Goodyear-Zeppelin ZRS-Derived Passenger Airship (~1935)

[Hlostoops]

Hullo all!

Attached are a few images of a 1930s Goodyear-Zeppelin proposal for a large passenger airship based on the ZRS scout airship. All items are held in the collection of the University of Akron Archives, from which permission to post has been obtained.

If there's any interest, I have a few thousand images and documents covering a wide range of unbuilt airships, from a myriad of American passenger and military designs (including the ZRCV, etc.) to the Zeppelins that would've followed the Hindenburg and LZ-130 into production had World War II not intervened. Lemme know!

Additionally, the original images are *very* large, hence the screenshots. If anyone needs a zoomed-in shot, etc., just drop me a comment.



General overview.


Layouts for passenger decks.


Layout of observation and control gondola.


View of passenger bay and main rings.


Propellor dimensions and clearances.


Schematic of engine room and propellor shaft.


Layout of keel.

 

[Jemiba]

Welcome and many thanks for sharing that very interesting design !
We have several topics about airship, but this one was still unknown here, I think.

 

[archipeppe]

WOW

 

[A Tentative Fleet Plan]

Hullo all!

Attached are a few images of a 1930s Goodyear-Zeppelin proposal for a large passenger airship based on the ZRS scout airship. All items are held in the collection of the University of Akron Archives, from which permission to post has been obtained.

If there's any interest, I have a few thousand images and documents covering a wide range of unbuilt airships, from a myriad of American passenger and military designs (including the ZRCV, etc.) to the Zeppelins that would've followed the Hindenburg and LZ-130 into production had World War II not intervened. Lemme know!

Additionally, the original images are *very* large, hence the screenshots. If anyone needs a zoomed-in shot, etc., just drop me a comment.


View attachment 625509
General overview.

View attachment 625510
Layouts for passenger decks.

View attachment 625511
Layout of observation and control gondola.

View attachment 625512
View of passenger bay and main rings.

View attachment 625513
Propellor dimensions and clearances.

View attachment 625514
Schematic of engine room and propellor shaft.

View attachment 625515
Layout of keel.

What information and images do you have on unbuilt ZRS and ZRCV designs?

 

[taildragger]

It's amazing how long the Goodyear Zeppelin company persisted in promoting the rigid airship in mainstream roles. I've seen Goodyear ads promoting transoceanic passenger-carrying airships dating from well after WWII. I've read that Goodyear's president and chief engineer learned of the Normandy landings (6/6/44) in the Pentagon where they were pitching the Navy on a revival of the fighter-carrying airship program that had ended with the crash of the USS Macon.

 

[riggerrob]

Goodyear built blimps during WW2 when they scared U-boats away from Atlantic coveys.
The USN continued flying blimps until circa 1960. The last generation of USN blimps had huge, long-range radar antennas inside their hulls.

 

[Grey Havoc]

The USN blimps proved quite useful during the war, and not only in the ASW patrol & convoy escort roles, some were used in mine warfare for example. A number of L-class blimps were even used to deliver mail and aircraft parts to carriers I believe, the latter most notably to USS Hornet in the run up to the Doolittle Raid.

The last generation of USN blimps had huge, long-range radar antennas inside their hulls.

Even the USAF found them useful and thought they had been retired prematurely, IIRC (the AN/APS-70 radar fitted to later AEW equipped N-Class [ZPG-3W type] blimps was well regarded). They were primarily victims of the urgent need to redirect funds to the increasingly costly Polaris program; the last N-Class AEW blimp was retired in 1962. (The last of the earlier ZPG-2W type, re-designated EZ-1B just prior to retirement, had already been retired earlier that year.)

On an interesting note, during the 1950s the Navy even seriously planned to equip ASW N-Class blimps [in particular the ZP2N type, re-designated ZPG-2 in 1954] with Mark 101 LuLu nuclear depth charges (11-kilotons), though there were concerns about blast effects. (To avoid some confusion, I should note that three of the initial ZP2Ns were modified to the aforementioned ZPG-2W standard in the mid-1950s.)

EDIT: The late generation K-Class type ZP5K blimps (re-designated ZS2G-1 in late 1955) were also slated to be equipped with Mark 101 nuclear depth charges.

 

[Sundog]

Hi Hlostoops, I don't recall what the name of it was going to be, but do you have any information on the flying carrier that was supposed to follow the Akron and the Macon and carry larger attack planes?

Thanks for the images of the Goodyear passenger dirigible.

 

[Hlostoops]

Hi Hlostoops, I don't recall what the name of it was going to be, but do you have any information on the flying carrier that was supposed to follow the Akron and the Macon and carry larger attack planes?

Thanks for the images of the Goodyear passenger dirigible.

That'd be the ZRCV ships, so named for Z: Lighter-Than-Air (almost certainly an homage to Zeppelin), R: Rigid, CV: Carrier Vehicle.

I've got quite a few blueprints for the various designs of that class of ship, if you're interested.

 

[Hlostoops]

Hullo all!

Attached are a few images of a 1930s Goodyear-Zeppelin proposal for a large passenger airship based on the ZRS scout airship. All items are held in the collection of the University of Akron Archives, from which permission to post has been obtained.

If there's any interest, I have a few thousand images and documents covering a wide range of unbuilt airships, from a myriad of American passenger and military designs (including the ZRCV, etc.) to the Zeppelins that would've followed the Hindenburg and LZ-130 into production had World War II not intervened. Lemme know!

Additionally, the original images are *very* large, hence the screenshots. If anyone needs a zoomed-in shot, etc., just drop me a comment.


View attachment 625509
General overview.

View attachment 625510
Layouts for passenger decks.

View attachment 625511
Layout of observation and control gondola.

View attachment 625512
View of passenger bay and main rings.

View attachment 625513
Propellor dimensions and clearances.

View attachment 625514
Schematic of engine room and propellor shaft.

View attachment 625515
Layout of keel.

What information and images do you have on unbuilt ZRS and ZRCV designs?

Hey! Sorry, I haven't checked this in a few weeks.

I have quite a few schematics of both ZRS and ZRCV-type ships, along with various other passenger variants and smaller training ships. If you're interested in seeing them, just let me know!

 

[Sundog]

I would love to see these, especially the CV designs.

Thanks,
Ken

 

[Hlostoops]

I would love to see these, especially the CV designs.

Just posted a few ZRCV schematics!

 

[sienar]

Do you have anything on the Zodiac MBZ-3 and its use by the germans in ww2?

 

[Hlostoops]

Do you have anything on the Zodiac MBZ-3 and its use by the germans in ww2?

Unfortunately, it's unlikely. Most of my stuff is either prewar, or Goodyear proposals from the 1940s and '50s.

 

[sea2sea]

Hullo all!

Attached are a few images of a 1930s Goodyear-Zeppelin proposal for a large passenger airship based on the ZRS scout airship. All items are held in the collection of the University of Akron Archives, from which permission to post has been obtained.

If there's any interest, I have a few thousand images and documents covering a wide range of unbuilt airships, from a myriad of American passenger and military designs (including the ZRCV, etc.) to the Zeppelins that would've followed the Hindenburg and LZ-130 into production had World War II not intervened. Lemme know!

Additionally, the original images are *very* large, hence the screenshots. If anyone needs a zoomed-in shot, etc., just drop me a comment.


View attachment 625509
General overview.

View attachment 625510
Layouts for passenger decks.

View attachment 625511
Layout of observation and control gondola.

View attachment 625512
View of passenger bay and main rings.

View attachment 625513
Propellor dimensions and clearances.

View attachment 625514
Schematic of engine room and propellor shaft.

View attachment 625515
Layout of keel.

These are some great schematics, thank you for sharing! If you'd be willing, I'd love to see more from your collection of civilian airship concepts, both the LZ-131 and the Goodyear-Zeppelin Co.'s various passenger airship concepts.
In regards to this specific design, do you know how the hull structure weighed in against the stated gas volume of 7.5 mil. cubic feet, and thus what its net capacity was? I've seen a few Goodyear civilian proposals from the 1930s and '40s, including this one, which all incorporated Akron-style deep rings, which were strong but very heavy - an issue, when you're already using helium instead of hydrogen.

 

[taildragger]

I've seen a few Goodyear civilian proposals from the 1930s and '40s, including this one, which all incorporated Akron-style deep rings, which were strong but very heavy - an issue, when you're already using helium instead of hydrogen.

I think you're mistaken regarding the weight of the Akron-style - their whole point was weight reduction. The structure required to carry bending loads, which are probably most important in an airship hull, will generally get lighter as it gets larger (up to a point). This tradeoff challenges wing designers, with drag reduction motivating a thinner section while weight reduction argues for a thicker profile.

 

[sea2sea]

I've seen a few Goodyear civilian proposals from the 1930s and '40s, including this one, which all incorporated Akron-style deep rings, which were strong but very heavy - an issue, when you're already using helium instead of hydrogen.

I think you're mistaken regarding the weight of the Akron-style - their whole point was weight reduction. The structure required to carry bending loads, which are probably most important in an airship hull, will generally get lighter as it gets larger (up to a point). This tradeoff challenges wing designers, with drag reduction motivating a thinner section while weight reduction argues for a thicker profile.

Really? Maybe my wording was off, but I read that they were heavier than the Hindenburg's wire-stiffened lattice strength rings, if not significantly at least by a fair bit, but because they were also so much stronger they were able to be placed farther apart, which helped offset it somewhat. I supposed it would have balanced out to a fair extent, ultimately?
Edit: Actually, I'd like to add a bit more. Weight wasn't the only consideration, hull strength was also highly important to the US Navy after the British-built R38 suffered structural failure over the Humber and crashed, killing most aboard. The Navy went with the three-keeled, deep-ringed design for Akron and Macon because of how strong it was, despite the added weight compared to "traditional" wire-stiffened lattice rings used on Zeppelins up to that point. Also, the ZRCV proposal from Goodyear after Macon's loss, ca. 1935-6, eliminated the deep rings in favor of Zeppelin-style rings to increase the number of fighter planes carried from five to nine. While I'm sure they refined the hull in other areas as well to decrease weight, changing back to the older, lighter ring style wouldn't have been for nothing. So considering this, and how carefully weight had to be calculated and accounted for in every facet of LTA designs in general, why wouldn't the deep rings have weighed more, tit-for-tat?

 

[Andrewjs2007]

Hullo all!

Attached are a few images of a 1930s Goodyear-Zeppelin proposal for a large passenger airship based on the ZRS scout airship. All items are held in the collection of the University of Akron Archives, from which permission to post has been obtained.

If there's any interest, I have a few thousand images and documents covering a wide range of unbuilt airships, from a myriad of American passenger and military designs (including the ZRCV, etc.) to the Zeppelins that would've followed the Hindenburg and LZ-130 into production had World War II not intervened. Lemme know!

Additionally, the original images are *very* large, hence the screenshots. If anyone needs a zoomed-in shot, etc., just drop me a comment.


View attachment 625509
General overview.

View attachment 625510
Layouts for passenger decks.

View attachment 625511
Layout of observation and control gondola.

View attachment 625512
View of passenger bay and main rings.

View attachment 625513
Propellor dimensions and clearances.

View attachment 625514
Schematic of engine room and propellor shaft.

View attachment 625515
Layout of keel.

Hi there, I'm a bit of a fan of these unbuilt dirigibles/airships, so yes please share

 

[ninjrk]

Hullo all!

Attached are a few images of a 1930s Goodyear-Zeppelin proposal for a large passenger airship based on the ZRS scout airship. All items are held in the collection of the University of Akron Archives, from which permission to post has been obtained.

If there's any interest, I have a few thousand images and documents covering a wide range of unbuilt airships, from a myriad of American passenger and military designs (including the ZRCV, etc.) to the Zeppelins that would've followed the Hindenburg and LZ-130 into production had World War II not intervened. Lemme know!

Additionally, the original images are *very* large, hence the screenshots. If anyone needs a zoomed-in shot, etc., just drop me a comment.


View attachment 625509
General overview.

View attachment 625510
Layouts for passenger decks.

View attachment 625511
Layout of observation and control gondola.

View attachment 625512
View of passenger bay and main rings.

View attachment 625513
Propellor dimensions and clearances.

View attachment 625514
Schematic of engine room and propellor shaft.

View attachment 625515
Layout of keel.

Thank you, this is something that I am very interested in!