Hawker Aircraft
7 types · 0 airframes
Pre-1950 Narrative
The first Hawker design was the unbuilt Hawker Humpback of December 1920. This was soon followed by the Hawker Duiker, the first prototype, which flew in July 1923. In the interwar years, Hawker produced a successful line of bombers and fighters for the Royal Air Force, the product of Sydney Camm (later Sir Sydney) and his team. These included the Hawker Hind and the Hawker Hart, which became the most produced UK aeroplane in the years before the Second World War. During the Second World War, the Hawker Siddeley company was one of the United Kingdom's most important aviation concerns, producing numerous designs including the famous Hawker Hurricane fighter plane that, along with the Supermarine Spitfire, was instrumental in winning the Battle of Britain. Hawker Aircraft since 1920 (3rd revised ed.).
Aircraft Types
Hawker Hart
The Hawker Hart was a British two-seat biplane light bomber designed by Sydney Camm and powered by the Rolls-Royce Kestrel. First flown in 1928, it could outpace every RAF fighter then in service, and it entered squadron service in January 1930. Production passed 1,000 aircraft, more than four hundred of them for the RAF, and the type served at home, in India and in the Middle East through the 1930s. Its basic design proved adaptable, giving rise to a family of Hawker derivatives, and individual Harts lingered in training and communications work until 1943. Two examples are on display with the RAF Museum, at London and at Cosford, and a Swedish-built B 4 survives in Sweden.
Hawker Horsley
The Hawker Horsley was a British single-engined biplane bomber designed by George Carter and Sydney Camm for Hawker Aircraft. Built first in wood, then in mixed wood-and-metal construction and finally all-metal, it served the Royal Air Force as a day bomber and torpedo bomber from 1926 to 1935, was sold in small numbers to Greece and Denmark, and briefly held the world distance record in May 1927. Production totalled 124 aircraft, including two prototypes, six for Greece and two Dantorps for Denmark. After retirement the type flew on as an engine testbed, including early trials of the Rolls-Royce Merlin, and no example is recorded preserved in a British museum.
Hawker Hunter
The Hawker Hunter is a transonic British jet fighter developed by Hawker Aircraft for the Royal Air Force and first flown in 1951. A single-seat, swept-wing design built around the Rolls-Royce Avon turbojet, it entered service in 1954 as a day interceptor and later served mainly as a fighter-bomber and reconnaissance aircraft, with two-seat trainers alongside. Production, including licence building in Belgium and the Netherlands, reached 1,972 aircraft, and the type served with 21 overseas air forces. Lebanon, the last military operator, retired it in 2014, while contractor-operated Hunters still fly in support roles.
Hawker Hurricane
The Hawker Hurricane is a British single-seat fighter designed by Sydney Camm for Hawker Aircraft and first flown on 6 November 1935. The RAF's first eight-gun monoplane, it outnumbered the Spitfire during the Battle of Britain and was credited with the larger share of the victories, then served in nearly every theatre of the Second World War as a fighter, night fighter, fighter-bomber and naval aircraft. Over 14,000 were built, and about a dozen remain airworthy.
Hawker Sea Fury
The Hawker Sea Fury was a British carrier fighter and fighter-bomber developed by Hawker Aircraft from its Tempest line and first flown, as a naval prototype, in February 1945. It entered Royal Navy service in 1947 as the service's last piston-engined fighter, fought in the Korean War — where a Sea Fury was credited with shooting down a MiG-15 jet — and was widely exported, with about 860 built including Fokker licence production in the Netherlands. Many survive in civilian hands, and modified examples became leading Unlimited-class racers at Reno.
Hawker Tempest
The Hawker Tempest was a British single-seat fighter that began as the Typhoon II, a rework of the Hawker Typhoon with a thinner laminar-flow wing to cure the performance the Typhoon lost at altitude. The Sabre-powered Mk V entered service in January 1944 and made its name against the V-1 flying bombs and on armed reconnaissance over north-west Europe. The Centaurus-powered Mk II and the Sabre V Mk VI arrived too late for the war but served afterwards, including transfers to India and Pakistan; in all, 1,401 Tempests were built.
Hawker Typhoon
The Hawker Typhoon was a British single-seat fighter-bomber of the Second World War. Designed to succeed the Hurricane and built around the powerful Napier Sabre engine, it disappointed as a high-altitude interceptor but excelled at low level, first against tip-and-run raiders and then, armed with bombs and rockets, as the RAF's principal ground-attack aircraft in north-west Europe in 1944-45. Of 3,317 built, almost all by Gloster, only one complete example survives.