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The Vickers F.B.5 (Fighting Biplane 5) (known as the "Gunbus") was a British two-seat pusher military biplane of the First World War.Armed with a single .303 in (7.7 mm) Lewis gun operated by the observer in the front of the nacelle, it was the first aircraft purpose-built for air-to-air combat to see service, making it the world's first operational fighter aircraft.
Beginning in the 1960s, various parts of the company were nationalised, and in 1999 the rest of the company was acquired by Rolls-Royce plc, which sold the defence arm to Alvis plc. The Vickers name lived on in Alvis Vickers, until the latter was acquired by BAE Systems in 2004 to form BAE Systems Land Systems.
At the start of the First World War, Vickers entered into a partnership with the Hart Engine Company to develop a 150 hp (110 kW) nine-cylinder radial engine designed by Hart. This engine was planned to power a number of new designs by Vickers, the first of which was a small single-engine pusher biplane fighter , the F.B.12 .
Top to bottom: 1870 helicopter; 1871 'Planophore; 1873 ornithopter Wright Flyer 1903 pusher Wright, Curtiss and Farman pushers Voisin-Farman 1908 Curtiss n°2 (1909 Bristol Boxkite (1910) Wright Model B (1910) Curtiss Model E (1911) Curtiss Model F (1912) Voisin III (1914) Airco DH.2 (1915) Vickers FB.5 (1915) Royal Aircraft Factory F.E.2] (1915) Grigorovitch M-9 (1916) FBA Type H (1916 ...
The design was a development of the earlier Vickers F.B.12 prototypes; [2] and was a two-bay biplane with a high-mounted nacelle for the pilot and an initial armament of two .303 in (7.7 mm) Lewis Guns. Behind this was a water-cooled 200 hp (150 kW) Hispano-Suiza engine driving the propeller.
An alternative to the pilot's synchronised Vickers had been designed, consisting of a fixed Lewis gun with deflector plates fitted to the propeller, although this was never used, a Vickers gun for the pilot being mounted on the port side of the fuselage in a similar position to that on the B.E.12, at first synchronised by the Vickers-Challenger ...
The Vickers F.B.19 was a British single-seat fighting scout of the First World War, developed from the Barnwell Bullet prototype, and sometimes known as the Vickers Bullet. It served with the Royal Flying Corps and the Imperial Russian Air Service , which subsequently led to the Red Air Force adopting it during the Russian Civil War .
Colour Autochrome Lumière of a Nieuport Fighter in Aisne, France 1917. World War I was the first major conflict involving the use of aircraft.Tethered observation balloons had already been employed in several wars and would be used extensively for artillery spotting.