Aircraft Trivia Quiz

Because once the engineers had understood the Prandtl-Glauwert transformation, and calculated the Karman-Tsien Factor, they were still puzzled by the Alhambra effect and had to test the wing in a water tank.

Just a guess, but the water tank was needed to test high fraction Mach numbers.

I'll accept that.

The problem was that when the F4U was designed, compressible flow was, if not terra incognita, definitely in the "here there be tygers" category. Yes, fluid dynamicists had some pretty mathematics, but the engineers kept building aircraft that crashed when they got too close to the Mach barrier (you don't have to go supersonic to get into trouble with the onset of compressibility).

What to do? Water tunnels existed, but (and this is where we get into that bit about testing in a "funny" way) the water tunnel (ship) model-makers were in the wrong union from the wind tunnel (aircraft) model-makers, and work demarcation was a BIG DEAL (think labor riot big deal).

So skating a little fancy (each card-carrying craft union was demanding 100% of the pie and was willing to strike to get it), a model F4U wing was constructed by the woodworkers salaried to build wind tunnel stuff AND an identical "bent" wing was built by the metalworkers paid to fabricate water tunnel testbeds. Workers in both unions got their money (which was the real basis of the dispute), and the compressibility danger zones were located and designed around.

So bondoman, the Trivia Quiz baton has been formally passed to YOU.

hello, is this thing on??

(crickets....)

F-8fanatic

hello, is this thing on??

Intermittently it would seem?

I think it's now in the first come, first served domain.

What famous bombing raid had aircraft 'armed' with broomsticks?

osher

What famous bombing raid had aircraft 'armed' with broomsticks?

The Jimmy Doolittle Raid, 18 April 1942

And to keep this lob going: United Nations fliers called the Korean air combat zone "MiG Alley"; what did the communists call it?

As a guess:

Mig 골목 ??

Tom T

West Yula River?

Дай мне силу (literally, [God] give me strength!) Seriously, they did have a name for it, one that had NOTHING to do with either MiGs or F-86's, rather like the way Polish pilots refer to "The Chessboard" (Szachy pokład, I think) or French pilots talk about "The Hexagon" (L'hexagone). A good old earthy name, one you'll agree is quite appropriate the first time you hear it.

Okay, based on the tremendous (lack of) response, here's a (vocabulary building) hint: the area was allantoid. Make of it what you can.

I have it on reasonable authority (one book, one combatant) that communist pilots referred to the air combat region as "The Sausage". Hopefully this map will help:

And "allantoid"? It means "sausage-shaped" (bet you didn't know that there was a word for "sausage-shaped" other than saying "sausage-shaped"!) Now somebody else can pose the next trivia question.

Easy one, worlds oldest airport?

I refuse to answer on the grounds that I like eating at the adjacent restaurant [DUH!].

wheres the resturaunt? i cant find it anywhere near by.

what were you doin' in Marylin'?

My daughters latest theater gig is head wig dresser for "Hairspray".

94th Aero Squadron Restaurant USED to be just across the footbridge from the museum. You had to be careful about closing time because the museum closed before the restaurant. I Googled the site just now and got an "OPERATIONS CURRENTLY CLOSED" banner. [Whatsacominago] I got myself in the mood to eat there. Now I'll have to go over to the Sir Walter Raleigh instead.

lol both of you know where it is, neither of you have said what it is.

The whole area apart from the museum seems to be industrial stuff.

Semi-private aside (between you, me, and what? a thousand of our close personal friends): My baccalaureate is in Aerospace Engineering. Guess from where? Hint: walking distance.

That would be linked to the Marauder?

huh?

Well it looks like the last question just died of natural causes.

So I guess I will post the next one.

We all are aware of that flying dinosaur, the Zeppelin.

Early on in WWI the first one was downed, but not by conventional weaponry.

So this is indeed a two-part question:

The first part has three items:

1. Which Zeppelin was downed?
2. Name the allied pilot, and how did the flyer actually down the monster?
3. How many survivors lived and what was unusual as to how? Explain as to why he was able to at that time, but they could not rely on such a tactic when the raider came to bomb England.

Now for the trickiest and truly trivial question:

Usually the story is told and the credit is granted to a certain make and model of aircraft.

The common story is in error, inasmuch as indeed an aircraft of the same manufacturer was used, but not that actual variant. Which one was the actual variant used?

Now feel free to take a stab at the items you feel comfortible with, and for those who sincerely wish to work with this question, if it looks like a "sticking point" I can choose to waive any part of my question and/or offer hints.

Tom T

I'll give it a shot,

Which Zeppelin was downed? LZ37

Name the allied pilot, and how did the flyer actually down the monster? Reginald Alexander John Warnefield

It appears he bombed it from above

How many survivors lived and what was unusual as to how? I can only find record of his surviving, albeit after the explosion blew him upside down and stopped his engine, he force landed, repaired the engine and flew away

Explain as to why he was able to at that time, but they could not rely on such a tactic when the raider came to bomb England? I guess bombing a airborne target over your own country is a lil risky.

Finally I have only found mention of the Morane Saulnier Type L Aircraft so can't answer the final part of the question.

Sources:

Wikipedia, The First Zeppelin Kill from WW1Aviation.com and century of flight.com

Kia Kaha

Stewart

The common story was actually not of this incident, but supposedly took place at a later date.  As the story went, French ace pilot Roland Garros was attacking a zeppelin when he ran out of ammo, so he supposedly rammed the intruder with his Morane Bullet, flying right through and out the other side.  There was no legitimate report of this, but faked pictures of a zeppelin with the airplane-shaped hole in it were sold throughout Paris for weeks afterwards....

thanks for that, its a fun image and good for morale I guess

I like your answer, it is close.

Interestingly enough this pilot's method of downing the airship was the same as the earlier downing, i.e., mid-air bombing, which occured in 8 October 1914.

Hint:

This pilot was flying a Sopwith aircraft of that era.

However, if no one can do better then you in a day or so, I feel you ought to have the next go at it for giving us a very good answer.

Tom T

I have now found reference to one survivor from LZ37, one of the crew apparently fell from the airship (which crashed on a convent) hitting the roof and falling through that to land in an unoccupied bed in room below. Additionally this report suggests the airship was carrying V.I.P. Engineers and Designers?

http://acepilots.com/wwi/zeppelin.html

I have not been able to find any reports of allied aircraft destroying a Zeppelin prior to Warneford and there doesn't appear to be any reports of Zeppelins used over England until 1915, prior to that they seem to have been mostly used by the navy as observation platforms, so I will be very interested in your answer when it comes.

Warneford's aircraft was nicknamed a Mauraine Parasol (out of interest

hmm LZ25 was destroyed on the 8th October 1914 by bombing, but it was in it's hangar at the time.

The 8 October incident you are thinking of was not an aerial victory--on that date in 1914, a pair of RNAS Sopwith Tabloid aircraft set out to attack the zeppelin sheds at Cologne and Dusseldorf.  This was the first British air raid over German territory of the war.  The target at Cologne was not located, and so that pilot bombed the train station instead.  The other pilot dropped two 20 pound bombs on the sheds at Dusseldorf, and in the process destroyed zeppelin Z.IX on the ground.  The airship was in the shed when the attack took place.

Well, Jafa's answer is the answer I was thinking of, wherein the airship was a VIP tour and the captain panicked when  the British Sopwith parasol pilot started pestering him with his Webley handgun, and so he suddenly dedided to lose altitude allowing the Sopwith driver to literally bomb the airship out of the air..

Unfortuantely, I have only erad this account in two erferences one of which I owned, but was lost in a move, thusly I also no longer have the particulars.

If it is OK with you-all, as far as I am concerned, Jafa has it.

Tom T