Top 5 US bombers of all time

Again just my opinoin but here goes

1. B-52- This is probably the greatest bomber ever to serve. It's service history(and future) speaks for itself
2.B-17 Flying Fortress- Almost single handedly who the war in Europe(with respect to the Lancaster) It was simply the right plane at the right time.
3.B-2 Spirit- Granted, has yet to be able to prove itself in the battle it was designed for, but nonetheless, is a technological wonder and the most advanced bomber in the world today.
4.B-25 Mitchell- A true over-achiever. An adaptable airframe at a time when the US needed one.
5.B-58 Hustler- it's a shame this plane wasn't mass produced. The Hustler was truly before it's time. Policy killed this program, but it's innovation is second to none

So there it is. Feel free to debate. Anxious to read your comments waynos!


[edit on 23-11-2005 by zoso28]

The only thing I see wrong with your list is that it's the B-58 Hustler. I'm sure just a minor typo though.

[edit on 11/23/2005 by Zaphod58]

Right you are. Thanks for the heads up. I have corrected it

What about the liberator? More impactful than the b17 although not as iconic.

B36? That was the empitome of 50s cold war strategy. besides, it looks like something out of dan dare.

B1? Despite its avionics problems, they've been ironed out, and it is more capable imo than the B2. On top of that it has a larger payload than B2 or B52.

Just throwing out some ideas.

The B-1 has too many other problems. Not enough power is a big one. They only have three generators onboard, so they have to pick and choose systems to operate at different times of flight. During take off and landing they can't run the deicing systems with everything else running so they have a real icing problem at times.

Begging to differ a bit:


1) B-29: Brought the war right to the home islands and was for its time the most advanced bomber the world had ever seen.

2) B-17: Along with the Lancasters won the war of city busting in the European theatre and bombed Nazi Germany into submission

3) B-52: The BUFF. Big Ugle Fat .......... Fought in Vietnam, DS I, Bosnia, Afganistan, and DSII. Slow but carries alot and over a great distance, it formed the backbone of SAC during the cold war flying numerous CHROME DOME missions.

4) B-25B Mitchell: Lt. Col. J.D. Doolittle and his selected airmen flew off of the carrier U.S.S. Hornet in April of 1942 to hit Tokyo. While the damage was little, it was a huge morale booster and a wakeup call to the Japanes that the US was in the war to win.

5) B-2: Has a combat record and is the most sophisticated plane yet to fly. Stealth, able to stage from the CONUS, it is quite an impressive platform.

Honorable Mentions
The B-58 was an amazing aircraft, but short service life and lack of record gets it left off

The B-47 was fast and the first true jet bomber for the SAC

Many Appologys, I missed the "US" bit.

The B-36 should be on the list in my opinion.

- Phil

[edit on 24-11-2005 by gooseuk]

This list is only about the top 5 US bombers, not the top 5 bombers.

Mod Edit: Post On Topic, Or Not At all.

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[edit on 24/11/2005 by Mirthful Me]

the B-47 should be in the top 5. it's swept wing and jets under the wing paved the way for modern comercial jets. a desing which has yet to be changed





from this simple wing design came the 707

"Model 367-80, popularly known as the "Dash-80" by Boeing employees. The design was largely inspired by the B-47, having borrowed the bomber's 35° swept-wing and the mounting of its turbojet engines on underwing pylons."


[edit on 24-11-2005 by bigx01]

B-52 Number one.
Longest serving Bomber

[edit on 24-11-2005 by Jezza]

Originally posted by zoso28
Anxious to read your comments waynos!

Anxious? Surely not. Interested, hopefully?

The 'single handed' comment about the B-17 had me gurgling a bit but I recognize it was an iconic type, even if the B-24, Lancaster and Halifax were all superior aircraft.

So, my list then ( in age order, not importance);

1 Martin B-10 - set the pattern to which almost every combatant bomber of WW2 was designed, even though it was obsolete itself by 1939. If America hadn't built the B-10 the RAF might have had to go war with the Handley Page Heyford and Fairey Hendon such was its influence on bomber design. Equipped the first ever practical US bomber force, the model upon which later success was built.

2 Boeing B-17, Not the greatest bomber due, (at first) to structural design weaknesses and a small bomb bay, it wasn't even wanted by the USAAC who preferred the weedy Douglas B-18 instead, it became iconic to Americans in almost the same way as the Spit and Lanc in the UK thanks to herioc actions by the 8th Air Force in daylight raids over Germany and played its part in a round the clock bombing campaign.

3 Boeing B-29 Like the B-10 a decade earlier this raised the bar not just in bomber design but in aeroplane design. Matched the bombload of the Lancaster but eclipsed in in every other area of its design with a pressurised cabin and long efficient high aspect ratio wings it flew out of the reach of defending fighters. Ended the war.

4 Boeing B-52 Do you see a Pattern emerging here? Surely I don't need to risk repetitive strain injury to type out what we already know? In short then; vast, huge capacity, long life, untouched for half a century.

5 Northrop B-2 At last the cycle is broken, someone else gets a go and the bomber is completely re-invented. Crackpot theories about secret technology can do nothying to diminish the impact of this massively innovative aircraft, possibly the last great strategic manned bomber, time will tell.





[edit on 24-11-2005 by waynos]

Originally posted by bigx01
the B-47 should be in the top 5. it's swept wing and jets under the wing paved the way for modern comercial jets. a desing which has yet to be changed







[edit on 24-11-2005 by bigx01]

I agree with you on that one, I like the B-47 airframe it should have been exported to other NATO countries who cannot afford big things. OK it does not have to be a bomber but as a tanker or an AWACS plane. This plane was also used by the USN once and i think Canada did once too. This one is basically a mini B-52 although it lead to it.

Did the B-47 see service in vietnam?.

www.allstar.fiu.edu...
www.aviation-history.com...

Another favourite The B-58 Hustler. I heard Australia was a customer for this. When retired from service the B-58s were kept at AMARC in case of Re-Activation but there were no need for them so they got scrapped. Having the cockpit like a fighter makes this one quite interesting. I wonder what it would be like if still in service/exported?. Reminds me of the Avro Vulcan/Aurora at some points.

www.air-and-space.com...

And the Convair YB-60. Competitor to the B-52, it is basically a jet engined B-36.

The B-58 was a neat plane, but good lord it was expensive, and a pig from what I've heard about it. Two B-58 wings were the equivalent of SIX B-52 wings. Not to mention the accident rate for them in one year was WAY too high. They lost SEVEN airplanes in 1959-1960. There were many major engineering issues before the airplane was accepted into the inventory that delayed acceptance, and many of them weren't corrected when it entered service.

The B-58 accident rate in 1959 and 1960 had been alarmingly high, which led SAC to delay acceptance of excecutive responsibility for the aircraft. The first accident had taken place on Dec 16, 1958, near Cannon AFB, NM when 58-018 was lost. The accident was attributed to a loss of control during normal flight when autotrim and ratio changer were rendered inoperative due to an electrical system failure. On May 14, 1959, 58-1012 was destroyed by fire during a refueling operation at Carswell AFB. 58-1017 was destroyed on September 16 of that year when a tire blew during takeoff from Carswell AFB. On October 27, 55-669 was destroyed near Hattiesburg, Mississippi when it lost control during normal flight. On November 7, 55-664 was destroyed during a high-speed test flight near Lawton, Oklahoma when it disintegrated in midair. Convair test pilot Raymond Fitzgerald and Convair flight engineer Donald A. Siedhof were both killed. The flight was attempting to collect vertical fin side loads data under the conditions of the loss of an engine at high speed. A friend of mine witnessed this accident from the ground. Although the cause of the accident was never adequately explained, it appears that a design flaw in the aircraft's flight control system and defects in the integrity of the vertical fin structure were to blame. There is also the possiblility that when the number 4 engine was purposely shut down for the test, number 3 lost thrust as well. On April 22, 1960 a failure of the Mach/airspeed/air data system caused the loss of 58-1023 near Hill AFB, Utah. On June 4, 1960, 55-0667 was lost due to pilot error while flying at supersonic speed near Lubbock, Texas.
home.att.net...

www.airtoaircombat.com...
www.milavia.net...

The Convair B-58 Hustler would be a great plane to fly for the pilot but for his other 2 mates it would be a burden(due to claustrophobia/lack of daylight). Being supersonic and having fighter style cockpits and size , I would compare this with the Avro Arrow although it is a bomber. Was the B-58 replaced by the F-111?.

It is a delta shaped airframe with 4x F-4 Phantom type engines shoved in it. Enginewise, This plane would be easy to repair. I dont see the reason for the B-58 to be so expensive.

Shame they got scrapped off.




[edit on 26-11-2005 by Browno]

The high altitude range of 3,500 nm for the B-58A and 4,000 nm for the B-58B included the use of a large centerline fuel pod. Although this range was better than the B-47, the lack of forward basing resulted in a requirement for more tanker support. While the B-58 was faster than Soviet fighters, the newly emerging threat was the development of SAMs in the late 1950's that forced the B-58 to adapt to low level penetration of enemy defenses. This change in mission profile caused a large increase in fuel consumption and compounded range problem.
www.fas.org...

That's one reason there. It took so much tanker support to get anywhere. Then there were engineering issues that were never fixed before it was delivered to the military that caused problems and had to be fixed. The payload was small, since it didn't have an internal bomb bay, so it took more arframes on target for the same result as a smaller number of B-52s.

XB-70 #1. The threat this would have posed would have been incredible.

Too bad it was never put into production.

Mach 3 Bomber, it doesnt get any cooler than that does it?

Train

Originally posted by BigTrain
XB-70 #1. The threat this would have posed would have been incredible.

The advent of SAMs , the Mig-25 and Mig-31 would have presented quite a challange to this platform. There is no disputing the technology however, and if you change it from a penatrating bomber to a High speed stealthy cruise missile carrier you have got a hell of a system that can dash in, fire off its missiles and dash off

Originally posted by BigTrain
XB-70 #1. The threat this would have posed would have been incredible.

Too bad it was never put into production.

Mach 3 Bomber, it doesnt get any cooler than that does it?

Train

Why dont they make a bomber version of the Aurora?. They were going to with the YF-12. If the B-70 was selected for USAF Service, it would well smoke off the B-1 Lancer. Bombers nowerdays should be that speed becouse they are too big and wounerable. Thats why i like the B-58 Hustler becouse it is more like a fighter and is not too big. Im more into fighter planes than bombers but this one has sort of cought my attention.

Imagine if either the B-70 or the B-58 were still in service, They would have came useful to the conflicts after the cold war.

ALSO Russia made a smaller copy of the B-70 called the Sukhoi T-4

Hiya Browno, the Soviet copy of the B-70 was the Tu-135 not the Sukhoi T-4, in the end the Tu-135 never got built and the Tu 160 was developed instead.

www.suchoj.com..." target="_blank" class="postlink">Tupolev Tu-135