Sea Fury

• Photographs
• Design
• Development
• Production
• Service History
• Drawings
• Data
• Surviving Sea Furies
• References for Information on the Sea Fury

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Photographs

The photo above is of a Sea Fury F10 and was published on the front cover of the Aircraft Recognion journal issue of May 1947.
The photo at the right is of Sea Fury FB11 serial VX639. This aircraft was delivered in September 1949 and served with 738 Squadron. It was struck off charge in December 1956 and sold to to Hawker Aircraft Ltd.

On the left above is WF619. It was delivered to the Royal Navy in 1951 and initially served with FAA 805 Squadron. It continued with the FAA until 1956 after which it was sold to the Cuban Air Force.
On the right above is TF956 which was the first production Sea Fury Mark FB11. It was built in 1947 and served with the FAA in the Korean War and elsewhere. In later years it flew with the Royal Navy Historic Flight and was destroyed in a crash on 10 June 1989.

The photos above were published in October 1949 and show a Sea Fury approaching an aircraft carrier and after having caught the arrester cable.

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Design

The Sea Fury (Fury) is a single seat monoplane fighter designed to Air Ministry specification F.2/43 and Admiralty specification N.22/43 and is powered by a Bristol Centaurus 54 litre 18 cylinder, two-row radial air cooled engine. The aircraft was designed with a four bladed propeller.
The fuselage is a new design with a raised cockpit. The wing was developed from that of the Tempest with the centre section of the wing deleted causing a reduction of span of 2 feet 7 inches. This results in a wing thickness to chord ratio of 14.2% at the root reducing to 10% at the tip and the mainwheels almost touching when retracted.
The internal fuel system consisted of four tanks, a fuselage tank of 97 gallons in front of the pilot, 28 gallon tanks between the spars of both inner wings, a 17 gallon tank in the leading edge of the starboard wing and a 30 gallon auxiliary fuselage tank; giving a total capacity of 200 gallons. The Mark F10 was armed with four 20 mm cannon, the Mark FB11 was additionally armed with bombs or rockets or drop tanks etc.

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Development

During flight testing it was found that with the same Centaurus engine as the Tempest Mark 2, the Sea Fury Mark 10 was 20 mph faster.
One of the prototypes was fitted with a Griffon 85 engine driving a contra rotating 2 x 3 blade propeller, this engine installation was not pursued.
Prototype LA610 was later fitted with a Sabre 7 engine rated at 3,055 hp. This aircraft had wing root radiators and a top speed of 485 mph, the fastest Hawker fighter of all. This development was not pursued either.

As well as the four F.2/43 prototypes there were three N.22/43 Sea Fury prototypes, the second of these was SR666 which first flew on 12 October 1945. Compared to the F.2/43 prototypes, this had the following modifications; folding wings, a larger rudder, a five bladed propeller, a longer tail hook and a lockable tail wheel.

Sea Fury Mark F10

The first 10 of these had four bladed propellers and the last 40 had 5 bladed propellers. It could carry bombs or drop tanks under its wings.

Sea Fury Mark FB11

It was decided not to continue the Sea Fury as a pure fighter but as a fighter bomber. This mark had under wing hard points for stores; drop tanks, bombs, rockets etc. It was the main production Mark.

Sea Fury Mark T20

This training Mark originally had two separate cockpits but during an early test flight the rear one collapsed and the aircraft was modified with the addition of a perspex tunnel between the two cockpits.

Export Sea Fury & Fury Marks FB60 and T61

These were essentially the same as the FB11 and T20.

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Production

A total 7 prototype and 880 production Sea Furies were built, 856 by Hawkers in England and 24 built under licence by Fokker in Holland.

The production totals were as follows:

Mark	Manufacturer	Number of Aircraft	Notes
F.2/43 prototypes	Hawker	4	NX798, NX802, LA610 & VP207
N.22/43 prototypes	Hawker	3	SR661, SR666 & VB857
F10	Hawker	50	-
FB11	Hawker	649	-
T20	Hawker	60	-
FB50	Hawker	24	-
FB50	Fokker	24	-
FB60	Hawker	92	-
T61	Hawker	5	-

Mark	Mark F10	Mark FB11	Mark T20	Export Marks
First Flight Dates: First Prototype First production Last production Total produced	1 Sep 1944 (NX798) 30 Sep 1946 (TF895) TF955 50	- 5 Sep 1947 (TF956) - 1951 (WZ656) 615	- - - 60	- - - 153

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Service History

Royal Navy Service History

The following 15 Royal Navy squadrons flew the Hawker Sea Fury at some time:

The Sea Fury F10 entered RN servive in August 1947 with 807 squadron based at RNAS Eglinton, Northern Ireland, in August 1947. The Sea Fury FB11 entered RN servive in May 1948 with 802 squadron. It was flown by the RN until 1953 and with the RNVR until August 1955 when 1832 squadron relinquised the Sea Fury.

The Sea Fury FB11 flew all through the Korean War with numbers 801, 802, 804 and 807 squadrons operational based on aircraft carriers HMS Glory, HMS Ocean, HMS Glory & HMS Theseus respectively. 807 squadron, from October 1951 to April 1952, flew 2,320 operational sorties involving 5,600 flying hours often in bad weather conditions. The Sea Fury squadrons were mainly engaged in ground attacks. They were also engaged in air combat and on 8 August 1952 Lt Peter Carmichael shot down a Mig 15 jet fighter. During the Korean War, numbers 801, 802, 804 and 807 Squadrons flew __ sorties for the loss of __ aircraft and __ pilots.

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Royal Australian Navy Service History

RAN Squadron numbers 805 and 808, based on HMAS Sydney, fought during the Korean War from October 1951 to April 1952. The Sea Furies were used for a mix of combat air patrols and ground-attack missions, both armed reconnaissance behind the North Korean lines and close air support near the front line. During the Korean War, Numbers 805 and 808 Squadrons flew __ sorties for the loss of __ aircraft and __ pilots.

RAN Squadron number 850, also based on HMAS Sydney, served in Korean waters in 1953 after the end of the war.

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Royal Canadian Navy Service History

A total of 74 Sea Furies FB 11 and one FB 10 served with the Royal Canadian Navy (RCN) between 1948 and 1956. Numbers 871 and VF871 Squadrons were based on the aircraft carrier HMCS Magnificent. The last flight of a RCN Sea Fury was of WG565 on 1 April 1958. Although the the following 7 RCN Squadrons flew the Sea Fury at some time, the peak strength was 2 operational squadrons and 1 training squadron, number VF40:

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Other Air Forces

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Drawings

The following drawings of the Sea Fury F10 were published in AIRCRAFT RECOGNITION Journal in March 1951.

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Data

NOTE 1

I think that the loaded weights quoted in many publications are too low. See the following weight analyses based the following:
200 gallons of petrol at a density of 0.72
14 gallons of oil at a density of 0.91
600 (300 for T20 & T61) rounds of 20 mm ammunition at 0.9 lb per round
Pilot and equipment at 200lb.
The Maximum loaded weight of 13,547 lb for the FB11 is comparable to the 13,560 lb for the Tempest Mark II.

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Surviving Sea Furies

Airworthy Sea Furies

The above photographs show VR930 the Royal Navy Historic Flight Sea Fury FB11 at Duxford in May 2006.

Sea Furies being Restored to Airworthy Condition

Non-Airworthy Sea Furies

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Reference for Information on the Sea Fury

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Tim Hammond, May 2010. Revised and Index added, August 2010.