This thread is for a series of drawings I've made of the products of this company.
Pioneer British aviator Claude Grahame-White founded the Grahame-White Aviation Company in 1911 at Hendon, the site later becoming the famous airport, RAF airfield and today home of the RAF Museum, Hendon.
This company had many and varied aircraft, several were just given names but two designation systems were put into place. Many of the post war projects never came to fruition and the company switched to building cyclecars until 1924 when the company finally closed.
During the Great War the company licence-built the Farman HF.20, R.A.F. B.E.2c, Airco D.H.6, Morane-Saulnier Type G (as the Type XIV) and the Breguet Bre.5 (as the Type 19) for the RFC and the RNAS.
Many of the the aircraft build by the company have little surviving record beyond a few contemporary illustrations and some line drawings and photographs. In some cases the dimensions are not known and these have had to be guessimated.
Listed below are all the products, my drawings are entered at the relevant places, hopefully I'll be able to fill in some of the blanks later on.
Baby: a Farman-layout pusher built in 1910 with a 50hp Gnome engine. It was licence-built in the US by the Burgess Company as the Burgess Type E.
Lizzie: a tractor-layout aircraft built in 1913 using a Morane-Saulnier fuselage.
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/2YWDgIK.png)
Type VI: this 1913 aircraft was perhaps one of the first in Britain intended as an armed scout, it could be armed with a Colt machine-gun and carried a pilot and two gun-crew. It was designed by J. D. North. Powered by an 120hp Austro-Daimler engine the propeller was driven by a large-diameter tubular driveshaft and a duplex chain. Only one attempt was made to fly it as it was under-powered aircraft and it only just managed to clear the hedge at the boundary of the airfield before making a forced landing!
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/JDfPI66.png)
Type VII Popular: a conventional pusher-configuration aircraft designed by J. D. North. It was built in single and two-seat versions and could be powered by a 35hp Anzani or 50hp Gnome Omega rotary engine. One of two ordered ordered by RFC in 1913 saw some use.
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/ztnCpeb.png)
Type VIIc Popular: another pusher-design of 1913 which shared the VII Popular designation but was in fact a heavily revised design.
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/4e8MsYM.png)
Type VIII: another 1913 design, this time a seaplane of conventional tractor layout and powered by an Anzani or Gnome rotary engine.
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/Mchbrp9.png)
Type IX: a monoplane design built in 1912.
Type X Charabanc: another J.D. North design. It first flew in 1913 powered by a 120hp Austro-Daimler engine and flown by Louis Noel with seven passengers set a British world record on 22 September 1913. On 2 October, he set a world record in carrying nine passengers, staying aloft for nearly twenty minutes. A 100hp Green E.6 engine was fitted for the 1913 Michelin Cup, which it won covering a distance of over 300 miles on 9 November 1913 piloted by R.H. Carr.
The first parachute descent from an aircraft in Great Britain was made by W. Newell from Charabanc at Hendon on 9 May 1914.
Type XI Naval and Military Biplane: This was another attempt to build a military aircraft, being displayed at the 1914 Olympia Show. Powered by a 100hp Monosoupape, the propeller was driven by a sprocket and chain system.
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/1L8DOho.png)
Type XII Box-Kite: built in 1913 to the then popular Box-Kite design.
Type XIII Circuit of Britain Biplane: a racing seaplane built to compete in the Daily Mail's 1914 Circuit of Britain air race, to be flown by Claude Grahame-White. However the outbreak of war saw the event cancelled and the Type XIII was converted into a landplane, probably in an attempt to drum up a military order. It was powered by a 100hp Monosoupape. The drawing shows the later landplane conversion.
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/nziF1Gk.png)
Type XV (Admiralty Type 1600): a development of the VII Popular for use as a military trainer. 135 were built for the Admiralty and the RFC. During November 1913 one RFC Type XV was employed in the first British trials firing a Lewis machine gun at ground targets. Three survived the war to go onto the civil register in 1919.
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/FqVu6tZ.png)
Type XVI: a 1914 seaplane.
Type 18: a two-seat reconnaissance-bomber powered by a 285hp Sunbeam Maori engine. A prototype was built, the only-known photo shows its structure before the airframe was given its doped fabric covering. It lost out to the Airco DH.4 and other similar competitors.
Type 20: a prototype scout built in 1916 and powered by an 80hp Clerget 9C or Le Rhone 9C rotary engine. The fuselage was believed to be that of a Morane-Saulnier G or H. It never progressed past trials.
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/0Q1pCEX.png)
Type 21: designed in 1917 this was a much cleaner design than the Type 20 having streamlined interplane struts and an aerodynamic dorsal fairing. The engine remained an 80hp Le Rhone 9C. Again the design failed to impress the RFC.
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/XQR3s3j.png)
G.W.E.4 Ganymede: a heavy three-engine bomber designed in 1918. Two of the engines were located at the front of the booms driving tractor propellers while the third engine was in the rear of the central nacelle driving a pusher propeller. Two pilots and a bomb-aimer/gunner were in the central nacelle with a gunner in each fuselage boom. Intending to use the 400hp Liberty engine, shortages meant three 270hp Sunbeam Maori engines were fitted instead, Only one of three prototypes was completed, being tested in 1919. After being damaged in a landing accident it was rebuilt into a civil airliner as the G.W.E.9 Ganymede. The central engine was removed and two 450hp Napier Lions fitted. A glazed cabin accommodated 12 passengers. Before it could enter service it was destroyed by fire in September 1920.
G.W.E.6 Bantam: a conventional racing biplane powered by a 80hp Le Rhône rotary engine. Two aircraft took part in the 1919 Aerial Derby at Hendon Aerodrome, but neither finished the race. A third example was flown in South Africa in the 1920s.
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/nUXy7Kw.png)
G.W.E.7 Aero-Limousine: a luxury airliner seating four passengers in a cabin in the nose with the pilot behind. It was powered by two 320hp Rolls-Royce Eagle V piston engines. Registered G-EALR it was first flown in 1919 but was later damaged beyond repair in a forced landing at Hendon, the damaged remains being burned in 1920.
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/OHJgJ9w.png)
G.W.E.8: a 1919 design for a 10 passenger flying boat powered by two 350hp Rolls-Royce Eagles and a range of 500 miles but never built.
G.W.E.10: a 1920 design for a small single-seat express mail plane, possible being a Bantam development. It was never built.
A large 24-seat three-fuselage and three-engined airliner was also planned but never built.
