Royal Aircraft Establishment

The Royal Aircraft Establishment (RAE ) was a British research and development institution, which went up in new, established by the Department of Defense organizations in 1991. From 1988 to 1991, the facility was named Royal Aerospace Establishment.

History

The company was founded in 1892 as an army own company for the production of balloons as " Her Majesty 's Balloon Factory" (Royal Balloon Factory) with location Aldershot. In 1905, the operation was moved to Farnborough, and in 1911 the company was renamed " Army Aircraft Factory ".

In December 1910, the company received the wreck of a Blériot monoplane with a tractor propeller for examination. These findings show the first aircraft, the BE1, a single-seat biplane was - but you used a pusher propeller. The machine was launched on December 4, 1911 for its first flight, but was not very successful: the BE1 crashed. So they built in April 1911 based on a need of repair Voisin biplane, which had acquired the company in a machine with a tractor propeller ( Royal Aircraft Factory BE1).

After re- renamed " Royal Aircraft Factory" from 1912, the team devoted around the designer Henry Phillip Folland reinforced the construction of aircraft and developed patterns that gained a high profile in the time of the First World War.

The most successful product is likely to have been the British fighter Royal Aircraft Factory SE5, which was in large numbers on the Allied side in use.

On 1 April 1918 as the British Air Force was given the name Royal Air Force and hence the abbreviation RAF, the company was renamed again to avoid confusion; it was called now " Royal Aircraft Establishment " ( RAe ). With the name change was accompanied by the state-imposed retreat from the field of aircraft development. Immediately the operation worked only in research in the field of aviation technology. Many well-known aircraft were tested in the postwar period in the plants of the RAe, so the British Hawker Siddeley Harrier VTOL aircraft and the British-French joint project of the supersonic airliner Concorde. The RAe operation including a large wind tunnel at Farnborough.

On April 1, 1991, the company the " Defence Research Agency" ( DRA), a newly established by the UK MoD organization was incorporated. On April 1, 1995, they summarized the DRA along with other organizations, the Department of Defense for " Defence Evaluation and Research Agency (DERA ) ."

In 2001 there was a partial privatization of DERA - it was the state's " Defence Science and Technology Laboratory " ( DSTL ) and the private company QinetiQ.

Both companies are now (2005) - in addition to the "British National Space Centre " and the Air Accidents Investigation Branch, the British investigative body for accidents in aviation - in the facilities of the former RAe.

Produced aircraft

For the classification of designations see designation system for aircraft of the British armed forces

  • Former aircraft manufacturer
  • Armaments manufacturer (United Kingdom)
Farnborough (Hampshire)
78413
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