The Hydro no.120 was a Romanian-designed two-seat, single-engine

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 ...

configured as a single-float

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 ...

. Built by Bristol in 1913, it was lost on its first flight.

Development

The Romanian aircraft designer

Henri Coandă Henri Marie Coandă (; 7 June 1886 – 25 November 1972)''Flight'' 1973 was a Romanian inventor, aerodynamics pioneer, and builder of an experimental aircraft, the Coandă-1910 described by Coandă in the mid-1950s as the world's first jet, a co ...

joined the British and Colonial Aeroplane Company, as Bristol was then known, in January 1912. The following January he designed a two-seat, single-engine single-float biplane. It was begun as a private venture but was purchased subject to acceptance trials by the

Admiralty Admiralty most often refers to: *Admiralty, Hong Kong * Admiralty (United Kingdom), military department in command of the Royal Navy from 1707 to 1964 *The rank of admiral * Admiralty law Admiralty can also refer to: Buildings *Admiralty, Tr ...

. As it turned out, the aircraft did not survive long enough to undertake these trials. It received no Bristol type name at the time and as a pre-

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

type, it did not get a retrospective Type number in 1923. For that reason it is usually referred to by its Bristol construction number, 120, or as the Hydro no.120. It was a single-bay biplane with unswept and unstaggered wings. The circular-section

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 ...

was mounted between the wings with a gap below and unusual framed struts above at the centre section. The observer's cockpit was between these frames, the pilot sitting at the wing trailing edge. The 80 hp (60 kW) Gnome

rotary engine The rotary engine is an early type of internal combustion engine, usually designed with an odd number of cylinders per row in a radial configuration. The engine's crankshaft remained stationary in operation, while the entire crankcase and i ...

was enclosed in a close-fitting

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 ...

cowling. The fuselage tapered to the tail, which in typical Coandă style comprised a nearly semicircular fixed

horizontal stabiliser 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 gyroplan ...

with a single

elevator An elevator or lift is a wire rope, cable-assisted, hydraulic cylinder-assisted, or roller-track assisted machine that vertically transports people or freight between floors, levels, or deck (building), decks of a building, watercraft, ...

, plus a balanced

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 ...

without a fixed fin. There was a single wide mahogany float built by

Oscar Gnosspelius Major Oscar Theodor Gnosspelius (10 March 1878 – 17 February 1953) was an English civil engineer and pioneer seaplane builder. Gnosspelius was born at Brookfield House, Lydiate on 18 March 1878 the only son of Adolf Jonathan Gnosspelius. He was ...

, with a pair of water rudders at its rear. Two streamlined cylindrical wingtip floats provided lateral stability. No. 120's career was very brief. After several days on the water at

Cowes Cowes () is an English seaport town and civil parish on the Isle of Wight. Cowes is located on the west bank of the estuary of the River Medina, facing the smaller town of East Cowes on the east bank. The two towns are linked by the Cowes Floa ...

for tests, the Gnosspelius float became waterlogged and heavy. It was therefore replaced by a lightweight, purpose-built

Consuta Consuta was a form of construction of watertight hulls for boats and marine aircraft, comprising four veneers of mahogany planking interleaved with waterproofed calico and stitched together with copper wire. The name is from the latin for "sewn t ...

float from

Saunders and Company Saunders is a surname of English and Scottish patronymic origin derived from Sander, a mediaeval form of Alexander.See also: Sander (name) People * Ab Saunders (1851–1883), American cowboy and gunman * Al Saunders (born 1947), American foot ...

of Cowes. On 15 April 1913,

Harry Busteed Harry may refer to: TV shows * ''Harry'' (American TV series), a 1987 American comedy series starring Alan Arkin * ''Harry'' (British TV series), a 1993 BBC drama that ran for two seasons * ''Harry'' (talk show), a 2016 American daytime talk show ...

took off successfully, only for the closely cowled engine to overheat and lose power. The subsequent heavy emergency landing destroyed the float, and the aircraft—though not its pilot—was lost.

Specifications

References

{{Bristol aircraft 1910s British military aircraft Floatplanes Hydro no.120 Biplanes Single-engined tractor aircraft Rotary-engined aircraft Aircraft first flown in 1913