Ladies and Gentlemen. The Boulton-Paul Defiant. First and foremost a massive thank you to RamboJutter who gave my bungling machinations controllable flight!
For those who don’t know, the Defiant was an aircraft designed to the ‘turreted fighter’ concept. (I think this idea was genius. 1x pilot driving, 1x “weapons officer” going bang. Not unlike what we see today with 2 seat fighters. What a concept, way ahead of its times.... genius!)
However the turret and extra crew member added significant weight and drag to the RR merlin III powered aircraft and performance lacked in comparison to modern fighters. Against unescorted bombers the Defiant was quite handy. If said bombers had an escort the Defiants were generally cut to pieces but not before many 109s and 110s were lost bouncing Defiants mistaking them for hurricanes.
After initial losses to the turreted fighter the Luftwaffe changed tactics to attack head on or from below where the turret could not face. The threat had to be countered by squadrons corralling into a circle and rapidly loosing height in what was known as the Luftbery circle developed in the First World War - thus giving 360 degrees of mutual support and negating the weakness from below.
Certainly not as famous as the Hurricane or Spitfires in the Battle of Britain,
Defiants were withdrawn from the daytime fighter role but made successful night fighters and went on to perform various other duties from towing target drogues to radar jamming operations.
Certainly not as popular as the Spit or Hurricane on this site I feel the humble Boulton-Paul Defiant is definitely worthy of more representation having been ‘in the thick of it’ (putting it rather ‘Pimms o’clockishly mildly) during our finest hour. Quirky. British. Ingenuity. Huzzah!
Controls
AG 8 Deactivates flying controls.
AG 2 activates turret controls
(Try not to shoot your tail off Dr Jones style!)
Disclaimer
Flaps are a gimmick, turret works after a fashion
Specifications
Spotlights
- RailfanEthan 4.5 years ago
- pancelvonat 4.5 years ago
General Characteristics
- Successors 1 airplane(s)
- Created On iOS
- Wingspan 39.7ft (12.1m)
- Length 35.2ft (10.7m)
- Height 12.9ft (3.9m)
- Empty Weight 9,440lbs (4,282kg)
- Loaded Weight 10,403lbs (4,718kg)
Performance
- Horse Power/Weight Ratio 0.096
- Wing Loading 13.5lbs/ft2 (66.0kg/m2)
- Wing Area 770.0ft2 (71.5m2)
- Drag Points 6238
Parts
- Number of Parts 403
- Control Surfaces 0
- Performance Cost 1,350
Not anytime soon I’m afraid. There’s plenty of good examples out there though. @TitanIncorporated
Gee thanks! Good to see peoples awareness of the type! @TitanIncorporated
Manufactured by someone else to a different concept, but yeah. Just like a hurricane.... @lol112
So all this plane was a hurricane hawker only that it had towers in the back
The planes of 2 Word war ist intresting
Absolutely. Without a shadow of a doubt. What this needed was a turret on the back. @ssenmodnar
They just had to have a turret on the back
Oh@Tang0five
It’s a british model company although the kits are made in China. I think the likes of Tamiya, revel, academy to name a few, are probably more popular internationally. @Hedero
Lol idk I haven't seen any airfix models recently. In fact, I've only heard of airfix models and how they were so popular from a YoutTube video. Btw, Is airfix a Britain thing or is it known worldwide?@Tang0five
When I was a kid and my older brother got the airfix model of a defiant and I was massively jealous. That was the 90s, do kids still do airfix? @Hedero
I hadn't every heard of a Boulton-Paul Defiant before so I saw this and though it was a hurricane with a tail gunner.Very interesting aircraft though!
@Tang0five np;)
Good plane, good work!
Thank you for giving this it’s 60th upvote @NANOMAN I’ve never made it to the 60s before!
Thank you both! @BusterShortWolf @Alien yeah, I don’t know why they didn’t try a turret-less version when the losses started mounting. I guess the priority was producing spits - they even experimented a defiant style turret on a mosquito.
Spiffing build, old chap! Nice to see this old crate in flight mode, even if the real thing was rather disappointiing in its original role.
Looks a lot like a Hurricane with a gunner seat! Nice work!
@Tang0five lol
“Sorry son, they got us!” @Zanedavid
shoots rudder
@Tang0five welcome
Hmmm. Debatable. It made a successful night fighter but was no match for a 109 in straight up daylight dogfight (unless it was mistaken for a hurricane) @X4JB
Thanks but I’ve definitely seen better from an iOS user - it’s disturbing what some wizards can make out there! I don't do cockpits for instance - way too fiddly on my old iPad Air 1 and too many parts causes crashes! @CrappyNames
Thanks! @Zott must say I didn’t expect that from a humble defiant!
I do like Blackburn’s aircraft, but yeah the firebrand was pretty poor! @Noname918181