The Blackburn T.R.1 Sprat was a British single-engine two-seat

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 ...

trainer, built in 1926 for advanced training, deck-landing and

seaplane A seaplane is a powered fixed-wing aircraft capable of takeoff, taking off and water landing, landing (alighting) on water.Gunston, "The Cambridge Aerospace Dictionary", 2009. Seaplanes are usually divided into two categories based on their tec ...

experience. Just one was built.

Development

The Sprat was designed to Air Ministry Specification 5/24 as an

RAF The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...

advanced trainer and

Fleet Air Arm The Fleet Air Arm (FAA) is one of the five fighting arms of the Royal Navy and is responsible for the delivery of naval air power both from land and at sea. The Fleet Air Arm operates the F-35 Lightning II for maritime strike, the AW159 Wil ...

deck-landing trainer. It was specified that the aircraft should be readily convertible to a

, again to be used as a trainer. The specification produced contracts for three machines, the

Vickers Vendace The Vickers Vendace was a 1920s British trainer aircraft. It was originally designed as a floatplane trainer for the Royal Air Force. Background In October 1924, the British Air Ministry issued Specification 5A/24 for a floatplane trainer. T ...

, the Parnall Perch and the Sprat. The Sprat, though a smaller aircraft, had strong family resemblances to the earlier Velos

torpedo bomber A torpedo bomber is a military aircraft designed primarily to attack ships with aerial torpedoes. Torpedo bombers came into existence just before the First World War almost as soon as aircraft were built that were capable of carrying the weight ...

. The Sprat was a staggered, single-bay biplane with equal-span wings that could be folded for carrier stowage. The

fuselage The fuselage (; from the French ''fuselé'' "spindle-shaped") is an aircraft's main body section. It holds crew, passengers, or cargo. In single-engine aircraft, it will usually contain an engine as well, although in some amphibious aircraft t ...

centre section was built around a tubular-steel structure which linked the engine mounting and the wooded-framed rear fuselage. The two dual-control open cockpits were both behind the trailing edge of the wing for optimum visibility. Unusually, the instruments were placed on the rear spar of the upper wing centre section, where they could be read from both cockpits. The

rudder A rudder is a primary control surface used to steer a ship, boat, submarine, hovercraft, aircraft, or other vehicle that moves through a fluid medium (generally aircraft, air or watercraft, water). On an aircraft the rudder is used primarily to ...

area was large compared to that of the fin, and a braced

tailplane A tailplane, also known as a horizontal stabiliser, is a small lifting surface located on the tail (empennage) behind the main lifting surfaces of a fixed-wing aircraft as well as other non-fixed-wing aircraft such as helicopters and gyroplane ...

was placed on top of the rear fuselage. The main

undercarriage Undercarriage is the part of a moving vehicle that is underneath the main body of the vehicle. The term originally applied to this part of a horse-drawn carriage, and usage has since broadened to include: *The landing gear of an aircraft. *The ch ...

was a robust split-axle construction, with the legs joining the wings at the bottom of the X-form centre-section struts. Braced stub axles carried the arrester claws required by the longitudinal arrester wires of

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against F ...

aircraft carriers up to 1926. The undercarriage assembly was designed so that it could be easily removed with the aircraft on trestles, and replaced with a pair of

aluminium Aluminium (aluminum in American and Canadian English) is a chemical element with the symbol Al and atomic number 13. Aluminium has a density lower than those of other common metals, at approximately one third that of steel. I ...

single-step, V-bottomed round-topped floats. These carried water rudders for manoeuvring afloat. The Sprat was powered by a water-cooled 275 hp (210 kW)

Rolls-Royce Falcon III The Rolls-Royce Falcon is an aero engine developed in 1915. It was a smaller version of the Rolls-Royce Eagle, a liquid-cooled V-12 of 867 cu in (14.2 L) capacity. Fitted to many British World War I-era aircraft, production ceased in 1927. ...

engine with a nose radiator, driving a four-bladed wooden propeller. As on the Velos, the upper engine cowling dropped smoothly away from the upper wing leading edge.

Operational history

The Sprat first flew at Blackburn's works at

Brough Aerodrome Brough Aerodrome was a private use aerodrome located at Brough, East Riding of Yorkshire, England. It is now disused with the last known flight out of the airfield occurring in 2011. The airfield closed in 2013. It is planned that the site ...

, then went to

Martlesham Heath Martlesham Heath village is situated 6 miles (10 km) east of Ipswich, in Suffolk, England. This was an ancient area of heathland and latterly the site of Martlesham Heath Airfield. A "new village" was established there in the mid-1970s and th ...

for comparative trials with the other two contenders. In the end, though the Vendace was selected as the best aircraft for the specification, no orders were placed with any manufacturer because of economy cuts. The Sprat last appeared in public at the

Hendon Hendon is an urban area in the Borough of Barnet, North-West London northwest of Charing Cross. Hendon was an ancient manor and parish in the county of Middlesex and a former borough, the Municipal Borough of Hendon; it has been part of Great ...

RAF display in July 1926.

Specifications (landplane)

Blackburn Sprat 3 view NACA Aircraft Circular No

References

* {{Blackburn aircraft

Sprat Sprat is the common name applied to a group of forage fish belonging to the genus ''Sprattus'' in the family Clupeidae. The term also is applied to a number of other small sprat-like forage fish (''Clupeoides'', ''Clupeonella'', '' Corica'', ' ...

1920s British military trainer aircraft Single-engined tractor aircraft Biplanes Carrier-based aircraft Aircraft first flown in 1926