__NOTOC__ The Handley Page Type A, sometimes called "Bluebird" and later designated HP.1, was the first powered aircraft designed and built by

Frederick Handley Page Sir Frederick Handley Page, CBE, FRAeS (15 November 1885 – 21 April 1962) was an English industrialist who was a pioneer in the aircraft industry and became known as the father of the heavy bomber. His company Handley Page Limited was ...

.Orbis 1985, p. 2059

Development

Following success in 1909 with an experimental glider Handley Page designed and built a single-seat monoplane. It was of wood construction with a tailskid landing gear, powered by a 20 hp (15 kW) Advance V-4 air-cooled engine . It used a wing with a shape patented by José Weiss which was claimed to provide automatic lateral stability, so there were no ailerons or wing warping mechanisms. Weiss was also responsible for the design of its tractor propeller. The wings, fuselage and tail surfaces were covered with a blue-grey rubberised fabric, hence the nickname Bluebird. After the aircraft had been displayed at the second Olympia Aero Exhibition, Handley Page successfully made a few straight hops in the Bluebird on 26 May 1910, but crashed at the first attempt to make a turn.Barnes 1976, pp.8, 50-2. Handley Page improved the design to include lateral control via wing warping and fitted a 25 hp (18.6 kW) Alvaston water-cooled flat-twin engine. The rebuilt aircraft was designated Handley Page Type C but it refused to fly. Although work was completed on modifying the aircraft to take a 50 hp (37 kW) Isaacson radial engine it was abandoned in late 1910. It ended its life as an instructional airframe at the

Northampton Polytechnic Institu City, University of London, is a public research university in London, United Kingdom, and a member institution of the federal University of London. It was founded in 1894 as the Northampton Institute, and became a university when The City Univ ...

te in

Clerkenwell Clerkenwell () is an area of central London, England. Clerkenwell was an ancient parish from the mediaeval period onwards, and now forms the south-western part of the London Borough of Islington. The well after which it was named was redis ...

, where Handley Page was a lecturer.Barnes 1976, p.9 In 1924 the company retrospectively applied model numbers, the Type A became the HP.1 and the Type C the HP.3.

Variants

;Type A (HP.1) :Experimental monoplane powered by an Advance 4-cylinder engine, one built. ;Type C (HP.3) :Type A improved and fitted with an Alvaston flat-twin engine.

Specifications

References

Notes

Bibliography

* * {{Handley Page aircraft 1910s British aircraft A Aircraft first flown in 1910