Robert Billo McIntyre

Robert Billo Mclntyre, B.Sc., M.Sc., was born near Toronto, Ontario on August 12, 1913. He graduated from Vaughn Road Collegiate with honours and went on to earn an Honours Degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Toronto.

In 1936 he was awarded a Massey Fellowship to Cambridge University in England, where he earned a post-graduate degree in mechanical and aeronautical engineering. While there, he earned his pilot's licence at the Cambridge University Air Squadron. When he returned to Canada in 1938, he lectured in Canada's first aeronautical engineering course at the University of Toronto.

During the early part of World War II, Massey-Harris Co. of Weston, Ontario, was under contract by de Havilland Canada (DHC) to build the wood wings for the de Havilland 98 Mosquito fighter-bomber. In 1939 Mclntyre began his aeronautical career at Massey-Harris, where he headed up the production team and served as senior aeronautical engineer.

In 1942 Mclntyre was invited to join DHC as Project Engineer on the complete Mosquito program. Production levels at the Downsview plant rose to as many as 80 Mosquitos per month, with more than 1100 airplanes built in less than three years.

Immediately after the war, Mclntyre was put in charge of the Aerodynamics and Stress Section of the DHC Engineering Department.

In 1946, when just 300 employees were retained from a wartime high of nearly 7000, Mclntyre became a key member of the DHC-1 Chipmunk team as project manager and head of production planning. The Chipmunk was a success from the start, becoming the primary trainer for the RCAF and the RAF.

Overhaul work was a major part of DHC's postwar program. Mclntyre was placed in charge of the company's newly-formed Aircraft Repair and Overhaul Division, rebuilding Ansons and Cansos. Following this, with the introduction of jet-powered military aircraft such as the DH 100 Vampire in the early 1950s, he established and ran the DHC Engine Division, overhauling up to 40 engines per week.

In 1959 he was appointed project engineer in charge of the DHC-4 (Caribou) program. With his considerable presentation skills and knowledge of aerodynamics, structures-and stress, he was successful in guiding the Caribou through FAA Certification in Washington, resulting in significant sales of this aircraft to the US Army.

In 1962 he was put in charge of merging DHC's Special Products Division with AVRO Canada's Applied Research facilities which DHC had recently purchased. As its first General Manager, he coined the acronym SPAR, later to be spun off as Spar Aerospace. With Mclntyre's assistance and leadership, the Division pioneered early spacecraft antennas and other unique accessories.

Mclntyre established and headed the Market Research Department in 1965, which marked a turning point in his career. His skill in market research and market development is perhaps his greatest legacy - bringing to the Canadian aerospace industry one of its first true commercial marketing organizations.

In 1971, he foresaw the potential demand for short haul airlines feeding into the growing hub-and-spoke networks which the major airlines were fast developing. Concurrently, he saw the simple, rugged and reliable Twin Otter as the perfect airplane to begin to fill this niche. His persistence, combined with the strength and quality of the Twin Otter, resulted in more than 840 sales around the world. It was a bush plane, but more than 500 were sold as airliners.

He turned his marketing skills to redefining the commuter and regional airline industry by encouraging DHC to design, develop and build purpose-built aircraft for the market. While the Twin Otter was the original 19-seat commuter, it was still a fairly basic airplane. Unpressurized, strutted, and with fixed gear, it was also noisy, with limited range and relatively slow speed. But as a market developer, it fit the bill for the time. The Twin Otter established the baseline for the next generation of regional airliner, and this was the defining moment in the eventual domination of de Havilland airplanes in the worldwide regional airliner market.

Mclntyre's intensive and thorough market research showed the need for a modern, quiet, pressurized airliner. This was a bold venture, since DHC's next product, the innovative DASH 7, would carry a price tag five times that of the Twin Otter it was meant to replace. As an example of his determination to spread the word about the potential of short haul regional airliners, in one three-week period he visited airline and government officials in 14 countries, from Scotland to Australia.

With design definition of the DASH 7 formed by Mclntyre's team, DHC produced the world's first four-engine, pressurized, two-crew aircraft, one specifically designed to move the regional airline industry into its second phase. Certificated in 1976, the 50-passenger, quiet, short haul DASH 7 airliner alerted the world to the possibility of immense profitability in the commuter/regional market. Regional carriers today have become so valuable to the transportation infrastructure in North America and abroad that most are affiliated with, or owned outright by, the major airlines themselves.

Although he had officially retired from DHC in 1978, Mclntyre remained active as a full-time consultant, with his final and most impressive assignment ahead of him: the advanced design definition of the world's most successful regional turboprop carrier - the DHC-8. The DASH 8 was launched in 1980 and came into service in 1983.

Mclntyre traveled the world conducting market research with airlines to ensure that the DASH 8 would meet their needs in passenger appeal, economics, speed, strength and reliability.

It is to the credit of Mclntyre and his team of market researchers and designers that over 20 years later, the DASH 8 remained in full production. When Bombardier Aerospace acquired the rights to produce the DASH 8, they renamed it the Dash 8/Q Series, with passenger capacities from 36 to 70.

The airliner continued to sell strongly as part of Bombardier's Regional Aircraft program, with more than 800 in service or on order. The “Dash 8” was the fore-runner of the "Q-400" series used ‘round the world.

Bob Mclntyre was made a Fellow of the Canadian Aeronautics and Space Institute (CASI) in May, 1976. In 1987 he was named Fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society, and added to the Hall of Distinction of the Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering, University of Toronto.

Among the many passions he enjoyed were his family: wife Peggy, their four children, and grandchildren. His many interests included photography, woodworking, golf, calligraphy, writing and sailing the Fireball racing dingy he built in 1963.

He died in Toronto on September 23, 1985, while still active as a consultant with the company he had served and loved since 1942.

Robert Billo Mclntyre was inducted as a Member of Canada's Aviation Hall of Fame at ceremonies held in Montreal on May 27, 2006.