Enamel Factory Sign for Aircraft Manufacturers Boulton & Paul Ltd Norwich

Enamel Factory Sign for Aircraft Manufacturers Boulton & Paul Ltd Norwich, fine blue enamel sign with white lettering, “MAKERS BOULTON & PAUL LTD NORWICH”. Six fixing holes to the enamel sign. Some areas of chipping and rusting but generally good condition. 102 x 23 cms at its widest and highest points. In 1915, Boulton & Paul began to construct aircraft under contract including 550 of the Royal Aircraft Factory FE.2b. Fe.2 construction was passed over to another East Anglian company so Boulton Paul could concentrate on production of more advanced designs. Their extensive use of jigs and the manufacture of the smaller fittings required meant that they could maintain fast production. A new production site was built and an assembly and proving ground developed on Mousehold Heath in Norwich rather than transport the aircraft to the Army at Thetford. During the war the company built more Sopwith Camels than any other manufacturer. Success as a builder of aircraft led to the company forming a design department but none of its resulting aircraft made a significant impact while the war lasted. The P.3 Bobolink fighter was overshadowed by the Sopwith Snipe and the Armistice came before the P.7 Bourges bomber into production. Boulton & Paul developed steel-framed aircraft under their designer John Dudley North. The first was the Boulton & Paul P.10 which used steel tubes rolled from sheet metal. It was exhibited – but not flown – at the Paris Air Show in 1919. Official interest in metal frame designs led to an order of a single Boulton & Paul Bolton, a twin-engine bomber design. In the same period Boulton & Paul produced another metal framed design, the Boulton & Paul Bodmin, with its engines in the fuselage. North believed that a metal frame could be 10% lighter than an equivalent wooden frame. After World War I, Boulton & Paul made its mark with the introduction of powered and enclosed defensive machine-gun turrets for bombers. Its Sidestrand twin-engined biplane bomber, which could fly at 140 mph, had an exposed nose turret that was clearly inadequate. The subsequent Overstrand bomber featured the world's first enclosed, power-operated turret, mounting a single Lewis gun and propelled by compressed air. The company licensed a French design of an electro-hydraulic four-gun turret that became a major feature of its future production. In addition to fitting turrets to bombers, Boulton & Paul was to install them in fighters. Boulton & Paul provided most of the structure for the R101 airship; the completed sections being transported to RAF Cardington for assembly there. The R101 subsequently flew over Norwich in return.