The Beardmore W.B.XXVI (W.B.26) was a prototype
British two-seat fighter of the 1920s. A single engined
biplane
A biplane is a fixed-wing aircraft with two main wings stacked one above the other. The first powered, controlled aeroplane to fly, the Wright Flyer, used a biplane wing arrangement, as did many aircraft in the early years of aviation. While ...
, one example was built and evaluated by
Latvia
Latvia ( or ; lv, Latvija ; ltg, Latveja; liv, Leţmō), officially the Republic of Latvia ( lv, Latvijas Republika, links=no, ltg, Latvejas Republika, links=no, liv, Leţmō Vabāmō, links=no), is a country in the Baltic region of ...
, but was not accepted for service.
Development and design
In 1924, the Scottish shipbuilding company of
William Beardmore and Company designed a two-seat fighter for Latvia, the W.B.XXVI. Beardmore's chief designer,
W.S. Shackleton produced a wooden single-bay
biplane
A biplane is a fixed-wing aircraft with two main wings stacked one above the other. The first powered, controlled aeroplane to fly, the Wright Flyer, used a biplane wing arrangement, as did many aircraft in the early years of aviation. While ...
, powered by a
Rolls-Royce Eagle engine. The slab-sided
fuselage was of hexagonal section, with the crew of two seated in separate cockpits. To reduce drag, the wings had no bracing wires, bracing being solely by means of struts, with a large inter-wing gap. A Lamblin radiator was installed in the leading edge of the lower wing. Instead of the normal
Vickers and
Lewis machine guns, the aircraft was armed by Beardmore's own
gas-operated
Gas-operation is a system of operation used to provide energy to operate locked breech, autoloading firearms. In gas-operation, a portion of high-pressure gas from the cartridge being fired is used to power a mechanism to dispose of the spent ...
Beardmore-Farquhar machine guns.
[Jarrett 1996, pp.27-29.]
The prototype first flew some time in 1925.
[Mason 1992, p.175.] While it proved to be manoeuvrable,
[''Flight'' 25 February 1925, p.111.] it was underpowered, and performance was poor, with the Latvians unwilling to pay for replacement of the Eagle with a more powerful
Napier Lion engine. It was sent to Latvia for evaluation in 1926, but was only flown three times in Latvia before it was rejected, and was eventually sent back to Beardmore and scrapped. No more W.B.XXVIs were built.
[Jarrett 1996, p.31.]
Specifications
Notes
References
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External links
BEARDMORE WB.26
{{Beardmore aircraft
1920s British fighter aircraft
W.B.XXVI
Single-engined tractor aircraft
Biplanes
Aircraft first flown in 1925