[bearoutwest]

No worries Juha, always happy to talk aeroplanes.

A few years ago when I lived on the other side of this continent in Melbourne, my local library had a copy of the Penrose biography. What struck me as I read it was how widely varied were the aircraft being designed at Westland during the late 1930s/early 1940s. Over a relatively short span of 3-4 years, Penrose was flying the Wapiti as a hack, demonstrating the Lysander, and test flying (or demonstrating) the Whirlwind and the Pterydactyl.

As for the Merlin-Whirlwind, I think (trusting my memory now) the Corduroy book intimates that Petter (or his development design team) were keen on redeveloping the wing and fuselage to suit a Merlin powerplant. This would have also included cross-feed tanks, and a whole host of other refinements. But somewhere along the track, this wasn't followed through with. The Welkin was being developed - but as a high altitude aircraft. Looking at line drawings and photos of the Welkin, it struck me as to how BIG it was. Almost a single seat Mosquito in size rather than a bigger Whirlwind or a dH Hornet. So a great deal of development work to trim it down, perhaps as much effort as to up-size a Peregrine-Whirlwind. Perhaps that was a big part of the reason to cancel any plans, together with a host of other factors. Anyway, food for thought for another time, place and discussion perhaps.

...geoff