Armstrong Whitworth Apollo Armstrong Whitworth Apollo The Armstrong Whitworth AW.55 Apollo was a 1940s British four-engine turboprop airliner built by Armstrong Whitworth at Baginton. The aircraft was in competition with the Vickers Viscount but was beset with engine problems and only two were built. The requirement resulted from the Brabazon Committee's Type II design, calling for a small, medium-range pressurized aircraft to fly its less-travelled routes which became Air Ministry Specification C.16/46 for an aircraft able to carry 24-30 passengers over 1,000 mi (1,610 km) at a cruising speed of . The resulting design was the AW.55 Apollo, a low-wing cantilever monoplane with
Three-surface aircraft canard foreplanes flew in 1985 and derivatives of this design became the only military types to enter production. Also in 1979, Piaggio began design studies on a three-surface civil twin turboprop which, in collaboration with Learjet, would emerge as the Piaggio P.180 Avanti. This type first flew in 1986 and entered service in 1990, with production continuing today. In the Avanti, the three-surface configuration is claimed to significantly reduce wing size, weight and drag compared to the conventional equivalent. Two experimental aircraft adopting this configuration were subsequently built by Scaled Composites under the lead of Burt Rutan and flown in