• Current opened records

  • Halford, Major Frank Bernard

Aero-engine designers
Life dates:
  • 1894 - 1955
Biography:
  • Frank Bernard Halford was born in 1894 in Nottingham, the son of Harry Halford, an estate agent, and his wife Ethel (née Grundy). Educated at Felsted and the University of Nottingham, Halford left university in 1913, prior to graduating, in order to learn to fly at the Bristol Flying School at Brooklands where he subsequently became an instructor. In 1914 he briefly joined the War Office’s new Aeronautical Inspection Department, Farnborough, as an engine examiner and upon the outbreak of the First World War joined the Royal Flying Corps. Recalled to engineering duties, he was lent to William Beardmore & Co Ltd in 1915 to help T C Pullinger, the company’s chief engineer, to develop the 230hp Beardmore-Halford-Pullinger (BHP). By 1918 Halford, promoted to major, was working as assistant to the head of aircraft engine production at the Air Ministry. After the war Halford joined Harry Ricardo at Engine Patents Ltd, selling licences for Ricardo products in the USA from offices in Cleveland, Ohio. He returned to the UK in 1921, helping to develop a Ricardo engine for the 500cc Triumph motorcycle, which he raced himself, and also working on the development of racing fuels for motorcycle engines and on the design of a luxury, four-cylinder shaft-driven motorcycle for Vauxhall.

    In 1923 Halford set up on his own as a design consultant, working as an engine designer to The Aircraft Disposal Co and consultant engineer to Vickers Ltd, and designing, building and racing the A M Halford Special racing car. In 1927 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society and joined the design staff of The de Havilland Aircraft Co, Hatfield, where he remained for eight years until joining D Napier & Son Ltd, London, as technical director. During these various appointments he was responsible for a large number of aero-engines, including the Airdisco, Cirrus, Gipsy and Nimbus, and later the Napier H-block engines, Rapier, Dagger and Sabre. During the Second World War Halford designed a simplified version of Frank Whittle's jet engine for de Havilland, known initially as the Halford H1, which became the de Havilland Goblin. Halford's company was eventually purchased outright by The de Havilland Aircraft Co in 1944. The de Havilland Engine Co was then formed as a separate company under Halford’s direction. The company developed and manufactured the Goblin and Ghost l turbo-jet engines and the supersonic jet engine, the Gyron. Halford also sat on the Advisory Committee to the Ministry of Aircraft Production during the war. Halford was appointed CBE for his contributions to aeronautics in 1948. He died on 16 April 1955 in Northwood, Middlesex.
Principle aero-engines designed:

  • Piston engines: Beardmore Halford Pullinger 230hp (1917); Siddeley Puma (1917); ADC Cirrus (1925); de Havilland Gipsy (1926); Napier Rapier (1929); de Havilland Gipsy Major (1932); Napier Dagger (1934); Napier Sabre (1938). 

    Turbojet engines: de Havilland H.1 Goblin (1942); de Havilland H.2 Ghost (1945); de Havilland H.3 - turbopropeller Gipsy replacement (n.d.); de Havilland H.4 Gyron (1953); de Havilland H.6 Gyron Junior (1955); de Havilland H.7 (n.d.).

Publications:

  • J L Pritchard and Robin Higham, ‘Halford, Frank Bernard (1894-1955), Oxford dictionary of national biography (2004).

Records:
CID:

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