Cramlington
Cramlington Aircraft Ltd
Contents
History
One of the earliest pupils of the Newcastle on Tyne Aero Club at Cramlington Aerodrome was Constance "Connie" Leathart (7 December 1903 – 4 November 1993), a young socialite who, despite crashing on her first solo flight, went on to become an accomplished pilot. With her great friend, Walter Leslie Runciman (26 August 1900 – 1 September 1989), 2nd Viscount Runciman of Doxford, they formed Cramlington Aircraft Ltd, and took over the aircraft and business of Pleasure Flying Services on 30 October 1929. The company managed Cramlington aerodrome and ran a maintenance and repair operation. In 1930 Alec Bell designed and built three examples of the Cramlington Cramcraft primary glider.
On 26 July 1935, Woolsington Aerodrome opened, about 5 miles to the south-west, as a great improvement on Cramlington (it would become Newcastle International Airport later). Almost all of Cramlington's users and residents had moved there by May 1936 in which month Cramlington Aircraft ceased trading, and the airfield was left almost deserted. An exception was the Gliding Club, which remained until the outbreak of World War II. Cramlington Aircraft Ltd entered voluntary liquidation in January 1939.
Company References
Project Data
| Project No | Type No | Name | Alternative Name(s) | Year | Spec (Requirement) | Status | Qty | Description | References |
|---|
Project References
- British Gliders and Sailplanes 1922-1970, Norman Ellison (Adam and Charles Black, 1971)
- Sailplane & Glider Vol 1 No 5
- Sailplane & Glider Vol 2 No 1
- Sailplane & Glider Vol 2 No 4
Production Details and Type Description
Single-seat, primary training glider. It was a wooden aircraft with wings of rectangular planform built around two box spars which, like the ribs, were made from spruce and plywood. Ailerons reached to the wing tips but no airbrakes were fitted. The tail surfaces were carried on a narrow, flat boom formed by two parallel beams from the wing leading edge, braced together and fabric covered. Both the boom-mounted tailplane and elevators it carried were rectangular in plan, though the latter had a cutout for rudder movement and extended beyond the tailplane. The rudder was mounted on a very narrow fin and initially extended further below the boom than above but was later modified so that little projected below and the upper profile became more rounded. Initially the pilot's seat was mounted well below the wing leading edge on the narrow edge of a board or plank, the under edge of which was shaped to curve up forwards and served as a skid. The board was fixed to the wing spars by two pairs of parallel V-form lift struts, the angle between them being unusually small.This arrangement left the pilot completely exposed and a later version placed them in a short nacelle. Both wings and tail were further wire braced, with lift wires from the fuselage and above from a pair of inverted V-struts mounted on the two boom beams.
| Specification | |||||
| Span | Length | Height | Wing Area | Empty Wt | Max AUW |
| 33 ft 6 in | 17 ft | 151 sq ft | 140 lb | ||
| 10.21 m | 5.18 m | 14.03 m2 | 64 kg | ||
Total Cramlington Production3