The story
Founded by Charles Richard Fairey in 1915.1
Founded in 1915 by Charles Richard Fairey (later Sir Richard Fairey) and Belgian engineer Ernest Oscar Tips on their departure from Short Brothers, the company first built under licence or as subcontractor aircraft designed by other manufacturers. The first aircraft designed and built by the Fairey Aviation specifically for use on an aircraft carrier was the Fairey Campania a patrol seaplane that first flew in February 1917. In the third report of the Royal Commission on Awards to Inventors, reported in Flight magazine of 15 January 1925, aviation figures prominently. C. R. Fairey and the Fairey Aviation Co. Ltd, was awarded £4,000 for work on the Hamble Baby seaplane.
Fairey subsequently designed many aircraft types and, after World War II, missiles.
The Propeller Division (Fairey-Reed Airscrews) was located at the Hayes factory, and used designs based on the patents of Sylvanus Albert Reed. C. R. Fairey first encountered Reed's products in the mid-1920s when investigating the possibilities of the Curtiss D-12 engine. The Curtiss company also manufactured propellers designed by Reed. Another example of utilising the talents of independent designers was the use of flaps, designed by Robert Talbot Youngman (Fairey-Youngman flaps) which gave many of the Fairey aircraft and those of other manufacturers improved manoeuvrability.
Aircraft production was primarily at the factory in North Hyde Road, Hayes (Middlesex), with flight testing carried out at Northolt Aerodrome (1917–1929), Great West Aerodrome (1930–1944), Heston Airport (1944–1947), and finally at White Waltham (1947–1964). Losing the Great West Aerodrome in 1944 by requisition by the Air Ministry to build London Heathrow Airport, with no compensation until 1964, caused a severe financial shock which may have hastened the company's end.
One notable Hayes-built aircraft type during the late 1930s and World War II was the Swordfish. In 1957, the prototype Fairey Rotodyne vertical takeoff airliner was built at Hayes. After the merger with Westland Helicopters, helicopters such as the Westland Wasp and Westland Scout were built at Hayes in the 1960s.
Receipt of large UK military contracts in the mid-1930s necessitated acquisition of a large factory in Heaton Chapel Stockport in 1935 that had been used as the National Aircraft Factory No. 2 during World War I. Flight test facilities were built at Manchester's Ringway Airport, the first phase opening in June 1937. A few Hendon monoplane bombers built at Stockport were flown from Manchester's Barton Aerodrome in 1936. Quantity production of Battle light bombers at Stockport/Ringway commenced in mid 1937. Large numbers of Fulmar fighters and Barracuda dive-bombers followed during World War II. Fairey's also built 498 Bristol Beaufighter aircraft and over 660 Handley Page Halifax bombers in their northern facilities. Postwar, Firefly and Gannet naval aircraft were supplemented by sub-contracts from de Havilland for Vampire and Venom jet fighters. Aircraft production and modification at Stockport and Ringway ceased in 1960.
On 13 March 1959 Flight reported that Fairey Aviation Ltd was to be reorganised following a proposal to concentrate aircraft and allied manufacturing activities in the United Kingdom into a new wholly owned subsidiary called the Fairey Aviation Co. Ltd. The Board felt that the change, taking effect on 1 April 1959, would enable the Rotodyne and other aircraft work to be handled by a concern concentrating on aviation. It is proposed to change the company's name to the Fairey Co. Ltd, and to concentrate general engineering activities in the Stockport Aviation Co. Ltd, whose name would become Fairey Engineering Ltd. Under these changes, the Fairey Co. would become a holding company, with control of policy and finance throughout the group.
The government in the late 1950s was determined to rationalise the UK's aero industry. The Ministry of Defence saw the future of helicopters as being best met by a single manufacturer. The merger of Fairey's aviation interests with Westland Aircraft took place in early 1960 shortly after Westland had acquired the Saunders-Roe group and the helicopter division of the Bristol Aeroplane Company. Westland Aircraft and the Fairey Company announced that they had reached agreement for the sale by Fairey to Westland of the issued share capital of Fairey Aviation, which operated all Fairey's UK aviation interests. Westland acquired all Fairey's aircraft manufacturing business (including the Gannet AEW.3) and Fairey's 10% investment in the Aircraft Manufacturing Company (Airco) Fairey's workforce employed on manufacture of the outer wings of the Airco D.H.121. (later to be the HS 121 Trident) was transferred to Westland. Fairey received 2,000,000 Westland shares of 5 shillings each and a cash payment of approximately £1.4m. The sale did not include Fairey Air Surveys or the works at Heston which was home to the weapon division, which had a contract for research into advanced anti-tank missile systems. Fairey's remaining net worth was approximately £9.5m.
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The collapse of the Fairey Group
In 1977 the Fairey Group went into receivership and was effectively nationalised by the government. Fairey went into liquidation when it introduced a Britten-Norman Islander production line into its subsidiary company, Avions Fairey, and overproduced the plane and subsequently faced redundancy payments of about £16 million in Belgium. The companies involved were as follows:
Fairey Hydraulics Ltd, Heston, Hydraulic power controls and filters for aircraft; sold in 1999 to a management buyout, the name changed to Claverham, bought in 2001 by Hamilton Sundstrand.
Fairey Engineering Ltd, Stockport, General, and nuclear engineering;
Fairey Nuclear Ltd, Heston, Nuclear components and light engineering; see also Dungeness nuclear power station
Fairey Industrial Products Ltd, Heston, Management company;
Fairey Filtration Ltd, Heston, Industrial filters;
Fairey Winches Ltd, Tavistock, Vehicle overdrives, winches, and hubs;
Jerguson Tress Gauge and Valve Co Ltd, Newcastle, Liquid Level indicators;
The Tress Engineering Co Ltd, Newcastle, Petrochemical valves;
Fairey Marine Holdings Ltd, Hamble, Management company;
Fairey Marine (East Cowes) Ltd, East Cowes, Ship, and boat building;
Fairey Exhibitions Ltd, Hamble, Exhibition stand contractors;
Fairey Marine Ltd, Hamble, Boatbuilding and repair;
Fairey Yacht Harbours Ltd, Hamble, Boat handling, berthing, and storage;
Fairey Surveys Ltd, Maidenhead, Aerial and geophysical survey and mapping;
Fairey Surveys (Scotland) Ltd, Livingston, Aerial and geophysical survey and mapping;
Fairey Developments Ltd, Heston, Management company:
The Fairey Britten-Norman Aircraft Company was taken over by Pilatus, then a subsidiary of the Oerlikon group in Switzerland.
The rescue action was taken by the Government under section 8 of the Industry Act 1972 acquiring from the official receiver of the Fairey Company Ltd the entire share capital for £201,163,000. The companies were managed by the National Enterprise Board (NEB). In 1980 The Fairey Group was purchased by Doulton & Co., part of S Pearson & Son, from the NEB. At the time, Pearson's interests in manufacturing were concentrated in the Doulton fine china business. The engineering interests were strengthened in 1980 by the acquisition of the high technology businesses of Fairey, and their merging with Pearson's other engineering interests in 1982. However, these businesses were disposed of in 1986 as part of Pearson wishing to concentrate on core activities; acquired by Williams Holdings they became Williams Fairey Engineering Ltd and then WFEL Ltd.
Other parts of the combined Fairey – Doulton group saw a management buy-out from Pearson, listing on the London Stock Exchange in 1988. During the 1990s this company concentrated on expanding its electronics business, acquiring a number of companies, and disposing of the electrical insulator and hydraulic actuator businesses. In 1997, the company acquired Burnfield, of which Malvern Instruments was the most significant company. Servomex plc was acquired in 1999. In July 2000, the acquisition of the four instrumentation and controls businesses of Spectris AG of Germany for £171m was the largest ever made by the company and marked an important strategic addition to the company's instrumentation and controls business. The reshaping of the group was marked with the change of name from Fairey Group to Spectris in May 2001.
From Wikipedia’s article on Fairey Aviation Company, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.3