Editing Brabazon Committee (section)

==Second Committee and Final Report==

Some weeks after the report from the First Committee, it was decided to form a Second Committee with more comprehensive and detailed terms of reference. The Second Committee began meeting on 25 May 1943<ref name=Phipp17/> under the leadership of Lord Brabazon in order to investigate the future needs of the British civilian [[airliner]] market. The committee included members of the state-owned [[airline]]s [[British Overseas Airways Corporation]] (BOAC) and later [[British European Airways]] (BEA), and the Secretary was [[Peter Masefield]] who later became the Chief Executive of BEA. They studied a number of designs and technical considerations, meeting frequently over the next two years to further clarify the needs of different market segments, and producing 151 papers.<ref name=MandG82/> The government contact for this committee was [[Sir Stafford Cripps]], the Minister of Aircraft Production until May 1945 when he was succeeded by [[Ernest Brown (British politician)|Ernest Brown]].  

The views of the Committee changed considerably in that period and the list of ''Brabazon Types'' continued to vary, as did the specifications of each. One early recommendation was to pursue the "Interim Types" which were conversions and/or developments of wartime aircraft. The original four adaptations became:<ref name=Phipp18>Phipp, 2007, p.18</ref>

*(i) [[Avro York]] (developed from the [[Avro Lancaster]])
*(ii) [[Avro Tudor]] (developed from the [[Avro Lincoln]], itself a development of the Lancaster), the Tudor I being an interim transatlantic airliner pending the introduction of the Brabazon Type I, and the Tudor II being an interim Brabazon Type III airliner with shorter range and greater capacity for the [[British Empire]] routes.<ref name=Phipp35>Phipp, 2007, pp.35-37</ref> 
*(iii) [[Handley Page Hermes]], a civil development of the [[Handley Page Halifax|Halifax]], first flown in 1945 but did not enter limited service with BOAC until 1950, having evolved through several iterations to be the Hermes IV. 
*(iv) [[Short Sandringham]] (an improved conversion of the Short Sunderland Mark V)

These were all produced in some numbers in due course, although the Tudor I and Tudor II never entered service. They were all too late to compete (for example) with the earlier and much more capable [[Douglas DC-4]] which had been in service since 1942 and could carry more passengers further and faster.<ref name=Phipp20>Phipp, 2007, p.20</ref> The final report in December 1945 ignored all these interim types<ref name=MandG82/> and called for the construction of seven new designs which would be required after the war:<ref name=Phipp21>Phipp, 2007, p.21</ref>

*'''Type I''' was for a very large [[Transatlantic flight|transatlantic]] airliner serving the high-volume routes like [[London]]-[[New York City|New York]], seating its passengers in luxury for the 12-hour trip. The Type I design developed into [[List of Air Ministry Specifications|Air Ministry Specification 2/44]].

*'''Type IIA''', originally a short-haul [[feederliner]] intended to replace the [[Douglas DC-3]], was for a piston-powered aircraft, to Air Ministry Specification 25/43, as originally intended.

*'''Type IIB''' was for an aircraft using the new [[turboprop]] engine, to Air Ministry Specification 8/46. This came about because [[Vickers]] favoured the move to turboprop power.<ref name=Phipp79>Phipp, 2007, pp.79-80</ref> There was some scepticism on the part of the committee, and in the end they decided to divide the specification in two, allowing the turboprop design to go ahead as Type IIB while at the same time ordering a "backup" piston design as the Type IIA.<ref name="Andrews421">Andrews and Morgan 1988, p. 421</ref> A parallel alternative specification 16/46 was subsequently raised to cover later changes.

*'''Type III''' called for a larger four-engined, medium-range aircraft, to Air Ministry Specification 6/45, for various multi-hop routes serving the British Empire, the "Medium Range Empire" (MRE) routes. This was at one time two separate requirements, IIIA and IIIB, but these had merged again in the Final Report.

*'''Type IV''' was a [[jet engine|jet-powered]], 100-seat high-speed transport, to Air Ministry Specification 22/46. This was added at the personal urging of one of the committee members, [[Geoffrey de Havilland]], whose company was involved in development of both Britain's first jet fighters and jet engines. The Type IV could, if the whole concept of a jet airliner could be made to work, be able to replace the Type III outright and assume many of the duties of the other planes in shorter routes.

*'''Type VA''' (initially Type V) was effectively the original Type II fourteen-passenger, feederliner aircraft to Air Ministry Specification 18/44 after the Type II had evolved into larger designs.

*'''Type VB''' was an eight-seat aircraft as a de Havilland Dragon Rapide replacement, to Air Ministry Specification 26/43, added as a further split in the Type V requirement.

The normal method for government aircraft production was that an [[Air Ministry Specification]] was issued and aircraft companies tendered designs to meet the specification. It was customary then to order prototypes of one or two designs for evaluation (though at times aircraft were ordered "off the drawing board"<ref group=note>eg the [[Armstrong Whitworth Albemarle]] ordered without waiting to assess prototypes (Buttler p75)</ref>). In some cases manufacturers brought designs to the Air Ministry and a specification was written for the design.<ref group=note>eg the de Havilland Mosquito which came from discussions between de Havilland and Air Ministry resulting in writing of specification B.1/40 after placing an order for 50.(Buttler p79)</ref> This process did not allow for companies to propose solutions which were, in their view, better, neither did it necessarily reflect the requirements of the planned operator who may have wanted something different. Additionally, other government bodies such as the [[Royal Aircraft Establishment]] had input to the process and these often conflicted with the designers being given contradictory instructions. One example of this is the trouble that [[Miles Aircraft]] had with the Ministry of Aircraft Production in relation to the design of the [[Miles Marathon]].<ref name=Brown301>Brown, 1970, pp.301-307</ref> In 1944, the Ministry of Aircraft Production started the process for contracts for all of these planes with individual companies; this role was taken over by the newly created [[Ministry of Supply]] in 1945. The view of Sir Cyril Musgrave, the [[Permanent Under-Secretary]] in the Ministry of Supply, was that "Only I can order civil airliners!"<ref name=MandG214>Masefield and Gunston, 2002, p.214</ref> This attitude was a source of considerable difficulties in this process.