FLIGHTPATH | 55A Bristol Scout being operated in the Middle East.
[Rutherford Album, RAAF Museum Archive]
Frank Barnwell, seen
here in a later RAF
uniform, was a
remarkable designer,
key to Bristol’s success
in W.W.I. [via Author]One of the most famous images of Australia’s W.W.I,
this Frank Hurly photograph shows Ross Smith (left)
with his observer and a Bristol Fighter. [RAAF Museum
Archive]The Minor Types
As well as the three great successes of the
war-time aircraft, Bristol developed several
other machines that didn’t make the cut.The Bristol T.T.A
A large two-seat, twin-engine biplane
designed in 1915 as a local defence
fighter, with two prototypes built, but it
did not go into production.Bristol Scout E & F
A single seat biplane fighter built in 1916
to use a proposed 200 hp (150 kW)
Cruciform radial engine, which was never
completed. Next, 200 hp Hispano-Suizas
were proposed, then 200 hp Sunbeam
Arabs. With the Arab engine the design
was redesignated the Scout F, and a later
still version with a Cosmos Mercury radial
as the F1, but never produced, the
Armistice intervening.Bristol F.3A
A three-seat, single-engine biplane
designed in 1916 as an anti-Zeppelin
fighter. Two prototypes were ordered,
but not completed.Bristol M.R.1
Perhaps the most interesting of the
unsuccessful types, the M.R.1 was an
unusual experimental biplane trialling
the then rare concept of metal construc-
tion, having an aluminium monocoque
fuselage and metal wings, originally to
be aluminium, but sub-contracted out
to be built in steel. Sometimes noted as
a ‘metal F.2B’ it was of similar layout but
new design, with two built, but the war’s
end stopped development.The Bristol M.R.1 [via Author]