The de Havilland DHC-2 “Beaver”, an aircraft for the bush pilots of Canada. Designed by a small team, with significant input from the potential customer base – yes the design and sales team actually did market research. Was designed and manufactured in Downsville Ontario, first flew on the 16th August 1947.
The original design called for the aircraft to be powered by de Havilland’s own Gipsy engine, but an offer of the Pratt & Whitney Junior Wasp at a bargain basement price was too good to refuse. The increased power of the Pratt & Whitney engine gave the Beaver outstanding STOL performance, this along with other design features were major selling points – although sales were slow at first.
The first production aircraft was delivered in April 1948, running all the way to 1967 where over 1,690 were finally delivered. With the United States Army being the customer for over half of the production. There are many sources of information available on the web for the “Beaver”, with one of the most comprehensive being Neil Aird’s site – with photographs of most of the production aircraft.
It is rumoured that someone once said that the “Beaver” only had to be faster than a dog sled to be a success, well it must have been faster than a dog sled – as it has been an outstanding success. It may well still be flying in it’s 100th year, with rights having been bought from Bombardier – we could even see it back in production at some point in the future.
There is now an “Electric Beaver” flying, a Harbour Air of Vancouver and Magnix collaboration. Although the infrastructure must be just enough for testing at the moment, I’m sure that there will be more available soon and the “Beaver” with it’s utilitarian function will be an aircraft that will be in the mix when the change to electic flight gains traction.