Fairey Fox The Fairey Fox was a British light bomber and fighter biplane of the 1920s and 1930s . It was originally produced in Britain for the RAF , but continued in production and use in Belgium long after it was retired in Britain . Development and design . Fox I . In 1923 , Charles Richard Fairey , founder and chief designer of Fairey Aviation , disappointed with his Fawn bomber , which owing to the constraints of Air Ministry specifications , was slower than the Airco DH . 9A which it was meant to replace while carrying no greater bombload , conceived the idea of a private venture bomber not subject to official limitations , which could demonstrate superior performance and handling . On seeing the Curtiss CR , powered by a Curtiss D - 12 V - 12 liquid - cooled engine of low frontal area and in a low drag installation , win the 1923 Schneider Trophy race , Fairey realised that this engine would be well suited to a new bomber and acquired an example of the engine and a licence for production . Fairey commenced design of a bomber around this engine , with detailed design carried out by a team at first led by Frank Duncanson and then by the Belgian Marcel Lobelle . The resultant aircraft , the Fairey Fox , was a single - bay biplane with highly staggered wings , with a composite wood and metal structure . The Curtiss D - 12 was installed in a closely cowled tractor installation , with one radiator mounted on the underside of the upper wing , and a second retractable radiator that could be wound in and out of the fuselage as required . Pilot and gunner sat close together in two tandem cockpits , with the gunner armed with a Lewis gun on a specially designed high - speed gun mounting that allowed the gun to be stowed to reduce drag , with the pilot armed with a single synchronised Vickers machine gun . Up to 460 lb of bombs could be carried under the wings , aimed by the gunner whose seat folded to allow use of a bombsight . The prototype Fox first flew at RAF Hendon on 3 January 1925 , piloted by Norman Macmillan , quickly demonstrating good performance and handling . Despite this , there was much resistance to the new bomber within the Air Ministry , with the Fox not designed to an official specification and having several features , such as fuel tanks within the fuselage , that went against official norm , and most importantly , it featured an American engine . ( Although Fairey had negotiated a license for the D - 12 , in the end it built no engines , with 50 engines being imported . ) However , on seeing the prototype Fox being demonstrated on 28 July 1925 , Air Chief Marshal Hugh Trenchard , the Chief of the Air Staff , announced that " Mr Fairey , I have decided to order a squadron of these machines " , thus shortcutting official channels , an initial order for 18 Foxes following . Second generation Foxes . In 1926 , the Air Ministry drew up Specification 12 / 26 for a new light - bomber for the Royal Air Force . This time , unlike previous specifications , high performance was stressed , and many of the overly prescriptive elements which had previously limited performance removed . At first , Fairey was not informed of the new specification , and only received a copy after protesting to the Air Ministry . To meet this requirement , Lobelle ' s team designed the Fox IIM , an effectively all - new aircraft with a metal structure as demanded by the Specification , and powered by a Rolls - Royce F . XIB ( later designated the Rolls - Royce Kestrel . It first flew on 25 October 1929 . However , the competing Hawker Hart and Avro Antelope prototypes had been flying for over a year by this time , and the Hart had received an initial production order in June 1929 . Although the Fox IIM was not wanted by the RAF , Fairey demonstrated it to the Belgian Air Force , which had a requirement for a light bomber to replace its Breguet 19 , and which had already purchased Fairey Firefly II fighters from Fairey which had also set up a Belgian subsidiary , Avions Fairey , to build the Firefly . The Fox IIM was successful , winning an initial order for 12 Fox II reconnaissance aircraft to be built in England , with further production to come from Avions Fairey . Operational history . The Fox entered service with No . 12 Squadron RAF in June 1926 . The Fox proved to have spectacular performance , being 50 mph ( 80 km / h ) faster than the Fairey Fawns that it replaced in 12 Squadron , and as fast as contemporary fighters . Such was the performance of the Fox that 12 Squadron was instructed to fly no faster than 140 mph ( 225 km / h ) during annual Air Defence Exercises in order to give the defending fighters a chance . Despite this , no further RAF squadrons were equipped with the Fox , and only 28 were purchased in total , with later aircraft being powered by the Rolls - Royce Kestrel engine and surviving Curtiss engined aircraft being re - fitted with the Kestrel . 12 Squadron , which later adopted a fox ' s mask as squadron badge in memory of their sole usage of the aircraft , remained equipped with the Fox until 1931 , being finally replaced by the Hawker Hart . Foxes remained in use as dual control trainers at the Royal Air Force College Cranwell until 1933 . Two superannuated Fox Mk . Is took part in the 1934 MacRobertson Air Race from London to Melbourne . One of them occasioned the only fatalities of the race when it crashed in Italy . The other , commanded by Australian Ray Parer ( a veteran of the 1919 England to Australia Air Race ) , had struggled no further than Paris when news came through that the race winner had completed the course . Parer and co - pilot Geoff Hemsworth continued an epic and eventful journey , taking nearly four months to reach Melbourne . The first Fox IIs entered service with the Belgian Air Force in early 1932 in the reconnaissance role , with one winning the " Circuit of the Alps " race for two - seat military aircraft at the 1932 Zurich Aviation meeting . The Fox continued in production at Avions Fairey at Gosselies for much of the 1930s , forming the backbone of the Belgian Air Force , being used in the pure reconnaissance , reconnaissance - bomber and two - seat fighter roles . Later aircraft were fitted with enclosed canopies and more powerful Hispano - Suiza 12Y engines . Over 100 Foxes were still in front - line service with the Belgian Air Force at the time of the German invasion on 10 May 1940 . Although massively outclassed by the aircraft of the " Luftwaffe " they flew about 75 sorties and even claimed one kill of a Messerschmitt Bf 109 .