Posted on 07/19/2019 3:41:40 PM PDT by Enlightened1
My dad flew Corsairs during WWII, he said it was the most wonderful airplane he ever flew. His flying career ended with a motorcycle accident in 1948 that left him partially paralyzed. He made it until 4 months shy of his 90th birthday in spite of it.
God bless your dad and may he rest in peace. Greatest generation. My old man too.
Same here Dad + 3 Uncles all of military age in 1941
All went
All came back...more or less in one piece (one carried some extra jap ‘hardware’ in his body - and it wasn’t grains of rice, either)
What the Navy really misses is the A-6E Intruder. Could carry 24+ 500 pound bombs, plus some other assorted systems.
If you have read the book, “Flight of the Intruder”, there were many scenes that seemed like they were contrived; they weren’t. Every one of them happened in real life.
The scene where an bombardier-navigator was hit by an AK-47 round and bled out before the pilot could get back to the carrier (USS Midway) was actually true. My dad was the Maintenance Chief for VA-115 at the time. My mom told me one of the very few times my dad cried was when he read that part of the book.
The part that seemed most unbelievable was a flight of two A-6As going flying into downtown Hanoi and bombing the docks. Well, that was true, too.
I remember reading ages ago that the swing wings were incredibly maintenance intensive and the radar cross section was horrendous. There was no way to make them stealthy. On the F35, a single rivet sticking up slightly from the surface degrades the RCS by 1,000 times or more.
My aero-engr bud from my Jet Engine days use to say Taildragger, it is in the wing design. I don’t know the airfoil or aspect ratio, but I need to dig into it more...
The advent of drones and supersonic missiles may doom the carrier altogether.
We are fully prepared to fight the last war, though.
I love those WW2 guys...they were my heroes as a kid and then on through life. Lost a 1st cousin a year ago at 93. Was a gunner on PT and crash boats. Shot down a Japanese “Jake” his lone kill during 4 years in the South Pacific. A professional boxer for a time after the war. They don’t make them like that anymore.
The 1942 Doolittle raid on Tokyo is a fascinating story of how to achieve sufficient range to hit Tokyo from very long stand-off distance. Different time and tech, of course, but very fascinating nonetheless.
There was a program on The History Channel about the Doolittle Raiders.
There were white lines on a satellite field way back in the woods at Eglin. It was the same length as The Hornet’s deck.
They got a guy who owned a fully restored B-25 to see if he could match their feat. He revved the engines and released the brakes. He couldn’t take off before passing the line.
Later the flier mentioned that during WWII they had 115 octane gas which could be the difference.
Even the WWII carriers could put a lot of wind over the deck too - right down the flight line. Can’t turn a field into the wind.
Yes the combination of wind over the open Pacific plus the speed of the carrier made the take off pretty easy. In those old films, you can see some of those B-25s look like they practically lift up off the deck.
Still when they were training at Eglin they were able to takeoff in that same length.
Bonemaker,
You have identified the greatest impediment to accomplishing anything in the the United States.
The political parties do not have the best interest of the country as a priority. The democrat/socialist/communist party cares only about changing our country to be of their agenda.
They will use any means to tear us down and accomplish that goal. The latest is to push people of color against the white people.
Some other countries, China and Japan for example, do not permit such radical SJW activists to attempt to overthrow their governments. They take swift and lasting punishment on those who would make such an attempt. Sadly, we are told that we can not take such action against them here in the USA.
We are not allowed to eliminate the threat to our country and our government even protects them while they destroy our once great country.
And, yes, other countries do not have political gridlock and move ahead swiftly with national projects that benefit the country, while the people of the USA live with a declining quality of life.
Maybe the only solution is to tear it all down and start over from the original beginning, with the guts to eliminate those who would attempt to destroy it.
Oh how you nailed it! All democrats care about is getting into power. Best interests of the country mean NOTHING. We are far too tolerant and it’s a toss up whether this will be our undoing. We are no more immune than any other country.
“’m thinking the 737 MAX, reconfigured as a missile-carrying drone”
> “A bit difficult to carrier launch and retrieve..... “
Retrieve? :)
It’d make a nice crater...
With all due respect, 'No sh*t, Sam Snead - how many knots of wind did the guy have? From the look of the sea state, Hornet must have had 30 knots over the deck.
When they trained at Eglin they only had whatever wind happened to be blowing and in those woods it probably wasn’t much.
Doolittle’s Raiders did accomplish it.
I imagine the combined wind and ship’s speed was probably maybe 65 mph.
I have a vague memory of a proposed upgrade to the F-14 that would have been designated the F-21, essentially a Super Tomcat. It was rejected and the F-18 Super Hornet variant was selected to be its replacement. The reason was to have only 1 aircraft, the F-18 series, to do the roles of the F-14 and the F-18. I might be wrong on this though.
The AAF guys that Doolittle had at Eglin were able to take off without the benefit of the head substantial wind. The 30 knot head wind of the Hornet sailing at full power into the wind only added to their ability to take off within the length of the carrier deck. The octane rating of the gasoline they had versus a possible lower octane by the History Channel attempt would have produced less power coming from the engines.
I recall reading the studies of performance studies of flying some German and Japanese fighters using their 87 octane gasoline and then flying them with US and British 100 octane gas; their engine performance was improved by the 100 octane gas.
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