Originally posted by Now_Then

Something fishy bout this one.

An inverted B-52?

Where did you get this? No sane US Air Force pilot would dare try that stunt. It would surely cost a pilot in our military his carrer to pull that stunt. Bombers aren't built to fly inverted.

Tim

its fake.


very fake.

Originally posted by waynos
This is what a Spitfire looks like after exceeding mach 0.9 - yes, it landed like this.

More information Waynos?

SteveR, I actually asked this question of waynos earlier his answer is on page 6. However here it is.

There is indeed a story to that pic, here's what I wrote about it some time ago on another thread;

some opinions I put here may have since changed



In RAE trials during 1943-46 various fighters were dived at full power from 40,000ft in what the test pilots desctibed as 'an attempt to break the world air speed record vertically downwards'

As part of these trials, once the terminal velocity was reached the guns were fired, and I quote, 'to see if the wings came off'. Nice work if you can get it!

It is recorded that in these trials the highest mach number ever recorded on a piston engined aircraft in flight was obtained when Sqn Leader A Martindale, in 1946, dived Spitfire XI 'EN409' to a speed of mach 0.92. However the photo below shows both what that speed did to the Spitfire and what a skillful pilot Sqn Ldr Martindale was! The propeller was ripped clean off and the fron end looks like its been repeatedly bashed with a lump hammer. And yet it appears to have landed perfectly.

external image

The account goes on to note that several other types were tested in this way, including the P-47 Thunderbolt and P-51 Mustang and none of them were able to reach the speed of the Spitfire because their high speed drag increased more rapidly. The major reason was in RJ Mitchells choice of a thin wing tapering to 9% thickness chord ratio, this was thinner than all other wings (even the P-51!) and against all aerodynamic advice of the time.

They alsdo found that NACA work oN laminar flow (NACA pioneered this work, not the RAE) was basically sound but that the promised advantages were not being obtained in practice. This was traced to surface roughness of the wing finish leading to skin friction which was cancelling out the benefits of laminar flow. This led to a change in the way the P-51 wing was manufactured and to the design of a laminar flow wing for the Spitfire, which led to the Spiteful.

Hope this helps.

LEE.

It's been a while since this thread got an airing and I have some shots here that are a little mysterious. Now I took these myself at a technical college in Sydney. I expect that the ever resourceful waynos will explain at least part of the mystery, ie: exactly WHAT it is, but as to how it made it's way to Australia 30+ years ago will probably remain a mystery. I have asked the oldest teacher who has been there since the early 70's and he cannot recall, except to say that it was around in the old college in Ultimo in inner Sydney all those years ago.

At first glance it appears to just be a display model of the Dassault Balzac STOVL/VSTOL demonstrator of the 1960's. And so did I think until I looked carefully at my photos with those of the real thing, notice the air intakes, they are completely different. I assume that this may be an early display model that was doing the airshow circuit in the early 60's and may have been originally intended for Farnborough or Paris. This would explain the differences in air intakes. One thing that I will try and confirm when I am back there week after next is what the model is made from. At first glance it appears to be made from metal (steel or Aluminium) if so this might suggest that it started life as a wind tunnel model before conversion to display.

Note: the display pedestal is fitted with Rolls Royce logos, so presumably it may have been used by them as well.

Hope somone can figure out exactly what it is, and maybe even how the hell it ended up at a technical colllege in Australia.

LEE.










And for comparison.



[edit on 5-1-2008 by thebozeian]

mmmm The X45c love it

Some beautful pictures Guy's, many thanks to all as I really enjoyed seeing the weird & wonderful .. & please do continue

For Waynos, Only one of these flying these days:



Gloster Gauntlet 2 GT-400

cheers, I thought the Gauntlet was long extinct. that was a pleasant surprise. I wonder how many other planes out there are the last of their kind? For a long time there was only one Lancaster but now there are two. By contrast I read recently that there are now more Spitfires flying than at any time since the end of WW2.