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On the flip side – Miles made 7000 aircraft. You might just get onto the toes of one foot if you count the airworthy survivors.

True indeed. But who now really knows or cares? Only a few years ago any remotely serious U.K. aviation historian would have been familiar with the Miles Company history and its aviation products and would have appreciated that team’s contribution to this country’s aeronautical heritage as a matter of course.
Not now I’m afraid; as certain recent posturings on this site sadly illustrate.
I expect they might still recognise a Vulcan though.

Thanks PL 🙂 A quick google for hawker hotspur revealed a few more clearer pictures, it’s a lovely looking ac… why was it ever dropped???

Now… i wonder if i can find a nice kit of it 🙂
And yes.. the ‘gunbus’ is indeed a horace farman…. whata mistaka de maka! :p

I think you’ll find the “Hotspur” is the Kestrel; and the Kestrel was a beautiful aeroplane with that distinctive gentle inverted gull wing – as can be clearly seen in the image in question. (Also undercarriage geometry, canopy panels, “sit” of the aircraft etc.)

wow ……! A fantastic collection of pictures 😀 😀 But one a/c particularly caught my eye in picture 16, can somebody shed any light as to it’s ID?? It’s next to the Gunbus to the rear right of the lineup, a low wing monoplane, natural silver, with a 3bladed VP prop’ and a prominent chin radiator/intake, you can see it again in picture 23 to the rear left of the image.
Would love to know what it is

Any takers???

Kenb’o

My guess would be the Miles Kestrel- if you mean the one alongside the Horace Farman

You might think that somebody who has the wherewithal and resources to rebuild a 1932 autogyro to flying condition would also be smart enough to research as much as possible the information on operating it. It is incorrect to say that the only reference is to read articles by pilots who have flown them. As pointed out previously on this thread Steve Pitcairn operated his vintage autogyro for a number of years until donating it to the EAA Museum last year, and may yet fly it again, and he is glad to talk about its handling qualities. Perhaps even more amazing is Johnny Miller, well known 1930s airshow pilot, who used to loop his autogyro as part of his airshow act. Johnny is still very lucid at the age of 100, in fact still holding a valid pilot’s license and owning a Bonanza (although I’m not sure that he flies solo any more). He still lives in the house he was born in, and saw Glenn Curtiss fly in 1910. Johnny is full of advice for aspiring autogyro pilots and aside from a few items to be aware of says that it shouldn’t be a problem.

As for making the wing a little bigger and making an aeroplane, the autogyro wing is primarily for stability and lateral control, and contributes only 20% of the lift.

The Pitcairns are Cierva type machines and were in fact built under a licensing agreement from Cierva. Early designations were PCA-1 and PCA-2 which stood for “Pitcairn-Cierva Autogyro”.

Wot?

I do accept that. What I take issue with is the accepted adage that autogiros were “a stepping stone to the helicopter and no more.
Juan de Cierva was initially, I believe,very much more interested in gyroplanes as a safer form of flying machine rather than as a helicopter precursor. Do take a look at the Helicop-Air Girhel from France (about 1960) as a projection of that concept – it looks a bit like an Eircoupe with a three-blade rotor.
There are drawbacks and “gotchas” with gyroplanes as with any type of aircraft, but I think that the popular vision of them as some sort of failed half-way helicopters is missing the point. They are rotorcraft , but fly and perform very differently from helicopters.
I haven’t flown one for many years but I must admit that in looking through this thread, the small scale reproduction tractor engine Cierva type built in Spain using a two blade rotor would make an interesting comparison to the popular pusher layout.

I do wonder the qualification for your remarks and am therefore curious as to the experience or knowledge base from which it is derived.
In disagreeing that an autogiro is only a stepping stone to a helicopter, I think that many , including Wallis and the Groen brothers in the U.S.A. might be of a similar opinion.
Some years ago I gained my autogiro P.P.L. endorsement, via Ken Wallis, as part of a development programme within the U.K. aircraft industry. An early lesson that we learned was not to confuse the capabilities of these two very different types of aircraft.

What was the best operational Japanese Fighter of WWII? :rolleyes:

Enola Gay?