BILL PIPPIN COLLECTION
No. 11691. Gloster Gauntlet Mk.II (K5296) Royal Air Force
Aeroplane Photo Supply (APS) Photo No. 2302

Gloster Gauntlet Mk.II

11/30/2012. Remarks by Johan Visschedijk: "Competing against the Boulton Paul Partridge, the Armstrong Whitworth A.W.16 Starling Mk.II and the Hawker Hawfinch to meet the requirements of Specification F.20/27 for a single-seat fighter built principally of steel or duralumin, the Gauntlet began life as the SS.18 (s/n J9125). It was designed to the contemporary F.10/27 specification and flew as such in January 1929, initially with a Mercury IIA engine. This power plant was subsequently replaced by a 480 hp Jupiter VIIF (as the SS.18A) and then by a 560 hp Panther III (as the SS.18B), the Jupiter later being reinstated (as the SS.19).

In its last-mentioned form, it was tested with four wing-mounted 0.303 in (7.7 mm) Lewis guns and two fuselage-mounted Vickers guns of the same caliber. The wing-mounted guns were later removed (as the SS.19A), and with the 536 hp Mercury VIS engine (as the SS.19B), this was ordered into production in February 1934 with a twin Vickers Mk V-gun armament and a 640 hp Mercury VIS2 as the Gauntlet. The first production aircraft was completed in the following December.

Twenty-four Gauntlet Mk.Is (s/n K4081 to K4104) built by the parent company were followed by 204 Gauntlet Mk.IIs (s/n K5264 to K 5367, K7792 to K7891) with revised (Hawker-type) structure. Seventeen were license-built in Denmark (s/n J-22 to J-38) by the Army Aviation Troops' Workshops (after procurement of one pattern aircraft, K4081 which became J-21), and ex-RAF Gauntlet Mk.IIs disposed of abroad comprised three to Rhodesia, four to South Africa and 25 to Finland. Six were later assigned to the RAAF in the Middle East."

Gloster Gauntlet Mk.II


Created November 30, 2012