The Avro Type F was an early single seat British aircraft from

Avro AVRO, short for Algemene Vereniging Radio Omroep ("General Association of Radio Broadcasting"), was a Dutch public broadcasting association operating within the framework of the Nederlandse Publieke Omroep system. It was the first public broa ...

. On 1 May 1912 it became the first aircraft in the world to fly with a completely enclosed cabin for the pilot as an integral part of the design.

Design and development

It was a wire-braced mid-wing

monoplane A monoplane is a fixed-wing aircraft configuration with a single mainplane, in contrast to a biplane or other types of multiplanes, which have multiple planes. A monoplane has inherently the highest efficiency and lowest drag of any wing con ...

with a tailskid undercarriage. 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 ...

was teardrop-shaped with flat sides and cellon windows. Oil leakage from the engine had been anticipated to obscure pilot view by coating cabin windows; so two circular windows at the pilot's head level could be opened for the pilot's head to protrude when flying, but their use proved unnecessary. Ingress and egress was via a sheet-aluminum trapdoor in the fuselage top. The cabin was quite cramped, being only 2 ft (60 cm) across at its widest point. The Type F made a few test flights in mid-1912 until damaged beyond repair in a hard landing on 13 September, after which it was not repaired. Its

Viale 35 hp The Viale 35 hp was a five-cylinder, air-cooled, radial engine for aircraft use designed and built in France by the Italian engine designer Spirito Mario Viale, that was first run around 1910. It developed 35 horsepower (26 kW). Three ...

engine is on display at the

Science Museum A science museum is a museum devoted primarily to science. Older science museums tended to concentrate on static displays of objects related to natural history, paleontology, geology, industry and industrial machinery, etc. Modern trends in ...

in London; and the rudder was preserved by the

Royal Aero Club The Royal Aero Club (RAeC) is the national co-ordinating body for air sport in the United Kingdom. It was founded in 1901 as the Aero Club of Great Britain, being granted the title of the "Royal Aero Club" in 1910. History The Aero Club was foun ...

Specifications

References

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Avro Type F
– British Aircraft Directory {{Avro aircraft 1910s British experimental aircraft Type F Single-engined tractor aircraft Mid-wing aircraft Aircraft first flown in 1912