The Avro Tutor was designed as a replacement for the Avro 504 trainer. The prototype was fitted with the lower powered Armstrong Siddeley Mongoose engine, but production engines were fitted with the Lynx engines. The Tutor entered service with the RAF in 1933 and from 1933-36, Tutors from the Central Flying School were famed for their impressive formation aerobatic displays. Tutors were also used throughout the RAF as elementary training aircraft. The Tutor was a luxurious and well-equipped aeroplane for its time, with a tail-wheel, effective brakes, seats that could be adjusted for height and rudder pedals for distance, spacious cockpits and a variable incidence tail-plane. The Tutor was mainly a military aeroplane and only nineteen appeared on the civil register.

K3215 was civilian registered as G-AHSA. It was built as part of the RAF's main production batch in 1933. It served with the RAF College at Cranwell and is painted in these colours today. It is believed to have been the last Tutor on RAF strength when in December, 1946 she was struck off. It was owned by the John Neasham of Darlington & District Aero Club. It was later bought by Wing Commander Heywood and was used in the film 'Reach for the Sky' when it suffered an engine crankshaft failure. Engine problems in 1979 caused the machine to be grounded for a number of years, a suitable Lynx could not be found even after a world-wide search. The existing engine was painstakingly rebuilt at Old Warden in 1981-82 by a senior member of the engineering staff. K3215 is now the only surviving example of the Avro Tutor and can still be seen flying at Old Warden.