Government Aircraft Factories

Government Aircraft Factories (GAF) was the name of an aircraft manufacturer owned by the Government of Australia. The primary factory was located at Fishermans Bend, a suburb of Melbourne in Victoria. It had its origins in the lead-up to World War II, during which it was known as the Department of Aircraft Production (DAP). In 1987, GAF was reorganised and renamed as Aerospace Technologies of Australia (ASTA) then privatised. ASTA was purchased by Rockwell International, that was in turn purchased by Boeing a few years later. ASTA subsequently formed the nucleus of Boeing Australia.

History

World War II

The entity was established just before the outbreak of World War II when the Australian government recognised that supplies of aircraft from traditional sources could no longer be assured. To ensure supply of aircraft, in 1939 the government set up the new Department of Supply and Development with an Aircraft Construction Branch within that department; both organisations officially came into being on 1 July 1939. The organisation was set up specifically to produce the Bristol Beaufort under licence in Australia. After an evaluation process to assess the operational needs of the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), a British Air Mission sent to Australia recommended that the Beaufort be manufactured for delivery to both the RAAF and the Royal Air Force (RAF).

It is noteworthy that at this stage (mid-1939) an Australian aircraft industry barely existed. The private-enterprise Commonwealth Aircraft Corporation had by that time completed three of its first product, the Wirraway, and was in the process of building the prototype of its second type, the Wackett. Both of these were single-engined aircraft and the Wackett was not an advanced design by any criterion. The other major aircraft manufacturer, de Havilland Australia, had up to that time mainly assembled aircraft manufactured by its parent company imported into Australia as parts, commencing the delivery of 20 Tiger Moths, built from imported fuselages and locally manufactured wings, to the RAAF in May 1939. Total production in Australia to mid-1939 of all types of aircraft was certainly less than 100, and may have been less than seventy. Many of these were "one-offs" and the vast majority were of "wood-and-fabric" construction like the Tiger Moth. By contrast the Beaufort was a large twin-engined all-metal aircraft of advanced design for the time.

An initial order for 180 Beauforts was placed in July 1939, for delivery in equal numbers to the RAAF and RAF. By the time the first aircraft was delivered, the organisation responsible for its manufacture had undergone several changes. In March 1940 the Aircraft Construction Branch was renamed the Aircraft Production Commission. Three months later oversight responsibility was removed from the Minister for Supply and Development to the Minister for Munitions. In June 1941 (by which time production work had begun) the Aircraft Production Commission was removed from the Department of Supply and Development, placed within the newly created Department of Aircraft Production (DAP) and was soon after renamed the Aircraft Advisory Committee for the Co-ordination of Aircraft Production with the actual aircraft manufacturer being constituted as the Beaufort Division, usually referred to as the Beaufort Division of the DAP.

As the Australian-built Beaufort was to be fitted with Pratt & Whitney R-1830 engines instead of the Bristol Taurus originally installed, the aircraft required several design changes, this partially accounting for the delay between the initial order and the first flight of the first aircraft in August 1941 (a Bristol-built aircraft had earlier been delivered to Australia and modified, flying with R-1830s for three months prior to this). Another reason for the delay was that various other parts of the aircraft (such as the undercarriage legs) were originally to come from Britain, but because of an embargo by the British Government on War Material after the Fall of France these had to be locally manufactured instead. One seemingly innocuous item caused major problems; no ball bearings were manufactured in Australia at the time, and so with none forthcoming from Britain a local substitute had to be found and incorporated into the design.

The original intention was that the first 90 aircraft would be delivered to the RAF; in the event only six were delivered to that air arm, although 59 were assigned RAF serials in the ''T95xx'' and ''T96xx'' serial number blocks. The flight of the first Australian-built aircraft was the culmination of efforts by over 600 different companies and organisations - the Beaufort Division being more-or-less responsible for only final assembly, with only wing centre-sections of some aircraft being manufactured "in-house" at Fishermans Bend, gun turrets being manufactured at Fairfield, Victoria, and final assembly on two lines; at Fishermans Bend and at Mascot. Major assemblies were manufactured by the Chullora Railway Workshops in Sydney, Newport Workshops in Melbourne and Islington Railway Workshops

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