engines in the world and continued to be sold into the 1960s.
In 1956, the division was renamed Bristol Aero Engines and then merged with Armstrong Siddeley in 1958 to form Bristol Siddeley as a counterpart of the airframe-producing company mergers that formed BAC. Bristol retained a 50% share of the new company, with Hawker Siddeley
Helicopter Division
The Bristol Aeroplane Company's Helicopter Division had its roots in 1944, when the helicopter designer Raoul Hafner, released from the Airborne Forces Experimental Establishment (AFEE), came to Bristol along with some members of his team.[18] Under Hafner's direction, the division produced two successful designs that were sold in quantity. The first, designated the Type 171, had a shaky start after the wooden rotor blades of the second prototype failed on its first flight in 1949.[18] Nevertheless, the Type 171, called Sycamore in military service, was sold to air forces around the world and 178 were built in total.[19]
After the Type 171, the Bristol Helicopter Division started work on a tandem rotor civil helicopter. The result was the 13-seat Type 173, which made its first flight in Filton in 1952. Five examples were built for evaluation purposes.[20] Although no airlines ordered the Type 173, it led to military designs, of which the Type 192 went into service with the
Products
Bristol did not systematically assign project type numbers until 1923, starting with the Type 90 Berkeley. In that year, they also retrospectively assigned type numbers in chronological order to all projects, built or not, from August 1914 onwards. Thus the Scouts A and B did not get a type number but the Scout C did and was the Type 1. The final Bristol project, numbered Type 225, was an unbuilt 1962 STOL transport. Of these 225 Types, 117 were built.[26] This list does not include the unbuilt "paper aeroplanes"; it does include the pre-August 1914 aircraft.
Aircraft
Pre-World War I
- Bristol Boxkite
- Bristol Glider
- Bristol Racing Biplane
- Bristol Biplane Type 'T'
- Bristol Monoplane
See also
- Aerospace industry in the United Kingdom
- Bristol Aerospace, Canadian subsidiary
- Roy Fedden, engine designer
- Harry Ricardo, engine designer
- Bristol Aeroplane Company F.C., the works football team
External links
- The Bristol Aeroplane Company, the founder's family's website
- Bristol aircraft engines
References
- "Bristol Aeroplane Company." BAE Systems, Retrieved: 12 May 2017.^
- Barnes 1988, p. 13.^
- Barnes 1988, p. 24.^