Rolls-Royce Dart Rolls-Royce Dart The Rolls-Royce RB.53 Dart is a long-lived British turboprop engine designed, built and manufactured by Rolls-Royce Limited. First run in 1946, it powered the first Vickers Viscount maiden flight in 1948, and in the Viscount was the first turboprop engine to enter airline service, with British European Airways (BEA), in 1950. On 29 July 1948 a flight between Northolt and Paris–Le Bourget Airport with 14 paying passengers in a Dart-powered Viscount was the first scheduled airline flight by any turbine-powered aircraft. The Dart was still in production when the last Fokker F27 Friendships and Hawker Siddeley HS 748s
Vickers Vellore Vickers Vellore The Vickers Vellore was a large biplane designed as a freight and mail carrier, in single-engined and twin-engined versions, which saw limited use as freighters and long-range experimental aircraft. A final variant with a broader fuselage, the Vellox, was built as an airliner. The Vickers Vellore, named after the Indian city of Vellore in the state of Tamil Nadu, was a response to Air Ministry specification 34/24, which called for a civil mail and freight carrier. It was a large single-engined two-bay biplane, metal framed and fabric covered. The wings were of equal span with a slight stagger