The Vickers VC10 is a 1960s airliner by Vickers-Armstrongs (Aircraft) Ltd. It magnified the leading issues of British post-War foreign and domestic politics until the Thatcher era: the break-up of the Empire, relations with the USA, de facto government control of the ostensibly private aircraft industry, and whether the priority ought to be to seek full employment and manage the market or to answer pure market demand.

Today a handful VC-10s are still in service as aerial refueling and transport aircraft with the RAF. Despite its lack of commercial success, many consider it to be a particularly elegant and even beautiful design. With 4 Rolls-Royce Conways grouped in pairs around the tail of the aircraft it is now rather loud by modern airliner standards, though for the time it was not and was regarded by passengers as being quiet and comfortable, something the original operator, BOAC, was keen to trumpet, describing it as "triumphantly swift, silent, serene".

History

Political and aviation background

Though privately owned, Britain's aviation industry had de facto been managed by its largest client, the state, in peace and particularly during the Second World War, when it was turned over to war materiel and production of transport and passenger craft was curtailed in favour of bombers. During the war, in 1943, the Brabazon Committee ushered even tighter command economy-style principles into the industry by specifying a number of different types of airliners that would be required for the post-War years. However, because it assumed that US technological leadership in heavy bombers would translate into leadership in long range airliners, at the time of the Brabazon Committee, the British government conceded in principle that its industry may have to cede the long range market to US makers.

By the late 1950s, the government decreed that the industry should consolidate. There were two engine makers by 1959: Rolls-Royce and Bristol-Siddeley. In 1960, the British Aircraft Corporation (BAC) encompassed Vickers, Bristol, and English Electric's aviation interests, Hawker-Siddeley built on de Havilland's heavy aircraft experience, and Westland consolidated helicopter manufacture. BAC and Hawker-Siddeley (now also covering Avro) merged along with Handley Page to give British Aerospace in 1977.

BOAC background

The British government also controlled the airline industry. Apart from very tight route licencing for private airlines, this involved direct ownership of the newly established BOAC long range and BEA short and medium range airlines. They acted as government instruments first and commercial entities second. Thus, BOAC serviced British Empire destinations across Southern Asia and Africa: the "Medium-Range Empire routes" (MRE). Many of them were to remote and less-developed areas. Most were commercially unattractive but politically, strategically, and socially important.

As had been the case for its interwar predecessor, Imperial Airways, BOAC invariably had to operate British-designed and built or British-powered aircraft, with procurement bills paid by the Ministry of Supply. All of these aircraft were either unsafe, delayed, uncompetitive, or had all of these defects. The Canadair DC-4M was uneconomical, as was the Hermes. The Comet I suffered crashes (due to metal fatigue) and was removed from service, and the Britannia was years late entering service. Though not operated by BOAC, the Tudor also suffered crashes which forced the closure of quasi-private British South American Airways. This strained relations between BOAC and indigenous aircraft makers.

Vickers and Rolls-Royce background

In the early 1950s, Vickers-Armstrongs designed the Type 1000 (V.1000): a military troop/freight development of the Valiant V-bomber with trans-Atlantic range. At this point, Atlantic routes were flown by slow aircraft and a jet would cut hours off the flight. The only jet airliner to have seen service by then was the Comet I, whose range was too short for the Atlantic.

As the RAF ordered six V.1000 strategic troop/freight transports, Vickers proposed a 120-seat airliner version known as the V.C.7 (the seventh civil design by Vickers). The government agreed to fund development and work began on a prototype. However, the RAF order was cancelled in a 1955 round of defence cuts and the project ended.

Rolls-Royce repeatedly readapted its V-bomber Conway by-pass engine to the V.1000 as the airframe weight grew, also "civilianising" it for the V.C.7. However, the engine maker was unconvinced in the success of the Vickers designs, turning its attention to getting the Conway onto the Boeing 707 and Douglas DC-8. During the following two decades, Rolls-Royce concertedly courted US airliner makers and lobbied for the outright closure of British airliner making which presented minor but irritating competition to the Americans. In the company's view, Britain had forfeited its chances with the Tudor, Hermes, Comet, and Britannia; for the sake of the Special Relationship, it had to concentrate on engine making as the sole viable part of its civil aviation design and manufacturing sector.

BOAC reenters the Jet Age

Though BOAC had ordered modified Comet 4s, it saw the type as intermediate (the new Comet served the carrier for well under a decade). In 1956, BOAC declared its direction for the future when it ordered 15 Boeing 707s. These, however, were both oversized and underpowered for BOAC's MRE routes. MRE included destinations with "hot and high" airports: those at high temperatures and elevations which reduced aircraft performance. For this reason, the early 707 BOAC had ordered was unsuitable for MRE routes, notably between Karachi and Singapore, and could not lift a full load from high-altitude airports like Kano or Nairobi. This seemed to inject new life into the MRE requirement.

Several companies pitched for the MRE fleet. De Havilland offered the DH.118, a development of the Comet 5 project, while Handley Page proposed the HP.97, based on their V-bomber, the Victor. After carefully considering the routes, Vickers offered the VC10.

The VC10 concept

The VC10 was an entirely new design and bore no relation to the V.C.7, other than having the same Conway engines. It had a generous wing equipped with full span Fowler flaps for high take-off and climb performance, and its engines were at the rear, giving an efficient clean wing and reduced cabin noise. Technological breakthroughs included structural parts which were milled from solid blocks, rather than being assembled from pieces of profiled sheet metal. The entire airframe was to be carefully coated against corrosion. Planned flightdeck technology was extremely advanced, with a quadruplicated automatic flight control system (a "super autopilot") envisaged to enable fully automatic zero visibility landings. Capacity was up to some 135 passengers in a two class configuration. Vickers designer Sir George Edwards is said to have stated that this was the sole route he could have taken unless he was to reinvent the 707. Despite very serious misgivings on operating cost, BOAC was pressured by the government to order 25 aircraft.

Vickers calculated that it would need to sell 80 VC-10s at about £1.75 million per aircraft to break even. With BOAC taking only 25, another 55 remained to be sold. Vickers offered a smaller version (the VC11) to BEA for longer routes like those to Athens and Beirut, being rejected in favour of the Hawker-Siddeley Trident. (In retrospect, it was sanguine to expect such low break even figures, especially with the expensive research and development involved in the design. Conventional logic at the time dictated that no fewer than 300 aircraft would have needed to be sold in order to cover research, development, testing, certification, and construction costs.)

Uncertainty and indecision

Vickers revamped its production plans to attempt breaking even with 35 sales at £1.5 million each, re-using jigs from the Vickers Vanguard. On January 14, 1958, BOAC raised its order to 35 with optional orders for a further 20 aircraft, all with smaller 109-seat interiors and more first class seating. With orders from a single customer giving an expected break even the use of the Vanguard jigs was abandoned and new production jigs made.

BOAC had calculated that the 707 cost £4.10 per passenger mile, while the VC-10 would cost £4.24 a mile. The large difference caused growing concern and calls to cancel the VC10 orders in favour of the 707. The VC10 was rescued by the British government. In order to offer a more economical product, Vickers began work on the Super 200 development of the VC10. Its main differences were more powerful Conway engines and a 28 feet (8.1 m) longer fuselage offering up to 212 seats: exactly as many as the Advanced 707-320B/C.

By January 1960, Vickers was experiencing financial difficulties and was concerned it would not be able to deliver the original 35 VC10s without a loss. It offered to sell ten Super 200s to BOAC at £2.7 million each, only to find that BOAC was unconvinced it had a role for the already ordered 35 VC-10s. The government intervened again on Vickers' behalf, with an order for Super 200s placed on June 23, 1960. BOAC doubts continued, this time centred on the airline's ability to fill all 200 seats. The Super 200 was accordingly cut down to a 13 ft (3.9 m) stretch to the final Super VC10 (Type 1150), the original design retrospectively becoming the Standard VC10 (Type 1100).

As allowed in its contracts with Vickers, in May 1961 BOAC amended its order to 15 Standard and 35 Super VC10s, with eight of the Supers having a new combi configuration with a large cargo door and stronger floor. The order was changed again in December to 12 Standards. By the time handovers were ready to begin in 1964, airline growth had slowed and BOAC wanted to cut its order to seven Supers. In May the government intervened, placing an order for VC10s to operate as military transports, absorbing the overproduction.

The lengthy political manoeuvring surrounding the VC10 was well publicised and did much to erode market confidence in the type. Its history to that date had been a see-saw, with the government promoting it and an increasingly unwilling national airline hoping it would go away. This culminated in a furious public political scandal when BOAC chairman Gerald d'Erlanger and managing director Sir Basil Smallpeice resigned over the issue of whether the national airline was a profit-making company or an automatic sponsor of indigenous aircraft designs; the two (with Smallpeice later an ardent supporter of the 1980s right wing Conservative Margaret Thatcher premiership) defended the former opinion. They were widely supported within BOAC, whose staff felt the VC10 was foisted on them in order to boost employment figures, and who no longer had confidence in British aircraft makers. BOAC's incoming chairman Sir Giles Guthrie was also anti-VC10: he proposed that the Vickers programme should be shelved in favour of more 707 orders.

Development and production

The prototype Standard, G-ARTA, rolled out of the Weybridge factory on April 15, 1962. After two months of ground, engine and taxi tests, on June 29 it flew to Wisley for further testing. By the end of the year, two more had been flown to Wisley. A serious problem with drag had appeared by then. To cure it, Kuchemann wingtips and "beaver tail" engine nacelle fairings were added and tested. Along with the rework of the base rudder segment (its scythe shape was replaced by an angular design with an endplate for greater control effectiveness), this lengthened testing. The certification programme included visits to Nairobi, Khartoum, Rome, Kano, Aden, Salisbury, and Beirut. A VC10 flew across the Atlantic to Montreal on February 8, 1964.

By this point seven of the original 12 Standards were complete, and the production line was preparing for Super VC10s. A Certificate of Airworthiness was awarded on April 22, 1964. By the end of 1964 all Standards had been delivered, with Vickers (by this point part of the BAC) retaining the prototype.

Super VC10s followed a month later, with the first flight on May 7, 1964. Although the Super was ostensibly a minor development of the Standard with an extra fuel tank in the fin, testing was prolonged by the need to move each engine pair 11 inches (27cm) outboard. This major redesign was needed to resolve tailplane buffeting and fatigue issues due to thrust reverser operation. The two inboard engines could have thrust reversers installed at last, matching the 707. (Military VC10s also had this engine arrangement.) The Certificate of Airworthiness was awarded in March 1965.

Later VC10 design developments included testing the large main deck freight door and new wing leading edges featuring a part-drooped four per cent chord extension over the inboard two thirds, and a drooped extended-chord wingtip which allowed more economical higher cruising heights. (This mimicked the 1961 aerodynamics of the similar-looking but otherwise entirely different Il-62.) Further developments were proposed, including freighter versions. Effort was focused on getting a BOAC order for a 250-seat "VC10 Superb." This was a move away from the VC10's initial MRE role, into the area targeted by Douglas with the DC-8 Super Sixties. Unlike the Douglas machine, the VC10 would have needed an entirely new double deck fuselage. This raised emergency escape concerns. The design failed to attract orders.

Sales and airline service

BOAC took delivery of its first VC10 on the day it received its Certificate of Airworthiness. The first commercial flight, to Lagos, was on April 29. Super VC10 services started on April 1 1965. Operational experience soon resulted in the deletion of the inboard thrust reversers due to continued tailplane buffeting despite the engine repositioning.

Ghana Airways ordered three VC10s in January 1961. Two were to be fitted with a cargo door and known as Type 1102s. The first was delivered in November 1964, the second in May 1965, and the third was cancelled. British United Airways (BUA), ordered two combi versions (Type 1103) in 1964, receiving them in October that year. When BOAC ceased VC10 operations to South America, BUA took them over, purchasing Ghana Airways' cancelled third aircraft in July 1965, and added a fourth example in 1969. Ghana Airways also leased out one of their aircraft to Tayran Assharq Alawsat (Middle East Airlines; MEA); this was destroyed at Beirut during an Israeli raid in December 1968. MEA also operated the prototype Vickers had kept until 1965, leased from Freddie (later Sir) Laker's eponymous charter airline. Nigeria Airways planned to purchase two VC10s but had to cancel their order for financial reasons; it later leased a BOAC aircraft.

The last VC10 built was an East African Airways Super, delivered in February 1970. The production line then closed, with 54 airframes built. Airline demand for the 707 and Douglas DC-8, with their superior operating economics, encouraged many of the world's smaller airports to extend their runways, thus eliminating the VC10's main advantage.

Marketing overtures for the VC10 were also mounted elsewhere, particularly in Mexico, Argentina, the Lebanon, Thailand, Czechoslovakia, and Romania. In line with the VC10's state-led background, these tended to be fronted by British cabinet figures from the Harold Wilson era like John Stonehouse and Tony Benn. (In reminiscences, some of these figures have claimed that BOAC staff actively sabotaged VC10 marketing by leaking confidential documents relating to the type's fuel consumption.) The final serious enquiry for VC10s came from Chinese state airline Zhōngguó Mínyòng (CAAC) in 1971 and was confirmed in 1972. By then production equipment had been broken up.

BOAC successor British Airways began retiring its Supers from Atlantic flights as early as 1974, using them to displace Standards. As the Standards were retired in turn, British Airways leased some to Tayran Alhalij (Gulf Air). Most were scrapped at Heathrow after an attempt to launch an airline in Belize failed. Retirement of the Super VC10 began in April 1980, but use continued on less travelled routes until 1981. After failing to sell them, British Airways handed them over to the RAF in May that year. This closed the type's commercial service history, though two machines continued in VIP service for some time.

RAF service

In 1960, the RAF issued Specification 239 for a strategic transport, placed by the Air Ministry with Vickers in 1961 as an order for five VC10s. The military version was a combination of the Standard combi airframe with the developed wing and Super VC10 engines. It also had a detachable in-flight refuelling nose probe and an auxiliary power unit in the tailcone. The order was increased by an additional six in 1963, plus the three which BOAC had cancelled in 1964. The first RAF machine (known to the service as the VC-10 C Mk. 1), was delivered for testing on November 26, 1965, with deliveries to No. 10 Squadron beginning in December 1966 and ending in August 1968.

In 1978 the RAF contracted British Aerospace to convert nine C.1s as air refuelling tankers. Eventually 13 of 14 C.1s were converted. (The fourteenth had been leased to Rolls-Royce for flight testing of the RB211 turbofan in 1969 and was later scrapped.) A further 39 surplus airline aircraft were acquired, some for immediate and others for later conversion. Of them, 13 were eventually converted, the rest used as parts sources.

The RAF has operated three types of VC10: the dual transport/tanker VC-10 C1K and the VC-10 K3 and VC-10 K4 tanker-only aircraft capable of lifting 78 and 68 tonnes of air-transferrable fuel respectively.

Surviving airworthy VC10s serve as tanker/transports with No. 101 Squadron at RAF Brize Norton, Oxfordshire and No. 1312 Flight at RAF Mount Pleasant, Falkland Islands, making the RAF the VC10's final operator. The VC10 and Lockheed Tristar tanker/transports are due to be replaced in RAF service by the Airbus A330 MRTT under the Future Strategic Tanker Aircraft Project.

Variants

• Vickers V.C.10 Type 1100: prototype; 1 built, (1 converted to Type 1109)
• BAC VC10 Type 1101: BOAC Standards; up to 35 ordered at various times; 12 built
• BAC Standard VC10 Type 1102: Ghana Airways' Standard combis; 3 built (1 redesignated Type 1103)
• BAC Standard VC10 Type 1103: BUA Standard combis; 2 built, (1 redesignated Type 1102)
• BAC Standard VC10 Type 1104: Nigeria Airways' Standards; two ordered, none built
• BAC Standard VC10 Type 1106: military transport version for the RAF (RAF designation "VC-10 C. Mk. 1"); 14 built
• BAC Standard VC10 Type 1109: converted from Type 1100 for lease to Laker Airways
• BAC Super VC10 Type 1150: generic Super VC10
• BAC Super VC10 Type 1151: BOAC Supers, up to 22 ordered at various times; 17 built
• BAC Super VC10 Type 1152: BOAC Super combi; 13 ordered, none built
• BAC Super VC10 Type 1154: East African Airways' Super combi; 5 built
• VC-10 C. Mk. 1: RAF designation for the Type 1106; 14 built, 13 converted to VC-10 C. Mk. 1K
• VC-10 C. Mk. 1K: RAF designation for the transport aircraft converted from Type 1106 ("VC-10 C. Mk. 1")
• VC-10 K. Mk. 2: RAF designation for 5 inflight-refueling tankers converted from Type 1101
• VC-10 K. Mk. 3: RAF designation for 4 inflight-refueling tankers converted from Type 1154
• VC-10 K. Mk. 4: RAF designation for 5 inflight-refueliing tankers converted from Type 1151

Preserved examples

• Type 1101 (Registration G-ARVF) on display in United Arab Emirates government colours at Flugausstellung Leo Junior at Hermeskeil in Germany
• Type 1103 (Registration A4O-AB) on display in Oman Royal Flight colours at the Brooklands Museum, Surrey, England
• Type 1151 (Registration G-ASGC) on display in BOAC-Cunard colours at Duxford, Cambridgeshire, England

Specifications (Model 1101)

External links

• The double deck VC10 Superb proposal
• Assorted proposals for the VC10
• A little VC10derness - a website dedicated to the VC10

References

• Benn, Tony, The Tony Benn Diaries 1940-1990, Arrow, UK, 1996, ISBN: 0099634112
• Cole, Lance, Vickers VC10, The Crowood Press Ltd, Ramsbury, UK, 2000, ISBN: 1861262310
• Hedley, Martin, VC-10, Modern Civil Aircraft Series, Ian Allan, UK, 1982, ISBN: 0711012148
• Henderson, Scott, Silent, Swift, Superb: the Story of the Vickers VC10, Scoval, UK, ISBN: 1902236025
• Powell, David, Tony Benn: a Political Life, Continuum Books, 2001, ISBN: 0826456995
• Smallpeice, Sir Basil, Of Comets and Queens, Airlife, Shrewsbury, UK, 1981, ISBN: 0906393108

• The Putnam Aeronautical Review, No.1, March 1989, Putnam, UK

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British airliners 1960-1969 | Vickers

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