Harry Tate

This one started of something, I think, all from cockney, music hall performers to flaming coffins.

Well, as I see it, without beeing sure I´ve got it all right, the "cockneything falling over music hall performer sitting in a flaming coffin" sounds quite ok. I buy it.

Peter Norell

[Vigilant]

The RE8 did do the job for which it was designed well. OK. But then so did the Armstrong-Whitworth FK8, and the FK8 seems to have avoided aquiring the dodgy reputation of old 'Harry'. (Deserved or otherwise.) Come to that, the Bristol F2B was a superb 2-seater and used in Art.Obs role. So it does not follow that a good corps aircraft had to be a liability when the gentlemen from Douai turned up. I think the RE8 was just too much a 1917 version of the BE2 design, The other 2 types had the advantage of having nothing to do with the BE!

My -/2d worth,

Vigilant
"I luva yew Mary Popins!" - Dick 'Chim-Chiminy' van Dyke

Dash it all! What is happening to the King's English? You're all talking like a bunch of demmed flower mongers.

Nah look 'ere, 'Enery 'Iggins! Anymore o' yore bleedin' lip, an' i'll 'ave to arsk yew t' step ahtside!!...........................Now I'm orf dahn the frog an'toad t' the rub a dub dub t' get a few pigs ears dahn the ol' gregory peck...if I sees ol 'Arry Tate i'll tell 'im yer wuz arskin' after 'im!!

[stephen]

No offense taken, Melinda, and actually you're not contradicting me at all. You're contradicting Lt. R. E. Norman of RAF 21, Lt. Phil Townsend of RAF 12, etc., etc. I am admittedly accepting their judgement over the opinion of modern historians. I could be wrong, but I make it a rule to never argue with a man who's peered at Fokkers through an Aldis sight.

No disrespect intended to the memories of the men cited by Stephen, but I have at least one memoir by an RE-8 pilot who refers to the type as "the flying paving-stone."

The Harry Tate actually achieved its design intention fairly well. The problem is that the design philosophy was wrong, and had been proven wrong when work on the project began. In any air force other than the RFC, the RE-8 wouldn't have progressed beyond the prototype state. (It's been argued that the only reason the RE-8 went into production at all was as a result of empire-building by Mervyn O'Gorman, the bureaucrat who headed the Royal Aircraft Factory.)

The thing I find most flabbergasting about the RE-8 story is that the vertical fin was actually *reduced* in size when production started. It wasn't until a series of fatal spins in front-line squadrons that the original fin size was restored. Even then, of course, the machine was so stable as to be almost unable to defend itself when attacked. (Not to mention the fact that it was so badly balanced that it couldn't be flown without a minimum of 150 lbs. in the rear cockpit -- yet if the gunner stood up while on landing approach, the machine would stall.)

The point about the Big Ack (FK-8) is well-made. The Ack was superior to the Harry Tate in every respect but one: it was a private design, and the RFC was notably reluctant to use designs produced by private concerns in competition to the Factory's own designs. (The French, for example, used almost four times as many Sopwith 1 1/2 Strutters as did the RFC.)

The RE8 WAS named after Harry Tate as a pure piece of rhyming slang. Those cockney blighters are always changing their slang as time goes on. Hence Alan Whickers (a well known TV personality) for knickers (sorry ladies) Deep Sea Diver (Fiver or five pounds) and recently a McGarret for Fifty pounds (5-0 -- geddit?) (that's parnds to you dickvandikers). I'll leave you to ponder on Kyber Pass...

B

[mike_baram]

"Daddy, what caused the collapse of Western Civilization?"

"Well, as far as anyone knows, it all started with an innocuous question by a guy named Peter Norell."

[Vigilant]

Obviously I shan't nemtion Gary Glitter. That would be unnecessary.