The Seddon Mayfly was a

tandem Tandem, or in tandem, is an arrangement in which a team of machines, animals or people are lined up one behind another, all facing in the same direction. The original use of the term in English was in ''tandem harness'', which is used for two ...

biplane of unusual construction. It was designed by

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by Kingdom of England, English and Kingdom of Scotland, Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were foug ...

Lieutenant John W. Seddon and A. G. Hackett and built by

Accles & Pollock Accles & Pollock is a British tube manipulation company based in Oldbury, West Midlands. History The company was started in 1896 by James George Accles as Accles Ltd, based at Holford Mill in Perry Barr in Birmingham as a producer of cold-drawn s ...

. When built it was the largest aeroplane in the world, but it failed to fly when tested.

Design and development

Design of the Seddon Mayfly began in 1908, with the intention of attempting to win the prize for a flight between

Manchester Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of City of Salford, Salford to ...

and

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

given by the ''Daily Mail''. The design was based on a paper model, and Seddon took leave from the Navy to design and build and test the aircraft. It was built in Oldbury by Accles & Pollock, a company who specialised in the manufacture of steel tubing, and its structure made extensive use of intersecting pairs of steel hoops: over of steel was used in its construction Lewis 1962 p.432 The aircraft had two sets of biplane wings, the front pair of greater span than the aft pair. Control surfaces consisted of a forward-mounted biplane

elevator An elevator or lift is a cable-assisted, hydraulic cylinder-assisted, or roller-track assisted machine that vertically transports people or freight between floors, levels, or decks of a building, vessel, or other structure. They ar ...

s and a pair of diamond-shaped rudders mounted between each set of wings. The aircraft was intended to carry five passengers in addition to the pilot. Seddon Mayfly circa 1908 side view

It was powered by a pair of

N.E.C. NEC Nijmegen (''Nijmegen Eendracht Combinatie''), commonly known as NEC (), is a professional Dutch association football club based in Nijmegen. The club currently competes in the Eredivisie, the top tier of Dutch football, following promotion f ...

water-cooled engines mounted side by side between the two sets of wings. Each drove a single Beedle type

tractor A tractor is an engineering vehicle specifically designed to deliver a high tractive effort (or torque) at slow speeds, for the purposes of hauling a trailer or machinery such as that used in agriculture, mining or construction. Most comm ...

propeller. These were made of sheet aluminium, with the semi-circular blades supported at the ends by attachment to a radial tube. It was tested at the Midland Aero Club grounds at

Dunstall Park Dunstall is a small village and civil parish in the borough of East Staffordshire, Staffordshire, England. It lies between Burton upon Trent and Barton-under-Needwood. The population of the parish at the 2001 census was 215, decreasing to ...

near

Wolverhampton Wolverhampton () is a City status in the United Kingdom, city, metropolitan borough and administrative centre in the West Midlands (county), West Midlands, England. The population size has increased by 5.7%, from around 249,500 in 2011 United ...

but damaged an axleDunstall Park
''Flight'' 19 November 1910] and failed to leave the ground. It was eventually taken apart by souvenir hunters.

Specifications

References

Bibliography *Lewis, P., ''British Aircraft 1809-1914''. London: Putnam, 1962 * Winchester, Jim. ''The World's Worst Aircraft''. United States, NY: Metro Books, 2005. {{ISBN, 0-7607-6742-4 Biplanes 1910s British aircraft Tandem-wing aircraft Twin-engined tractor aircraft