HISTORY
In 1922,
T.C. Ryan founded a flying service
in San Diego that would lead to
several aviation ventures bearing
the Ryan name, including Ryan
Airlines founded in 1925.
The new
company's first aircraft was the
Ryan ST or "Sport Trainer", a
low-wing tandem-seat monoplane with
a 95 hp (71 kW) Menasco B-4 "Pirate"
straight-4 engine. Five were built
before production switched to the
Ryan STA (Aerobatic) with a more
powerful 125 hp (93 kW) Menasco C-4
in 1935. This aircraft had enough
power for aerobatic display, and it
won the 1937 International Aerobatic
Championships. A further improved
Ryan STA Special was built in 1936,
with a supercharged Menasco C-4S
with 150 hp (112 kW).
In 1937 and
1938 a second civilian aircraft
model was introduced, the Ryan
SCW-145 for Sport Coupe, Warner 145
horsepower (108 kW) engine. The SCW
was a larger three seater aircraft
with a sliding canopy and
side-by-side front seating. The
prototype SCW was originally powered
by a Menasco engine, however
prototype testing revealed that more
power was needed hence the move to
the Warner 145 hp (108 kW),
7-cylinder radial engine for
production models. Thirteen examples
of the SCW were built, although the
last one was assembled from surplus
parts decades after the initial
production run was finished.
Interest
from the United States Army Air
Corps followed. The Menasco engines
proved unreliable, and instead
Kinner radial engines were fitted.
Aircraft were produced as the PT-16
(15 built), PT-20 (30 built), PT-21
(100 USAAF, 100 USN) and finally as
the definitive PT-22 Recruit (1,298
built) ordered in 1941 as pilot
training began its rapid expansion.
Ryan also
pioneered STOL techniques in its
YO-51 Dragonfly observation craft.
Three prototypes were built, but no
USAAF order came.
In the
immediate postwar years, Ryan
diversified, including even building
coffins for a short period. It
bought the rights to the Navion
light
aircraft from North American
Aviation in 1947, selling it to both
military and civilian customers.
Ryan became
involved in the missile and unmanned
aircraft fields, developing the Ryan
Firebee unmanned target drone, the
Ryan Firebird (the first air-to-air
missile) among others, as well as a
number of experimental and research
aircraft.
Ryan
acquired a 50% stake in Continental
Motors Corporation, the
aircraft-engine builder, in 1965.
In the
1950s, Ryan was a pioneer in jet
vertical flight with the X-13
Vertijet, a tail sitting jet with a
delta wing which was not used in
production designs. In the early
1960s, Ryan built the XV-5 Vertifan
for the U.S. Army, which used wing
and nose mounted lift vanes for
V/STOL vertical flight. It was
flown, crashed after ingesting a
test rescue dummy in its fans, and
was not made into a production
aircraft. Other Ryan V/STOL designs
included the VZ-3 Vertiplane and the
YO-51 Dragonfly.
In 1966/67,
Ryan was awarded the contract to
build the digital Doppler radar
system installed aboard the Apollo
Lunar Lander.
In 1968 the
company was acquired by Teledyne for
$128 million and a year later became
a wholly owned subsidiary of that
company as Teledyne Ryan. Claude
Ryan retired as chairman with the
Teledyne purchase.
Northrop
Grumman purchased Teledyne Ryan in
1999, with the products continuing
to form the core of that firm's
unmanned aerial vehicle efforts.
Source:
Wikipedia
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