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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 10 ก.ย. 2007
- Design and development
The origins of the Empire boats lay in an Air Ministry requirement for passenger and mail carriers that could service the colonies particularly to make the connection to Australia.
The Empire was officially known as the C-class and each aircraft was christened with a name beginning with C. The first aircraft, G-ADHL Canopus, was completed in June 1936 and launched on 3 July. A total of 42 Empires were built, all at Short's Rochester factory.
Imperial Airways (and its successor BOAC), Qantas and TEAL operated the Short Empire.
The first series of the Short Empires, the S23, could carry 5 crew, 17 passengers, and 4,480 lb (2,035 kg) of cargo at a maximum speed of 174 knots (320 km/h).
The range of the S.23 was less than that of the US Sikorsky "Clipper" flying boats and as such they could not provide a trans-Atlantic service. Two boats (Caledonia and Cambria) were lightened and given long range tanks so they could make the trip but that meant they could carry fewer passengers and less cargo. In an attempt to manage the Altantic crossing a piggy-back approach was tried. Using a built up S.23 design as the main carrier and a smaller four-engined floatplane design, the Short S.20, mounted on its back. Only a single example was built of a carrier aircraft, the S.21 (Maia) and one S.20 (Mercury) together known as the Short Mayo Composite A successful mid-air launch of Mercury was made in 1938.
The S30 series were fitted with Bristol Perseus sleeve valve engines and had a strengthened airframe allowing the take off weight to be increased to 46,000 pounds and giving a range of 1,500 miles. Cabot, Caribou, Clyde and Connemara were fitted with in-flight refuelling equipment and extra fuel tanks so they could be used for a trans-atlantic airmail service. The idea behind this was for the aircraft to take off and once airborne take on extra fuel to an all up weight of 53,000 pounds giving a range of over 2,500 miles. The extra fuel did reduce the payload to 4,270 pounds against the 6,250 pounds of the standard craft. The refuelling was by 3 converted Handley Page Harrow bombers operating out of Ireland and Newfoundland.
In addition to the C class flying boats there were also three S.26 type built; these were known as the "G class" and had names starting with "G": Golden Hind, Golden Fleece and Golden Horn. They were a scaled up version of the C class, with a wing span of 134 ft (40.9 m) and a length of 101 ft. (30.9 m).
General characteristics
Length: 88 ft (26.82m)
Wingspan: 114 ft (34.75 m)
Height: 31 ft 9¾ in (9.70 m)
Wing area: 1,500 ft² (139.35 m²)
Empty weight: 23,500 lb (10,659 kg)
Max takeoff weight: 40,500 lb (18,370 kg)
Powerplant: 4× Bristol Pegasus radial engines, 920 hp (696 kW) each
Performance
Maximum speed: 200 mph (322 km/h)
Range: 760 miles (1,223 km)
Service ceiling: 20,000 ft (6,100 m) - บันเทิง
I was a 4th grade schoolkid in Sydney in 1960. Lived at Darling point, school at Double Bay, and used to ride my bike to Rose Bay to watch the Sunderlands and eat oysters from under the pier. Got my private licence at 17. The Victa Airtourer I soloed in is still flying.
I flew in these flying boats out of Seletar in Singapore in 1949-50. I went on several bombing missions over Malaya in these great aircraft. My job was loading the bomb racks after each bombing run.
Amazing!
Earns my vote for the best looking flying boat :D.
As a kid I sailed on Sydney Harbour in the 1960s and 1970s. The images of the Flying Boat landing on the Harbour you see at the end of this posting were being repeated until late 60s. Shark Island is visible in the shot and the aeroplane is seen taking off with Point Piper in the background. The Water Airport was at Rose Bay nearby. By the 60s Ansett was using later versions of these planes to fly to Lord Howe Island, which then had no airstrip
If you go to Kermit Weeks channel, he has one of the former Ansett Short Sunderlands in his collection. No longer air worthy unfortunately.
th-cam.com/video/th1JI90vQtg/w-d-xo.html
I wish they would revive the glorious flying boats. A glamorous form of travel, that's for sure!
Glamorous and very romantic.
Seaplanes are the most practical form of transport, Always wondered why they never had an airport for them and regular flight path`s. Get`s into trouble and can ditch afloat. I just remember the snider trophy winner when i was at school.
@jeanniedee
After WWII Airports became very common around the world. These mighty machines were very pretty but they were very slow. The Constellation and the stratocruiser were faster and soon became the standard for many nation's airlines.
Soon those propeller planes were replaced by jets and the idea of luxury was passed over for larger passenger volumes. Now Airliners are just Geryhound buses with wings.
Strangely no mention of the Corsair which crash landed on a small river in the Belgian Congo. Eventually after damming the river and rebuilding the plane they managed to fly it out again.
What beautiful creatures!
MARVELLOUS ABSOLUTELY MARVELLOUS!!! Such a shame FANTASTIC aircraft like this don't fly anymore! 😧😧😧😧😧😧. It's so sad that such ICONIC aircraft as this & many others around the same time are gone but, hopefully NOT FORGOTTEN!!!
Absolutely brilliant collection!
Thank you for going to the trouble - made my day to watch!
Thanks for the memories, as a Young lad I remember the short Sunderland seaplanes in moth balls in the solent arround 1950
Yes, I too treasure the memory of having an Aquila Airways 'Solent' land very close to our sightseeing (inspecting the Queen Mary and other liners) boat. The Sunderlands hung on at Seletar until 1960, I believe, about the same time and place as the Beaufighter-and then there were those grey ghosts, the three Princess flying boats on the ramp at Calshot.
Love those Imperial Airways flying boats.
To think they did so much on just 3600 bhp! I would love to fly on one!
Incredible footage and what a way to travel!
Marvellous footage and a lot of hard work
Well done sir
Great footage! I am lucky to live in a part of the world where you can still routinely see a water bombing run by a Martin Mars and were small communities are still linked by a de Havilland Beaver on floats. If you are lucky you get to sit in the co-pilot seat but only to discover that the pilot looks to be barely 14 and that the manufacturer's plate on the dash announces the age of the plane to be well in excess of your own. There is nothing like flying at 500' at 120 with a snarling P&W R-985
Very beautiful.
@irishimp2 Imperial 109 is one of my all-time favorites, but it's very hard to find now. The air-to-air refueling used in the book was never used on commercial flights because it never got approval from Britain's Air Ministry. But it was very practical; it was the same probe-and-drogue system used by the US Navy and just about every Air Force in the world today--except the USAF, which decided to go for something incompatible with the US Navy's equipment.
@LoveOfRighteousness The sun never set on the British Empire in the 1930s, so it was possible to fly from London to Singapore without ever landing anywhere that wasn't part of a British colony or Dominion. KLM couldn't, but the Dutch have been very careful to stay good friends with the British since 1783, so it could use the same routes to get to the Dutch East Indies, which were right next to Singapore.
´´THE GOLD YEARS´´
amazing feat of engineering
Very nicely put together, thanks!
The British government did use British seaplanes, hell it had the Sanders-Roe Princess built in the 1950s for what was British Overseas Airways Corporation. But BOAC wasn't interested and went with American airliners.
Just blew my father in law away. He has a picture of the "Caledonia" delivering the mail to the Seychelles from before he was born! To see it in this video blew him away
cool thanks for posting!
Brits have such regal names for their Empire assets.
Very interesting
So proud it's BRITISH
These [planes are the most useful, and practical of all time. Why aren't these planes being used today?
Expensive to operate. They were great when places had more water options then runways. Not that way anymore.
After the sadness of R-101 the Empire Class Flying Boats were majestic wonderful creations. All the best from Canada. Cheers!
the beginning footage of this video shows the plans of the Empire Flying Boat drawn by Brian Cassidy and then photos from his website at www.users.waitrose.com/~mbcass. . The plans are available from the site as either a4 free downloads or to buy full size.
Madness. The english government should have bought and used english flying boats. Then they would have supported thousands of jobs instead of just "buy american".
How much for one of these for a team of 4 + 2 pilots and cargo room?
5*****!
What year?
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