In 1919, John Kenworthy, chief designer of the motor manufacturer Austin Motor Company, (who had built large numbers of aircraft under license during the First World War) designed a small single-seater light aircraft in order to cash in on an expected boom in private flying. The resulting aircraft, named the Austin Whippet, was a small single-seat biplane of mixed construction, with a fabric covered steel tube fuselage, and single-bay, folding wooden wings. The wings avoided the need for rigging wires by use of streamlined steel lift struts.[1] [2]
The first prototype, powered by a two-cylinder horizontally opposed engine,[3] flew in 1919, receiving its Airworthiness Certificate in December that year.[1] Production aircraft were powered by a six-cylinder Anzani air-cooled radial, and four more aircraft followed before Austin abandoned aircraft production in 1920, when it realised that the postwar depression was severely limiting aircraft sales.[1] [4]
Of the five aircraft built, two were sold to New Zealand, while another was sent by its purchaser to Argentina. One of the New Zealand aircraft, serial AU.4/ZK-ACR, remained in existence at Kai Iwi in the 1940s.[5]
An accurate replica of Whippet K-158 is currently on display at the Aeroventure South Yorkshire Aircraft Museum in Doncaster, UK.
A Replica K.158/BAPC.207 South Yorkshire Aircraft Museum at Doncaster.