AP 118 · No. 10 Section II · Aircraft Plate 106 / 168

Plate 106 of 168 · Early jet age · Jet flying-boat fighter prototype

Saunders-Roe SR.A/1

SR.A/1, painted as TG263, Solent Sky’s Saunders-Roe SR.A/1, the first prototype and the only one of the three left, first flown from Cowes by Geoffrey Tyson on 16 July 1947, last flown in June 1951 and at Southampton since the early 1990s: the world’s first jet-propelled water-based aircraft, a single-seat flying-boat fighter of 46 ft span with two Metropolitan-Vickers Beryl axial turbojets side by side in a deep planing hull, fed through one bifurcated nose intake and exhausting either side of the hull behind the wing, a straight wing with stabilising floats that retract into pods beneath it and a tailplane set high on the fin, shown standing on its beaching gear with twin-wheel legs under the wing roots and a tail wheel, the floats retracted, the hood slid back and a guard over the intake: silver overall, a yellow-ringed Type C1 roundel on each side of the nose with the yellow prototype ‘P’ in a ring behind it, black ‘TG263’ on the rear hull, a red, white and blue fin flash and Type C roundels on the upper wings (the fin flash and wing roundels follow earlier photographs of the same scheme), no under-wing markings.

3D model

Turn it over

A procedural model built in Blender from published dimensions, drawings and photographs, painted as TG263, Solent Sky’s Saunders-Roe SR.A/1, the first prototype and the only one of the three left, first flown from Cowes by Geoffrey Tyson on 16 July 1947, last flown in June 1951 and at Southampton since the early 1990s: the world’s first jet-propelled water-based aircraft, a single-seat flying-boat fighter of 46 ft span with two Metropolitan-Vickers Beryl axial turbojets side by side in a deep planing hull, fed through one bifurcated nose intake and exhausting either side of the hull behind the wing, a straight wing with stabilising floats that retract into pods beneath it and a tailplane set high on the fin, shown standing on its beaching gear with twin-wheel legs under the wing roots and a tail wheel, the floats retracted, the hood slid back and a guard over the intake: silver overall, a yellow-ringed Type C1 roundel on each side of the nose with the yellow prototype ‘P’ in a ring behind it, black ‘TG263’ on the rear hull, a red, white and blue fin flash and Type C roundels on the upper wings (the fin flash and wing roundels follow earlier photographs of the same scheme), no under-wing markings. Drag to orbit, scroll or pinch to zoom · download .glb (823 KB)

Data plate

Specification

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

History

The SR.A/1

Saunders-Roe proposed a jet fighter flying boat to the Air Ministry in 1943, for a war in the Pacific where a fighter that could work from any sheltered stretch of water would need no airfield. Specification E.6/44 followed in April 1944, with a contract for three prototypes. Two Metropolitan-Vickers Beryl axial jets sat side by side in a deep planing hull, fed through a single intake in the nose, and stabilising floats under the wings retracted in flight. The armament was to be four 20 mm Hispano cannon.

The war was over before the first prototype, TG263, was ready. Geoffrey Tyson flew it from Cowes on 16 July 1947, and it proved fast and pleasant to fly: its top speed of 512 mph was remarkable for an aircraft with a boat hull. Tyson flew it upside down past the crowd at the 1948 Farnborough show. Two of the three prototypes were then lost in 1949: TG271 was holed by floating debris on landing and sank, its pilot, Eric Brown, being pulled from the wreck, and TG267 was lost in September with the death of its pilot.

By then land-based jets had outrun the idea, and with Metropolitan-Vickers giving up jet engines there were no more Beryls to be had. Work stopped for lack of orders and TG263 went into store early in 1950. The Korean War briefly revived interest late that year, but the project was cancelled for good, and TG263 made its last flight in June 1951.

This airframe

SR.A/1 TG263

TG263The airframe modelled

TG263, the first prototype and the only SR.A/1 left, is displayed at Solent Sky in Southampton, a few miles across the water from the Cowes slipway where it first flew. It is shown in its silver finish with a yellow-ringed roundel and the yellow prototype ‘P’ on the nose, standing on its beaching gear with the wing floats retracted and the cockpit hood slid back. The model shows it as displayed, without the trestles and barriers; the fin flash and upper-wing roundels follow earlier photographs of the same scheme.

See it at Solent Sky

Where to see one

In the gazetteer

The gazetteer records the SR.A/1 in one UK collection. The airframe modelled here is marked.

Every airframe and serial All 168 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.