By: mike currill
- 20th August 2013 at 15:07Permalink- Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Really? So, tell us, mate, how we managed to have the Chain Home system operational in 1935, how we were able to see German raids building up in 1940, and carried out the first aircraft-borne, radar-controlled interception, and kill, in 1940.
.
Well, mate, I suggest you read up about Bletchley Park, Enigma and Colossus, and how desperate the U.S. was to get involved, but, initially, weren't trusted because it was felt that their security "system" was too full of holes.
In addition to the last part of that post I would have to say that in my experience it still is, yet they are paranoid about the rest of the world seeing some of their technology which foreign intelligence knows more about than their own citizens.
By: chaza87
- 20th August 2013 at 16:05Permalink- Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
I am intrigued by the aspects of this series of posts. No-one has pointed out that M52 aerofoil surfaces were of mahogany. That the design of the Vickers ~Transonic missile went through a multitude of tests, including flight trials, with wooden wings and horizontal and vertical tail surfaces. It was very much a success. The first model was lost due to turbulance, the second was lost when the motor failed to ignite (a copy of the German engine in the Schmetterling missile) and the third flew in October 9th 1948 a complete success. This missile had the all flying tail. An earlier report of the M52 said -
"With the gradual accumulation of knowledge it became clear that the E.24/43
was unlikely to reach sonic speed and when wind-tunnel model tests indicated the same serious
loss of longitudinal stability at high subsonic speeds as was then characteristic of all existing
aircraft the wisdom of continuing with this design was questioned. The decision was
reached to acquire preliminary experience of flight under transonic conditions using rocket-driven pilotless scale models."
Also
"Early in 1946 the contract for the E.24/43 was cancelled, since in addition to the adverse feature
already mentioned there was now added a further unsolved difficulty--the impossibility of safe
escape for the pilot in the event of an emergency bale-out at high speed."
Here is the description of the wing, "Wing.--The wing was of biconvex section 97.5-in. span and 18-94-in. mean chord.
It was constructed in mahogany, and formed a single-piece unit which passed right through the
body. Ailerons of mahogany were fitted to the trailing edges, and were operated by push-pull
rods running in tunnels formed in the thickest part of the wing. These rods were actuated by a
single bell-crank lever in the centre section of the wing and similar levers transferred their motion
through 90 deg to the ailerons. The fit of the pins at all pivot points was made tight purposely,
to avoid backlash ; for the aileron a distorting plate-type hinge was adoptedWing.--The wing was of biconvex section 97.5-in. span and 18-94-in. mean chord.
It was constructed in mahogany, and formed a single-piece unit which passed right through the
body. Ailerons of mahogany were fitted to the trailing edges, and were operated by push-pull
rods running in tunnels formed in the thickest part of the wing. These rods were actuated by a
single bell-crank lever in the centre section of the wing and similar levers transferred their motion
through 90 deg to the ailerons. The fit of the pins at all pivot points was made tight purposely,
to avoid backlash ; for the aileron a distorting plate-type hinge was adopted."
There were in fact eight test vehicles in the Vickers Transonic program.
When flown from St Eval in Cornwall the mother Mosquito had to have a Meteor to
accompany it. This was to give the radar operators a trace to follow the target since the
Mosquito's wooden construction caused no signature on the monitors.
If you carry out a patent search with the search term Phillips and Powis you will
see that the Miles company was well versed in the innovation of aerofoil sections.
The balance of evidence is this, Miles did the all flying tail first. The Americans
were given all the test reports on the M52 project just before the ending of Lease Lend.
Reciprocal aid is the British term for the British operating its own Lease Lend to the Americans.
Of course I stand corrected on all this but I have the papers in front of me.
By: Bager1968
- 21st August 2013 at 07:36Permalink- Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Hi All,
I remember seeing a documentary about breaking the sound barrier and although the X-1 broke it , it was a British Idea of a movable horizontal tail-plane from the designer of the M-52 that made it all possible and the U.S. only got the design because of the lack of government support and pressure to help the U.S. out with their project this all came from the designers lips in the documentary.
Geoff.
The complaints of an embittered engineer holding a personnel grudge are not actual facts... especially if that engineer himself did not know what actual knowledge the US had before the transfer of the M-52 data.
As for your post, you might want to read the parts of the thread posted before you joined the forum.
There are mentioned the many examples of aircraft built with "all-flying" horizontal stabilizers long before WW2.
To repeat the post, in case that would be too much work:
Aside from all the examples of earlier aircraft with "all-moving tailplanes", the Curtis XP-42 also flew with a one-piece, "all-flying" horizontal stabilizer well before the Miles M52 data ever went to the US.
The XP-42 was the 4th production P-36A, delivered in March 1939 with a number of modifications for better streamlining.
It was fitted with the "all-flying" horizontal stabilizer in 1942, and used to gather data on the aerodynamics of that configuration.
It was later cannibalized for parts, and scrapped in 1947.
The National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA)* was the governmental agency tasked with undertaking, promoting, and institutionalizing aeronautical research. Founded in 1915, NACA was involved in all experimental aerodynamics research by not only the government, but the private companies... so NACA would have been involved in the XP-42 testing.
NACA was also a major part of the X-1 program... so they already had the basics of the idea well before the Miles data was transferred.
Whether the Curtis data, or the Miles data, was more important... or whether either played any part at all, is nearly impossible to tell without someone digging into the X-1 program records.
* became NASA in 1958
Note that in another thread someone else mentioned that one of the British propeller-driven fighters was flown (in the UK) with an "all-flying" horizontal stabilizer (designed and fitted by UK engineers) at about the same time as the XP-42 got its new "tail feathers".
Simply put, the idea had been around since the first years of aviation, had been used by many designers from many nations, and had been installed on modern aircraft and subjected to wind-tunnel and flight tests in 1942-43 by both American and British engineers and aircraft manufacturers.
By: merlin2
- 21st August 2013 at 12:56Permalink- Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Whittle's (out of courtesy, do try to get a man's name correct) engine was obsolescent before the end of the war, since Metropolitan-Vickers engines, using axial-flow compressors designed (and worked on since 1936) by the RAE, had first flown in a modified Lancaster in mid-1943, so the Germans had little to do with it.
You should pull your head out of wherever you hide it and get your facts straight..
1942 Dr. Anselm Franz develops the axial-flow turbojet, Junkers Jumo 004, used in the Messerschmitt Me 262, the world’s first operational jet fighter.
Ever heard about Anselm Franz and Dr Herbert Wagner dude ?? I don't think so..Anyway, you guys have your view and the rest of the world has their own.
Try looking up A.A Griffiths "An Aerodynamic Theory of Turbine Design" published in 1926.
Well ,I can provide another 10 links and you will call all of them as biased as long as they don't recognize F.Whittle as the inventor.
The fact is and this is shared by the worlds scientific community that Frank Whittle didn't invent the jet engine, he simply built the first British jet engine.
The jet engine or the Gas Turbine as a principle has existed long before him .
In France, Maxime Guillaume was issued a patent for the use of an axial-flow turbojet engine to power an aircraft in 1921, he didn't have the money or the materials available to build it.
Hungarian mechanical engineer Albert Fonó filed a patent in Germany in 1928 for several jet engine designs, including a turbojet. Germany was obviously the wrong country to do that .. The American Rocket Society reviewed Fonó's patents in 1960 and acknowledged him as the inventor of the jet engine.
The fact is that Nazi Germany in 1930's and 1940's was miles ahead of Britain in almost every field of science engineering and technology .
Even the cavity magnetron was invented by a German ,Hans Erich Hollmann in 1935 long before the Birmingham university professors John Randall and Henry Boot can provide valid links proving that but why bother.
By: merlin2
- 21st August 2013 at 14:04Permalink- Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
The Americans said, "you show us yours, and we'll show you ours" Unfortunately, once they had British know-how, they reneged on the agreement. Typical bloody yanks. Never did, never will trust them.
Did it ever occur to you they might have done this to settle an old score for Klaus Fuchs, British citizen at that time ,selling Manhattan Project secrets to Soviets? Just a thought.. Because its a common knowledge the Americans never trusted the Brits especially after Philby, Burgess affair.
As I already stated, Admiral Hyman Rickover ,the father of the nuclear submarine USS Nautilus was furious and almost gone crazy when he learned that IKE had decided to share nuclear submarine technology with the Brits in 1958 and later Kennedy's decision regarding Polaris..This is well documented.
By: bazv
- 21st August 2013 at 14:40Permalink- Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Quite a few people round the world were aware of the various different types of jet engine possible to build...however - the materials/blade design/fuel control required to build a succesful and production standard (ie reliable !) Axial Flow were not really available until a few years after ww2 - Nazi Germany was never going to be able to build a successful production quality Axial Flow engine during ww2.
Britain rightly concentrated on centrifugal type engines at that time and left the Axials as a slowly developing possibility !
By: Jayce
- 21st August 2013 at 15:01Permalink- Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Well ,I can provide another 10 links and you will call all of them as biased as long as they don't recognize F.Whittle as the inventor.
The fact is and this is shared by the worlds scientific community that Frank Whittle didn't invent the jet engine, he simply built the first British jet engine.
The jet engine or the Gas Turbine as a principle has existed long before him .
In France, Maxime Guillaume was issued a patent for the use of an axial-flow turbojet engine to power an aircraft in 1921, he didn't have the money or the materials available to build it.
Hungarian mechanical engineer Albert Fonó filed a patent in Germany in 1928 for several jet engine designs, including a turbojet. Germany was obviously the wrong country to do that .. The American Rocket Society reviewed Fonó's patents in 1960 and acknowledged him as the inventor of the jet engine.
Um, so? The original series of Star Trek featured automatic doors about 20 years before they were actually invented. An idea, even a fully fledged theory backed up with a patent, is a long way away from a working demonstrable prototype. Just because you can imagine a thing doesn't mean you can do it, and if you can't do it, you haven't invented it yet.
By: Beermat
- 21st August 2013 at 17:40Permalink- Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
..Anyway, you guys have your view and the rest of the world has their own.
I suspect the divide is more between people who already know about things and people who start out with a view and then search for references on the internet to support it.
By: 1batfastard
- 21st August 2013 at 19:34Permalink- Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Hi All,
All I can add to my previous post on this subject is that the U.S. never had a jet engine till Britain gave them one (Correct me if I am wrong), as for reading the 2009 post I was just commenting on a subject post like all other forumites, I am the first to hold my hands up and say I only know a little which is why I find this forum very imformative and love learning more on a subject I have enjoyed over my life time. Or am I wrong about this and the Forum ? and it is only for those with an higher intellect with actual aeronautical knowledge that comes from first hand experience of Flying or Working in the Industry.
The amount of snobbery that exists in life amazes me and to have it here on a subject I have enthused about since childhood is beyond belief, for cry'n out loud were meant to be adults, all forumites have the right to post opinions and some obviously know more about the subject than others, but I joined this forum not only to learn more but to be involved with like minded people but the more I read it seems that some behave like spoilt kids and only their view is the correct one. :mad: Sorry to all for the rant back on subject.
I found these following statements on wiki :- All flying tailplanes were used from early times and the private venture monoplane de Havilland DH.77 (first flying in 1929) offering for a high performance Royal Air Force interceptor used an all flying tail.
Stabilators were developed to achieve adequate pitch control in supersonic flight, and are almost universal on modern military combat aircraft. All[citation needed] non-delta-winged supersonic aircraft use stabilators because with conventional control surfaces, shock waves can form past the elevator hinge, causing severe mach tuck.
The British wartime Miles M.52 supersonic project was designed with stabilators. Though the design only flew as a scale rocket, its all-flying tail was tested on both a Spitfire and the Miles "Gillette" Falcon.[5] The contemporary American supersonic project, the Bell X-1, adapted its variable incidence tailplane into an all-moving tailplane (based on the Miles M.52 project data) and was operated successfully in 1947.[6] The North American F-86 Sabre, the first U.S. Air Force aircraft which could go supersonic (although in a shallow dive) was introduced with a conventional horizontal stabilizer with elevators, which was eventually replaced with a stabilator.
When stabilators can move differentially to perform the roll control function of ailerons, as they do on many modern fighter aircraft they are known as tailerons or rolling tails. A canard surface, looking like a stabilator but not stabilizing like a tailplane, [7] can also be mounted in front of the main wing in a canard configuration (Curtiss-Wright XP-55 Ascender).
Stabilators on military aircraft have the same problem of too light control forces (inducing overcontrol) as general aviation aircraft. In older jet fighter aircraft, a resisting force was generated within the control system, either by springs or a resisting hydraulic force, rather than by an external anti-servo tab. For example in the North American F-100 Super Sabre, springs were attached to the control stick to provide increasing resistance to pilot input. In modern fighters, control inputs are moderated by computers ("fly by wire"), and there is no direct connection between the pilot's stick and the stabilator.
Also
Stabilators or all-moving tails
In transonic flight shock waves generated by the tailplane render the elevator unusable. An all-moving tail was developed by the British for the Miles M.52, but first saw actual transonic flight on the Bell X-1; fortunately Bell Aircraft Corporation had included an elevator trim device that could alter the angle of attack of the entire tailplane. This saved the program from a costly and time-consuming rebuild of the aircraft.
Transonic and supersonic aircraft now have all-moving tailplanes to counteract Mach tuck and maintain maneuverability when flying faster than the critical Mach number. Normally called a stabilator, this configuration is often referred to as an "all-moving" or "all-flying" tailplane.
By: Edgar Brooks
- 21st August 2013 at 20:22Permalink- Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
You should pull your head out of wherever you hide it and get your facts straight..
It's under my hair, unlike yours, which is under a dunce's cap.
1942 Dr. Anselm Franz develops the axial-flow turbojet, Junkers Jumo 004, used in the Messerschmitt Me 262, the world’s first operational jet fighter.
Ever heard about Anselm Franz and Dr Herbert Wagner dude ?? I don't think so..
Which is the same time that an axial-flow engine was flying in the U.K; do have the courtesy of reading what others write, dude.
The fact is and this is shared by the worlds scientific community that Frank Whittle didn't invent the jet engine, he simply built the first British jet engine.
The jet engine or the Gas Turbine as a principle has existed long before him .
Very true, and not denied by any U.K. researcher worthy of the name; the first person to put the idea forward to this government was Mr. F.W. Meredith (ever heard of him? You should, since you "borrowed" his expertise for use in the Mustang's radiator.)
I noticed, with considerable amusement, how you concentrated on the F-86's engine, in Korea, and omitted to mention the F-80, which was powered by a direct copy of the centrifugal compressor-powered engine donated, by us, to the U.S. during WW2. If you can find time, while looking down from your lofty perch on us lesser mortals, perhaps you can tell us how long the T-33 (2-seat trainer conversion of the F-80,) powered by the same "obsolete" engine, remained in service with the U.S.A.F? Even the Thunderbirds used one.
Did it ever occur to you they might have done this to settle an old score for Klaus Fuchs, British citizen at that time ,selling Manhattan Project secrets to Soviets?
I somehow doubt it, since Fuchs also spied, for the Americans, on the British, and the Manhatten Project was entirely under the control of the U.S., so who was it trusted him enough (and therefore didn't carry out properly stringent tests) to give him those secrets?
I note, too, in your usual "cherry-picking" mode, you omit to mention that Fuch's contact was an American citizen, Harry Gold, and it was the incompetent British Secret Service who finally unmasked him.
The fact is that Nazi Germany in 1930's and 1940's was miles ahead of Britain in almost every field of science engineering and technology .
We're quite happy to give them best, when it comes to gassing civilians, since we preferred to keep ours alive.
By: bazv
- 21st August 2013 at 21:32Permalink- Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Some of my text from an earlier thread (Arado 234) which gives an engineering/reliability comparison between the 'useless' Brits and Ze Master race vis a vis their respective jet engines in volume production during ww2,the comparison is the TBO (time between overhaul) which is the target number of engine hours flown before overhaul is deemed necessary ...no further comment !
An easily googleable quote below...
Therefore at the middle of 1945 it could be said that there were 2 centrifugal (British) designs and 2 axial (German) designs of 2,000 lbs plus with a production and flight history. The centrifugal ones were simpler, more rugged and had a longer-life – the Welland had entered service in May 1944 with a TBO of 180 hours . Arguably they had also been developed in a shorter time with smaller design resources. Against this, the Allied blockade and bombing had seriously hindered German progress. Pilots who evaluated both British and German jets at this time had little doubt that the British centrifugal engines were more reliable and easier to handle than the German axial ones.
My quote below
Compare the entered service Time Between Overhaul for the RR Welland of 180 hours to the absolute life of 10 - 25 hrs for the Jumo (+BMW)jet engine ...they were simply not production standard engines,I know much has been made about lack of certain materials in germany but in my view they tried to run before they could walk with jet technology and would still have struggled with blade technology and engine control problems for a few more years yet even if there was not a shortage of certain materials for alloys etc.
By: dhfan
- 22nd August 2013 at 10:24Permalink- Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Um, so? The original series of Star Trek featured automatic doors about 20 years before they were actually invented. An idea, even a fully fledged theory backed up with a patent, is a long way away from a working demonstrable prototype. Just because you can imagine a thing doesn't mean you can do it, and if you can't do it, you haven't invented it yet.
Very true. As the "British invented nothing" poster pointed out, the cavity magnetron was invented in Germany in 1935. However, the first people to make one that actually worked were in Birmingham in 1940.
By: Creaking Door
- 22nd August 2013 at 14:43Permalink- Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
I think what is needed here is some overall qualification of what people are claiming.
For example RADAR (or Radio Direction Finding before that) is not an absolute; many people, in many different countries, were working on radar and, because of its obvious military application, much of that development work was secret, or at least, sensitive information unlikely to be shared in the usual way.
So, 'Britain gave the US radar' is incorrect unless it is qualified. It is well-known that the US had radar at Pearl Harbor when it was attacked in December 1941 but prior to that Britain had used radar (successfully) to defeat the Germans during the Battle-of-Britain which was officially over by October 1940. The Germans also had radar at this time.
I am fairly certain that the first ever successful operational interception of a bomber at night using airborne radar was by a British Blenheim night-fighter in 1941 so at this point in time Britain was technically a world-leader in airborne radar. I am equally certain that British airborne radar expertise was passed to the US at around this time and I know that by about 1944 British night-fighters were flying with US-built and developed radar that was superior to earlier British airborne radar. I doubt that the US airborne radar equipment would have been at the development stage it was in 1944 without British assistance or that Britain would have had such good airborne radar equipment available in 1944 without the enormous development and manufacturing resources of the US.
So maybe this is where the truth / myth that 'Britain gave the US radar' comes from?
By: Beermat
- 22nd August 2013 at 16:47Permalink- Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
I agree - if there is one thing I have learned is that the 'scientific community' (recent coinage, but there always was something like this) cross-fertilise ideas and don't really think in terms of national borders - it is narrow-minded nationalists and governments who do that, the latter sometimes preventing the free flow of ideas that would be the utopian ideal of actual research scientists and engineers.
So, something I do know a little about - aerofoils. Who 'invented' 'laminar flow' sections? An American with an agenda would say 'NACA' almost as a knee jerk reaction, as they were the first body to come up with a method to generate some theoretical sections from applied mathematics. This codification of a series had the side effect of putting the NACA name on a lot of aerofoils subsequently used.
However, there were more-or-less identical sections in existence many years previously. In fact, these sections, in symmetrical form as 'modified RAF sections', were used for the tail-planes of designs that pre-date the existence of NACA laminar-flow sections even as theoretical ideas. Nobody knew to call them laminar flow at the time (though experiments on delayed boundary layer turbulence on these pre-existing sections were happening around the globe), and they probably weren't as they were too rough to really harness the effect (as were the wings of the P-51 and P-63). But they were all thin sections, low drag, and had max thickness at 40% of chord or more.
Until the advent of World War Two, US, UK and German scientists were all reading each others technical reports. Researchers in two of those three countries were permitted by their governments to continue to share after 1939. In fact, a lot of these scientists were from other countries, but the best research facilities were in these countries, and these attracted the best brains. So, who (which country) invented 'laminar flow'? No-one, and everyone. In this light, is it not a little odd - puerile even - to say that scientists working in one particular place were somehow not coming up with any innovations/ideas/inventions, or that those in another were somehow coming up with all of them?
PS - First successful airborne radar interception - July 1940
By: Creaking Door
- 22nd August 2013 at 17:36Permalink- Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
And going back to the 'code-breaking computer' presumably this refers to Colossus, the world's first electronic digital programmable computer (operational in 1943), or perhaps the 'bombe' machines used by the British to decipher German codes.
Code-breaking information was shared by Britain with the US and this certainly included the complete design of the bombe machines because, once again, the huge manufacturing capacity of the US was harnessed to produce some of the large number of bombe machines eventually required.
In the case of both these machines, but particularly Colossus, military secrecy prevented the scientific achievement from becoming know outside a select few until many years after the war; the 'history' of early computing had to be re-written when the Colossus was finally declassified in about 1970.
Ironically, for those of a nationalistic disposition, the origin of the original 'bombe' (and the name) that was developed by the British came from Polish code-breaking developments that were shared with the British (and the French) when war with Germany became inevitable.
Posts: 8,505
By: mike currill - 20th August 2013 at 15:07 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
In addition to the last part of that post I would have to say that in my experience it still is, yet they are paranoid about the rest of the world seeing some of their technology which foreign intelligence knows more about than their own citizens.Posts: 27
By: chaza87 - 20th August 2013 at 16:05 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
I am intrigued by the aspects of this series of posts. No-one has pointed out that M52 aerofoil surfaces were of mahogany. That the design of the Vickers ~Transonic missile went through a multitude of tests, including flight trials, with wooden wings and horizontal and vertical tail surfaces. It was very much a success. The first model was lost due to turbulance, the second was lost when the motor failed to ignite (a copy of the German engine in the Schmetterling missile) and the third flew in October 9th 1948 a complete success. This missile had the all flying tail. An earlier report of the M52 said -
"With the gradual accumulation of knowledge it became clear that the E.24/43
was unlikely to reach sonic speed and when wind-tunnel model tests indicated the same serious
loss of longitudinal stability at high subsonic speeds as was then characteristic of all existing
aircraft the wisdom of continuing with this design was questioned. The decision was
reached to acquire preliminary experience of flight under transonic conditions using rocket-driven pilotless scale models."
Also
"Early in 1946 the contract for the E.24/43 was cancelled, since in addition to the adverse feature
already mentioned there was now added a further unsolved difficulty--the impossibility of safe
escape for the pilot in the event of an emergency bale-out at high speed."
Here is the description of the wing, "Wing.--The wing was of biconvex section 97.5-in. span and 18-94-in. mean chord.
It was constructed in mahogany, and formed a single-piece unit which passed right through the
body. Ailerons of mahogany were fitted to the trailing edges, and were operated by push-pull
rods running in tunnels formed in the thickest part of the wing. These rods were actuated by a
single bell-crank lever in the centre section of the wing and similar levers transferred their motion
through 90 deg to the ailerons. The fit of the pins at all pivot points was made tight purposely,
to avoid backlash ; for the aileron a distorting plate-type hinge was adoptedWing.--The wing was of biconvex section 97.5-in. span and 18-94-in. mean chord.
It was constructed in mahogany, and formed a single-piece unit which passed right through the
body. Ailerons of mahogany were fitted to the trailing edges, and were operated by push-pull
rods running in tunnels formed in the thickest part of the wing. These rods were actuated by a
single bell-crank lever in the centre section of the wing and similar levers transferred their motion
through 90 deg to the ailerons. The fit of the pins at all pivot points was made tight purposely,
to avoid backlash ; for the aileron a distorting plate-type hinge was adopted."
There were in fact eight test vehicles in the Vickers Transonic program.
When flown from St Eval in Cornwall the mother Mosquito had to have a Meteor to
accompany it. This was to give the radar operators a trace to follow the target since the
Mosquito's wooden construction caused no signature on the monitors.
If you carry out a patent search with the search term Phillips and Powis you will
see that the Miles company was well versed in the innovation of aerofoil sections.
The balance of evidence is this, Miles did the all flying tail first. The Americans
were given all the test reports on the M52 project just before the ending of Lease Lend.
Reciprocal aid is the British term for the British operating its own Lease Lend to the Americans.
Of course I stand corrected on all this but I have the papers in front of me.
Posts: 3,614
By: Bager1968 - 21st August 2013 at 07:36 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
The complaints of an embittered engineer holding a personnel grudge are not actual facts... especially if that engineer himself did not know what actual knowledge the US had before the transfer of the M-52 data.
As for your post, you might want to read the parts of the thread posted before you joined the forum.
There are mentioned the many examples of aircraft built with "all-flying" horizontal stabilizers long before WW2.
Specifically, though, you should read my post of 24 May 2009 (#46 on this thread): http://forum.keypublishing.com/showthread.php?50961-X1-or-M52-who-s-right-who-invented-the-all-moving-tailplane-first&p=1411546#post1411546
To repeat the post, in case that would be too much work:
Note that in another thread someone else mentioned that one of the British propeller-driven fighters was flown (in the UK) with an "all-flying" horizontal stabilizer (designed and fitted by UK engineers) at about the same time as the XP-42 got its new "tail feathers".
Simply put, the idea had been around since the first years of aviation, had been used by many designers from many nations, and had been installed on modern aircraft and subjected to wind-tunnel and flight tests in 1942-43 by both American and British engineers and aircraft manufacturers.
Posts: 305
By: merlin2 - 21st August 2013 at 12:56 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
You should pull your head out of wherever you hide it and get your facts straight..
1942 Dr. Anselm Franz develops the axial-flow turbojet, Junkers Jumo 004, used in the Messerschmitt Me 262, the world’s first operational jet fighter.
Ever heard about Anselm Franz and Dr Herbert Wagner dude ?? I don't think so..Anyway, you guys have your view and the rest of the world has their own.
http://www.scientistsandfriends.com/jets1.html
http://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~eroberts/courses/ww2/projects/jet-airplanes/material.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anselm_Franz
Posts: 2,915
By: dhfan - 21st August 2013 at 13:09 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
I see, you select what proves your heavily loaded opinions. I don't think I've ever seen such a biased page as http://www.scientistsandfriends.com/jets1.html
Try looking up A.A Griffiths "An Aerodynamic Theory of Turbine Design" published in 1926.
Posts: 305
By: merlin2 - 21st August 2013 at 13:38 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Well ,I can provide another 10 links and you will call all of them as biased as long as they don't recognize F.Whittle as the inventor.
The fact is and this is shared by the worlds scientific community that Frank Whittle didn't invent the jet engine, he simply built the first British jet engine.
The jet engine or the Gas Turbine as a principle has existed long before him .
In France, Maxime Guillaume was issued a patent for the use of an axial-flow turbojet engine to power an aircraft in 1921, he didn't have the money or the materials available to build it.
Hungarian mechanical engineer Albert Fonó filed a patent in Germany in 1928 for several jet engine designs, including a turbojet. Germany was obviously the wrong country to do that .. The American Rocket Society reviewed Fonó's patents in 1960 and acknowledged him as the inventor of the jet engine.
The fact is that Nazi Germany in 1930's and 1940's was miles ahead of Britain in almost every field of science engineering and technology .
Even the cavity magnetron was invented by a German ,Hans Erich Hollmann in 1935 long before the Birmingham university professors John Randall and Henry Boot can provide valid links proving that but why bother.
Posts: 305
By: merlin2 - 21st August 2013 at 14:04 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Did it ever occur to you they might have done this to settle an old score for Klaus Fuchs, British citizen at that time ,selling Manhattan Project secrets to Soviets? Just a thought.. Because its a common knowledge the Americans never trusted the Brits especially after Philby, Burgess affair.
As I already stated, Admiral Hyman Rickover ,the father of the nuclear submarine USS Nautilus was furious and almost gone crazy when he learned that IKE had decided to share nuclear submarine technology with the Brits in 1958 and later Kennedy's decision regarding Polaris..This is well documented.
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By: Creaking Door - 21st August 2013 at 14:20 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Yes, you're right.....Nazi Germany first, Britain second, America third! :rolleyes:
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By: bazv - 21st August 2013 at 14:40 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Quite a few people round the world were aware of the various different types of jet engine possible to build...however - the materials/blade design/fuel control required to build a succesful and production standard (ie reliable !) Axial Flow were not really available until a few years after ww2 - Nazi Germany was never going to be able to build a successful production quality Axial Flow engine during ww2.
Britain rightly concentrated on centrifugal type engines at that time and left the Axials as a slowly developing possibility !
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By: Jayce - 21st August 2013 at 15:01 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Um, so? The original series of Star Trek featured automatic doors about 20 years before they were actually invented. An idea, even a fully fledged theory backed up with a patent, is a long way away from a working demonstrable prototype. Just because you can imagine a thing doesn't mean you can do it, and if you can't do it, you haven't invented it yet.
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By: Beermat - 21st August 2013 at 17:40 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
I suspect the divide is more between people who already know about things and people who start out with a view and then search for references on the internet to support it.
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By: 1batfastard - 21st August 2013 at 19:34 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Hi All,
All I can add to my previous post on this subject is that the U.S. never had a jet engine till Britain gave them one (Correct me if I am wrong), as for reading the 2009 post I was just commenting on a subject post like all other forumites, I am the first to hold my hands up and say I only know a little which is why I find this forum very imformative and love learning more on a subject I have enjoyed over my life time. Or am I wrong about this and the Forum ? and it is only for those with an higher intellect with actual aeronautical knowledge that comes from first hand experience of Flying or Working in the Industry.
The amount of snobbery that exists in life amazes me and to have it here on a subject I have enthused about since childhood is beyond belief, for cry'n out loud were meant to be adults, all forumites have the right to post opinions and some obviously know more about the subject than others, but I joined this forum not only to learn more but to be involved with like minded people but the more I read it seems that some behave like spoilt kids and only their view is the correct one. :mad: Sorry to all for the rant back on subject.
I found these following statements on wiki :- All flying tailplanes were used from early times and the private venture monoplane de Havilland DH.77 (first flying in 1929) offering for a high performance Royal Air Force interceptor used an all flying tail.
Stabilators were developed to achieve adequate pitch control in supersonic flight, and are almost universal on modern military combat aircraft. All[citation needed] non-delta-winged supersonic aircraft use stabilators because with conventional control surfaces, shock waves can form past the elevator hinge, causing severe mach tuck.
The British wartime Miles M.52 supersonic project was designed with stabilators. Though the design only flew as a scale rocket, its all-flying tail was tested on both a Spitfire and the Miles "Gillette" Falcon.[5] The contemporary American supersonic project, the Bell X-1, adapted its variable incidence tailplane into an all-moving tailplane (based on the Miles M.52 project data) and was operated successfully in 1947.[6] The North American F-86 Sabre, the first U.S. Air Force aircraft which could go supersonic (although in a shallow dive) was introduced with a conventional horizontal stabilizer with elevators, which was eventually replaced with a stabilator.
When stabilators can move differentially to perform the roll control function of ailerons, as they do on many modern fighter aircraft they are known as tailerons or rolling tails. A canard surface, looking like a stabilator but not stabilizing like a tailplane, [7] can also be mounted in front of the main wing in a canard configuration (Curtiss-Wright XP-55 Ascender).
Stabilators on military aircraft have the same problem of too light control forces (inducing overcontrol) as general aviation aircraft. In older jet fighter aircraft, a resisting force was generated within the control system, either by springs or a resisting hydraulic force, rather than by an external anti-servo tab. For example in the North American F-100 Super Sabre, springs were attached to the control stick to provide increasing resistance to pilot input. In modern fighters, control inputs are moderated by computers ("fly by wire"), and there is no direct connection between the pilot's stick and the stabilator.
Also
Stabilators or all-moving tails
In transonic flight shock waves generated by the tailplane render the elevator unusable. An all-moving tail was developed by the British for the Miles M.52, but first saw actual transonic flight on the Bell X-1; fortunately Bell Aircraft Corporation had included an elevator trim device that could alter the angle of attack of the entire tailplane. This saved the program from a costly and time-consuming rebuild of the aircraft.
Transonic and supersonic aircraft now have all-moving tailplanes to counteract Mach tuck and maintain maneuverability when flying faster than the critical Mach number. Normally called a stabilator, this configuration is often referred to as an "all-moving" or "all-flying" tailplane.
Geoff.:D
Posts: 894
By: Edgar Brooks - 21st August 2013 at 20:22 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
It's under my hair, unlike yours, which is under a dunce's cap.
Which is the same time that an axial-flow engine was flying in the U.K; do have the courtesy of reading what others write, dude.
Very true, and not denied by any U.K. researcher worthy of the name; the first person to put the idea forward to this government was Mr. F.W. Meredith (ever heard of him? You should, since you "borrowed" his expertise for use in the Mustang's radiator.)
I noticed, with considerable amusement, how you concentrated on the F-86's engine, in Korea, and omitted to mention the F-80, which was powered by a direct copy of the centrifugal compressor-powered engine donated, by us, to the U.S. during WW2. If you can find time, while looking down from your lofty perch on us lesser mortals, perhaps you can tell us how long the T-33 (2-seat trainer conversion of the F-80,) powered by the same "obsolete" engine, remained in service with the U.S.A.F? Even the Thunderbirds used one.
I somehow doubt it, since Fuchs also spied, for the Americans, on the British, and the Manhatten Project was entirely under the control of the U.S., so who was it trusted him enough (and therefore didn't carry out properly stringent tests) to give him those secrets?
I note, too, in your usual "cherry-picking" mode, you omit to mention that Fuch's contact was an American citizen, Harry Gold, and it was the incompetent British Secret Service who finally unmasked him.
We're quite happy to give them best, when it comes to gassing civilians, since we preferred to keep ours alive.
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By: bazv - 21st August 2013 at 21:32 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Some of my text from an earlier thread (Arado 234) which gives an engineering/reliability comparison between the 'useless' Brits and Ze Master race vis a vis their respective jet engines in volume production during ww2,the comparison is the TBO (time between overhaul) which is the target number of engine hours flown before overhaul is deemed necessary ...no further comment !
An easily googleable quote below...
My quote below
rgds baz
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By: bazv - 21st August 2013 at 21:41 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Nice cutaway comparison between RR Welland and Jumo 004 on post 57 on this thread...
https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&ved=0CC8QFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fforum.keypublishing.com%2Fshowthread.php%3F120911-Arado-Ar-234-Why-is-it-neglected&ei=hSUVUoSYJMOU4ASe3IGwDA&usg=AFQjCNGHOMADsQF1gc0HDgCZEgv79vtM3w&sig2=Lg2SMXnEU5V6cpg_l0hT5A&bvm=bv.50952593,d.d2k
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By: dhfan - 22nd August 2013 at 10:24 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Very true. As the "British invented nothing" poster pointed out, the cavity magnetron was invented in Germany in 1935. However, the first people to make one that actually worked were in Birmingham in 1940.
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By: Edgar Brooks - 22nd August 2013 at 13:10 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
You'll need to qualify that, otherwise it'll be claimed you mean Birmingham, Alabama.
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By: Creaking Door - 22nd August 2013 at 14:43 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
I think what is needed here is some overall qualification of what people are claiming.
For example RADAR (or Radio Direction Finding before that) is not an absolute; many people, in many different countries, were working on radar and, because of its obvious military application, much of that development work was secret, or at least, sensitive information unlikely to be shared in the usual way.
So, 'Britain gave the US radar' is incorrect unless it is qualified. It is well-known that the US had radar at Pearl Harbor when it was attacked in December 1941 but prior to that Britain had used radar (successfully) to defeat the Germans during the Battle-of-Britain which was officially over by October 1940. The Germans also had radar at this time.
I am fairly certain that the first ever successful operational interception of a bomber at night using airborne radar was by a British Blenheim night-fighter in 1941 so at this point in time Britain was technically a world-leader in airborne radar. I am equally certain that British airborne radar expertise was passed to the US at around this time and I know that by about 1944 British night-fighters were flying with US-built and developed radar that was superior to earlier British airborne radar. I doubt that the US airborne radar equipment would have been at the development stage it was in 1944 without British assistance or that Britain would have had such good airborne radar equipment available in 1944 without the enormous development and manufacturing resources of the US.
So maybe this is where the truth / myth that 'Britain gave the US radar' comes from?
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By: Beermat - 22nd August 2013 at 16:47 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
I agree - if there is one thing I have learned is that the 'scientific community' (recent coinage, but there always was something like this) cross-fertilise ideas and don't really think in terms of national borders - it is narrow-minded nationalists and governments who do that, the latter sometimes preventing the free flow of ideas that would be the utopian ideal of actual research scientists and engineers.
So, something I do know a little about - aerofoils. Who 'invented' 'laminar flow' sections? An American with an agenda would say 'NACA' almost as a knee jerk reaction, as they were the first body to come up with a method to generate some theoretical sections from applied mathematics. This codification of a series had the side effect of putting the NACA name on a lot of aerofoils subsequently used.
However, there were more-or-less identical sections in existence many years previously. In fact, these sections, in symmetrical form as 'modified RAF sections', were used for the tail-planes of designs that pre-date the existence of NACA laminar-flow sections even as theoretical ideas. Nobody knew to call them laminar flow at the time (though experiments on delayed boundary layer turbulence on these pre-existing sections were happening around the globe), and they probably weren't as they were too rough to really harness the effect (as were the wings of the P-51 and P-63). But they were all thin sections, low drag, and had max thickness at 40% of chord or more.
Until the advent of World War Two, US, UK and German scientists were all reading each others technical reports. Researchers in two of those three countries were permitted by their governments to continue to share after 1939. In fact, a lot of these scientists were from other countries, but the best research facilities were in these countries, and these attracted the best brains. So, who (which country) invented 'laminar flow'? No-one, and everyone. In this light, is it not a little odd - puerile even - to say that scientists working in one particular place were somehow not coming up with any innovations/ideas/inventions, or that those in another were somehow coming up with all of them?
PS - First successful airborne radar interception - July 1940
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By: Creaking Door - 22nd August 2013 at 17:36 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
And going back to the 'code-breaking computer' presumably this refers to Colossus, the world's first electronic digital programmable computer (operational in 1943), or perhaps the 'bombe' machines used by the British to decipher German codes.
Code-breaking information was shared by Britain with the US and this certainly included the complete design of the bombe machines because, once again, the huge manufacturing capacity of the US was harnessed to produce some of the large number of bombe machines eventually required.
In the case of both these machines, but particularly Colossus, military secrecy prevented the scientific achievement from becoming know outside a select few until many years after the war; the 'history' of early computing had to be re-written when the Colossus was finally declassified in about 1970.
Ironically, for those of a nationalistic disposition, the origin of the original 'bombe' (and the name) that was developed by the British came from Polish code-breaking developments that were shared with the British (and the French) when war with Germany became inevitable.
July 1940; earlier than I thought!