The Hawker Hurricane was designed by Hawker's Chief Designer Sydney Camm, originally as a private venture, but later under Air Ministry specification F36/34. The prototype Hurricane first flew on the 6th of November 1935 at Hawker Aircraft Ltd's Brooklands establishment at Weybridge in Surrey, and retained the overall visual lines of Hawker's existing Fury biplane fighter. The first Hawker Hurricane Mk.I's were delivered to the RAF in October 1937 and were the RAF's first monoplane fighter (the Bristol M1c was withdrawn from service as a fighter before the RAF was formed). The early production aircraft had fabric-covered wings, a wooden fixed-pitch propeller, they lacked armour to protect the pilot and self-sealing fuel tanks, even worse in the event of a "scramble" they had to have their engines started by several ground-crew simultaneously cranking twin starting handles located either side of the engine. Fortunately by the Battle of Britain in 1939 the RAF was in possession of over 497 improved Mk.I's, these were now fitted with a Rotol or deHavilland constant-speed metal propeller, ejector exhaust stacks, armour for the pilot, self sealing fuel tanks, electric starters and stressed duraluminium-skined wings. Hawker Hurricane MkI Specifications: Crew: Pilot only Engine: Single 1,030 hp Rolls-Royce Merlin III twelve-cylinder liquid-cooled engine Wing span: 40ft 0in (12.19m) Length: 31ft 4in (9.55m) Weight: 7,127 lb Maximum speed: 328 mph (529km/h) at 17,500 ft Service ceiling: 36,000 feet Range: 700 miles
Armament: |
