- Thread Starter Thread Starter
- #61
Yep but occasionally, just occasionally, Blackburn pulled a cracker out of all that rubbish.
Of course Blackburn weren't the only ones designing and building rubbish in the UK. Fairey Aviation, Handley Page, Armstrong Whitworth, Bristol, Gloster, Vickers, Avro, Supermarine, de Havilland, Hawker and so on. But I think the biggest problem was the Air Ministry and it's seemingly lack of vision and foresight which wasn't helped by the RAF and the governments of the day. Whilst this was most evident during the interwar years, it also reared its head again after WW2. The Americans soon leapt ahead in military aviation, but the British didn't in some areas. They didn't go with swept wings until the Hawker Hunters, except for Roy Chadwick's Avro Vulcan and the other two V Bombers. At least of their jet fighters after the war was a tail dragger. It's not as though they didn't have the breakthroughs or smarts, but I don't know. Maybe they were to stuck in their ways. Then there is the TSR-2; arguably the most advanced aircraft of its time and they cancel it completely. I actually think that both prior to and after WW2 they had far to many aviation companies and should have consolidated them down to about four maybe five companies maximum to design and build both military and civil aircraft. That may have worked better all around for them and made them more technically advanced.
Of course Blackburn weren't the only ones designing and building rubbish in the UK. Fairey Aviation, Handley Page, Armstrong Whitworth, Bristol, Gloster, Vickers, Avro, Supermarine, de Havilland, Hawker and so on. But I think the biggest problem was the Air Ministry and it's seemingly lack of vision and foresight which wasn't helped by the RAF and the governments of the day. Whilst this was most evident during the interwar years, it also reared its head again after WW2. The Americans soon leapt ahead in military aviation, but the British didn't in some areas. They didn't go with swept wings until the Hawker Hunters, except for Roy Chadwick's Avro Vulcan and the other two V Bombers. At least of their jet fighters after the war was a tail dragger. It's not as though they didn't have the breakthroughs or smarts, but I don't know. Maybe they were to stuck in their ways. Then there is the TSR-2; arguably the most advanced aircraft of its time and they cancel it completely. I actually think that both prior to and after WW2 they had far to many aviation companies and should have consolidated them down to about four maybe five companies maximum to design and build both military and civil aircraft. That may have worked better all around for them and made them more technically advanced.
