Blackburn Type D
| Type D | |
|---|---|
 |
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| The Type D, the oldest British flying aircraft, of the Shuttleworth Collection at Old Warden | |
| Role | sports |
| National origin | United Kingdom |
| Manufacturer | Blackburn Aeroplane Co |
| Designer | Robert Blackburn |
| First flight | late 1912 |
| Status | still active |
| Number built | 1 |
The Blackburn Type D, sometimes known as the Single Seat Monoplane, was built by Robert Blackburn at Leeds in 1912. It is a single-engine mid-wing monoplane. Restored shortly after the Second World War, it remains part of the Shuttleworth Collection and is the oldest British flying aeroplane.
The Type D, a wooden, fabric-covered single-seat monoplane powered by a 50 hp (40 kW) Gnome rotary engine, was built for Cyril Foggin in 1912.
The design inherited some features from the earlier Mercury: it too had thin wings of constant chord with square tips of about the same span as the later Mercuries and used wing warping rather than ailerons. The wing was wire braced from above via a kingpost and below via the undercarriage, and was built up around machined I-section ash spars. The Type D also had the triangular cross-section fuselage seen on several of Blackburn's aircraft from the Second Monoplane onward.
It was a more pleasing-looking machine with a shorter fuselage, cowled engine, simplified undercarriage and heavily-revised empennage. The fuselage had rounded upper decking and aluminium covering at the front. Blackburn had persisted with the Second Monoplane's Antoinette-style fin and tailplane through subsequent aircraft, but the Type D's tailplane had a much less steeply swept leading edge (though still 60°) than its predecessors and carried a divided elevator. The fin likewise was less swept though still long, and now carried a single rudder rather than the characteristic triangular pair previously used. The undercarriage featured a pair of wheels, compared with four on the Mercury, with two struts per side terminating on skids and joined by the axle and a higher transverse strut. For the first time, Blackburn fitted a rudder bar in preference to his "triple steering column".
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