These two schemes have evolved into son-of-V1000. But the blunder would have been to invest further in any of them. Freschi and other fans miss the essential point of any R&D investment, which is to pay off in volume production. Here: no way, Jose!
Timelines: BAC 2-11:
11/11/55: 1 prototype+6 V1000/RAF cancelled. No BOAC interest in VC7. Purge GRE's moan ("biggest blunder of all") from your mind. It was in his scope to go to Vickers Ltd Board for their money, but he knew better than to try. So he tried:
20/7/56: Viscount Major (to be Vanguard): BEAC orders 20, soon TCA 23. Vickers Ltd accepts PV spend, to avoid 7.5% Sales Levy on Treasury Launch Aid: why pay that cost-of-money when we have upfront deposits? Write off by Vickers Ltd: £16.7Mn. (by us £0).
14/1/58: BOAC orders 35 (Standard) VC10. V-A receives £10.25Mn Launch Aid. Yield on our money: £0.943Mn. Vickers Provided £20Mn. H.Evans,Vickers Against the Odds,Hodder,78,P86: “(Result) probably a breakeven position.”
9/5/61: new BUA launches BAC 1-11/200, which has Treasury Launch Aid. Sales follow inc to US, then stall as Viscount Customers TCA buys DC-9-14, Lufthansa, 737-100 (these are shocking losses).
What all this means is that Weybridge has no civil rain-maker status at BAC's Board, and then:
7/10/66: RR becomes proud owner of Bristol's 20% of BAC.
15/10/66: UK/France Govts reject Sud/BAC Galion as Euro Big Twin, for (unbid) Sud/HSAL/(to be)DASA) Super Galion, launched:
25/7/67: as A300 with RB207, Launch Aid all round (France, 100%).
BAC schemes (to be) 2-11, also pitches for workshare on Lockheed schemes.
15/12/67: Ministers decline BAC 2-11 Launch Aid (doing A300). BAC, nowhere with Lockheed (no Launch Aid), starts scheming (to be):
BAC 3-11:
29/3/68: RB211-22 exclusive on L-1011, 450 engines ordered at fixed prices, while also trying to develop RB207 for A300.
6/9/68 Weinstock/GEC buys EE Co, inc poison pill 40% of BAC; lets BAC spend £2Mn. 3-11 PV C.Gardner,BAC,Batsford,81,P182 and to seek Launch Aid by asserting capacity for 50% of £150Mn. R&D R.Payne,Stuck on Drawing Board,Tempus,04,P143.
9/12/68: A300 lapses; A300B emerges, Launch Aid assumed from 3 Govts.
16/4/69: UK quits A300B, to the joy of Treasury (£), BEAC (required to take L-1011), RR (L-1011). HS Group face civil Aero exit.
29/5/69: FRG accepts HSAL wing (18% of airframe R&D) to count towards its 50% of A300B and to pay 60% of DM250Mn. R&D Estimate, HS Group to find 40% +100% of any overrun. No Treasury Launch Aid: HS Group's exposure is PV.
2/12/70: UK declines BAC 3-11 Launch Aid: potentially cannibalising HS' plucky risk. Markets-Rule OK Ministers staring at RR bankruptcy.
G.Freschi,BAC 3-11,Tempus,06,P104 has denial of 2-11/3-11 Aid as Opportunities Lost. But 1-11 was losing to DC-9/737; VC10 sold none open-market (Ghana/EAAC: BOAC Associated Companies; BUA trying to curry political favour): heavy; rickety Support, languid Product Devt - Britcraft norm: why would 3-11 have done more? Sold to whom? Not AF, DLH, or in US versus the Triplets. (uk75 #29: ) it would have confused and cannibalised HSAL's A300B wing, to the benefit only of DC-10/L-1011.
(uk75 #30) 3-11 and BEAC, RR: there's what I say...and there's what I think.
RR could not develop RB199/MRCA, RB211/L-1011, RB211/BAC 3-11 concurrently, nor as a BAC equity-holder did they have capital capacity (or appetite) for their share of BAC 3-11 airframe R&D net of Treasury Launch Aid. MRCA+L-1011, that'll do nicely.
BEAC at Farnborough, 9/70 Show made a "provisional commitment" to 3-11, in part to deflect HS Group's efforts to extract an A300B order, and in part to dissuade new Ministers from optimism on BEAC's offtake from Air Holdings Ltd "order" for 50 L-1011s (a dodgy feature of UK efforts to land RB211 exclusivity: all puff). BEAC's 1964 Spec for a Big Twin envisaged an order of 6.
