Aircraft Trivia Quiz

That would be the De Havilland 'Groundgripper', aka the Hawker Siddeley Trident, the first 3-engined jet airliner to enter service. Among its more bizarre features was the nose u/c, which was offset to port, and retracted sideways:

Cheers,

Chris. 

That's the one!

Not just smoky, but on a bad day on finals, it looked as if the engines were on fire. Far fewer kippers, albeit in 5-abreast comfort (maybe Hughes thought people would pay extra to fly TWA 5-abreast as opposed to Pan Am (and everyone else) 6-abreast). And highly transonic is all very well, but if you generate so much drag at Mach=0.91 that you have to stop on the way to refuel, it kinda defeats the purpose.

As to ugly, there ain't no such thing as a beautiful 4-podded underwing jet airliner (maybe excepting the B-747-400 and later). I reckon this:

http://cdn-www.airliners.net/aviation-photos/middle/8/3/6/1035638.jpg

is about as bad as they get.

Your turn, Bondo!

Cheers,

Chris.

BTW, as is well-known, penguins only fly in flying boats and, very occasionally, and only when needs must, seaplanes.

It's the Convair 990.

The engines were a j79ish thing with a fan at the back.

The faults were:

It was smoky.

It carried a whole bunch fewer kippers than the DC-8 or 707. And got the whathave you from the 727.

Convairs stratagem, ackd to he who knows, and raised me, was to be highly transonic. Mayb's the B-58 guys were in the next bay and a little swagger wore off on the poor transport engineers. But it subjected the penguins in iceflow class to all kinds of buffeting and no doubt the image of wings doing strange things in flight.

I'm thinken that it was also 5 abreast which was the scheme of the 880.

And to me it's ugly.

OK, here we are:

Generally, turbofan engines have the fan in front of the compressor. The engines on the aircraft I'm thinking of, however, had the fan positioned after the turbine.

1) Name that plane.

2) The aircraft concerned was not an operational success. Name two (for a bonus, three) factors which contributed to this.

Cheers,

Chris.

Thanks Matt!

The pressurization issues around the cabin windows had been flagged up during tests, and were one of the reasons why the Brabazon was never given a full airworthyness certificate. The whole project was a classic example of not bothering to consult with the (presumed) customer during product development.

At least some useful research work came out of the Brabazon project, and Filton got a runway long enough to operate prototype Concordes off, all at taxpayers' expense. And it didn't nearly bankrupt the company, like the Convair 990, or was only able to maintain intended cruise speed with the afterburners on, or have cabin air conditioning so noisy that passengers had to be issued with earplugs, like the Tu-144.

Next question tomorrow morning UK time - say in 8 or 9 hours.

Cheers,

Chris.

chris hall wrote:

The Bristol Brabazon sorta satisfies these criteria. Describing it as the 'worst aircraft ever', however, is a bit harsh, in a world which includes such gems as the Bachem Natter, the Tu-144,the Convair 990, and pretty much any large French inter-war biplane. Cheers, Chris.

You hit it Chris!

 I know the Brabazon wasn't that bad in tests, but I believe it could have been very bad in service. It would probably have run into the same pressurization problems the first Comets ran into, and many likely could have broken up in flight because the airframe itself was not properly stressed to deal with high-speed gusts of wind.

Matt90 wrote:

Oh God I'm sorry mate, forgot...  Throughout history there have been many, many aircraft described as bad. However, this one in my opinion is in strong running for the worst aircraft in the world. It suffered severe structural deficiencies due to improper bracing for high-altitude work, and it's gust detector system was so bad it caused a Lancaster used as a test plane to crash. The entremely complex engines were underpowered, and performance was akin to flying a barge. What is this atrocious airplane?

Guessing:

Avro Manchester? (underpowered... not too sure about it's structural attributes)

...or possible C-5A Galaxy (quite notorious for structural problems, but unsure if classed as 'underpowered')

The Bristol Brabazon sorta satisfies these criteria. Describing it as the 'worst aircraft ever', however, is a bit harsh, in a world which includes such gems as the Bachem Natter, the Tu-144,the Convair 990, and pretty much any large French inter-war biplane.

Cheers,

Chris.

Oh God I'm sorry mate, forgot...

 Throughout history there have been many, many aircraft described as bad. However, this one in my opinion is in strong running for the worst aircraft in the world. It suffered severe structural deficiencies due to improper bracing for high-altitude work, and it's gust detector system was so bad it caused a Lancaster used as a test plane to crash. The entremely complex engines were underpowered, and performance was akin to flying a barge. What is this atrocious airplane?

Oh thank you for the rescue Matt. Yes it is Kai Tak in Hong Kong, and google images if you want to see some fun stuff. There's a cliff that is on approach, where you do a 180 and bank in.

I was thinking how fun it is to look at airports and air fields on the various satellite photo websites. I do that a lot to entertain myself. If you pick a busy one like Beijing, it's not hard to go back up the approach and find a/c in the shots.

Anyhow, well done Matt and the floor is yours.

Here's another. My concept for this question is not happening, sorry.

Where dat?

That's the correct anwser. the NHI H-3 Kolibri.

The floor is your's Bondoman

Oh well in that case it's the NHI H-3.

Israeli cropduster only, they got better service from their AH-1s.

bondoman wrote:

I think I know! It's the Hiller HOE-1. I grew up right around the corner from the plant.

No, sorry, that's not the one, the Hiller HOE-1 was only delivered to the US army. As I said the helicopter I am looking for was delivered (to civil costumers) in the UK, Germany, Netherlands and Israel.

The Hiller HOE-1 and the helicopter I am looking for work on the same princials of the RAM jet rotor tip, there are a lot of commonalities like size and layout.

As een extra hint, I am looking for a heli made on continental Europe.

bondoman wrote:

I think I know! It's the Hiller HOE-1. I grew up right around the corner from the plant.

You rock! That's it.

I think I know! It's the Hiller HOE-1.

I grew up right around the corner from the plant.

RemcoGrob wrote:

simpilot34 wrote: Is it the Sud-Ouest Djiin? In 1953, Sud-Ouest produced the small Djinn helicopter for the French Army. It was developed from the Ariel models and was one of the first successes of the French aeronautical industry, with 178 units built for 10 countries. The aircraft had no electrics and the engine was started by hand with a large starting handle that stuck out of the starboard side. The jet engine provides bleed air which is ducted thru the rotor to the tips. No torque, no tail rotor. Cheers, Richie No, sorry, I'll give a few hints, the one I am looking for was build in much smaller numbers and had RAM jets on the tips.

OMG. I know that one. It's lost somewhere in my brain though! Ow! It hurts to think today.

chris hall wrote:

Did use some B-29 parts - not the main gear, though - those did, indeed, come from a C-54. Bonus questioin - if the XH-17 had been put into production, what major factor would have limitied its tactical usefulness? Cheers, Chris.

Also, it's primary cargo was to be the latest American battle tank... A bit on the heavy side!

Try to imagine what it would sound like at take off! Doppler effect on the gas turbines whirring like they did... Probably quite unnerving!

simpilot34 wrote:

Is it the Sud-Ouest Djiin? In 1953, Sud-Ouest produced the small Djinn helicopter for the French Army. It was developed from the Ariel models and was one of the first successes of the French aeronautical industry, with 178 units built for 10 countries. The aircraft had no electrics and the engine was started by hand with a large starting handle that stuck out of the starboard side. The jet engine provides bleed air which is ducted thru the rotor to the tips. No torque, no tail rotor. Cheers, Richie

No, sorry, I'll give a few hints, the one I am looking for was build in much smaller numbers and had RAM jets on the tips. 

Is it the Sud-Ouest Djiin?

In 1953, Sud-Ouest produced the small Djinn helicopter for the French Army. It was developed from the Ariel models and was one of the first successes of the French aeronautical industry, with 178 units built for 10 countries. The aircraft had no electrics and the engine was started by hand with a large starting handle that stuck out of the starboard side.

The jet engine provides bleed air which is ducted thru the rotor to the tips. No torque, no tail rotor.

Cheers, Richie

My turn? oh dear..

 OK, the XH-17 had rotor jets. What other helicopter with rotor jets whent into production and was used in the United Kingdom, Germany, Israel, the Netherlands and ...New Guinea?

That's the one - B-29 fuel cell! Well done, Rem!

It wasn't so much the height of the thing that would have been a problem - after all, many crane helicopters (CH-54, Mil-10R Harke) are long-legged, so that payloads can be driven beneath them. This was particulalry important in early aerial cranes, which had very poor fuel economy, and needed to have the load hooked on before the engines were fired up.

And yes, you're right about the range - one smallish fuel tank and two very powerful (by late 1940s standards) turbojets acting as gas generators for a max. range (that's range, not tactical radius) of 40 miles!

Your turn, Rem! 

Cheers,

Chris.

chris hall wrote:

Bonus questioin - if the XH-17 had been put into production, what major factor would have limitied its tactical usefulness? Cheers, Chris.

The range of the XH-17 was very short because, less then 100 km, because of the gas guzzeling rotor-tip jets. That was a servere limitation.