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Felixstowe F.3
	Felixstowe F3
Role	Military flying boat
Manufacturer	Short Brothers; Dick, Kerr & Co.; Phoenix Dynamo Manufacturing Company; Malta Dockyard
Designed by	J C Porte,
First flight	February 1917
Introduced	1917
Primary users	RNAS; RAF; US Navy
Number built	182
Developed from	Felixstowe F.2
Variants	Felixstowe F.5; Felixstowe F5L

The Felixstowe F.3 was a British First World War flying boat designed by Lieutenant Commander John Cyril Porte RN of the Seaplane Experimental Station, Felixstowe the successor to the Felixstowe F.2

[edit] Development

The Felixstowe F.2a entered production and service as a patrol aircraft, with about 100 being completed by the end of World War I. In February 1917, the first prototype of the Felixstowe F.3 was flown. This was a larger and heavier development of the F.2a, powered by two 320 hp (239 ) Sunbeam Cossack engines.^[1] Large orders followed, with the production aircraft powered by Rolls-Royce Eagles. The F.3s larger size gave it greater range and heavier bomb load than the F2, but poorer speed and agility. Approximately 100 Felixstowe F.3s were produced before the end of the war, including 18 built in the dockyards at Malta.^[2]

The Felixstowe F.5 was intended to combine the good qualities of the F.2 and F.3, with the prototype first flying in May 1918. The prototype showed superior qualities to its predecessors but the production version was modified to make extensive use of components from the F3, in order to ease production, giving lower performance than either the F.2a or F.3.

The Felixstowe was re-exported to America, and a re-jigged Felixstowe/Curtiss with the Curtiss Company, provided the basis for NC-4 which was the first plane to fly the Atlantic.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Operational service

The larger F3, which was less popular with its crews than the more maneuverable F2a, served in the Mediterranean as well as the North Sea.

[edit] Operators

Canada

Canadian Air Board

United Kingdom

United States

United States Navy

[edit] Specifications (F.3)

Data from British Naval Aircraft since 1912 ^[3]

General characteristics

Crew: 4
Length: 49 ft 2 in (14.99 m)
Wingspan: 102 ft (31.10 m)
Height: 18 ft 8 in (5.69 m)
Wing area: 1,432 ft² (133.1 m²)
Empty weight: 7,958 lb (3,167 kg)
Loaded weight: 12,235 lb (5,561 kg)
Powerplant: 2× Rolls-Royce Eagle VIII V12 inline piston, 345 hp (257 kW) each

Performance

Maximum speed: 91 mph (79 knots, 147 km/h) at 2,000 ft (610 m)
Service ceiling: 8,000 ft (2,440 m)
Wing loading: 8.54 lb/ft² (41.8 kg/m²)
Power/mass: 0.056 hp/lb (0.092 kW/kg)
Endurance: 6 hours
Climb to 2,000 ft (610 m): 5 min 15 s
Climb to 6,500 ft (1,980 m): 24 min

Armament

Guns: 4 × Lewis guns (1 in nose, 3 amidships)
Bombs: Up to 920 lb (418 kg) of bombs beneath wings

[edit] See also

Related development

[edit] References

^ Bruce 16 December 1955, p.897.
^ Thetford 1978, p.197.
^ Thetford 1978, p.198.

Bruce, J.M. "The Felixstowe Flying-Boats: Historic Military Aircraft No. 11 Part 1". Flight, 2 December 1955. pp.842—846.
Bruce, J.M. "The Felixstowe Flying-Boats: Historic Military Aircraft No. 11 Part 2". Flight, 16 December 1955. pp.895—898.
Bruce, J.M. "The Felixstowe Flying-Boats: Historic Military Aircraft No. 11 Part 3". Flight, 23 December 1955. pp.929—932.
Thetford, Owen. British Naval Aircraft since 1912. London:Putnam, Fourth edition, 1978. ISBN 0370 30021 1.

[edit] External links

[Bruce_pt_2_p897-0] Bruce 16 December 1955, p.897.

[Thet_navy_p197-1] Thetford 1978, p.197.

[Thetford_Navy_p198-2] Thetford 1978, p.198.

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