FSX/FS2004/THE FAIREY FANTOME biplane fighter
A design competition was announced in 1934 by the Belgian Air Ministry to find a replacement for the Fairey Firefly, which had been in service with the Aeronautique Militaire fighter squadrons since 1930. Wanting to continue as their principal supplier of fighter aircraft, Fairey Aviation began the evaluation of a number of schemes at their Hayes, UK, factory.
Consideration was given to the possibilities of a monoplane design, but although the monoplane promised an estimated maximum speed some 2 1/2 % higher than the biplane, it was found that the rate of climb of the monoplane was some 18 % less than the biplane, and a biplane arrangement was decided upon.
The UK Air Ministry showed interest in the design from the start, and approved all aspects of the proposal except for the engine mounted cannon, which they refused to consider. They did, however, order an example of the aircraft.
Sets of components for four aircraft were put in hand at the Belgian factory of Avions Fairey S.A. at Gosselies, and one set was shipped to Fairey Aviation at Hayes, UK, for final assembly as the prototype and as the entry for the Belgian Air Ministry competition, and this aircraft was introduced to the aeronautical press in June 1935. The first public appearance of the aircraft was at the SBAC display at Hendon, UK, in July 1935, where it created a very good impression, as reported in the ' Aeroplane '. The aircraft was then successfully demonstrated at Evere in Belgium as part of the fighter competition. Unfortunately, three days later, at the completion of a further demonstration to Government and Service officials, the aircraft failed to flatten out at the end of its aerobatic display, crashing and killing the pilot, Stephen Trower. No evidence of structural failure was found, and the cause of the crash was thought to be as a result of a momentary blackout of the pilot.
Two further aircraft were completed in time for them to take part in the fighter competition, but a change in the requirements of the Belgian Air Ministry curtailed this. The two aircraft were eventually sold to Soviet Russia, and were shipped to the Republican forces in Spain during the civil war, where it is believed that one was soon destroyed in action, while the other succeeded in shooting down a number of Nationalist aircraft.
The fourth and final set of components were assembled at Gosselies, and the aircraft flown to Hayes in November 1937, where it received its RAF serial L7045. Further testing was carried out both at Farnborough and at Martlesham Heath, where trials continued until June 1939. Nothing is known, however, of its final fate.


Installation:
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-Unzip "Fairey_Fantome" into a temporary file and move the "Fairey_Fantome" folder into the main Aircraft directory.
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-Read instructions carefully when installing the gauges , say YES...when asked if the gauges sources should be trusted. If you say no....most of the gauges are not going to work !
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-Leave the PW9.cab in your panel folder.
-Copy the effects into your flightsim\effects folder.
-If having trouble with the cockpit transparencies or turningprop in FSX acceleration or FSX demo, copy the glass.bmp and prop2blade from 'acceleration' into the plane's texture folder.



CREDITS
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Special thanks to :
-GMAX for the drawing program and Microsoft for their makmdls.mdk.


LEGAL:
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The project is released as freeware. You may modify it and repaint it. You may upload this file to another website as long as it is not for profit.
You need the written permission of the original authors to use any of these files for commercial purposes, otherwise a simple credit would be nice. Non commercial repaints-remakes are welcome but I would appreciate very much receiving a copy of your model.
This file should not cause any problems with your computer, but I accept no responsibility if you think it does. Remarks and hints are welcome and are being considered.


Happy Landings!

A.F.Scrub
November 2012
Email: af_scrubbypc@hotmail.com