3D model
Turn it over
A procedural model built in Blender from published dimensions, drawings and photographs, painted as XA302 in the red and cream Air Training Corps scheme, as displayed at the RAF Museum, Hendon. Drag to orbit, scroll or pinch to zoom · download .glb (605 KB)
History
The Tutor
Slingsby of Kirkbymoorside, in North Yorkshire, built most of the gliders that British boys and girls learned to fly in. The T.31 Tandem Tutor of about 1949 was its two-seat trainer, with the instructor sitting behind the pupil in a wooden boat-shaped hull under a high wing braced by two struts on each side.
The Air Ministry bought it for the Air Training Corps as the Cadet TX Mk.3, and well over a hundred went to the gliding schools that taught air cadets to fly from the early 1950s. A winch or a car launched it to a few hundred feet, and the instructor then flew it round the circuit, handing the controls over to the cadet.
The Cadet Mk.3 gave way to later trainers, but plenty were sold on to civilian clubs, where the Tutor’s gentle handling kept it flying for decades. It is the “Tutor” in the gazetteer’s Slingsby family, which also covers the single-seat Cadet and the Grasshopper.
This airframe
Cadet TX Mk.3 XA302
XA302 is a Slingsby T.31B built in 1950 and flown by RAF gliding schools at Kirton in Lindsey, White Waltham, Booker, Halton and elsewhere, where one instructor alone sent more than a thousand cadets solo in it. It hangs from the roof at the RAF Museum in Hendon in the red and cream scheme and “AIR CADETS” titles of the Air Training Corps. The model stands on its wheel as it would on the airfield.
Where to see one
In the gazetteer
The gazetteer records the Tutor in 7 UK collections. The airframe modelled here is marked.