Is this the same one that was posted on IAA late last year? (looks the same)
I came to the same conclusion that it belonged to a 18" aircraft torpedo as the reinforced propeller guard and rudder resembles the smaller 18" aircraft than the larger 21" submarine types.
How did you conclude that it is a Mk XII* ? (There were 15 different Mks produced for the 18" aircraft by RNTF - I would be very interested if you have any information on this?)
(my apologies as my interest is generally on the "other" end of a torpedo!)
Here's one of the photo I came across when researching this last year.
Jason,
In the early years Whitehead and back then RL / RGF did indeed exchange "technological improvements" (i.e. counter- rotating propellers etc), but it is a very interesting question as to when this "arrangement" actually ceased - or did it?
Whitehead died around 1905, his son John in 1902, Georg Hoyos was already dead by 1905 and the last person with any technical expertise - Capt. Gallway died in 1906.....the British government concerned that the business would fall into "unfriendly" ownership had encouraged both UK firms Vickers & Armstrong to invest equal shares etc.....that occur around 1907.
This arrangement fell apart in 1914 as Austria grabbed the Fiume works and in 1915 when Italy joined into the war, the factory's manufacturing plant was basically moved some 40 miles to St.Polten.
However it was of course a different story for the Weymouth factory, which was split away from the Fiume concern and registered as a separate company in 1907 as "Whitehead & Company" and of course building torpedoes for the Royal Navy............
RNTF came into existence around ~1917, so one could speculate that the ongoing exchange and manufacturing occurred as all companies were collaborating in one way or another as all were either British firms /government and by 1917 as WW1 was still going, the demand for production would have been seek via any available manufacturing capacity.
Cheers
Drew