A DH 127 type what if.....

[zen]

What if

What if....DeHaviland had come up with something like the DH.127 Delta winged FighterStrike design (to OR.346) earlier?
Say in more conventional form to F.155T?

Consider.
Big Delta wing
Though likely with lift devices
Twin RB.106 sized engines about the same size as Spey's in the design and also to Avons for a prototype.
36" dish radar
Twin seats
Semi-circular inlets with translating shock cones.
Large internal fuel load.
Mach 2.3 performance with normal materials.

It struck me that had they come up with this back in '56, they'd likely have won that competition.

It also struck me had this formed their submission to OR.339 in it's OR.346 configuration, they'd have stood a decent chance in that competition too.
That's with the lift jets in the nose and diverters for the main engines.

It's also struck me that the process of getting the basics prototyped is a fairly straightforward matter until the diverters of the main engines.

 

[Hood]

The DH.117 was a very conservative design, they were aiming for low cost adequate rather than super high-end cutting-edge.
In some ways it was very conservative but on the other hand, by this time DH was concentrating on civil designs. The last military design, the DH.111 was warmed up bomber Comet, work was still underway on a variety of mods for the Sea Vixen (new engines, wings, GOR.339 version etc.) and there was no serious military project after DH.117 until the DH.127 appeared for OR.346. Actually it still surprises me that Hatfield even went for OR.346 given the other more experienced military design teams within Hawker Siddeley. The DH.127 was a fairly 'solid' design too, nothing too fancy and designed to be a reasonable aircraft at a reasonable price.
I think the DH.117 was possibly de Havilland's first clean-sheet supersonic design and I don't think they had any delta experience at that time.

So while a serious delta-winged entry needs a lot of hand-waving as a AU scenario, something similar in size and layout to DH.127 would have been attractive assuming it could carry enough fuel for the interception sortie and have sufficiently high rate of climb.

 

[zen]

Very true and I'll add it's a shame Avro didn'tcome up with something similar.

Ironically I think HP in their studies to OR.339 did conclude that the simplest option was a tailless Delta but it didn't meet the STOL requirements at all.

Yet really this sort of approach was the simplest way of achieving the desired system, and the easiest to incrementally develop.

 

[zen]

Another thought struck me....this is a slightly smaller Arrow-type design.

Seems odd that for instance Fairey never looked at such a machine. One shorn of rockets and using the more funded RB.106. Especially as they could fly a prototype with Avons or Gyron Juniors.