RTB CFS Little Rissington..

[Garry Russell]

Hi Dave

Over the Viking just about everything has changed......it was considered a new deign

It is in no way a nose wheel version of the Viking.as often thought ....even all the window are in a different place.

Nothing common between the two, but it must be interesting to see the two side by side

The Varsity always amazed me in how the main gear was just long enough to reach the ground

[DaveB]

Yes mate.. a stable landing was necessary to stop scraping the underside Clearance twixt fuse bottom and the deck must be measured in inches rather than feet I love em both Never felt the same affection for the Valetta though and never fly the FS model. Last time I did.. it was for beta testing!

ATB

DaveB

[Garry Russell]

Somehow I can't imagine a Varsity commander calling out "Rotate"

[DaveB]

No.. not by a lot anyway. Much better to build up speed and simply unstick

ATB

DaveB

[Tomliner]

always amazed me in how the main gear was just long enough to reach the ground

My undercarriage is just the same Garry(providing I wear thick soled shoes) EricT

[Chris558]

Had the Viking had a nose wheel, I'm sure it would have sold much better.

[Garry Russell]

I don't think so

The Viking was a stopgap..they never had any interest shown in the civil Varsity

Also in the early fifties when HP were ironing out the design for the four engined Herald a lot of potential customers wanted it to be re designed with a tail wheel.

Things were looked upon differently then.

[DaveB]

Yup

I've been thinking about the 'could have sold better' with the addition nose gear since I read it yesterday and all things considered, I think it did pretty darned well at 163 units.. very many more if you add the military version, the Valetta Given the utter austerity the country was suffering and the fact ex military aircraft were cheap as chips, Vickers did very well out of the Viking.

Quoted from Airlines and Airliners - Vickers Viking..
.. the Viking became a beacon of post war British aviation, being seen in a large number of countries around the world for nearly 30 years.. and further on.. It became the fleet mainstay for a large number of British and European independent airlines in the 50's and 60's and would take millions of people on holiday to destinations that they could only have dreamt of during the dark and austere years of post war Europe.

That kinda works for me The tailwheel (it retracted which was rare in those days) was so designed should a nose gear version been adopted at a later date which of course it wasn't as such. The front fuse was already stressed sufficiently to fit one

ATB

DaveB

[Garry Russell]

Of all the Bombers with a new fuse the Viking was, by far the most sucessful.as you say Dave 163 and 263 Valetta's

It was faster than the Dak and when introduced was just the ticket to get things on the go again for the fledgling BEA.

The Varsity civil development in which no interest was shown, was the VC3

[DaveB]

263 Valettas Blimey.. I didn't realise they'd made that many!!

No.. as you pointed out earlier, it was only ever given the green light to be a stop gap and in that light, it was a great success.. beyond that in reality I'd forgotten until I picked up the A&A booklet that it's tail surfaces were off the Warwick!

ATB

DaveB