Hawker Hector

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Hawker Hector was intended as a replacement for the Hawker Audax Army co-operation aircraft. Because of the demand for Rolls-Royce Kestrel engines required for the Hawker Hind program, an alternative power plant was specified. Consequently the Napier Dagger III was used. Although both the design and the building of the prototype was done by Hawkers, the subsequent production aircraft were built by Westland Aircraft in Yeovil, Devon. The prototype first flew on on 14 February 1936 with George Bulman as pilot. One prototype and 178 production aircraft were built. Thirteen of these were supplied to Eire in 1941-2. The aircraft were later used by the RAF (in 1940) as target-towers, and for towing the General Aircraft Hotspur training glider.

1 Variants
2 Operators
3 Units using the Hector
4 Specification
5 Reference

[edit] Variants

Hector Mk I : Two-seat army co-operation aircraft for the RAF.

[edit] Operators

Eire or Ireland.
- Irish Air Corps.
United Kingdom.
- Royal Air Force.

[edit] Units using the Hector

No. 2 Squadron RAF
No. 4 Squadron RAF
No. 13 Squadron RAF
No. 26 Squadron RAF
No. 53 Squadron RAF
No. 59 Squadron RAF
No. 296 Squadron RAF
No. 602 Squadron RAF
No. 612 Squadron RAF
No. 613 Squadron RAF
No. 614 Squadron RAF
No. 615 Squadron RAF

[edit] Specification

Span - 36' 11½” - 11.26 m
Length - 29' 9½” - 9.06 m
Height - 10' 5" - 3.18 m
Empty Wt - 3389 lb - 1537 kg
Loaded Wt - 4910 lb - 2227 kg
Max speed - 187 mph at 6560 ft - 301 km/h at 1999 m
Ceiling - 24000 ft - 7815 m
Armament - one forward-firing Vickers machine gun Mk V & one Lewis gun in the rear cockpit on a Hawker mount & mountings for a Camera, flares, and two 112 lb bombs (or containers).