fury of Howard!, The

Air Classics, Jun 1999 by O'Leary, Michael

COMPLETELY REBUILT AND MODIFIED BY EZELL AVIATION, HOWARD PARDUE'S CUSTOM HAWKER FURY SERVES AS NOT ONLY AN UNLIMITED Jll ii_ AIR RACER BUT ALSO AS A HIGH- PERFORMANCE, TWO-SEAT SPORT PLANE

During the dark days of 1940, the Hawker Hurricane, teamed with the Supermarine Spitfire, defeated the threat posed by the Luftwaffe as Hitler planned his invasion of Britain. The Hurricane, Britain's first production monoplane fighter with retractable landing gear and an enclosed cockpit, was in itself a logical progression of Hawker's elegant Fury biplane.

Detailed view of the Wright R-3350 in Pardue's Fury. Although the Wrights have replaced the Bristol Centaurus in most American-operated Sea Furys, the Bristol is famous in its own right. The largest British radial engine to enter production during WWII, the 18-cylinder two-row radial dispenses with the more common poppet valves in favor of sleeves. The engine has a displacement of 3270 cubic inches and has a standard military rating of 2470-hp at 2700 rpm for takeoff. Design for the Wright R-3350 began as long ago as 1936, and a prototype engine was run by 1937. Numerous problems, including catastrophic backfires, delayed development but the engine was chosen for the new Boeing B-29 Superfortress, so development of the engine was given top priority. However, fuel injection, which would have solved many of the problems, had to wait until the end of the war. Variants of the R-3350 were used on Constellations, Skyraiders, DC-7s, and other aircraft and "growth" variants of the radial increased to an amazing 3700-hp!

The Hurricane was followed by the massive Typhoon and Tempest fighters - heavy hitters that were also employed by the Royal Air Force in the ground-attack role. The Hawker Fury evolved from a proposal titled "Tempest Light Fighter (Centaurus)." Using the Bristol Centaurus sleevevalve 18-cylinder powerplant, a sleek monoplane standing on a wide-track landing gear was envisioned. Work began in late 1942, but Hawker and the Air Ministry had differing ideas over the project. However, the differences were eventually worked out and the RAF and Royal Navy showed interest in the result.

Hawker's chief designer was Sydney Camm (who would be knighted for his many aeronautical accomplishments in 1953), and he planned that the first few prototypes of the new design would be used to test different powerplants. Named Fury, the first aircraft flew on 1 September 1944 with Philip Lucas in the cockpit. After test flights with different engines, it was decided to concentrate development on the Centaurus engine.

However, victory in Europe was near at hand, and all 200 Royal Air Force Furys were canceled

outright. In the meantime, the Royal Navy's version, the Sea Fury, proceeded, since it could be used in the upcoming final battle with Japan. The first Sea Fury flew on 21 February 1945. Big and powerful, the Sea Fury held its own in the dawn of the new jet age, and Hawker had orders for 565 aircraft by 1950, with many being finished as fighter-bombers designated FB Mk. 11. Too late for service in World War Two, the Sea Fury went into action in Korea, flying thousands of missions against the enemy and even successfully engaging and destroying the enemy's new MiG 15 fighter.

The Sea Fury was also an export success, with examples going to Canada, Australia, Egypt, Iraq, The Netherlands, Pakistan, and Burma. Many Sea Furys soldiered on into the late-1950s and early-1960s. When the Warbird movement began to take hold in the United States during the mid-1960s, a Sea Fury could be purchased for a few thousand dollars, but it was not worth the cost to bring the planes into the country!

That would soon change as Warbird values began to rise and some Sea Furys were imported and restored. During the late1970s, David Tallichet and Ed Jurist discovered that the Iraqis still had around three dozen Fury airframes (a de-navalized Sea Fury that Hawker prepared for Iraq and delivered in the early-1950s) and huge quantities of spares, so a deal was struck, and planes were returned to the United States.

A legal dispute prevented the immediate sale of the airframes, but many of these aircraft are now flying once again while others are under restoration. One of the most attractive of the ex-Iraqi Furys is the example that belongs to well-known Warbird pilot Howard Pardue of Texas. Howard obtained the disassembled aircraft (still in Iraqi camouflage) in 1984 and had the plane taken to his headquarters in Breckenridge were it was handed over to Nelson Ezell's shop for a complete rebuild and conversion to a customized racing/sport machine. When obtained, the aircraft had been registered N34FF but this was changed by Howard to N666HP/Race 66 (tI like sixes," explains the droll Pardue).

Nelson replaced all the British systems with more reliable American units and installed a rebuilt Wright R3350 with a customized "tuned" exhaust system. The cockpit was also modified to include a second seat under a larger bubble canopy. Pardue was very pleased with the result, which was given an unusual Royal Air Force-style camouflage scheme with a massive gold spinner, and the aircraft has since been a regular participant at Reno.