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de Havilland Tiger Moth History
de Havilland had been very
successful with it's Moth biplanes since their introduction
in 1925 dominating the UK civilian market, they had however failed
to dominate the military aircraft Market. de Havilland had tried to
sell their Gipsy Moth in large numbers to the RAF, but the RAF saw
several problems when the aircraft was flown to the edge of it's
performance envelope, the RAF believed their pilots could be almost
guaranteed to reach or exceed these limits. The perceived problems included
difficulty in spin recovery, a tight fitting cockpit for the trainee
with the upper
wing directly above making a bail-out extremely difficult while
wearing a bulky parachute, the fuel tank and it's fuel lines located
directly above the
trainees cockpit was seen as an obstruction to a trainee trying to
bale out.
de Havilland Tiger Moth Design
de Havilland heavily modified the
design of the Gipsy Moth to address all of the RAF's worries. The
fuel tank was relocated on to the upper wing, a strake was added to
the top of the rear fuselage just in front of the tail fin to make
it far easier to recover from a spin. The upper wing was moved
forwards so the forward cockpit was no longer under the wing, to
retain the original centre of gravity and lift the new upper wing
was swept backwards and the cabane struts moved. To further aid
egress from the aircraft the top twelve inches of the sides of both
cockpits were hinged so they could be folded down to quicken exit
times for both trainer and trainee, finally the adoption of an
inverted engine gave far improved forward vision. The changes made
by de Havilland to the
Gipsy moth were so extensive that a new designation, DH82a, and a
new "Moth" name were required, the new name chosen was of course
the "de Havilland DH82a Tiger Moth".
The de Havilland Tiger Moth During WW2
The efforts of de Havilland's were
not wasted, by the outbreak of WW2 over 500 de Havilland DH82a Tiger
Moth were in
service with the RAF, and during the war the RAF acquired over 4,000
more de Havilland DH82a Tiger Moths. It was not just the RAF who found the
de Havilland DH82a Tiger Moth an excellent
trainer, the Canadian, Australian and New Zealand air forces also
adopted the de Havilland DH82a Tiger Moth as their primary biplane trainer
aircraft.
The de Havilland Tiger Moth after WW2
The 1950's saw the world's air
forces slowly replacing their time served de Havilland DH82a Tiger
Moth biplanes, surplus Tiger Moth aircraft were quickly absorbed into the civilian market
where many Tiger Moths remain airworthy to this day.
Various scale
models, model kits and plans of this aircraft have been available in
the market place.
De Havilland Tiger Moth Specifications:
de Havilland
Tiger Moth Crew: Student & Instructor
de Havilland Tiger Moth Length: 23 ft 11 in (7.34 m)
de Havilland Tiger Moth Wingspan: 29 ft 4 in (8.94 m)
de Havilland Tiger Moth Height: 8 ft 9 in (2.68 m)
de Havilland Tiger Moth Wing area: 239 ft² (22.2 m²)
de Havilland Tiger Moth Empty weight: 1,115 lb (506 kg)
de Havilland Tiger Moth Loaded weight: 1,825 lb (828 kg)
de Havilland Tiger Moth Engine: Single 130 hp (100 kW) de Havilland Gipsy Major I inverted
inline four cylinder
de Havilland Tiger Moth Maximum speed: 109 mph at 1,000 ft (175 km/h at 300 m)
de Havilland Tiger Moth Range: 302 miles (486 km)
de Havilland Tiger Moth Service ceiling: 13,600 ft (4,145 m)
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