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My first cool aerospace thing is the Saab 35 Draken. I just think it is a futuristic looking fighter for an early 50s design and incorporated lots of interesting abilities like rapid turnaround, ground support equipment independence and the ability to operate from roadways, that would have made a real difference in a shooting war.

They were an export success and had a very long service life. Austria only retired theirs a couple of years ago. This video shows Drakens doing the cobra manoeuvre (I'd turn the sound down. If my memory of bad, mid-80s pop hasn't failed me, it's Mister Mister's Broken Wings It was sh!te then and even worse now [:D]). Not bad for an aircraft that first flew in 1955!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hax3rhqGJcQ&NR=1

Feel free to add your own cool aerospace thing.

Cheers, Neilster

Here's mine. One of the last, if not the last truly good-looking military jets, the Hawker Hunter:

My dad was a USAF air traffic controller and used to bring his Jane's aircraft guide home. I would study it for hours, reading and comparing aircraft performance specs and drawing different planes.

The Draken is one that I remember being fascinated by.

Thanks for the blast from the past

Re: Hunter. Truly a classic. Many think it was the best sub-sonic fighter.

Cheers, Neilster

I've always liked the look of Saab fighter aircraft.

I always had a soft spot for the F-111

ORIGINAL: Raverdave

I always had a soft spot for the F-111

What the h*** happened to that?[X(][X(]

Nice "Pig" dump-and-burn picture Raverdave. A couple of my mates are technicians on Triple Ones. When I was at 76SQN I'd check them out if they visited RAAF Williamtown. They're an amazing looking machine up close. Huge, very obviously a late 50s design but also extremely impressive.

Apparently they're a real bastard to work on, which is pretty typical for aircraft of that era. The designers thought "You beauty! Look at all this new technology we can cram in. Let's do it!", without a lot of thought for how difficult it would be to maintain. For example, they don't have ejection seats, but rather the entire cockpit "ejects". You can imagine what this means as regards to severing control runs, wiring looms etc. There must be explosive bolts and the like everywhere.

Check out this site for excellent airpower articles...

http://www.ausairpower.net/pig.html

...including a convincing argument that the F-111 fleet shouldn't be retired as planned. The "geniuses" in Canberra appear to have been smoking the wacky tobacky again, as their decision to pension off the Pig and get Super Hornets to fill the gap until the F/A-35 is in RAAF service (which probably won't be until around 2020) is looking about as good an idea as New Coke. The price alone is completely outrageous. It appears to be more of a political decision that has been influenced by Boeing.

On a similar note, we may be better off buying at least some F/A-22s, rather than only F/A-35s. By the time the latter are available, it appears the difference in price won't be all that much. There's much stuff on this, as well as cool comparisons with Russian gear etc on that site. It's put together by guys who really know their stuff.

Cheers, Neilster

ORIGINAL: Terminus




What the h*** happened to that?[X(][X(]

Offhand, it looks like he's dumping fuel while in afterburner, which would result in the jettisoned fuel igniting in the slipstream.

ORIGINAL: Doggie

ORIGINAL: Terminus




What the h*** happened to that?[X(][X(]

Offhand, it looks like he's dumping fuel while in afterburner, which would result in the jettisoned fuel igniting in the slipstream.

Yes, it's a dump-and-burn.

Cheers, Neilster

Well, never saw something like that before... Cool image.[8D]

What might have been ..........

Here's another one:

ORIGINAL: Ironclad

What might have been ..........

The TSR 2? Yeah, not spending the readies on that looks like a bad decision now. Super advanced.

Cheers, Neilster

This look-down view shows NASA 831, an SR-71B flown by Dryden Flight Research Center, Edwards, California, as it cruises over the Mojave Desert. The photo was from an Air Force refueling tanker taken on a 1997 mission.

The X-24B is seen here in flight over the lakebed at NASA Dryden Flight Research Center, Edwards, California. The X-24B was the last aircraft to fly in Dryden's manned lifting body program. The X-24B's design evolved from a family of potential reentry shapes, each with higher lift-to-drag ratios, proposed by the Air Force Flight Dynamics Laboratory. The X-24B is on public display at the Air Force Museum, Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio.

XB-70 = sweet

http://www2.interceptor.com/~thumper/xb2/in-flight.jpg

Edited for D'oh! forgot the link.

Heh. Another favorite of mine:

I think the Sabre is one of the best looking aircraft ever. There's something about a bubble canopy that is just so "right". More on this later... [;)]

Cheers, Neilster

ORIGINAL: Neilster


On a similar note, we may be better off buying at least some F/A-22s, rather than only F/A-35s. Cheers, Neilster

Yeah but the problem is that the yanks will not sell the F-22 to us even if we did want it. [&:]