Supermarine Sea Eagle

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Supermarine Sea Eagle
Supermarine Sea Eagle.png
Type: Amphibious aircraft
Design country:

United KingdomUnited Kingdom United Kingdom

Manufacturer:

Supermarine Aviation Works

First flight:

June 1923

Production time:

1923

Number of pieces:

3

The Supermarine Sea Eagle ("Seeadler") was a single-engine amphibious aircraft made by the British manufacturer Supermarine Aviation Works in the 1920s with a wooden fuselage. It was one of the first flying boats developed for passenger transport and was able to accommodate six passengers in addition to two pilots. The three machines built were used in air traffic between Southampton and the Channel Islands .

Development history of the Sea Eagle

The company Supermarine Aviation Works in Southampton had operated the series production of the AD flying boat developed by the Admiralty from 1917 to April 1918 . In 1919 the company bought back ten of these mothballed machines and modified them for civil traffic under the name Supermarine Channel . The first G-EAED (ex N1529) was allowed to perform sightseeing and scheduled flights between places on the British Channel coast and to Cherbourg and St. Malo from July 1919 . In 1920, Supermarine was able to sell three Channel flying boats to the Norwegian Det Norske Luftfartreideri (DNL) for the Bergen - Haugesund - Stavanger postal route and then also four other flying boats to the Norwegian government. Three other machines (G-EAGE, G-EAEJ, G-EAEF) went to the "Bermuda & West Atlantic Aviation Company" for island flights as well as sightseeing and charter flights. Two other machines with cameras in the bow were used to explore the Orinoco Delta in Venezuela. In 1921 additional channels could be sold, but only one for civil purposes. G-NZAI came to New Zealand to attend the state flight school there and became the first aircraft to ever fly to Fiji . Five machines designated as Channel Mk.II received modified hulls and more modern engines for military use. Three went to Japan , one each to Sweden and Chile .

Previously, in the fall of 1920, Supermarine and three other companies took part in a competition organized by the Ministry of Aviation for a civil aircraft taking off on the water. The competition, which took place in Felixstowe and Martlesham Heath near Woodbridge (Suffolk) in September and October 1920 , was narrowly won by the Vickers Viking III G-EAUK. 2nd prize of £ 4000 won the first independent design of Supermarines new chief engineer Reginald Joseph Mitchell , the Commercial Amphibian G-eave, before the Fairey III - floatplane G-EALQ. The prize money was doubled to £ 8,000 by the Air Ministry because it was believed that Supermarine had presented an excellent design with outstanding performance despite inferior engine performance. Unfortunately, the new Supermarine plane crashed in October 1920 and was never rebuilt. In the following period, Supermarine developed the military reconnaissance flying boat Supermarine Seagull on behalf of the Aviation Ministry , which in 1921 led to the first series order after the World War. In contrast to the aforementioned flying boats, the Seagull had a pull propeller.

At the same time, Supermarine developed a new civil model with the Sea Eagle . At the end of 1922, the British Marine Aircraft Navigation Company was founded with a government grant to set up a liner service with flying boats between Southampton, the Channel Islands and Le Havre . The government financed three flying boats for this line to be built by Supermarine, a partner in the new company.

The Sea Eagle was similar in the basic dimensions of the new Seagull , but only used the wings of the military model. Like all Supermarine flying boats built up to that point, it was made almost entirely of wood. It had a different wooden hull with a passenger cabin for six passengers in the bow and behind it an open cockpit for the pilot (s) and a different tail unit. Supermarine also returned to the propulsion concept with a pusher propeller for the Sea Eagle. The 12-cylinder Rolls-Royce Eagle IX V-engine , which developed 360 hp, was used as the engine. The first machine G-EBFK flew in June 1923 and on September 25, 1923 the scheduled service to Guernsey began .

Use of the Sea Eagle

The three machines built (G-EBFK, G-EBGR, G-EBGS) came into service with the British Marine Aircraft Navigation Company in 1923 and began liner service between Southampton and Guernsey without the planned extension to France. Supermarine deployed two factory pilots for the liner service. On March 31, 1924, the company founded with state aid was incorporated into the new state-owned airline Imperial Airways . Until then, the company had operated 104 round-trip flights, or 15 per month. The G-EBFK was written off on May 21, 1924. It was last used in regular service in October 1923 and was probably only available as a spare parts dispenser. The G-EBGR was converted to the more powerful Napier-Lion engine in late summer 1924 . From 1925 both machines had this engine and had a slightly larger upper wing in order to be able to take off more safely. In January 1927, the second machine, the G-EBGS, was lost when it was rammed by a ship in St. Peter Port. The damaged machine was returned to Southampton but not repaired. So only G-EBGR remained on the route to the Channel Islands until 1929. In addition to the remaining Sea Eagle , the prototype of the twin-engine Supermarine Swan was also used on the line between June 30, 1926 and February 1927 , which also flew to Deauville , Le Touquet and Cherbourg , but made fewer than ten round-trip flights and in 1927 canceled.

After they were eliminated, Imperial Airways used Short Calcutta between August 14, 1928 and February 20, 1929, in order to then abandon the line to the Channel Islands. In 1929 the “Tour and Travel Association” briefly used the former military machine Supermarine Seagull Mk.IV G-AAIZ for a few flights with up to six passengers to Guernsey.

The hull of the G-EBGR was preserved for a long time. It was donated to BOAC by Vickers (Aviation) in 1949 and then burned in Heston on February 13, 1954 because of maintenance and storage problems .

Supermarine Scarab

In 1924 a military version for the Spanish naval aviators was created with the Supermarine Scarab. This type had a different torso. The pilot sat in an open cockpit in the bow, behind it also in open positions the machine gunner and the radio operator / navigator / bombardier, who also had a closed fuselage cabin. In the fuselage there was a rotating bomb chamber for twelve 22 kg bombs. There were further suspensions for four 45 kg bombs under the wings. The tanks had been moved from the fuselage to the upper wings. Of the twelve machines ordered, one was lost during the tests in Great Britain. The aircraft mother ship Dédalo , dispatched from Spain, could not stow the machines through its too small hatches in the hold and therefore transported them all on deck. On the way back, the ship got into a severe storm in the Bay of Biscay , in which seven machines were seriously damaged. The undamaged machines were immediately dispatched to Morocco on arrival in Spain to be used against the Kabyle in the Rif War .

Military use

Spain 1875Spain Spain
  • marine

Technical specifications

Parameter Channel Mk.I Sea Eagle Scarab Swan
crew 1 1-2 3 1-2
Passengers 3-4 6th No 10
length 9.14 m 11.38 m 11.28 m 14.78 m
span 15.37 m 14.02 m 14.02 m 20.93 m
height 3.96 m 4.85 m 4.92 m 5.58 m
Wing area 42.1 m² 57.6 m² 56.7 m² 117.5 m²
Empty mass 1069 kg 1792 kg 1803 kg 3538 kg
Takeoff mass 1542 kg 2744 kg 2608 kg 5398 kg
Top speed 128 km / h 150 km / h 150 km / h 148 km / h
Cruising speed 114 km / h 135 km / h 128 km / h 134 km / h
Range 3 h 370 km 400 km ??
Service ceiling 2285 m 2438 m ?? 2469 m
Engines Beardmore, 160 hp Rolls-Royce Eagle IX, 360 hp Eagle IX, 360 hp 2 × Eagle IX
Armament (1 MG) no 1 MG
450 kg bombs		 no

See also

literature

  • Neville Doyle: From Sea Eagle to Flamingo - Channel Island Airlines 1923-1939. Upton-upon-Severn 1991, ISBN 1-85421-103-X .
  • Peter London: British Flying Boats. The History Press, Stroud 2003, ISBN 978-0-7524-60550 .
  • Kenneth Munson: Flying boats and seaplanes since 1910. Orell Füssli, Zurich, 1972.
  • John Stroud: Wings of Peace. In: Airplane Monthly. April 1986, p. 209 ff.

Web links

Commons : Supermarine Sea Eagle  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ London: British Flying Boats. Pp. 20-23.
  2. ↑ London, pp. 49f.
  3. ↑ London, p. 54.
  4. ↑ CF Andrews, EB Morgan: Supermarine Aircraft since 1914. Putnam, 1981, p. 44.
  5. ↑ London, p. 50 ff.
  6. ↑ London, p. 73.
  7. ^ Doyle: From Sea Eagle to Flamingo. P. 35.
  8. ^ Doyle, p. 38.
  9. ^ Doyle, p. 43.
  10. ^ Doyle, p. 52.
  11. ↑ London, pp. 73f.
  12. ↑ London, p. 74, Doyle, p. 271.
  13. ↑ London, p. 257.
  14. ^ A new Supermarine for Spain Flight, June 8, 1924
  15. ↑ London, pp. 73f.