As most regulars here will know, my local airport at Shoreham has played a big part in my life. I've been visiting the airport for almost as long as I can remember & first worked there in 1960 as general factotum for the Southern Aero Club. F.G. Miles Ltd was based on the airport at the time so I met a lot of people working for the company, including my future father-in-law although we were both blissfully unaware of that then.
Long before this I could often be found in one of the WWII gun emplacements on the airport perimeter that me & like-minded friends used as a spotting base. We collected the registrations in those days & one interesting one at Shoreham was on a light blue fuselage stored at the back of the Flight Shed with the registration G-AAYX clearly marked on it. It was listed in our registration books as a Southern Martlet but that's the only information we had & I promptly forgot about it. I remember seeing it on visiting the Flight Shed when I first started work for the club but nobody seemed to know much about it or why it was there.
Turn the clock forward some 40 years when I visited Old Warden for the first time for several years. I was pleasantly surprised to see the same aircraft, now beautifully restored to flying condition. The restoration had also won several awards.
So what am I going on about? Heres some photos I've taken during various displays at Old Warden over the last couple of seasons. The static ones were taken last Saturday before the Sunset Display.
This pretty little plane in the air. It performs very well & looks fun to fly.
I copied this from the Shuttleworth Collection website: http://www.shuttleworth.org/html/shuttleworth/air19.htm
[i]"The Southern Martlet was designed by F.G. Miles, who had established Southern Aircraft at Shoreham in Sussex. Miles acquired several aircraft components from the former Avro factory at Hamble in 1926. Among these was the fuselage of an Avro Baby, Miles modified this aeroplane with a new undercarriage and tail unit and fitted a different engine to create the Martlet.
Only six Martlets were built, and each one was slightly different from each other. Five different types of engines were used and many other details differences occurred. Martlets were used as air racing machines, but did not achieve any real success. However the Southern Martlet achieved great success and popularity as aerobatic and demonstration aeroplanes. The last Martlet was built in 1931 and a variant of the Southern Martlet was also built in that year, called the Metal Martlet. It was not a success and had only a short flying career.
G-AAYX, constructors number 202, was used for many years as the personal aircraft of F.G. Miles. It was taken by Miles with him to Woodley, near Reading, when he set up Miles Aircraft. Miles Aircraft later built aircraft such as the Magister. While at Woodley, G-AAYX was used by the Reading Aero Club, 'YX survived World War Two intact and was acquired by Butlins, who used it to give displays for holidaymakers at Broomhall, Pwllheli.
