| T.8 Kirby Tutor (Cadet TX.2) | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Role | Sport Glider |
| National origin | United Kingdom |
| Manufacturer | Slingsby Sailplanes |
| Designer | John Sproule |
| First flight | 1937 |
| Number built | T.8 Kirby Tutor - ca 44 (+kits and wing sets) T.8 Cadet TX Mk.2 - 62 |
| Developed from | Slingsby T.7 Kirby Kadet and BAC VII |
| Variants | Slingsby T.29 Motor Tutor |
The Slingsby T.8 Kirby Tutor was a single-seat sport glider produced from 1937, by Fred Slingsby in Kirbymoorside, Yorkshire. [1]
The T.8 Kirby Tutor (a.k.a. Taper-wing Kadet) came about at the request of the Midland Gliding Club which wanted a higher performance aircraft to progress to after the T.7 Kirby Kadet. [2] John Sproule adapted the wings from a BAC VII to fit onto the T.7 Kirby Kadet fuselage. The higher-aspect ratio wings gave a measurable increase in performance for minimum cost. Gliding clubs could also elect to buy the wings alone and fit them to Kirby Kadet fuselages as required. Post-war the absence of spoilers was rectified by a modification which was applied to most surviving aircraft.
The T.8 Kirby Tutor was immediately popular but only seven complete aircraft were sold before the outbreak of World War II, as well as kits of parts, spares and sets of wings (for retrofit to T.7 Kirby Kadets). [3] The T.8 Tutor was also produced for use by the Air Training Corps, being renamed Slingsby T.8 Cadet TX Mk.2. Sixty-two Cadet TX Mk.2s were ordered from 1944 with simple windscreens and landing wheels. [4]
Postwar Slingsby sub-contracted Martin Hearn Ltd to build 25 new T.7 Kirby Kadets and 25 new T.8 Kirby Tutors and these were followed by about a dozen more built by Slingsby at Kirbymoorside. [5] The interchangeability of the components led to many hybrid aircraft having wings and fuselages of all types mixed together. During the 1960s the numbers dwindled, especially when an urgent inspection of the main-spars was called for. The cost of the inspection and resultant rectification work often exceeded the value of the aircraft, with many being withdrawn from use. An example is on display at the Gliding Heritage Centre.
Data fromBritish Gliders and Sailplanes 1922-1970, [6] and The World's Sailplanes:Die Segelflugzeuge der Welt:Les Planeurs du Monde [7] [8]
General characteristics
Performance
Aircraft of comparable role, configuration, and era
Related lists
The Antonov A-13 was a Soviet aerobatic sailplane flown in the 1950s and 1960s. It was a small, single-seat, all-metal aircraft developed from the A-11 which could optionally be fitted with that aircraft's longer-span wings. It was a mid-wing monoplane with a tadpole-like fuselage and a V-tail.
The Schneider ES-59 Arrow is a sailplane designed and manufactured in Adelaide, South Australia in the early 1960s. The Arrow was manufactured with a one-piece wing of 13.23 metres span. It was the first Australian-built sailplane to compete in the World Gliding Championships, 1963 in Argentina. The Arrow has wood/fabric wings and tail and a wood fuselage. It has a fixed main wheel and a nose skid.
The Slingsby T.21 is an open-cockpit, side-by-side two-seat glider, built by Slingsby Sailplanes Ltd and first flown in 1944. It was widely used by the Royal Air Force, Sri Lanka Air Force and by civilian gliding clubs.
The Slingsby T.41 Skylark 2 was a sailplane produced from 1953 by Slingsby Sailplanes at Kirkbymoorside, Yorkshire.
The Slingsby Type 42 Eagle was a two-seat glider designed in England from 1952.
The Slingsby T.37 Skylark 1 was a small low-cost sailplane built during 1952-3 at Kirbymoorside, Yorkshire by Slingsby Sailplanes.
The Slingsby T.6/T.23 Kirby Kite was a single-seat sport glider produced from 1935, by Fred Slingsby in Kirbymoorside, Yorkshire.
The Slingsby T.12 Gull was a British single-seat glider designed and built by Slingsby Sailplanes and first flown in 1938.
The Slingsby T.25 Gull 4 is a British glider designed and built by Slingsby that first flew in 1947.
The Eon Olympia was a glider produced from 1947 by Elliotts of Newbury.
The IS-5 Kaczka was a single-seat canard research glider designed and built in Poland from 1948.
The Slingsby Type 34 Sky is a high performance single seat competition sailplane built in the United Kingdom. It was successful in major events, particularly in the World Gliding Championships of 1952.
The Slingsby T.30 Prefect is a 1948 British modernisation of the 1932 single-seat Grunau Baby glider. About 53 were built for civil and military training purposes.
The Slingsby Type 45 Swallow was designed as a club sailplane of reasonable performance and price. One of the most successful of Slingsby's gliders in sales terms, over 100 had been built when production was ended by a 1968 factory fire.
The Slingsby T.13 Petrel was a British single-seat competition glider built by Slingsby Sailplanes just before World War II.
The Slingsby T.50 Skylark 4 was a British single seat competition glider built by Slingsby Sailplanes in the early 1960s. It sold in numbers and had success at national, though not world level competition.
The Czerwiński Sparrow, sometimes known as the de Havilland Canada glider, was a single seat glider, designed and built by a group of de Haviiland engineers in Canada in 1942. It was intended to popularise gliding and be suitable for both basic training and thermal soaring.
The Ikarus Košava is a two-seat sailplane designed and built in Yugoslavia in the early 1950s. It won the 1954 World Gliding Championships in the two seat category and came second in the same event two years later.
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 IS-2 was an intermediate training glider designed by Iosif Şilimon and built in Romania in the 1950s at the URMV-3 factory at Brașov.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)