In the early 1930s Avro produced a license version of the Fokker F.VII/3m, the Avro “Ten”. Wanting something bigger and more up to date, Avro took the latter’s wing and placed it on a shoulder position of a 16-passenger capable fuselage to produced their “Eighteen”. Modernising the design somehow, the engines of the first prototype were a pair 450hp AS Jaguar IVD placed on the wing leading edge. First flown in early 1933, the 642/2m soon suffered a modification in its cockpit enclosure, changing into a more conventional stepped design. Not followed in production, the twin-engined prototype saw some commercial services in UK and later in New Guinea, where it was destroyed by the Japanese in 1942.
Only other “Eighteen” was produced: the pretty, but handful four-engined (215hp AS Lynx) 642/4m. Nicknamed the “Star Of India”, it was supplied to the government of India for the personal use of the Viceroy. When not in official duties it also served as an airliner.
Aviation Rapture 