Gloster N9/39 Single Seat Naval Fighter Project

[hesham]

Hi,


the British N9/39 Spec. was for carrier based naval fighter,the main tenders were;
Blackburn B-31,Hawker,Gloster,Fairey and Supermarine-334.


The Gloster N9/39 was a single seat low-cantilever-wing project,powered by
1550 hp Bristol Hercules VI or Napier Sabre I engine.


http://alternathistory.org.ua/proekt-dvukhmestnogo-bashennogo-istrebitelya-gloster-n939-velikobritaniya

 

[malcolm]

Spec 9/39 calls for, and image indicates two seat carrier fighter

 

[Apophenia]

As Hesham's site says: "Type: two-seat turret fighter project". Presumably N9/39 was for a Blackburn Roc replacement?

I wonder if this aircraft was derived from the Gloster F.9/35, another single-engined turret fighter design?

 

[Hood]

This drawing appears in Alec Brew's 'The Turret Fighters' and is the only N.9/39 proposal illustrated.
There are specs for it in the book, including; span 50 ft, length 39 ft 1 in, loaded weight 10,000 lb and a top speed of 321 mph. Engine looks to be a Bristol Hercules.

EDIT: engine is Hercules, see Schneiderman post below.

 

[Mike Pryce]

I wonder if this aircraft was derived from the Gloster F.9/35, another single-engined turret fighter design?

Looks like a relation of the Gloster F5/34 too :

 

[Schneiderman]

This drawing appears in Alec Brew's 'The Turret Fighters' and is the only N.9/39 proposal illustrated.
There are specs for it in the book, including; span 50 ft, length 29 ft 1 in, loaded weight 10,000 lb and a top speed of 321 mph. No mention of the engine type but obviously a Bristol radial, possibly a Mercury or Taurus, looks a bit small for a Hercules.

A late reply.
Recently I've been looking into late 30s - early 40s Naval fighter projects starting with Supermarine (where there are a great many mistakes in Spitfire: The History) and have now come back to Gloster. The dimensions and layout of this turret fighter project are remarkably similar to those of the single-engine, two-man bomber project Folland drew up for application to a Mayo Composite (note, the length of the fighter is 39ft 1in, not 29ft 1in). Both of these projects were to be powered by a Hercules radial. As the Composite bomber was drawn up in 1935 I would have expected Gloster's design style to have advanced somewhat by 1939 but apparently not.

 

[Hood]

I'm not sure Gloster ever had any sense of style...

However, that is an interesting link indeed. I would agree they do look almost identical in layout with detail differences in control surfaces and different wings.

In BSP:3 Tony Buttler doesn't cover the N.9/39 submission in detail but focuses on the single-seat N.8/39 (no images though). To compare the specs for this were 50ft span, 39ft 4in length, 9,929lb, 1x Hercules and a second design of 47ft 6in span, 39ft long, 9,462lb, 1x Napier E.112. Buttler notes that the undercarriage did not fully retract so would presumably have the same undercarriage layout as the N.9/39.
In BSP.4 the composite is dated as 1936 and the design work on the N.8 and N.9 specs began in 1938 so it's perhaps not too surprising that Folland would dust off the concept of similar size on which to base these designs.

Butter does have a fuselage line drawing of the succeeding single-seat design to NAD.925/39, it looks like a fully retracting undercarriage was fitted. The airframe was indeed smaller; 40ft span, 33ft 7in long (34ft 4in 2-seater), 9,102lb, 1x Griffon. This puts it much closer to F.5/34 design lineage (and indeed shares similar stylistic design although the N.9/39 tail looks very similar too). Presumably Folland recognised that the original Composite-based design was too large/heavy/draggy and went for a refined F.5/34 for NAD.925/39.

(Edited my post above to fix the length and choice of engine).

 

[Schneiderman]

I'm not sure Gloster ever had any sense of style...

However, that is an interesting link indeed. I would agree they do look almost identical in layout with detail differences in control surfaces and different wings.

In BSP:3 Tony Buttler doesn't cover the N.9/39 submission in detail but focuses on the single-seat N.8/39 (no images though). To compare the specs for this were 50ft span, 39ft 4in length, 9,929lb, 1x Hercules and a second design of 47ft 6in span, 39ft long, 9,462lb, 1x Napier E.112. Buttler notes that the undercarriage did not fully retract so would presumably have the same undercarriage layout as the N.9/39.
In BSP.4 the composite is dated as 1936 and the design work on the N.8 and N.9 specs began in 1938 so it's perhaps not too surprising that Folland would dust off the concept of similar size on which to base these designs.

Butter does have a fuselage line drawing of the succeeding single-seat design to NAD.925/39, it looks like a fully retracting undercarriage was fitted. The airframe was indeed smaller; 40ft span, 33ft 7in long (34ft 4in 2-seater), 9,102lb, 1x Griffon. This puts it much closer to F.5/34 design lineage (and indeed shares similar stylistic design although the N.9/39 tail looks very similar too). Presumably Folland recognised that the original Composite-based design was too large/heavy/draggy and went for a refined F.5/34 for NAD.925/39.

(Edited my post above to fix the length and choice of engine).

Of course Folland had upped-sticks and gone by the second half of 1936 so it is a little curious that Carter, his replacement, still used these old mid-30s designs as the inspiration for the later projects.
The Composite bomber had its origins in Nov 1935, was enlarged slightly for the Hercules engine in May 1936 and has obvious F.5/34 DNA in its formula. That both were providing the design style basis later is interesting.
Then we come to the NAD.925/39 single seat fighter, for which only a single side view showing the internal configuration is known. It does not take long to see that the installed engine cannot be a Griffon, the outline does not fit, the supercharger intake is flipped and the mounting points are odd. Neither can it be the Napier E.112, a development of the Dagger, as it is clearly a water-cooled unit. I had considered a Sabre in a mount borrowed from the Typhoon, but that doesn't work either, The search for clarity on this continues.

 

[Hood]

Sorry yes, my bad in referring to Folland, I forgot he had flown the nest by that time!

I must admit to not having perused the drawing in detail - another mystery then!

 

[Schneiderman]

Sorry yes, my bad in referring to Folland, I forgot he had flown the nest by that time!

I must admit to not having perused the drawing in detail - another mystery then!

I probably overstated it a bit about it not being a Griffon but there are obvious questions about the shape, size and intake of the supercharger a the rear of the engine and the odd placement of the engine mounts. As trying to fit any other plausible engine from that era is even worse I'm at a bit of a loss on that.

 

[jcf]

Would it be possible to post the Gloster NAD.925/39 interior arrangment drawing?