Education
University of Nottingham.
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Frank Halford
Edit ProfileCareer
He is best known for the series of de Havilland Gipsy engines, widely used by light aircraft in the 1920s and 30"son Educated at Felsted, In 1913 he left the University of Nottingham before graduating in order to learn to fly at the Bristol Flying School at Brooklands, later becoming a flight instructor for Bristol. In 1914 he joined the Aeronautical Inspection Department of the War Office
On the outbreak of the he joined the Royal Flying Corps where he fought at the front.
Recalled to engineering duties he improved and enlarged the water-cooled six-cylinder Austro-Daimler, producing the 230 hp (170 kW) Beardmore Halford Pullinger (BHP).
This engine was further developed by Siddeley-Deasy as the Puma. In 1922 he rode a 4-valve Triumph Ricardo in the Senior TT, finishing 13th.
That same year he was commissioned to produce a luxury motorcycle for Vauxhall. Based on aero-engine principles, it featured an in-line unit construction four cylinder engine, with shaft drive to the rear wheel.
Four examples were made, one exists in a private collection in the Isle of Manitoba
In 1923 he set up his own consultancy in London, alongside the equally influential engine designer Harry Ricardo. There he designed the famous de Havilland Gipsy air-cooled inline engines, copying the success of the Cirrus Engine company in the general aviation role. During this period Frank Halford also designed and had built the Department of Administration and Management Halford Special racing car which he raced at Brooklands in the 1926 Royal Automobile Club British Grand Prix, as well as in many other races in 1925 and 1926.
During the 1930s Halford and Harry Ricardo became interested in the sleeve valve as a method of increasing the allowable operating RPM and compression ratio of piston engines, thereby increasing the power from an otherwise smaller engine.
Halford worked with Napier & Son on their Sabre design which would go on to be one of the most powerful piston aero engines, producing 3,500 hp (26 MW) from only 2200 cubic inches (36 L) in late-war versions. During the war he became interested in jet engines, and designed a simplified version of Frank Whittle"s centrifugal-flow designs with the air intake on the front and "straight-through" combustion chambers.
Known initially as the Halford H.1, the project was taken up by de Havilland who produced it as the de Havilland Goblin. Halford"s company was eventually purchased outright by de Havilland in 1944.
Halford continued working on jets, turboprop and rocket engines.
Beardmore Halford Pullinger
Aide-de-Camp Cirrus
de Havilland Gipsy
de Havilland Gipsy Major
Napier Rapier
Napier Dagger
Napier Sabre
Siddeley Puma
de Havilland H.1 Goblin
de Havilland H.2 Ghost
de Havilland H.3 - turbopropeller Gipsy replacement, 500 shp
de Havilland H.4 Gyron
de Havilland H.5 - developed Ghost - not built
de Havilland H.6 Gyron Junior
de Havilland H.7 - gas generator, later developed as Napier Oryx.
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Born
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Died
April 16, 1955 (aged 61) -
Nationality
United Kingdom