2/43 Report of the Brabazon Committee recommendations included: Type I, Transatlantic and Type III, Empire. Ministers accepted they would fund such things..."without detriment to the War Effort", which excluded the only design teams with experience of large structure. They were all scheming Big Bombers.
Bristol had bid for one, 11/42, declined for the precise reason that their expertise was in twins. That left them with a Big Wing design and an idle design team. By 2/43 Minister of Aircraft Production was MP for Bristol E. To the consternation of Avro/HP/Short/Vickers, T.167 was funded 3/43, Bristol Centaurus initially: that would offer no benefit over Very Heavy Transports being schemed in US, but (to be) Bristol Theseus propellor-turbine was also being schemed for Big Bombers and would go in a T.167 Mk.II.
Noise from Big Teams caused MAP to release Type III (Empire) only as very Interim derivations of Halifax (as Hermes) and Lancaster (as Tudor), and to defer a proper competitor for DC-4/L-049. Schemes for Medium and Long Range Empire occupied Avro et al into 1947.
1947, time to raze the village of Charlton, to extend Filton's runway for T.167: fortunately Cabinet did not demur - it helped that the President of the Board of Trade was MP for Bristol E.
1947, time to contemplate an enemy: Medium Bomber schemes; and invitation to re-bid MRE, ex-Type III. Avro+HP won the Bomber by 12/47, Short won a back up; 4/48, so did Vickers. So, no-one was left to do MRE. Fortunately the Chancellor of the Exchequer was MP for Bristol E. T.175 was bid with Centaurus, funded 5/7/48, 25 ordered 28/7/49 for BOAC, who converted the order 12/50 to Proteus. That engine was funded for Saro Princess, Brabazon II and (to be) Britannia 100. Otherwise, the only link between 167/175 was the generality of big structure/systems.
Bristol, 1946-48 schemed licenced L-849 Constellation, with Centaurus, then Theseus, but could not extract $. If only...
Last edited by tornadoken; 6th Oct 2014 at 11:59.