Aviation Traders projects

[Maveric]

Hi all,

have found a list of the projects by the british Aviation Traders. Also a pic of the ATL.96 project.
Do you have pics or drawings of the projects ATL.91/ATL.92/ATL.93/ATL.95 and ATL.99????

Regards Maveric

 

[Stargazer]

Here is the Aviation Traders Accountant(don't know the inhouse designation for it):

 

[hesham]

Hi Stargazer,


the inhouse designation for Accountant is ATL-90.

 

[Arjen]

That one actually flew.


Airliners.net caption:

G-ATEL (cn ATL.90) One of the unsuccessful "Dakota Replacements", the Accountant was built by Freddie Laker's Aviation Traders at Southend. It was powered by two Rolls-Royce Darts. It accommodated 28 passengers and first flew on July 9, 1957. Seen at the 1957 Farnborough air show, it last flew on January 10, 1958 and was scrapped at Southend in February 1960.

[edit] replaced dead image-link with image

 

[Stargazer]

I absolutely love the way that British aircraft, British cars, British houses, British clothes, British TV shows used to look like NOTHING ELSE in those days.

(that was when the British still cherished their difference and didn't surrender to the influence of world culture, of course...)

 

[Arjen]

I absolutely love the way that British aircraft, British cars, British houses, British clothes, British TV shows used to look like NOTHING ELSE in those days.

 

[hesham]

Hi,

I think the ATL-94 & ATL-97 were a Carvair Car Ferry variants of the Douglas
DC-6 & DC-7,but I am not sure ?.

 

[taildragger]

I've always wondered
British post-war passenger aircraft often have cockpit arrangements that break the fuselage upper mould line - ie: the fuselage contours do not flow smoothly from the top of the windscreen aft, but are broken immediately behind the cockpit. This is quite evident on the Vickers Viscount, HS 125 and to a lesser degree on the Accountant and the Airspeed Ambassador. My guess is that it has to do with pressurization loads and allows the pressure vessel of the cockpit to be constructed as a near-dome grafted to the near-cylinder of the fuselage, both being efficient shapes for handling the loads. It probably made the pressure load stress calculations easier in the slide-rule era but I'd think that this benefit would be outweighed by penalties in weight, drag and goofy appearance. Does anyone have any actual knowledge of this?

 

[hesham]

Hi Taildragger,

that's right,the British commercial aircraft designers was mainly care with performance
than the shape,or on account of configuration.

 

[sienar]

 

[TsrJoe]

ATL. Accountant

 

[TsrJoe]

pre definition configuration

 

[alertken]

Joe's Flight 1/11/57 article has "might be built by a major a/c group". Gloster built some structure for the prototype (flew 9/7/57). R.Payne's Back to the Drawing Board,P.123: GAC's "abortive attempt to take (it) over...some of (that) information was used by (Avro in) 748"; others have Freddie Laker bearing a grudge against HSAL, 748 as a copy. But it was Hunting A/c that Freddie hoped to licence for production - he had recruited its designer there. They looked...and declined: either because it was useless, or because Fokker/Fairchild and HP (and Grumman for the biz-market) were ahead to market.

Freddie put up risk money for other jobs which thrived, and for Prentice civilianisation, which did not. He was central to the emergence of BUA (which subsumed Hunting-Clan Air Transport as credible Second Force v. BOAC). He would also extract £4Mn. restitution from the Big Boys who destroyed Laker A/W.

 

[hesham]

For the ATL-91,

it was a two-seat tricycle undercarriage trainer Project,but its name
is very familiar "Auditor" ?!.

 

[TsrJoe]

Are there any drawings extant for the ATL.91 Auditor trainer, ATL.98 modified DC.4 with 'triple tail', and ATL.99 modified Britannia with swing tail ?

 

[Apophenia]

..., ATL.98 modified DC.4 with 'triple tail' ...

Source: Page 37 of The ATL-98 Carvair: A Comprehensive History of the Aircraft and All 21 Airframes, William Patrick Dean, McFarland & Company, Jefferson NC, 2015

 

[TsrJoe]

Brilliant thank you, does it say why such a redesign was mooted ?

 

[Apophenia]

Brilliant thank you, does it say why such a redesign was mooted ?

Caption from The ATL-98 Carvair: A Comprehensive History of the Aircraft and All 21 Airframes.

The orginal DC-4 fin and rudder were found to be inadequate. Studies were done to add vertical stabilzers to the ends of the horizontal tail plane. Further tests proved the same could be achieved by increasing the vertical fin by 34 inches. Pictured is the original DC-4 fin with the proposed stabilizers (courtesy Michael Zoeller).

Elsewhere in the book, it is implied that wind tunnel testing would show that the longer, higher nose dictated more tail surface area. AFAIK, ATEL chief engineer Arthur Leftly designed the ultimate replacement fin and rudder (which almost perfectly matched that of the DC-7).

 

[hesham]

From JAWA 1960-1961,

here's the Aviation Traders/Percival Prentice conversion.

 

[alertken]

Freddie Laker, Necremancer. A bunch of Halifaxes at scrap value started him in business. Then Tudors. ATEL/Stansted (almost the sole tenant, early-50s)/Southend was a business in its own right (today: MRO), jobbing for anything that flew, as well as supporting his tramp, Air Charter. He parlayed that into Br.United A/L, launch Customer for BAC 1-11/200. He inspired Branson to do Virgin Atlantic and he named a 747 for him.

His bid for RAF Prentices was said to be £5 each, as is in their MUs, so some cash to bring them to STN/SEN. He thought he would come out ahead on the engines alone. ATEL thought they could achieve civil Certification for 5 seats at a selling price that could cope with the surge in imports following wider $ access for Brits exactly then, 1959.
I and orhers published pics of bonfire-piles at STN, 1962-ish. Why an owner has spent time and money recently restoring one baffles me - it's a How Not to Do It, students gaining skill in the back seat. When collecting them from the MUs ATEL found some with few hours, displaced by RAF's more sensible Chipmunk-Provost-Vampire T.11 sequence.

 

[hesham]

From JAWA 1960-1961,

here's the Aviation Traders/Percival Prentice conversion.

Of course I didn't confess of ATL-94 was not allocated,but may it
was this conversion ?.

 

[avion ancien]

For the ATL-91,

it was a two-seat tricycle undercarriage trainer Project,but its name
is very familiar "Auditor" ?!.

I wonder if Freddie Laker had the balls to use 'Administrator' as the name for any of the ATL projects?