General Dynamics Convair Models 200 / 201 / 218 Sea Control Ship fighters

[circle-5]

The original painting of that illustration was discovered a few years ago, forgotten and unwanted in a San Diego art store. It's a nice scene with a CL-84 on deck (Canadair was owned by General Dynamics at the time, so it made sense to push another GD VTOL product in the background). I can't clearly make out the name of the artist, unfortunately.

It's interesting to see how Convair solved the hot gas recirculation issue by having their Model 200 land on a perforated platform. Simple, cheap and effective – ideal for a Sea Control Ship.

 

[sferrin]

That's enough to make you cry. :'( I would hope it's now hanging on your wall?

 

[circle-5]

Yes.

 

[Michel Van]

It's really sad the NAVY not took the Convair Model 200 and end up with the Rockwell XFV-12 fiasco.

I wonder, What if: USAF and NAVY took Model 200 as F-16 and FV-12 ?

 

[LowObservable]

An interesting distinction between the RB.153, RD-41 and F135 is that the first two used A/B in the hover. Also, by the looks of things, the RB.153 design put the burner in the final stage of the nozzle (hence its German name). How was that done on the Model 200 and the Yak-141?

As for the CL-84 in the background - GD owned Canadair until 1976.

 

[Triton]

Yes.

Congratulations, circle-5.

 

[ScrutorAudax]

I found this at my library. If anyone wants more information or a better scan, I can do that.

 

[hesham]

Yes I want,Scrutor.

 

[ScrutorAudax]

Here's another photo.

 

[ScrutorAudax]

Here are the scans. I plan on doing the full study tomorrow, so message me if you are interested in a copy.

 

[hesham]

Thank you Scrutor.

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

From Congress Advanced Aeronautical Concepts hearings July 1974

 

[hesham]

From Congress Advanced Aeronautical Concepts hearings July 1974

Nice find my dear Paul.

 

[Colonial-Marine]

Assuming the Navy didn't pick the Rockwell XFV-12 because they expected it to fail, what advantages did it supposedly offer over the Convair design?

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

It wouldn't melt the carrier's deck when taking off (slower, colder efflux).

 

[zen]

If I may....
I have a question having read through this.
How much more fuel would the VTOL version have?

 

[Pioneer]

If I may....
I have a question having read through this.
How much more fuel would the VTOL version have?

Readying your question Zen, I would think the "VTOL version" would have less fuel than the CTOL variant, due to the two lift engines, due to the volume they occupy and their weight.


Regards
Pioneer

 

[zen]

That's weird, I'm sure I typed CTOL.....?

 

[Mark Nankivil]

No worries Zen, C & V are within fat fingers range on my keyboard! Mark

 

[zen]

No worries Zen, C & V are within fat fingers range on my keyboard! Mark

Thanks it's a million times worse on a touchscreen!
And the really weird bit is I had to retype that to force the autocorrect to not turn it to VTOL.
Yet there it is....?

Anyway reading through it seems a little over 5,000lb of fuel for VTOL. But no mention of how much is gained in the switch to CTOL, but it's a fairly big tank they replace the lift jets with.

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

You could make a first order assumption if you knew the length and diameter of the XJ99 liftjet.

 

[zen]

You could make a first order assumption if you knew the length and diameter of the XJ99 liftjet.

I might have that too.
Good idea!

 

[Pioneer]

No worries Zen, C & V are within fat fingers range on my keyboard! Mark

 

[Pioneer]

That's weird, I'm sure I typed CTOL.....?

No worries zen, all good

Regards
Pioneer

 

[blackkite]

Hi!

Chance Vought F4U-4 Corsair | Chad Slattery Aviation Photography

1/24 large-scale F4U-4 Corsair model made in the mid-1940s probably by Topping Models.

www.chadslattery.com

 

[sferrin]

One thing I don't think I've ever seen discussed would have been it's performance. Any ideas?

 

[TomS]

One thing I don't think I've ever seen discussed would have been it's performance. Any ideas?

See this post on the first page of this thread.

 

[sferrin]

One thing I don't think I've ever seen discussed would have been it's performance. Any ideas?

See this post on the first page of this thread.

I was hoping for something more thorough than, "Mach 2 class". I think we'd both agree that an F-22 performs differently than an F-104 but both are, "Mach 2 class".

 

[Sundog]

I was hoping for something more thorough than, "Mach 2 class". I think we'd both agree that an F-22 performs differently than an F-104 but both are, "Mach 2 class".

IIRC, that Canard Delta Fighter that GD looked at for comparison to the YF-16 when it was being developed was basically the same design. According to Paul's booklet on it, it's maneuverability at supersonic speeds was equivalent to the YF-16, but the YF-16 was superior at subsonic speed. I don't recall there being specific numbers, such as actual turn rates given, for comparison.

 

[sferrin]

I was hoping for something more thorough than, "Mach 2 class". I think we'd both agree that an F-22 performs differently than an F-104 but both are, "Mach 2 class".

IIRC, that Canard Delta Fighter that GD looked at for comparison to the YF-16 when it was being developed was basically the same design. According to Paul's booklet on it, it's maneuverability at supersonic speeds was equivalent to the YF-16, but the YF-16 was superior at subsonic speed. I don't recall there being specific numbers, such as actual turn rates given, for comparison.

I wonder how it would compare to something like the Gripen, Lavi, or J-10.

 

[Sundog]

I wonder how it would compare to something like the Gripen, Lavi, or J-10.

I would expect it to be inferior, at least at subsonic speeds, as I think it was statically stable at subsonic speed. Whereas everything on that list is an unstable design at subsonic speed IIRC.

 

[blackkite]

Lifting system is almost F-35B. These contributions are amazing.

 

[taildragger]

Lifting system is almost F-35B. These contributions are amazing.

The lift system (vectored rear engine plus forward lift engines) is what the McDonnell Douglas/Northrop/BAe team adopted for their JSF proposal and that choice was supposedly largely responsible for their non-selection to the prototyping phase. The USMC, which had a long history with both firms (McD and BAe) on the Harrier, saw the configuration as a bet against the V/STOL version of the JSF (their baby) and something of a betrayal, took it personally and exercised a veto.
The lift jet approach produces an inferior V/STOL aircraft (dead weight to provide thrust that's unusable except during launch and recovery, extra fuel and control systems, additional supply chain and maintenance overhead) while being relatively easy to delete from the design if improving the CTOL and CV versions by throwing V/STOL capability over the side became necessary.
Once excluded from the JSF program, it was time for McDonnell Douglas to put the company on the block because there wasn't a whole lot of other business in prospect.

 

[BroSmithBoris]

Well this will come in handy in certain conversations that tend to come up over and over again.

Hello, are there more images for this nozzle?
And can you please drop the source?

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

His source was my post just above, and my source was the SDASM Flicker photostream:

SDASM Archives

Explore SDASM Archives’s 386,882 photos on Flickr!

www.flickr.com

 

[nuuumannn]

The lift jet approach produces an inferior V/STOL aircraft (dead weight to provide thrust that's unusable except during launch and recovery, extra fuel and control systems, additional supply chain and maintenance overhead) while being relatively easy to delete from the design if improving the CTOL and CV versions by throwing V/STOL capability over the side became necessary.

Agree. Also, pure VTOL operations severely limits load carrying capability and range, aside from the limitations of lugging jet lift engines around. From the outset, STOVL (a simple rearrangement of letters and deletion of a slash, of V/STOL?) has been the preferred method of operating vectored thrust/jet lift aircraft. The Yak-38 and Sea Harrier performed rolling take-offs from their respective platforms; the Yak-38 having jet lift engines, whereas the Sea Harrier did not, which made its load carrying capability far greater and the jet a more versatile platform. In fairness to the Yak-38, it was designed as an extension of a greater weapon system; the Kiev anti-submarine/anti-ship heavy cruiser, so there wasn't perhaps the necessity for a versatile platform like the Sea Harrier FRS.1. It went into service aboard its carrier before the Sea Harrier, too.

The Kiev in all its glory, today at Binhai, PRC as a museum ship. Rather optimistically, on the flight deck, a mock up Yak-38 has been joined by Nanchang Q5s.

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

In my opinion Yak-38 was an attempt to make a VSTOL aircraft without designing a substantially new primary engine in the Pegasus class, and something to keep Yakovlev busy while they failed to win any real military work.

 

[nuuumannn]

In my opinion Yak-38 was an attempt to make a VSTOL aircraft without designing a substantially new primary engine in the Pegasus class, and something to keep Yakovlev busy while they failed to win any real military work.

True to a degree, but Yakovlev registered his disappointment that he was not given approval to work on a four nozzle vectored thrust engine in the '10-tonne thrust class'. Yakovlev was told to design something simpler and less expensive, hence the common jet lift configuration of the Short SC.1, Dassault Balzac, VAK-191 and ultimately Yak-38. Its test bed predecessor the Yak-36 did not have jet lift engines though, it had two vectored thrust engines with one nozzle each.

As for work for Yak, hm, you can't really call the Yak-36/Yak-38 'not real military work' - the programme was quite substantial in terms of trials and testing and developing the technology into a workable system, aside from creating a viable military aircraft from a test bed design. Yak always understood that the Yak-36/38 was an interim until the Yak-41 could be funded - that the Yak-141 was not put into production was not necessarily the manufacturer's doing. Also, the numbers of Yak-28s in service throughout the 1970s and 80s kept the company busy - over 1,100 Yak-28s of all marks were produced and it remained in service from 1960 through to the fall of the Soviet Union.

 

[taildragger]

Assuming the Navy didn't pick the Rockwell XFV-12 because they expected it to fail, what advantages did it supposedly offer over the Convair design?

It wouldn't melt the carrier's deck when taking off (slower, colder efflux).

I believe that the XFV-12 was expected to be more efficient due to the anticipated eductor effect in its VTOL system. The air bleed/exhaust from the engine was expected to entrain surrounding air, increasing mass flow and lift, reducing the required engine size. That, of course, would translate to lower cost for equivalent payload/range. As it turned out, the eductor effect, which had been demonstrated experimentally, didn't scale up and the XFV-12 couldn't generate enough lift to take off. This risk must have been understood at the time, since the aircraft was really more of a demonstrator (using big chunks of A-4 and F-4 airframes) than a prototype. The fuselage of a production version would have likely been entirely redesigned. I don't know that the Convair program was planned to go through a demonstrator phase. That would make sense since I don't think it relied on any unproven aerodynamics.
I remember following the XFV-12 program at the time in AW&ST and it just seemed to disappear without notice. I didn't read that the airplane had proven unable to take off until years later.

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

In my opinion Yak-38 was an attempt to make a VSTOL aircraft without designing a substantially new primary engine in the Pegasus class, and something to keep Yakovlev busy while they failed to win any real military work.

As for work for Yak, hm, you can't really call the Yak-36/Yak-38 'not real military work' - the programme was quite substantial in terms of trials and testing and developing the technology into a workable system, aside from creating a viable military aircraft from a test bed design. Yak always understood that the Yak-36/38 was an interim until the Yak-41 could be funded - that the Yak-141 was not put into production was not necessarily the manufacturer's doing. Also, the numbers of Yak-28s in service throughout the 1970s and 80s kept the company busy - over 1,100 Yak-28s of all marks were produced and it remained in service from 1960 through to the fall of the Soviet Union.

The Yak-25/27/38 family lucked out twice - firstly by having the first half-decent Soviet radar which was too big to fit in the other fighters of its time, and then with being twin engined while engine reliability issues were endemic. None were very popular with the air force and some versions never passed acceptance tests (despite being in service for years). Yakovlev came last in pretty much every competition they entered.