Bristol Boxkite

Bristol Boxkite
Boxkite replica, Continental O-200-B engine
Role	Two-seat trainer
Manufacturer	British and Colonial Aeroplane Company
First flight	30 July 1910
Introduction	1910
Primary users	Bristol Aeroplane Company flying schools. RFC Imperial Russian Air Service Australian Flying Corps
Produced	1910–14
Number built	78
Unit cost	£1,000 with engine
Developed from	Farman III, Zodiac Biplane

The Boxkite (officially the Bristol Biplane) was the first aircraft produced by the British and Colonial Aeroplane Company (later known as the Bristol Aeroplane Company). A pusher biplane based on the successful Farman III, it was one of the first aircraft types to be built in quantity. As the type was used by Bristol for instruction purposes at their flying schools at Larkhill and Brooklands many early British aviators learned to fly in a Boxkite. Four were purchased in 1911 by the War Office and examples were sold to Russia and Australia. It continued to be used for training purposes until after the outbreak of the First World War.

The original intention of Sir George White, the founder and chairman of Bristol Aircraft, was to build licensed copies of the Zodiac biplane, designed by Gabriel Voisin. One example of this design was imported from France and exhibited by Bristol at the 1910 Aero show in London in March 1910, and afterwards taken to Brooklands for flight testing. Initial attempts to get it to fly were entirely unsuccessful. This was largely due to its unsatisfactory wing section (the shallow camber of the Zodiac's wings had been commented upon by the aviation journal Flight), but the aircraft was also underpowered for its weight, and a new set of wings did little to improve performance. A single brief flight on 28 May was achieved by Maurice Edmond, but after an accident that damaged its undercarriage on 10 June it was abandoned, as was work on five more examples being built at Filton. Sir George was advised to acquire rights to build copies of the successful Farman biplane. This proved impossible since George Holt Thomas was negotiating rights with the Farman company, but George Challenger, the chief engineer at Bristol's factory in Filton, believed that he could produce a satisfactory copy since full details of the Farman machine had been published in Flight. This was authorized by Sir George, and Challenger set to work on drawings for a new aircraft. The first example was constructed in a matter of weeks, using some components from the abandoned production Zodiacs, and was delivered to the company's flying school at Larkhill on Salisbury Plain, where it was first flown on 30 July 1910, piloted by Maurice Edmond. Farman sued Bristol for patent infringement, but the company's lawyers claimed substantial design improvements in matters of constructional detail, and the lawsuit was dropped.