Felixstowe F.3
Felixstowe F3
Type	anti-submarine flying boat
Manufacturer	Short Brothers Dick, Kerr & Co. Phoenix Dynamo Manufacturing Company Malta Dockyard
Designed by	J C Porte,
Maiden 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 Cyrill Porte RN of the Seaplane Experimental Station, Felixstowe the successor to the Felixstowe F.2 An aerospace manufacturer is a company or individual involved in the various aspects of designing, building, testing, selling, and maintaining aircraft, aircraft parts, missiles, rockets, and/or spacecraft. ... Short Brothers plc is a British aerospace company now based in Belfast. ... Dick, Kerr and Company was a locomotive manufacturer in Kilmarnock, Scotland. ... English Electric logo English Electric was a 20th-century British industrial manufacturer, initially of electric motors, and expanding to include railway locomotives and aviation, before becoming part of GEC. // 1917: Dick, Kerr & Co. ... The Maiden flight of an aircraft is the first occasion on which an aircraft leaves the ground of its own accord. ... The Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) was the air arm of the Royal Navy until near the end of World War I. When the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) was founded on April 13, 1912 it was intended to encompass all military flying. ... RAF is an three letter acronym for: Royal Air Force -- the Air Force of the United Kingdom (see also Air Ministry) Red Army Faction (Rote Armee Fraktion) -- a German terror organisation Rigas Autobusu Fabrika -- a factory making buses in Riga, Latvia Rapid Action Force in India Računarski Fakultet RAF... The United States Navy (USN) is the branch of the United States armed forces responsible for naval operations. ... The Felixstowe F.2 was a British First World War flying boat designed by Lieutenant Commander John Cyrill Porte RN of the Seaplane Experimental Station, Felixstowe. ... Ypres, 1917, in the vicinity of the Battle of Passchendaele. ... Boeing 314 A flying boat is an aircraft that is designed to take off and land on water, in particular a type of seaplane which uses its fuselage as a floating hull (instead of pontoons mounted below the fuselage). ... In the Royal Navy, United States Navy and United States Coast Guard, a lieutenant commander (lieutenant-commander or Lt Cdr in the RN) is a commissioned officer superior to a lieutenant and inferior to a commander. ... The Royal Navy of the United Kingdom is the oldest of the British armed services (and is therefore the Senior Service). ... The Seaplane Experimental Station at Felixstowe was a British aircraft design unit of the early part of the 20th Century. ... Statistics Population: 29,349 (2001 Census) Ordnance Survey OS grid reference: TM306345 Administration District: Suffolk Coastal Shire county: Suffolk Region: East of England Constituent country: England Sovereign state: United Kingdom Other Ceremonial county: Suffolk Historic county: Suffolk Services Police force: Suffolk Constabulary Fire and rescue: {{{Fire}}} Ambulance: East of England... The Felixstowe F.2 was a British First World War flying boat designed by Lieutenant Commander John Cyrill Porte RN of the Seaplane Experimental Station, Felixstowe. ...

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 larger and heavier then the F.2, giving it greater range and heavier bomb load, but poorer agility. Approximately 100 Felixstowe F.3s were produced before the end of the war. The Felixstowe F.2 was a British First World War flying boat designed by Lieutenant Commander John Cyrill Porte RN of the Seaplane Experimental Station, Felixstowe. ...

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.

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.

Variants

Specifications (F.3)

Data from British Aircraft Directory

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 m²)
• Empty weight: 7,958 lb (3167 kg)
• Loaded weight: 12,235 lb (5561 kg)
• Powerplant: 2× Rolls-Royce_Eagle VIII V12 piston, 345 hp (257 kW) each

Performance

• Maximum speed: 91 mph at 2,000 ft (147 km/h)
• Range: nm (mi, km)
• Service ceiling: 8,000 ft (2440 m)
• Rate of climb: 5 min 15 sec to 2,000 ft (610 m)
• Endurance: 6 hours

Armament

• Guns: 4 Lewis guns (1 in nose, 3 amidships).
  
• Bombs: Up to 920 lbs bombs beneath wings.

The distance AB is the wing span of this Aer Lingus Airbus A320. ... The Rolls-Royce Eagle V12 was a 12 cylinder 60 degree V12 aero engine of 20 Liters capacity. ... VNO of an aircraft is the V speed which refers to the velocity of normal operation. ... The maximal total range is the distance an aircraft can fly between takeoff and landing as limited by its fuel capacity. ... In aeronautics, the service ceiling is the maximum density altitude where the best rate of climb airspeed will produce a 100 feet per minute climb(twin engine) and 50 feet(single engine) at maximum weight while in a clean configuration with maximum continuous power. ... This page is a candidate to be moved to Wiktionary. ... The Lewis Gun was a pre-WWI era British machine gun that continued to see service all the way through WWII. It is visually distinctive because of the wide tubular cooling shroud around the barrel, and the top mounted drum magazines. ...

References

Related content

Related development

Felixstowe F5L

Designation sequence

Felixstowe Porte Baby - Felixstowe F.2 - Felixstowe F.3 - Felixstowe F.5 The Felixstowe F.2 was a British First World War flying boat designed by Lieutenant Commander John Cyrill Porte RN of the Seaplane Experimental Station, Felixstowe. ...

External links

• Felixstowe Flying-Boats
• britishaircraft.co.uk - Felixstowe F.3
• Smithsonian National Air and Space article on the F5L