• Current opened records

  • Slingsby Aircraft Ltd

Aircraft manufacturers
Location:
  • Kirbymoorside, North Yorkshire
Operating dates:
  • 1934 - 1969
History:
  • In 1920 Frederick Nicholas Slingsby (1894-1973) left the Royal Air Force and bought into a woodworking and furniture-making partnership based in Queen Street, Scarborough, North Yorkshire. In 1930 Slingsby, a gliding enthusiast, was a founder member of Scarborough gliding club becoming its ground engineer. His firm repaired some of the club's gliders before building an aircraft of its own in 1931, a German-designed RRG Falke. By late 1933 Slingsby was constructing training gliders in disused tram sheds in Scarborough. In 1934, at the invitation of Major J Shaw, whom he had met at the gliding club, Slingsby established a glider manufacturing business in sheds on Shaw's land at Kirkbymoorside, some 30 miles from Scarborough, operating as Slingsby Sailplanes Kirbymoorside. In 1935 Shaw suggested Slingsby merge his business with Shaw's own engineering firm and the business became the aviation department of Slingsby, Russell & Brown Ltd. As demand for gliders increase, with Shaw's support a new factory was opened at Welburn, near Kirkbymoorside, in 1939, and Slingsby Sailplanes Ltd was founded. During the Second World War civilian gliding was banned and Slingsby Sailplanes Ltd built components for other aircraft as well as its own troop carrying glider, the Slingsby Hengist. Towards the end of the war the company produced large numbers of training gliders for the Air Training Corps and afterwards continued to build both training gliders and gliders for civilian club and competition use. Its Sky aircraft took first place at the 1952 World Gliding Championships. In 1955 the death of Major Shaw meant his shares in the company had to be sold and the Slingsby-Shaw Trust was set up to avert a takeover of the company. The business continued to trade successfully, with the Slingsby Skylark series becoming its post-war best seller. In 1967, after Frederick Slingsby's retirement, the company was renamed Slingsby Aircraft Ltd and began to move toward glass reinforced plastic (GRP) and metal construction methods. However, after a disastrous fire at the works in late 1968 the company went into receivership and in 1969 Slingsby Aircraft Ltd was acquired by Vickers Ltd, largely for its expertise in GRP construction. The business thereafter traded as the Vickers-Slingsby Division of Vickers Ltd or Vickers-Slingsby Sailplanes Ltd, before reverting to Slingsby Sailplanes Ltd. During the late 1970s the business was renamed Slingsby Engineering and in 1979 became part of British Underwater Engineering, a new firm 90% owned by National Enterprise Board. Glider construction ended in 1982 and in 1983 a subsidiary, Slingsby Aviation Ltd was set up for the design and manufacture of aircraft components, which passed to ML Holdings in 1993, then to Cobham plc in 1995. In 2006 Slingsby Aviation Ltd changed its name to Slingsby Advanced Composites Ltd, which in 2010 was acquired by Marshall Aerospace. Slingsby Advanced Composites Ltd currently trades at Kirbymoorside as Marshall Slingsby Advanced Composites designing and manufacturing composite structures.
Principal and significant aircraft manufactured:
  • Baynes Bat (1943); Buxton Hjordis (1935); T1 Falcon 1 (1931); T2 Falcon 2 (1931); T3 Primary (1934); T4 Falcon 3 (1935); T5 Grunau Baby (c.1935); T6 Kirby Kite (1935); T7 Kirby Cadet (1935); T8 Kirby Tutor (1937); T9 King Kite (1935); T12 Kirby Gull (1938); T13 Petrel (1938); T18 Hengist (1942); T19 (date unknown); T20 (1944); T21 (1944); T24 Falcon 4 (1946); T25 Gull 4 (1947); T29A/B Motor Tutor(1948); T30 Prefect (1948); T31 Tandem Tutor (1949); T35 Austral (1949); T34 Sky (1950); T37 Skylark 1 (1953); T38 Grasshopper (1952); T41 Skylark 2 (1953); T42 Eagle (1954); T43 Skylark 3 (1957); T45 Swallow (1957); T46 (1944); T49 Capstan (1961); T50 Skylark 4 (1961); T51 Dart (1963); T53 (1967); T59 Kestrel (1970); T61 Falke (1971); T65 Vega (1977); T67 Firefly (1974).
Publications:
  • M Simon, Slingsby sailplanes (1996).
Records:
CID:

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