Planes you'd never heard of

theprestige said:
To me the Victor looks like it was designed by someone who learned everything they knew about jet bombers from the Bell X-1. Advanced, but somehow also primitive. And those intakes just look saggy.

For me, the peak bomber aesthetic is probably the B-1B.

But I'm also fond of the F-117 (which is a bomber despite its nomenclature). Its form is pure "interim", but also an absolute dedication to singular function: Lowest possible radar cross section. Only the most meager concession is made to the aerodynamic requirements of flight. Low RCS is everything.
Click to expand...

Victor had a constant critical Mach number across the entire wing and consequently a high cruise speed, the nose and tail, were also designed to the 'area rule' for the same critical mach number so the shape of the Victor had a constant critical mach number all over.
A similar looking aircraft was the Buckaneer, it had similar crescent wings for the same reason.
 
Fantastic thread, the best fun I've had on ISF for years. Well done to all contributors!
 
Two of my favourite little-known aircraft are the stunningly unaesthetic Avro Bison and Blackburn Blackburn (so ugly they named it twice). For some unfathomable reason there was a decision made that naval spotter-reconnaissance aircraft needed a full-sized chart table and enough room for the observer to stand up inside the fuselage, but still needed to be small enough to operate from an aircraft carrier. There was a two-seat side-by-side trainer version of one that reputedly had so much drag that it could barely get airborne from the Fleet Air Arm's longest land runways, never mind a carrier. Fortunately they were never needed in a war; in any kind of combat they'd have been sitting ducks.

Dave
 
Captain_Swoop said:
They drop a sonar buey. Why would they need to land?
What would they do with a contact if they were on the surface?
ASW helicopt have a 'dipping' sonar they lower in to the water without landing.
Click to expand...

I guess because a sonar array that could be placed in contact with the water from an amphibious aircraft could be larger and more sensitive than a dropped sonar buoy or dipped sonar.
 
BillC said:
I guess because a sonar array that could be placed in contact with the water from an amphibious aircraft could be larger and more sensitive than a dropped sonar buoy or dipped sonar.
Click to expand...
The current strategy seems to be to use the helicopter for covering a large area quickly, while its parent frigate or destroyer brings the big stuff up behind. Either the ship following up on contacts from the helo, or the helo covering the route of a contact being chased by the ship.

And a ship-helo team can stay out longer and operate in more conditions than a seaplane.
 
theprestige said:
For me, the peak bomber aesthetic is probably the B-1B.
Click to expand...
Probably because it looks more like a fighter than a bomber.
But I'm also fond of the F-117 (which is a bomber despite its nomenclature). Its form is pure "interim", but also an absolute dedication to singular function: Lowest possible radar cross section. Only the most meager concession is made to the aerodynamic requirements of flight. Low RCS is everything.
Click to expand...

Trebuchet said:
For a proper designation, I'd say it should have had an "A" (Attack), rather than a "B" (Bomber). But it certainly isn't an "F".
Click to expand...
I've always wondered how it ended up as and "F".
 
theprestige said:
The current strategy seems to be to use the helicopter for covering a large area quickly, while its parent frigate or destroyer brings the big stuff up behind. Either the ship following up on contacts from the helo, or the helo covering the route of a contact being chased by the ship.

And a ship-helo team can stay out longer and operate in more conditions than a seaplane.
Click to expand...

I am surprised that this is true. The Seahawk helicopter, one of the current anti-submarine navy helicopters, has an endurance up to 3-1/5 hours and a range of 282 miles. Although there are no current USN seaplanes used for anti-sub patrol (AFAIK), many of the seaplanes used in WW 2, such as the PBY Catalina, had endurances of up to 31 hours and ranges of 2,500 miles - one of the main reasons they were so beloved for patrols.

This does not resolve the "operate in more conditions" issue but isn't that referring to the difficulty seaplanes have landing on rough water, rather than in flight? I imagine helicopters and seaplanes both (being relatively slow, bulky, and with low max altitudes compared to most jets) have similar problems in flight in storms, with the Catalina actually having slightly higher ceilings and max speeds vs helicopters. And notably landing a helicopter on a rocking aircraft carrier deck in high and gusty storm winds is probably very difficult - is it that much less limiting than landing a seaplane in a storm when the seaplane can travel thousands of miles to find smoother water?

Am I misunderstanding the facts?
 
Last edited:
Trebuchet said:
Marketing. Hey Congress, we can't tell you about this Stealth FIGHTER we're building, but continue to fund it anyhow. And the Air Force hates having a ground attack mission, hence their repeated attempts to kill the A-10.
Click to expand...
Stereotypes aside, there doesn't seem to be any good information about how it happened. Some say it was to mislead the Soviets, or fit into some negotiation with them. Others say it was to attract the top pilots. Still others suggest it was an accident - just another meaningless anomaly in the application of the tri-service numbering system.
 
Also, as hilariously awesome as the A-10 is, it hasn't made a lot of sense, operationally or fiscally, in a long time. That's why the Air Force is trying to get rid of it. Modern CAS is being done more effectively by the F-16, F-15E, and the B-1B.

The age of the multirole fighter is upon us. Building a dedicated tactical ground attack plane today would be like building a dedicated night fighter.
 
theprestige said:
Stereotypes aside, there doesn't seem to be any good information about how it happened. Some say it was to mislead the Soviets, or fit into some negotiation with them. Others say it was to attract the top pilots. Still others suggest it was an accident - just another meaningless anomaly in the application of the tri-service numbering system.
Click to expand...

To be fair, it was the F-111 that initially muddied the waters; the F-111B would have been something that could reasonably be described as a fighter, but every F-111 (as opposed to FB-111 and EF-111, which definitely weren't fighters either) that actually flew had low level bombing and ground attack as a primary mission.

Dave
 
Giordano said:
I am surprised that this is true. The Seahawk helicopter, one of the current anti-submarine navy helicopters, has an endurance up to 3-1/5 hours and a range of 282 miles. Although there are no current USN seaplanes used for anti-sub patrol (AFAIK), many of the seaplanes used in WW 2, such as the PBY Catalina, had endurances of up to 31 hours and ranges of 2,500 miles - one of the main reasons they were so beloved for patrols.

This does not resolve the "operate in more conditions" issue but isn't that referring to the difficulty seaplanes have landing on rough water, rather than in flight? I imagine helicopters and seaplanes both (being relatively slow, bulky, and with low max altitudes compared to most jets) have similar problems in flight in storms, with the Catalina actually having slightly higher ceilings and max speeds vs helicopters. And notably landing a helicopter on a rocking aircraft carrier deck in high and gusty storm winds is probably very difficult - is it that much less limiting than landing a seaplane in a storm when the seaplane can travel thousands of miles to find smoother water?

Am I misunderstanding the facts?
Click to expand...

A ship-helo team can operate in more conditions than a seaplane. And while the helo's own endurance is limited, the destroyer it's flying from can stay on station for weeks at a time - in any weather. A seaplane that has to fly thousands of miles away to land is not going to be much use in hunting the submarine it left behind. When the USN does need that kind of trade-off, they just operate land-based ASW planes like the P-3 and the P-8.
 
Dave Rogers said:
To be fair, it was the F-111 that initially muddied the waters; the F-111B would have been something that could reasonably be described as a fighter, but every F-111 (as opposed to FB-111 and EF-111, which definitely weren't fighters either) that actually flew had low level bombing and ground attack as a primary mission.

Dave
Click to expand...

Yep. And the F/A-18 should actually be the AF-18. And the F-15E should actually be the AF-15. The F-16 should probably be the AF-16, but at least in that case it was designed as a pure fighter, that later turned out to be flexible and upgradeable enough to be an effective multirole.
 
theprestige said:
The current strategy seems to be to use the helicopter for covering a large area quickly, while its parent frigate or destroyer brings the big stuff up behind. Either the ship following up on contacts from the helo, or the helo covering the route of a contact being chased by the ship.

And a ship-helo team can stay out longer and operate in more conditions than a seaplane.
Click to expand...

Exactly, I served on ASW Frigates in the RN in the 80s. We had an array of detection gear including variable depth sonar that could be lowered deep to detect subs 'hiding' in thermal layers. We had a helicopter that could be armed with AS torpedoes and depth bombs that we could send to engage any distant contacts and our own onboard weapon systems.

Most of the sensors were passive 'listening' devices, they could pinpoint and identify a particular class of sub and even individual boats.
Active 'pinging' was only used as a last accurate 'fix' before a weapon was engaged.
Bigger helicopters from carriers and cruisers carried 'dipping' sonars as well as sonobuoys and could locate and engage targets on their own.
I am sure the sensors and systems are a lot more sophisticated today.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom