Bristol Bloodhound

The Bristol Type 84 Bloodhound was a British two-seat reconnaissance and fighter biplane, designed and built by the Bristol Aeroplane Company in the 1920s as a possible replacement for the Bristol F.2 Fighter in the Royal Air Force. Only four prototypes were built and it was unsuccessful. After the failure of the two-seat Bullfinch, the Air Ministry issued Specification 3/22 in 1922 for a two-seat fighter with a supercharged engine, and Bristol chief designer Wilfred Reid drew the Bloodhound as a private venture. It was a swept two-bay biplane powered by a Bristol Jupiter IV radial engine, and it first flew at the end of May 1923. The fuselage and wings were revised when Frank Barnwell returned as chief designer, and the Air Ministry then ordered three examples, one of all-metal construction, the first of which flew on 4 February 1925. Evaluation showed it could not replace the F.2, and its rivals, the Hawker Duiker, Armstrong Whitworth Wolf and de Havilland D.H.42 Dormouse, also fell short. The first prototype later became a Jupiter engine testbed for Imperial Airways and was scrapped in 1931.