Canadian Car & Foundry — Canada's Wartime Aviation Powerhouse
Canadian Car and Foundry Company Limited (CC&F), founded in Montreal in 1909 as a railway rolling stock manufacturer, became one of Canada's most prolific aircraft producers during the Second World War. Operating from its Fort William (Thunder Bay) and Amherst facilities, CC&F built over 6,500 aircraft between 1938 and the early 1950s — a remarkable industrial achievement for a company that had no aviation background before the war. Its production record spans British fighters, American trainers, dive bombers, and a handful of original Canadian designs.
Aircraft Production Record
Licence-Built Aircraft
| Aircraft | Units Built | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Avro Anson Mk.II | 341 + 800 wings + 300 fuselages | British twin-engine trainer/patrol aircraft; major contribution to the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan |
| Avro Anson Mk.V | 300 | Improved all-Canadian variant with moulded plywood fuselage |
| Beechcraft T-34A Mentor | 125 | 25 for RCAF, 100 for USAF; post-war piston trainer |
| Canadian Car and Foundry (Curtiss) SBW Helldiver | 835 | Licence-built Curtiss SB2C Helldiver dive bomber; largest single CC&F production run of a combat type |
| Grumman G.23 Goblin I / Delfín | 52 | Biplane fighter; examples sold to the Spanish Republican Air Force and RCAF |
| Hawker Hurricane Mk.X, XI & XII | 1,451 | CC&F's most significant wartime contribution; Canadian-built Hurricanes served with the RCAF and were exported under Lend-Lease |
| North American Harvard Mk.IIB / AT-16 | 1,798 | The definitive Commonwealth advanced trainer; built for the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan |
| Noorduyn Norseman Mk.V | 51 | Built after CC&F acquired Noorduyn Aviation |
| Noorduyn Norseman Mk.VII | 1 | Extensively redesigned variant; did not enter series production |
Post-War Production
| Aircraft | Units Built | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Canadian Car and Foundry Harvard Mk.4 / T-6J | 555 | Built post-war for RCAF and USAF under the Military Defense Aid Pact; the final Harvard production run in Canada |
Original Designs
Beyond licence production, CC&F developed several original aircraft, though none entered large-scale production:
- Canadian Car and Foundry CBY-3 Loadmaster — One built. A large twin-boom cargo transport designed for bush operations; an ambitious original design that did not find a production customer.
- Canadian Car and Foundry Maple Leaf Trainer I — One built. Known as the Wallace project; a Canadian-designed basic trainer prototype.
- Canadian Car and Foundry Maple Leaf Trainer II — One built. The jigs and parts were subsequently sold to Mexico, where the design was developed further as the Ares #2.
- Gregor FDB-1 — One built. A fighter design by Michel Gregor, constructed at the CC&F facility; a single prototype only.
Production Highlights
Three programmes define CC&F's wartime legacy:
The Hawker Hurricane production (1,451 aircraft) made CC&F the sole Canadian manufacturer of a front-line British fighter. Canadian Hurricanes differed from their British counterparts in several respects, including the use of Packard-built Merlin engines and locally sourced equipment. They served in every theatre where the RCAF operated.
The North American Harvard programme (1,798 aircraft) was central to the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan — the massive Allied aircrew training scheme that graduated over 131,000 pilots, navigators, and aircrew in Canada between 1940 and 1945. CC&F Harvards trained a generation of Allied airmen.
The Curtiss SBW Helldiver programme (835 aircraft) represented CC&F's most complex manufacturing challenge — a modern stressed-skin monoplane dive bomber built to US Navy standards, produced entirely in Canada.
Legacy
Canadian Car and Foundry's aviation division wound down in the mid-1950s as post-war defence contracts dried up and the company returned its focus to railway equipment. Its contribution to Canadian aviation history, however, is permanent: over 6,500 aircraft produced in less than two decades, from biplane fighters to modern trainers and dive bombers, built by a workforce that had no aviation experience before 1938. CC&F stands as one of the great industrial mobilisation stories of the Second World War.
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