Airspeed Limited was established in 1931 to build

aeroplane An airplane (American English), or aeroplane (Commonwealth English), informally plane, is a fixed-wing aircraft that is propelled forward by thrust from a jet engine, Propeller (aircraft), propeller, or rocket engine. Airplanes come in a vari ...

s in

York York is a cathedral city in North Yorkshire, England, with Roman Britain, Roman origins, sited at the confluence of the rivers River Ouse, Yorkshire, Ouse and River Foss, Foss. It has many historic buildings and other structures, such as a Yor ...

, England, by A. H. Tiltman and Nevil Shute Norway (the aeronautical engineer and novelist, who used his forenames as his pen-name). The other directors were A. E. Hewitt, Lord Grimthorpe and

Alan Cobham Sir Alan John Cobham, KBE, AFC (6 May 1894 – 21 October 1973) was an English aviation pioneer. Early life As a child he attended Wilson's School, which was then in Camberwell, London. The school was relocated to the former site of ...

Amy Johnson Amy Johnson (born 1 July 1903 – disappeared 5 January 1941) was a pioneering English pilot who was the first woman to fly solo from London to Australia. Flying solo or with her husband, Jim Mollison, she set many long-distance records dur ...

was also one of the initial subscribers for shares.

Foundation

Airspeed Ltd. was founded by Nevil Shute Norway (later to become a novelist as

Nevil Shute Nevil Shute Norway (17 January 189912 January 1960) was an English novelist and aeronautical engineer who spent his later years in Australia. He used his full name in his engineering career and Nevil Shute as his pen name to protect his enginee ...

) and designer Hessell Tiltman. In his autobiography, '' Slide Rule: Autobiography of an Engineer'', Norway gives an account of the founding of the company and of the processes that led to the development and mass production of the

Airspeed Oxford The Airspeed AS.10 Oxford is a twin-engine monoplane aircraft developed and manufactured by Airspeed Ltd, Airspeed. It saw widespread use for training Commonwealth of Nations, British Commonwealth aircrews in navigation, radio-operating, bombin ...

. He received the Fellowship of the

Royal Aeronautical Society The Royal Aeronautical Society, also known as the RAeS, is a British multi-disciplinary professional institution dedicated to the global aerospace community. Founded in 1866, it is the oldest Aeronautics, aeronautical society in the world. Memb ...

for his innovative fitting of a retractable undercarriage to an aircraft.

Early operations

The AS.1 Tern, the first British high-performance glider (sailplane), was built to get publicity and attract more capital by setting British gliding records. A glider could be designed and built in two or three months while the design office and workshop were being set up in half of an empty bus garage on

Piccadilly Piccadilly () is a road in the City of Westminster, London, England, to the south of Mayfair, between Hyde Park Corner in the west and Piccadilly Circus in the east. It is part of the A4 road (England), A4 road that connects central London to ...

. Shute flew the Tern's first test flight. In 1932 Airspeed produced the AS.4 Ferry, a three-engined, ten-passenger

biplane A biplane is a fixed-wing aircraft with two main wings stacked one above the other. The first powered, controlled aeroplane to fly, the Wright Flyer, used a biplane wing arrangement, as did many aircraft in the early years of aviation. While ...

designed specifically for Sir

. In March 1933 the firm moved to

Portsmouth Portsmouth ( ) is a port city status in the United Kingdom, city and unitary authority in Hampshire, England. Most of Portsmouth is located on Portsea Island, off the south coast of England in the Solent, making Portsmouth the only city in En ...

where the

City Council A municipal council is the legislative body of a municipality or local government area. Depending on the location and classification of the municipality it may be known as a city council, town council, town board, community council, borough counc ...

gave generous terms for a factory building constructed to Airspeed's requirements at the local airport. The first

Airspeed Courier The Airspeed AS.5 Courier was a British six-seat single-engined light aircraft, designed and produced by the British aircraft manufacturer Airspeed Limited at Portsmouth. It was the first British aircraft fitted with a retractable undercarri ...

was flown from there in 1933, followed by the first of a twin-engined development of the Courier, the

Airspeed Envoy The Airspeed AS.6 Envoy was a twin-engined light transport aircraft designed and produced by the British aircraft manufacturer Airspeed Ltd. The Envoy originated as a heavier twin-engine derivative of Airspeed's Courier light transport aircraf ...

, in 1934. Both the Courier and the Envoy were made in small numbers. In the same year, a long-range racing version of the Envoy, the AS.8 Viceroy, was developed for the England-Australia

MacRobertson Air Race The MacRobertson Trophy Air Race (also known as the London to Melbourne Air Race) took place in October 1934 in aviation, 1934 as part of the 1934 Centenary of Melbourne, Melbourne Centenary celebrations. The race was devised by the Lord Mayor o ...

. In August 1934, Airspeed (1934) Limited made a public issue of shares, in association with the

Tyneside Tyneside is a List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, built-up area across the banks of the River Tyne, England, River Tyne in Northern England. The population of Tyneside as published in the United Kingdom Census 2011, 2011 census was 774,891 ...

ship builder Swan Hunter & Wigham Richardson Limited. In 1934 six Couriers had been sold to an operating company for a hire purchase deposit of £5 each. Nevil Shute Norway wrote that they could come back to Airspeed and as an "obsolescent type" might not be so easy to sell again. He got a reputation as being "unscrupulous" for resisting the auditors' attempt to write them down on the books because, with growing talk of war, civil aircraft of any size would sell immediately. As the six were worth nearly twenty thousand pounds, writing them down to half that would add £10,000 to their loss, making the firm's proposed share issue a very unattractive investment. Shute could see from his office the four hundred workers in the workshop with families depending on them. In 1936 most of the unsold Couriers and Envoys were sold and found their way to the

Spanish Civil War The Spanish Civil War () was a military conflict fought from 1936 to 1939 between the Republican faction (Spanish Civil War), Republicans and the Nationalist faction (Spanish Civil War), Nationalists. Republicans were loyal to the Left-wing p ...

. The demonstration Envoy was sold to the Spanish Nationalists for £6000, paid for in cash. In 1935, the sole

Airspeed Viceroy The Airspeed AS.8 Viceroy was a British racing version of the Airspeed AS.6 Envoy built by Airspeed (1934) Limited at Portsmouth. The Viceroy was built to order for Captain T. Neville Stack and Sydney Lewis Turner, to compete in the England ...

was nearly sold to Ethiopia for use against Italian forces. In 1934 Shute negotiated a licensing agreement with

Fokker Fokker (; ) was a Dutch aircraft manufacturer that operated from 1912 to 1996. The company was founded by the Dutch aviator Anthony Fokker and became famous during World War I for its fighter aircraft. During its most successful period in the 19 ...

. In 1935, Airspeed signed a manufacturing licensing agreement for the

Douglas DC-2 The Douglas DC-2 is a retired 14-passenger, twin-engined airliner that was produced by the American company Douglas Aircraft Company starting in 1934. It competed with the Boeing 247. In 1935, Douglas produced a larger version called the DC-3 ...

and several Fokker types, with Fokker to be a consultant for seven years. Airspeed considered making the Fokker D.XVII fighter for Greece, which wanted to buy from Britain for currency reasons. Shute and a Fokker representative "who was well accustomed to methods of business in the Balkans", spent three weeks in Athens but did not close the deal. After a year, the drift to war, and their Air Ministry contracts, meant that the Dutch could not go to the Airspeed factory or attend board meetings.

Wolseley engine

All

Airspeed In aviation, airspeed is the speed of an aircraft relative to the air it is flying through (which itself is usually moving relative to the ground due to wind). In contrast, the ground speed is the speed of an aircraft with respect to the sur ...

aeroplanes under manufacture or development in 1936 were to use the Wolseley Scorpio, a radial engine of about which was under development by Nuffield. The project was abandoned in September 1936 after the expenditure of about two hundred thousand pounds when

Lord Nuffield William Richard Morris, 1st Viscount Nuffield (10 October 1877 – 22 August 1963), was an English motor manufacturer and philanthropist. He was the founder of Morris Motors Limited and is remembered for establishing the Nuffield Foundation, th ...

got the fixed price I.T.P. (Intention to Proceed) contract papers, which would have required re-orientation of their offices with an army of chartered accountants) and decided to deal only with the

War Office The War Office has referred to several British government organisations throughout history, all relating to the army. It was a department of the British Government responsible for the administration of the British Army between 1857 and 1964, at ...

and the Admiralty, not the

Air Ministry The Air Ministry was a department of the Government of the United Kingdom with the responsibility of managing the affairs of the Royal Air Force and civil aviation that existed from 1918 to 1964. It was under the political authority of the ...

. Norway thought that it was a very advanced engine at a low price, so its loss was a major disaster for Airspeed.

Second World War

In June, 1940, formal announcement was made that

de Havilland The de Havilland Aircraft Company Limited (pronounced , ) was a British aviation manufacturer established in late 1920 by Geoffrey de Havilland at Stag Lane Aerodrome Edgware on the outskirts of North London. Operations were later moved to ...

had completed negotiations for the purchase from Swan, Hunter and Wigham Richardson, Ltd., of their holding of Airspeed ordinary shares. Airspeed retained its identity as a separate company though as a wholly-owned subsidiary of de Havilland. Around 1943 in order to reduce the risk from Luftwaffe bombing, a new dispersed design office was opened at Fairmile Manor in Cobham, Surrey; little is known of this establishment and nothing survives there today. Airspeed's most productive period was during the Second World War. The AS.10 Oxford had a production run exceeding 8,500. 3,800 AS51 and AS58

Horsa Hengist (, ) and Horsa are legendary Germanic peoples, Germanic brothers who according to later English legends and ethnogenesis theories led the Angles (tribe), Angles, Saxons and Jutes, the progenitor groups of modern English people, in thei ...

military glider Military gliders (an offshoot of common gliders) have been used by the militaries of various countries for carrying troops ( glider infantry) and heavy equipment to a combat zone, mainly during the Second World War. These engineless aircraft wer ...

s were built for the

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the Air force, air and space force of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. It was formed towards the end of the World War I, First World War on 1 April 1918, on the merger of t ...

and its allies. Many of these were used as part of the

D-Day The Normandy landings were the landing operations and associated airborne operations on 6 June 1944 of the Allied invasion of Normandy in Operation Overlord during the Second World War. Codenamed Operation Neptune and often referred to as ...

landings, and later for the Operation Market Garden.

Postwar operations

The company reverted to the company name of Airspeed Limited on 25 January 1944. Postwar it converted over 150 surplus ex-RAF Oxford aircraft as AS65 Consuls for the commercial market. Airspeed went on to produce the superbly streamlined pressurised twin-engined piston airliner called the AS57 Ambassador. This served successfully for some years with

British European Airways British European Airways (BEA), formally British European Airways Corporation, was a British airline which existed from 1946 until 1974. BEA operated to Europe, North Africa and the Middle East from airports around the United Kingdom. The ...

as their "Elizabethan Class". In 1951 Airspeed Limited was fully merged with de Havilland who then cancelled further development of the Ambassador, although the Ambassador fleet continued in service with smaller airlines such as

Dan-Air Dan-Air (legally ''Dan Air Services Limited'') was an airline based in the United Kingdom and a wholly owned subsidiary of London-based shipbroker, shipbroking firm Davies and Newman. It was started in 1953 with a single aircraft. Initially, i ...

until 1971. The original York factory was demolished in November 2015.

Aircraft

* AS.1 Tern – (1931) :Glider (sailplane); built to get publicity by breaking British gliding records (Two built; plus parts for third, which were sold) * AS.4 Ferry – (5 April 1932) :Three-engine biplane transport aircraft, four built * AS.5 Courier – (1 April 1933) :Single-engine low-wing monoplane passenger transport with retractable undercarriage of conventional configuration, 16 built * AS.6 Envoy – (26 June 1934) :Two-engine development of the Courier, 60 built * AS.8 Viceroy – (August 1934) :Variant of Envoy, adapted for long-range flight. One aircraft was built * AS.10 Oxford – (19 June 1937) :Larger two-engine development of Envoy, built in large numbers in the Second World War. *AS.16 :Projected licence production of Fokker F.XXII, none built. *AS.20 :Projected licence production of Fokker F.XXXVI, none built. *AS.22 :Projected licence production of Fokker C.X, none built. * AS.30 Queen Wasp – (11 June 1937) :Single-engine single-seat biplane target drone aircraft, seven built. * AS.39 Fleet Shadower – (18 October 1940) :Four-engine high-wing monoplane maritime patrol aircraft prototype. Two aircraft were ordered; one was completed * AS.45 Cambridge – (19 February 1941) :Single-engine two-seater low-wing monoplane trainer aircraft with retractable undercarriage of conventional configuration. Two aircraft were built AirspeedHorsaCockpitExternal

* AS.51 Horsa I – (12 September 1941) :Large troop-carrying glider; 2,245 built including seven prototypes. * AS.57 Ambassador – (10 July 1947) :Two-engine high-wing piston engine airliner, 23 built * AS.58 Horsa II – :Variant of Horsa with openable nose section for front loading; 1,561 built. * AS.65 Consul – (March 1946) :Civilian conversion of wartime Oxford; 161 were converted in 1946-48.

References

Bibliography

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External links

{{Authority control Defunct aircraft manufacturers of the United Kingdom Manufacturing companies of England Defunct companies based in York British companies established in 1931 Manufacturing companies established in 1931 Manufacturing companies disestablished in 1951 1931 establishments in England 1951 disestablishments in England British companies disestablished in 1951