Supermarine Swift
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| Supermarine Swift | |
|---|---|
 Swift F Mk.2 WK242 / "P" of No. 56 Sqn. |
|
| Type | Fighter |
| Manufacturer | Supermarine Aviation Works (Vickers) Ltd. |
| Designed by | Joseph "Joe" Smith |
| Maiden flight | 29 December 1948 (Type 510) |
| Introduced | 1954 |
| Retired | 1970s |
| Primary user | Royal Air Force |
| Number built | 197 |
| Developed from | Supermarine Attacker |
The Supermarine Swift was a British single-seat jet fighter of the Royal Air Force (RAF), built by Supermarine during the 1950s. After a protracted development period, the Swift entered service as an interceptor, but, due to a spate of accidents, its service life was short. A photo reconnaissance variant resolved some of the Swift's teething problems.
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[edit] Design and development
The Swift evolved from a number of prototypes, the first being the Type 510, a prototype jet fighter. It was based upon the Supermarine Attacker, a straight-wing Fleet Air Arm jet with a taildragger undercarriage, but had swept-wings, first flying in 1948; a year after the first navalised prototype Attacker had flown. The Type 510 became the first British aircraft to have both swept wings and a swept tailplane. The Type 510 also had the distinction of becoming the first swept-wing aircraft to take off and land from an aircraft carrier, during trials for the Royal Navy 's (RN) Fleet Air Arm (FAA). However, RN interest soon waned despite Supermarine's modifications to the aircraft to improve aspects of its performance.
The second aircraft in the ancestral lineage that led to the Swift was the Type 528, which first flew in March 1950. Soon after its first flight, many modifications were made to its structure and it was then designated the Type 535, making its first flight under this name in August 1950. The final variant was the Type 541, a pre-production model of the Swift for which the Air Ministry had placed an order of over one hundred as a fallback in case the Hawker Hunter programme failed. The Swift was also seen by the Ministry as a replacement for the Gloster Meteor in the role of air defence.
The Type 541 replaced its predecessors' Rolls-Royce Nene centrifugal flow turbojet engine with the axial-flow Rolls-Royce AJ.65 turbojet engine and its successor Avon engines. The fuselage, which had been given a cross section suitable for the Nene engine, was not redesigned for the narrower AJ.65 and Avon engines. Two Type 541s were produced, the first prototype making its maiden flight in 1951 and the second the following year.
The Swift had been ordered into "super-priority" production, a policy created by Sir Winston Churchill who had become Prime Minister in 1951 at a time of particular tension between NATO and the Warsaw Pact during the Cold War; the Korean War had begun in 1950. The first production variant was a fighter designated the Swift F Mk.1 of which eighteen were eventually built. The first flight occurred in 1953 and the F.1 entered service with No. 56 Squadron RAF in February 1954, becoming the RAF's first swept-wing aircraft. It was powered by a 7,500 lbf (33.4 kN)-thrust Avon 109 engine and carried an armament of two 30 mm ADEN cannon.
The second variant was the F Mk.2 of which sixteen were built. It was simply an F.1 with two extra ADENs. However, the addition of these cannons caused problems as the structural modifications required to house the increased ammunition load lead to dangerous handling problems with the aircraft. Numerous further modifications were then required to resolve this issue.
The third Swift variant was the F Mk.3, with twenty-five being built and powered by an Avon 114 engine with reheat. It was never taken into operational service with the Royal Air Force and was used just as an instructional airframe. The next variant was the F Mk.4, which included a variable incidence tailplane intended to correct the handling problems that the Swift suffered from. It did indeed fix the problem, however, it was found that reheat could not actually be ignited at high altitude which added to the problems that the Swift variants suffered from.
The next in the line, the FR Mk.5, had a longer nose to accommodate a number of cameras to suit it to a reconnaissance tole and had other modifications to its structure. The FR.5 also reverted to the F.1's 2 ADEN armament. It first flew in 1955 and entered service the following year. It performed its reconnaissance mainly at low-level, making the reheat problem at high altitude irrelevant.
Two further variants were designed; the PR Mk.6 was an unarmed photo reconnaissance variant. However, it was a short-lived program due to ever-present reheat problems. The last variant was the F Mk.7 and was the first Swift variant to be fitted with guided-missiles, being armed with the Fairey Fireflash air-to-air missile and was powered by a new Avon engine. Only fourteen were built and none ever entered service with the RAF, being relegated - along with its prototype missiles - to guided-missile trials duties.
[edit] Operational history
Tragedy began to strike early on in the career of the Swift, with a number of accidents occurring with the F.1 and F.2, some ending fatally. Due to these accidents, the F.1 was grounded in August in the same year it had entered service, while the F.2, which had replaced the F 1 in August, was also soon grounded.
All fighter variants of the Swift were eventually withdrawn from service by the RAF, after only a brief time in service, and were replaced by the more capable Hawker Hunter.
The FR.5 was deemed to be suitable for its role and was based with RAF Germany during the Cold War. A number of Swift airframes went to Australia for Operation Buffalo in 1956, being placed at various distances from a detonating atomic bomb.[1] The FR.5 was the last Swift variant to enter service with the RAF and was eventually replaced by the Hunter FR.10, leaving the RAF in 1961.
The Swift never saw combat action with the RAF. It did break a number of speed records in its time; in Libya, in 1953, an F.4 piloted by Commander Mike Lithgow broke the world absolute speed record, reaching a speed of 737.7 mph (1187 km/h), though it was broken in turn only hours later by the Douglas Skyray, a United States Navy (USN) fighter. Under two hundred Swifts were built from an order of 497.
By its last variant, many of the problems that had plagued the earlier Swifts were resolved, but the Swift programme was not continued. The Hunter was performing satisfactory in the same roles as the Swift and any requirement to persist with the Swift[2]
[edit] Operators
- Royal Air Force
- No. 2 Squadron RAF FR.5
- No. 4 Squadron RAF FR.5
- No. 56 Squadron RAF F.1 and F.2
- No. 79 Squadron RAF FR.5
[edit] Survivors
- VV106 (Supermarine 517) is stored by the Fleet Air Arm Museum, Yeovilton, England.
- WK198 (F.4) fuselage only of the former World air speed record holder is on display at the North East Aircraft Museum, Sunderland, England.
- WK275 (F.3) on display at Upper Hill, Herefordshire, England.
- WK277 (FR.5) on display at the Newark Air Museum, Newark, England.
- WK281 (FR.5) on display at the Tangmere Military Aviation Museum, Tangmere, England.
- G-SWIF (F.7, the former XF114) is stored by at Solent Sky, Southampton, England.
[edit] Popular culture
One of the prototypes (VV119) of the Swift (named the Prometheus in the film) appeared in the 1952 film The Sound Barrier.
[edit] Specifications (Supermarine Swift FR Mk.5)
General characteristics
- Crew: 1
- Length: 42 ft 3 in (12.8 m)
- Wingspan: 32 ft 4 in (9.9 m)
- Height: 13 ft 6 in (4.1 m)
- Wing area: 328 ft² (30.5 m²)
- Empty weight: 13,435 lb (6,094 kg)
- Max takeoff weight: 21,673 lb (9,380 kg)
- Powerplant: 1× Rolls-Royce Avon 114 turbojet
- Dry thrust: 7,175 lbf (31.9 kN)
- Thrust with afterburner: 9,450 lbf (42.0 kN)
Performance
- Maximum speed: 713 mph (1147 km/h)
- Range: 630 mi (1,015 km)
- Service ceiling 45,800 ft (13,960 m)
Armament
- 2 × 30 mm ADEN cannons and provisions for bombs and rockets
[edit] See also
Related development
Comparable aircraft
Related lists
[edit] References
[edit] Notes
[edit] Bibliography
- Birtles, Philip. Supermarine Attacker, Swift and Scimitar (Postwar Military Aircraft 7). London: Ian Allan, 1992. ISBN 0-7110-2034-5.
- Taylor, John W.R. "Supermarine Swift." Combat Aircraft of the World from 1909 to the present. New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1969. ISBN 0-425-03633-2.
- Winchester, Jim. The World's Worst Aircraft: From Pioneering Failures to Multimillion Dollar Disasters. London: Amber Books Ltd., 2005. ISBN 1-904687-34-2.
[edit] External links
- British Aircraft Directory entry
- Swift at Thunder and Lightnings
- Picture of a Swift F.Mk.1
- Picture of an early Swift
- Picture of the Supermarine 510 VV106
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