AP 118 · No. 10 Section II · Aircraft Plate 80 / 84

Plate 80 of 84 · Cold War · Primary trainer

Scottish Aviation Bulldog T.1

Bulldog T.1, painted as XX654, the RAF Museum’s Scottish Aviation Bulldog T.1 (c/n BH120/312), the side-by-side two-seat primary trainer developed from the Beagle B.125 with a fixed tricycle undercarriage, sliding bubble canopy and a 200 hp Lycoming IO-360 flat-four, built at Prestwick for the RAF, now at RAF Museum Midlands, painted as it is displayed there: white upper fuselage and red lower fuselage, red tailplane and outer wing panels, a black anti-glare panel, a white ‘3’ on the cowling and a black ‘3’ at the fin top, Type D roundels on the rear fuselage and upper wings, a red, white and blue fin flash, a black ‘XX654’ below the tailplane, and a black and white spinner and propeller with red tips.

3D model

Turn it over

A procedural model built in Blender from published dimensions, drawings and photographs, painted as XX654, the RAF Museum’s Scottish Aviation Bulldog T.1 (c/n BH120/312), the side-by-side two-seat primary trainer developed from the Beagle B.125 with a fixed tricycle undercarriage, sliding bubble canopy and a 200 hp Lycoming IO-360 flat-four, built at Prestwick for the RAF, now at RAF Museum Midlands, painted as it is displayed there: white upper fuselage and red lower fuselage, red tailplane and outer wing panels, a black anti-glare panel, a white ‘3’ on the cowling and a black ‘3’ at the fin top, Type D roundels on the rear fuselage and upper wings, a red, white and blue fin flash, a black ‘XX654’ below the tailplane, and a black and white spinner and propeller with red tips. Drag to orbit, scroll or pinch to zoom · download .glb (807 KB)

Data plate

Specification

First flight, number built and top speed are for the whole family (); engine, crew and dimensions are for the Bulldog T.1 modelled here.

History

The Bulldog T.1

The Bulldog began at Beagle Aircraft at Shoreham as the B.125, a military trainer developed from the company’s Pup light aircraft. Beagle kept the Pup’s general layout, a low wing and a fixed tricycle undercarriage, but gave the trainer a stronger, fully aerobatic airframe, a 200 hp Lycoming flat-four, a wider cabin seating instructor and pupil side by side under a sliding bubble canopy, and hardpoints under the wings. The prototype first flew on 19 May 1969, and Sweden became the first customer, for its air force and army.

Beagle went into receivership before production began, and Scottish Aviation took over the design, building the Bulldog at Prestwick from 1971. The Swedish aircraft, known there as the Sk 61, were delivered first. The RAF chose the Bulldog T.1 to replace the Chipmunk, and about 130 were delivered from 1973. They served with the Central Flying School, but above all with the University Air Squadrons, where generations of student pilots first flew solo, and later with the Air Experience Flights, which gave cadets their first taste of flying.

Scottish Aviation became part of British Aerospace in 1977, and production ended in the early 1980s after some 320 had been built, many of them for export to air forces in Africa, the Middle East and Asia, among them Kenya, Nigeria, Ghana, Jordan, Lebanon and Malaysia. The RAF replaced its Bulldogs with the Grob Tutor between 1999 and 2001 and sold most of them; many still fly in private hands in Britain. XX654 at RAF Museum Midlands is one of three complete RAF Bulldogs in the museums the gazetteer covers.

This airframe

Bulldog T.1 XX654

XX654The airframe modelled

XX654, construction number 312, was built by Scottish Aviation at Prestwick in 1974 as one of the RAF’s Bulldog Series 120s and delivered to Church Fenton on 1 November that year. In January 1975 it joined the Bristol University Air Squadron at Filton as “A”, and in the 1980s the squadron’s commanding officer flew it in air races, among them the King’s Cup. It stayed with Bristol UAS for most of its career, moving with the squadron to Colerne, where it was shared with No. 3 Air Experience Flight, apart from a short spell with the Oxford University Air Squadron at Benson in 1993. By 1999 it was with the Central Flying School at Cranwell, coded “3”. It went into store at Shawbury on 11 May 2000 with some 7,450 flying hours, and when the other stored Bulldogs had been sold it was the last one left there. The Ministry of Defence gave it to the RAF Museum, and it arrived at Cosford by road on 14 January 2004. The model shows it as photographed there between 2009 and 2019, in the RAF’s red and white training scheme: a white upper fuselage, fin and inner wings, red lower fuselage, tailplane and outer wing panels, a black anti-glare panel, a white “3” on the cowling and a black “3” at the fin top, Type D roundels on the rear fuselage and upper wings, a red, white and blue fin flash, a black “XX654” below the tailplane, and a black and white spinner and propeller with red tips.

See it at Royal Air Force Museum Midlands

Where to see one

In the gazetteer

The gazetteer records the Bulldog T.1 in 5 UK collections. The airframe modelled here is marked.

Every airframe and serial All 84 plates

Profiles and models are procedural interpretations built in Blender from published dimensions, three-view drawings and photographs of each airframe. Treat the museum aircraft as the reference.