The latter was powered by the new, nine-cylinder Wright J-4B static, air-cooled radial engine rated at 200 horsepower. To increase production, Walter Beech, Clyde Cessna and the board of directors relocated manufacturing to West Douglas Avenue where 30 employees struggled to keep pace with growing demand for Travel Air airplanes.ĭevelopment of the Type “BH” began with the Type “BW” that was introduced in March 1926. In 1925, its first year in business, the Wichita, Kansas-based company sold 19 airplanes and held orders for more as 1926 dawned. Following the end of World War I, supplies of the “Hisso,” as it was commonly called, were available to buyers, but to keep prices as low as possible Travel Air offered their ships with the inexpensive and ubiquitous Curtiss OX-5 and OXX-6 engines rated at 90- and 100-horspeower, respectfully.
In an effort to expand the Travel Air Manufacturing Company’s product line, Walter Beech and the engineering department mated the proven Type “B” airframe with the war-surplus Hispano-Suiza engine rated at 180 horsepower. In 1926 the Travel Air Manufacturing Company offered pilots the “Type BH” biplane powered by the superb Hispano-Suiza V-8 engine.
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