Francis Rodwell Banks was born 22 March 1898, son of late Bernard Rodwell and Frances Emily Banks. In 1925 he married Christine Constance Grant Langlands, with whom he had two daughters. Banks was educated at Christ’s College.

Banks served in the First and Second World Wars: 1914-1919 in the Navy and 1939-1946 in the RAF. Between the two wars he specialised in the development of aviation engines and their fuels with The Associated Ethyl Company (a company which was responsible for the production, research and development of aero engines, including gas turbines, at Ministry of Aircraft Production, during the Second World War). Banks was Principal Director of Engine Research and Development, Ministry of Supply (1952-1953); Director of the Bristol Aeroplane Company (1954-1959); Director of Hawker Siddeley Aviation Ltd (1954-59), then worked as an Engineering Consultant. He died in 1985.

Banks wrote various technical papers on aviation engines and their fuels and his memoir "I Kept No Diary" (1978 with a 2nd revised edition in 1983).