It entered service in 1953 and remained in use with the Royal Air Force, powering its Dominie T1 navigation training aircraft until January 2011.

Like the similar J85 built in United States, the Viper was originally developed as an expendable engine for production versions of the Jindivik target drone.

[2] Because it was initially developed as an expendable engine, the Viper was subject to many recurring maintenance issues.

This led to the development of the first Power by the Hour program in which operators would pay a fixed hourly rate to Bristol Siddeley for the continual maintenance of the engines.

[3] In the 1970s, Turbomecanica Bucharest and Orao Sarajevo acquired the license for the Viper engine, which propelled various Romanian and Yugoslav built aircraft.