BLACKBURN FIREBRAND TF5

VACUUM-FORMED MODEL AIRCRAFT KIT

The Blackburn Firebrand was a single-engine strike fighter for the Fleet Air Arm of the Royal Navy designed during World War II by Blackburn Aircraft. Originally intended to serve as a pure fighter, its unimpressive performance and the allocation of its Napier Sabre piston engine by the Ministry of aircraft Production for the Hawker Typhoon caused it to be redesigned as a strike fighter to take advantage of its load-carrying capability. Development was slow and the first production aircraft was not delivered until after the end of the war. Only a few hundred were built before it was withdrawn from front-line service in 1953.

The Firebrand did not see action in World War II, as TF 4s were not issued to 813 Naval Air Squadron until 1 September 1945. The squadron was disbanded 30 September 1946 without ever deploying to sea. It was reformed with TF 5s on 1 May 1947 and flew them from the carrier HMS Implacable, later HMS Indomitable, until it was reequipped with turboprop Westland Wyvern attack aircraft in February 1953. 827 Naval Air Squadron received their TF 5 and 5As on 13 December 1950 and flew them primarily off the carrier HMS Eagle until it disbanded on 19 November 1952. A variety of second-line squadrons were issued Firebrands of various marks for training or trials at one time or another.

In test pilot and naval aviator Captain Eric Brown's opinion the aircraft was "short of performance, sadly lacking in manoeuvrability, especially in rate of roll". Furthermore the positioning of the cockpit even with the trailing edge of the wing gave the pilot a very poor view over the nose and inhibited his ability to view his target and to land his aircraft aboard a carrier, enough so that Brown called it "a disaster as a deck-landing aircraft.

Firebrand T.F. 5

Improved variant, 124 modified from T.F. IV, two conversions to T.F. 5A.

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