Avro 730 supersonic bomber

Thanks Rich! 🙂

Youre not thinking of engine runs on that day too are you? now the temperature is picking up i might be swayed to pop along!

Not yet, the next date will be put up on WR963’s thread in due course. I’ll post an update on there shortly.

The opportunity to copy the Ashton material might be appreciated down these parts! 😉

Newark was the first thought in my head when I saw them, seeing as that’s where the Ashton is!

The opportunity to copy the Ashton material might be appreciated down these parts! 😉

Also just on the off chance there’s any Monospar stuff they’d be really interested!! 😀

SHACKLETON RUNS

Youre not thinking of engine runs on that day too are you? now the temperature is picking up i might be swayed to pop along!

So far we’ve only gone through 4 folders out of 20; in 1 cabinet out of 16 so there may be more Avro 730 stuff come to light (and 707C, Tudor, Ashton, Vulcan and Argosy…). We’re going to start filtering the non Shackleton drawings out.

Until they’re back at Woodford, the only way to see them is to pop over to see us at Coventry. We’ll be having the drawing cabinets open next on the 20th Apr.

Well, this is a puzzle. My information is that the 730 was the type number for design studies of a supersonic bomber with eight engines. None were built. Some two-engined test models were projected, but again not built. Any connection with the Bristol 188 seems coincidental. The 188s first flew several years after the 730 was abandoned. What gives?

The Bristol T188 was originally order against contract ER.134d and had nothing to do with Avro 730. However when the 730 project (Spec R.156T) got underway three additional 188 where ordered to act as engine test beds for 730’s AWP159. These 3 were cancelled when the 730 got the chop. The 730 started life as a 4 engined recon aircraft but some way into it’s development it was decided to add a nuke (OR 330 & 336) resulting in an extensively redesigned to have 8 engines. The aerodynamic test bed for the Avro 730 was the Avro 731 which was a 3/8 scale twin engine 730.

A little while back I was lucky enough to come across 2 people who had either worked directly on in one case and had worked in the vacuum brazing department. Note the fuselage was to be brazed stainless steel. Both of these guys said that categorically there was no fuselage produced and the story of the 730 scrap bins story is an urban myth. The chap who worked in the brazing department did remember some large compound curved test honeycomb sections being produced as process prove outs. These were cut up to examine the thoroughness of the brazing process.

Great find, I would love to see these drawing, original Avro 730 data is very thin on the ground, how can I get to see them?

anyone out there have anything to do with the Avro 730 supersonic bomber?

there are plenty of outline drawings out there and there have been some good books published recently with sections on the spec and requirement for this aircraft, but I feel none of this goes into much real detail considering a prototype was under construction at the time of cancellation.

looking it up on google reveals some rather smart computer renderings based on the outlines available, and ive seen some of the models at hendon and on the science museum web page.

Would be interested in hearing from anyone that worked at woodford or chadderton in the late 50’s / early 60’s as apparently the prototype was cut up for use as scrap bins in the factory…..

Well, this is a puzzle. My information is that the 730 was the type number for design studies of a supersonic bomber with eight engines. None were built. Some two-engined test models were projected, but again not built. Any connection with the Bristol 188 seems coincidental. The 188s first flew several years after the 730 was abandoned. What gives?

Avro project

Well that will explain it then! i vaguely recall reading that somewhere now you mention it, I had the priviledge of meeting Godfrey Auty some years ago and he was a lovely unassuming modest Gentlemen, He told me he was picked to fly the 188 cos he was of a smaller stature and if youve ever seen the cockpit of that aircraft you can well believe it.

The Bristol 188 was research aircraft for the Avro 730 project:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bristol_188

avro project

It looks very Bristol 188 to me.

You might want to mention that to the folks over at the Secret Projects website… I suspect they might be mildly interested… :diablo:

Zeb

(Holy zombie thread resurrection Batman! :eek:)

Hi all,

This weekend we opened the first of the drawing cabinets from Avro/BAe to start cataloguing the Shackleton drawings. Mixed in are several other types drawings- a few of which are Avro 730.

I’ll admit – until I looked I had no idea what it was. I wondered if anyone had any more information on this aircraft; as to whether anything was built. We have found references to an ‘Echo Model’ as well as a couple of studies, mock up and genuine type drawings.

Kind regards,

Rich

yep it certainly is a wicked looking thing….

thanks Will J for the offer – my mate at work was probably the very last person to get that very book out before you! – I think that ‘project cancelled’ by Derek Woods still has the most comprehensive info on this type, it even shows how the crew workstations would have been organised in the prototype, having a vulcan style blister canopy for early flying, before reverting to a periscope (!) for the more streamlined version shown above.
There were many many ‘thuderbirds’ style projects around at this time, but I find this one is more interesting cos’ they actually started to build one….

I recently happened across some pictures of a model of the 730 from the RAE for radar trials, will ask the owner of the pics for permission to scan and share here…..

thanks for the link Distiller, the renderings are neat – shows the interest is out there – lets keep digging and see what turns up! – there must be more stuff out there than the current crop of books suggest. (no offence authors!)

http://prototypes.free.fr/tsr2/tsr2-8.htm

There is some interesting stuff about it and its link to the Bristol (188?) stainless steel test aircraft in a book called ‘British Experimental TurboJets’ or similar that is in Coventry library…

..or at least it will be when I return it, I can send you a PM 🙂

That’s a wicked looking thing. The long fuselage with a delta at the back is a little like an SR-71. That squarish canard sure looks odd though.