Slingsby Aviation was a British aircraft manufacturer based in Kirkbymoorside, North Yorkshire, England. The company was founded to design and build gliders and sailplanes. From the early 1930s to around 1970 it built over 50% of all British club gliders and had success at national and international level competitions.[1] It then produced some powered aircraft, notably the composite built Firefly trainer, before becoming a producer of specialised composite materials and components.
The business is now known as Marshall Advanced Composites and produces composite parts for ships, submarines and aircraft. It is a subsidiary of Marshall of Cambridge.
The business was founded in Scarborough by Frederick Nicholas Slingsby, an RAF pilot in World War I. In 1920 he bought a partnership in a woodworking and furniture factory in Queen Street, Scarborough. In 1930 Slingsby was one of the founders of the Scarborough Gliding Club. After repairing some of the club's gliders, Slingsby's business built its first aircraft, a German designed RRG Falke which flew in 1931. By late 1933 Slingsby was advertising training gliders for sale. In 1934, encouraged by a local landowner, the business moved to Kirkbymoorside, some 30 miles from Scarborough, operating as Slingsby, Russell & Brown Ltd. As demand for gliders built up, a new factory was needed and built in Welburn, just outside Kirkbymoorside. This opened in July 1939, when Slingsby Sailplanes Ltd was founded.[1] The best selling Slingsby glider in the pre-World War II period was the Primary.[2]
During the war Slingsby built parts for other company's aircraft as well as their own military glider, the Slingsby Hengist, though the latter did not see action. Towards the end of the war and afterwards the company produced large numbers of training gliders for the Air Training Corps (ATC). After the war Slingsby continued to make increasingly refined gliders for civilian use in clubs and competitions. Their greatest success was with the Sky at the 1952 World Gliding Championships, which finished in first, third and fourth place. The later Slingsby Skylark series was their post war best seller. Slingsby began to move toward glass reinforced plastic (GRP) and metal construction methods, but the company, trading as Slingsby Aircraft Ltd since 1967, went into liquidation in July 1969 following a disastrous fire in the previous November.[1]
Slingsby Firefly T67M of the UK Defence Elementary Flying Training School, used for training Army and Navy student pilots.
After this Slingsby became part of the Vickers Group in November 1969, initially as Vickers-Slingsby Sailplanes Ltd, then reverting to the old name of Slingsby Sailplanes Ltd, and original design declined, though they built versions of other aircraft, both powered and unpowered. Slingsby’s last glider, which was also their last original design, was the GRP Slingsby T.65 Vega. This ceased production in 1982, by which time high performance sailplane design had moved away from the UK.[3] During the upheavals in the British aerospace and marine sector the company became Slingsby Engineering, part of the public/private holding company British Underwater Engineering (UBE).[4] In July 1982 Slingsby Aviation was set up by, and as part, of Slingsby Engineering.[failed verification][4] Slingsby Aviation passed from UBE to ML holdings in 1993,[4] then to Cobham plc in December 1995. Slingsby's last aircraft was the T-67 Firefly, a two-seater military training aircraft, originally a René Fournier design but structurally reworked by Slingsby into a wholly composite machine. At this time Slingsby Aviation employed around 130 people on its 12,220 square metre (131,000 square feet) site. The company had its own airfield at Kirkbymoorside with a 750-metre reinforced grass runway. Slingsby Aviation’s SAH 2200 hovercraft has operated in such varied regions as the Arctic Circle and Africa. Two are seen in the James Bond film, Die Another Day.
On 10 August 2006 the name of the company was changed to Slingsby Advanced Composites.[5] Since then the company was owned by three individuals and was no longer a part of Cobham plc.
Logo used in 2013
On 8 January 2010 the UK company Marshall Aerospace bought Slingsby Advanced Composites Ltd which currently trades as Marshall Slingsby Advanced Composites.[6]
In 2020, Marshall Slingsby Advanced Composites won the Aerospace Company of the Year in the Corporate Live Wire North England Prestige Awards.[7]
The gull wing is an aircraft wing configuration, known also as Pulaski wings, with a prominent bend in the wing inner section towards the wing root. Its name is derived from the seabirds which it resembles. Numerous aircraft have incorporated such wings for a diverse range of purposes. The gull wing was commonly used to improve visibility in a high wing arrangement, because such wing could be thinnest by the fuselage, and in theory should limit pilot's view no more than A-pillars of a windscreen in a car body.
The T.31 Tandem Tutor is a British military training glider, designed and built by Slingsby and used in large numbers by the Air Training Corps between 1951 and 1986.
The Sigma is an experimental glider developed in Britain from 1966 by a team led by Nicholas Goodhart. After disappointing performance during flight testing the Sigma was passed on to a Canadian group which carried out modifications, making the Sigma more competitive.
The Slingsby T.12 Gull was a British single-seat glider designed and built by Slingsby Sailplanes and first flown in 1938.
The SZD-6x Nietoperz was a single-seat tail-less experimental glider aircraft that was designed and built in Poland at Szybowcowy Zakład Doświadczalny in Bielsko-Biała in 1951. Only one example was constructed.
The SZD-12 Mucha 100 was a single-seat glider aircraft that was designed and built in Poland from 1953.
The SZD-14X Jaskółka M was a single-seat glider designed and built in Poland at Szybowcowy Zakład Doświadczalny - Glider Experimental Works in Bielsko-Biała in 1954. This was an experimental prototype, and only one unit was constructed.
The SZD-17X Jaskółka L was a single-seat high-performance competition glider designed and built in Poland at Szybowcowy Zakład Doświadczalny in Bielsko-Biała in 1955.
The Airspeed AS.1 Tern was a 1930s British glider aircraft, the first aircraft built by Airspeed Limited at York and one of the earliest British-designed gliders.
The WWS-2 Żaba (Frog) was a single-seat training glider designed and built in Poland from 1937.
The WWS-3 Delphin (Dolphin) was a single-seat glider designed and built in Poland from 1936.
The IS-2 Mucha was a single-seat training glider designed and built in Poland starting in 1947.
The IS-1 Sęp was a single-seat high-performance glider designed and built in Poland from 1947. It was the first post-war Polish glider.
The FVA 1 Schwatze Düvel was a glider produced in Germany in 1920. It was a highly streamlined, thick winged cantilever monoplane.
The Bowlus 1-S-2100 Senior Albatross was a 1930s single-seat glider designed by William Hawley Bowlus for Bowlus Sailplane Company Ltd. The aircraft is based on a prototype glider the "Super Sailplane" designed by Bowlus, and instructor Martin Schempp, built by students at the Curtiss-Wright Technical Institute.
The Applebay Zuni and Zuni II are single-seat, water-ballasted gliders designed to compete in the FAI 15m class.
The Arsenal Air 100 is a French single seat competition sailplane produced in the 1940s. It sold in small numbers but set several records, still holding the world absolute solo glider endurance record of 56 h 15 m.
The Ikarus Meteor is a long-span, all-metal sailplane designed and built in Yugoslavia in the 1950s. It competed in World Gliding Championships (WGC) between 1956 and 1968 and was placed fourth in 1956; it also set new triangular-course world speed records.
The RRG Falke of 1930 was a secondary training glider designed by Alexander Lippisch in Germany and intended to provide better performance than his earlier RRG Prüfling whilst being easier to fly because of its inherent stability. It was sold as plans for both club and commercial production and was built in Germany and abroad.
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