The Avro 529 was a twin-engined

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 ...

long-range

bomber A bomber is a military combat aircraft that utilizes air-to-ground weaponry to drop bombs, launch aerial torpedo, torpedoes, or deploy air-launched cruise missiles. There are two major classifications of bomber: strategic and tactical. Strateg ...

of the

First World War World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

. Two prototypes were built but no production ensued.

Development

The Avro 529 was Avro's second twin-engined aircraft and their second attempt at a

heavy bomber Heavy bombers are bomber Fixed-wing aircraft, aircraft capable of delivering the largest payload of air-to-ground weaponry (usually Aerial bomb, bombs) and longest range (aeronautics), range (takeoff to landing) of their era. Archetypal heavy ...

. Their first in both categories was the

Pike Pike, Pikes or The Pike may refer to: Fish * Blue pike or blue walleye, an extinct color morph of the yellow walleye ''Sander vitreus'' * Ctenoluciidae, the "pike characins", some species of which are commonly known as pikes * ''Esox'', genus of ...

, developed in early 1916 to

Royal Flying Corps The Royal Flying Corps (RFC) was the air arm of the British Army before and during the First World War until it merged with the Royal Naval Air Service on 1 April 1918 to form the Royal Air Force. During the early part of the war, the RFC sup ...

(RFC) guidelines for a short-range bomber. The Pike arrived too late to secure orders from the RFC who would order the Handley-Page O/100 and for the

Royal Naval Air Service The Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) was the air arm of the Royal Navy, under the direction of the Admiralty (United Kingdom), Admiralty's Air Department, and existed formally from 1 July 1914 to 1 April 1918, when it was merged with the British ...

(RNAS) who had ordered the

Short Bomber The Short Bomber was a British two-seat long-range reconnaissance, bombing and torpedo-carrying aircraft designed by Short Brothers as a land-based development of the very successful Short Type 184 (of which more than 900 were built and many exp ...

. Nonetheless, after trials of the Pike, the

Admiralty Admiralty most often refers to: *Admiralty, Hong Kong * Admiralty (United Kingdom), military department in command of the Royal Navy from 1707 to 1964 *The rank of admiral *Admiralty law Admiralty can also refer to: Buildings * Admiralty, Tra ...

ordered two

prototype A prototype is an early sample, model, or release of a product built to test a concept or process. It is a term used in a variety of contexts, including semantics, design, electronics, and Software prototyping, software programming. A prototype ...

s of an enlarged Pike for a long-range bomber role. This was the Type 529. Like the Pike, it was a large twin-engined biplane of the then-standard wood and canvas construction. It had three-bay wings without sweepback, dihedral or stagger, partly to facilitate wing folding. The vertical tail was different from that of the Pike: it had a small, roughly triangular fin and a rudder with a round balance surface above the fin, a reminder of Avro's "comma"

rudder A rudder is a primary control surface used to steer a ship, boat, submarine, hovercraft, airship, or other vehicle that moves through a fluid medium (usually air or water). On an airplane, the rudder is used primarily to counter adverse yaw ...

form. The fuselage was rectangular in cross-section and seated three in separate cockpits. The pilot sat just forward of the wing leading edge, there was a gunner's position (with emergency dual control) midway between the trailing edge and the tail and the front gunner/bomb-aimer's position was in the nose. Both gunners' positions were provided with a .303 in (7.7 mm) Lewis Gun mounted on a

Scarff ring The Scarff ring was a type of machine gun mounting developed during the First World War by Warrant Officer (Gunner) F. W. Scarff of the Admiralty Air Department for use on two-seater aircraft. The mount incorporated bungee cord suspension in el ...

. The landing gear used two main wheels on split axles, plus a tail-skid. The two prototypes differed from each other chiefly in their powerplants. The first, just known as the Avro 529, had a pair of uncowled

Rolls-Royce Falcon The Rolls-Royce Falcon is an aircraft engine, aero engine developed in 1915. It was a smaller version of the Rolls-Royce Eagle, a liquid-cooled V-12 of 867 Cubic inch, cu in (14.2 Litre, L) Engine displacement, capacity. Fitted to many British ...

water-cooled in-line engines mounted midway between the wings. Each produced 190 hp (140 kW) and drove four-bladed, opposite-handed wooden airscrews. It carried 140 gal (636 L) of fuel in a tank in the centre fuselage. Avro 529 NARA-17342061

The second machine, designated the Avro 529A, had a pair 230 hp (170 kW)

BHP BHP Group Limited, founded as the Broken Hill Proprietary Company, is an Australian multinational mining and metals corporation. BHP was established in August 1885 and is headquartered in Melbourne, Victoria. As of 2024, BHP was the world� ...

in-line water-cooled engines, cowled and mounted in nacelles on the lower wing. These drove wooden, two-bladed airscrews. In this aircraft fuel was held in a pair of 60 gal (273 L), one in each

nacelle A nacelle ( ) is a streamlined container for aircraft parts such as Aircraft engine, engines, fuel or equipment. When attached entirely outside the airframe, it is sometimes called a pod, in which case it is attached with a Hardpoint#Pylon, pylo ...

. Fuel was pumped from these to 10 gal (45 L) tanks above the engines by wind-driven pumps, and fed to the motors under gravity. The type 529A had slightly different wings to the first prototype, 13 in (33 cm) greater in span, smaller in area and hence of higher

aspect ratio The aspect ratio of a geometry, geometric shape is the ratio of its sizes in different dimensions. For example, the aspect ratio of a rectangle is the ratio of its longer side to its shorter side—the ratio of width to height, when the rectangl ...

. It was about 8% lighter. Another difference between the two prototypes were the arrangements for the bomb-aimer. In the first machine, this was done from the seat of the front cockpit, but in the 529A there was provision for a prone bomb-aimer's position with a small window, noticeable in side view. From there, he communicated with the pilot by Gosport tube. The 529A could carry 20 50 lb (20 kg) bombs racked nose up inside the fuselage between the lower wing spars. The Type 529 was, even with the B.H.P. engines rather low powered, but seems to have handled well apart from poor elevator control. There was no production order and the type was not developed further.

Specifications (529A)

References

* {{Avro aircraft Biplanes 1910s British bomber aircraft

529 __NOTOC__ Year 529 ( DXXIX) was a common year starting on Monday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Decius without colleague (or, less frequently, year 1282 ''Ab urbe condita''). The denomination ...

Aircraft first flown in 1917 Twin piston-engined tractor aircraft