Aeroplane September 2017

T

he work to transform

Brooklands Museum, covered

in depth in the March issue, is

gathering pace. Completion of

the first stage of the

£8.1-million Heritage Lottery Fund-

backed Brooklands Aircraft Factory and

Race Track Revival project was marked at

the museum’s Double Twelve Motorsport

Festival on 17-18 June when Goodwood

supremo Lord March re-opened the

track’s finishing straight. It has been

refurbished for motoring use for the first

time since 1940. Meanwhile, the Aircraft

Factory — using the restored WW2-

vintage Bellman hangar — and Flight

Shed buildings are nearly finished, with a

scheduled opening in October. The

museum is looking for donations to

complete fundraising towards both.

Over at Dunsfold Park airfield, the latest

taxi run by Brooklands Museum’s ex-RAF

VC10 K3 ZA150 took place on Saturday

15 July. Its next activity will be on Sunday

27 August, in the form of a full-bore taxi

run as part of the annual Wings and

Wheels show at Dunsfold being staged

on 26-27 August. On both the Saturday

and Sunday of that weekend, there will be

tours inside the aircraft. Various

Brooklands-organised activities will again

feature at Wings and Wheels — see

http://www.wingsandwheels.net for more

information. Ben Dunnell

For further details and to contribute to

the Brooklands Aircraft Factory and

Race Track Revival project, visit

http://www.brooklandsmuseum.com. Many

thanks to the Brooklands Museum

archives for their assistance with these

features.

ABOVE:

VC10 K3 ZA150

taxiing at Dunsfold

this July.

STEVE POMROY/

BROOKLANDS MUSEUM

AEROPLANE SEPTEMBER 2017 http://www.aeroplanemonthly.com 47

BAC stressed that the layouts were

based on preliminary discussions

“with many of the world’s major

airlines”. The aircraft could be ready

for service in 1969. It claimed that the

rear-mounted engine layout “provides

a long-range turbofan aircraft of the

size needed at the end of the decade

and which has a true profit potential

greater than any other similar capacity

aircraft on offer at this time.”

But by May 1966 BAC had come

up with another double-decker. It

could have been built in two versions,

one with wing-mounted engines, the

other with aft-mounted powerplants.

In both cases power would have come

from a quartet of high-bypass ratio

turbofans.

The former version would have

been able to carry a 70,000lb

(31,800kg) payload and the latter

74,200lb (33,700kg). Direct operating

costs for the rear-engined version

were expected to be 6.5 per cent

better than the other due, it was

claimed by BAC, to lower drag and

less weight.

There were, though, some safety-

related issues raised by these ideas.

The double-deck arrangement could

have created difficulties in the event of

an emergency evacuation with lengthy

escape slides required for upper deck

passengers. Lower deck occupants

would have been uncomfortably close

to the ground in a heavy or wheels-up

landing. Ditchings on water could

have been problematic, too.

On the other hand, the deeper

fuselage would have brought added

structural strength to the VC10’s long

nose, while the altered aerodynamics

removed the need for special

nosewheel tyres to eliminate the risk

in wet weather of spray being ingested

by the engines.

BAC’s legendary chief test pilot

Brian Trubshaw was convinced there

were no insurmountable difficulties.

He told Lance Cole, author of VC10:

Icon of the Skies — BOAC, Boeing and

a Jet Age Battle (published by Pen and

Sword) that the double-decker was

“entirely viable.”

Because the basis of the idea was

for one VC10 fuselage on top of

another, much of the tooling had

already been paid for and costings

could have been kept reasonably

low. Cole told Aeroplane: “Trubshaw

was convinced that it was a viable

engineering and marketing project

which would have competed directly

with the DC-9-60 and wiped out the

Boeing 707-400. He considered it a

brilliant project which was technically

viable.”

BAC’s engineers continued to

seek other ways of increasing the

VC10’s capacity. One proposal, dated

February 1966, envisaged a 300-seat

single-decker with rear-mounted

engines and an oval, four-arc-section

fuselage with space for 10-abreast

seating.

And they were busy on VC10

developments into the 1970s. This

is confirmed by a brochure dated

December 1971, which described a

proposal to accommodate 179 to 225

passengers at 31in (79cm) pitch, with

power courtesy of a pair of rear-

mounted Rolls-Royce RB211s.

This design was designated RTOL/

VC10/RB211, the first four letters

standing for reduced take-off and

landing as it was envisaged that

in short-haul form it would offer

sparkling field performance. A long-

haul variant would have had more

conventional performance.

Interestingly, this proposal seems

to have been under consideration

at Weybridge a year after the

government had refused support

for the promising BAC Three-

Eleven and decided against official

participation in the European Airbus

programme.

By now, though, wide-body aircraft

had become a reality. The first Boeing

747 had arrived at Heathrow in

1970 and all the proposed VC10

developments stayed firmly on the

drawing board. For a while, though,

a double-deck version of the British

four-jet airliner had seemed like a

good idea.

So, as the Airbus A380 marks the

10th anniversary of its entry into

commercial service, it’s interesting to

speculate whether Britain really

could have been first with a

double-deck jet airliner.

BROOKLANDS: ROARING INTO LIFE

38-47_AM_VICKERS_Sept17_cc C.indd 47 31/07/2017 13:29