V Bomber

[chiglet]

Just been watching a Discovery prog on "British Nuclear Bombers".
My [and the Exs'] fave is the Vulcan.
What's yours?
p.s. Sperrin don't count.....nice, tho'
watp,iktch

[Georgeablelovehowindia]

chiglet: permit me to direct you to the Military Aviation forum thread entitled "Did you fly the Vulcan?" where you can satiate your admiration for the 'Tin Triangle' to your heart's content! :cool:

[G-SCUD]

Sorry to p1ss on your chips, but the only time a Vulcan ever bombed in anger it missed (the South Atlantic unpleasantness, for our younger readers…).

[henry crun]

G-SCUD: Sorry to p1ss on your chips but it did not miss.

FYI, the first bomb of the stick hit almost dead centre in Port Stanley's runway, penetrated, and then detonated.
The second bomb caused similar damage to the edge of the runway.
A later bomb in the stick landed between a hangar and Pucaras parked nearby causing considerable damage to both.

[Mac the Knife]

The physical damage may have been small, but the political and psychological impact was massive, in Argentina, Britain and internationally.

It was a major wake-up call to Gualtieri and his boys to the effect that Britain was not fooling and was willing to do whatever it took to retake the islands.

[tinpis]

Did the yanks provide the tanker for that flight Henry?

[henry crun]

No, they did not Tin, all RAF tankers.

[Loose rivets]

And that reminds me....was standing on the edge of the runway at Subrough, a red light from the tower telling me not to cross. I looked to the north. On my end of trails of black smoke was a large object. Probably better not to ignore the red light.

Within a minute, a Vulcan was right beside me, it's wheels only inches from the concrete. I thought ‘how the hell is that going to stop?' Suddenly the wheels tucked themselves away.

Then it hit me, in the chest, in the teeth and then down to my toes, a noise so loud that one did not need ears to hear it.

To say that the rotation was spectacular, would be a universal prize-winning understatement, I could see all of the top of the wings; an area the size of several tennis courts. It seemed to be pointing at an angle twice that needed to clear Sumbrough Head and as it punched a hole in the sky and vanished, I had one thought.

"Lucky, Lucky Bsatards!!!!!!!"

[slim_slag]

There was a fascinating book written by a Fleet Air Arm pilot who calculated how much fuel it took to get each bomb overhead Stanley on a Vulcan, and how much fuel it took to get a bomb overhead on a Harrier. Then how many hit the target. Great stuff.

Used to get Vulcans flying over the village I grew up in the Lakes, was almost as if you could reach out and grab them out of the air.

[henry crun]

slim_slag: Did the Fleet Air Arm pilot also calculate how much fuel the carriers burned getting the Harrier to the South Atlantic ?

I have a feeling that if he did that calculation for two carriers from UK to Falklands, plus the support ships that the carriers would not move without, plus the aircraft fuel used, and applied it to the number of bombs the Harriers scored on Port Stanley's runway the answer might not be as one sided as he obviously wants to make out.

[SpinSpinSugar]

You're probably referring to Sea Harrier Over the Falklands (http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/1857971027/qid=1139040814/sr=8-2/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i2_xgl/026-5254754-1594029) by Sharkey Ward.

[anoxic]

I was on that Vulcan Squadron at the time. You bomb on the diagonal to ensure a hit. Bombing at ninety degrees, you may get one bomb either side of the target. Bomb parallel to the runway and every bomb may miss. There was only ever meant to be one bomb to hit the runway. The only fault was that the middle bomb in the stick should have been that bomb, but any one will do. The damage to the substructure of the runway was huge.

I was also on the Vucan display aircaft :) for two years.

[Tone]

Are there any photographs of the damage sculling around?

[VP8]

http://www.raf.mod.uk/falklands/images/cas047a.jpg
Only one I can find
VEEPS

[Shaggy Sheep Driver]

I'm looking forward to the magical day, hopefully later this year, when the primal howl and earth-shuddering pounding roar of the mighty beast will be heard again, as XH558 take to the air again.

Living only a few miles south of Woodford, we used to see these lovely aeroplanes a lot in the past. Last one I saw in the air was early '90s, when the display Vulcan did a very spectacular departure from EGCC after overnighting there following a Barton display (which I also saw).:ok:

SSD

[gravity victim]

The V-bomber programme had impressive footage of the Avro test pilot barrel-rolling the prototype. Was it done since? No names expected!

[BEagle]

The great Tin Triangle:

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a341/nw969/XM571.jpg

:ok:

[Shaggy Sheep Driver]

..And from underneath..

http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b132/GZK6NK/VulcanB2.jpg

SSD

[Conan the Librarian]

Apparently, the RAF asked Avro to instruct their chief test pilot Jimmy Harrison, (Early B.2 days) not to do any more barrels over RAF airfields, as the Airships were worried that everyone else was going to have a go and a few overstressed airframes might result.

Conan

[Noah Zark.]

Excellent piccies of the Beautiful Beast. But will you guys in the know answer me this, please? In the second piccie above, withe underneath view, what is / was the fairing / cover w.h.y? between the jet pipes on the starboard wing?

[ATCO1962]

And, speaking of Vulcans, wasn't it a Vulcan that left bits of itself on the runway at Wellington, NZ a few years ago, before recovering to Ohakea, or some such place?? An anniversary flypast that went horribly wrong but everyone survived to tell the tale.

If someone's got photos of that, I'd like to see them again.

[soddim]

Shame we never managed to get a Vulcan down to Stanley with LGBs. If we had found a way of designating and, if the weather had been suitable, we could have destroyed the only airfield we had after the Argie surrender!

"This was predominately a Naval operation" I would have you know.

Difficult to measure the contribution of the Vulcan but I'll bet the Argies burned a lot of midnight oil worrying about it.

So where is our strategic bomber capability now?

[Archimedes]

Noah,

IIRC, the plate between the engines is part of the ECM system <struggles to remember name, fails>

Soddim - the Argentines did worry about the prospect of a handbagging via the Vulcan, which was what the raid was intended to do. Despite Sharkey Ward's complaints, Admirals Lewin, Fieldhouse and Woodward all thought the use of the Vulcan a good idea precisely for this reason. The then-CAS (Sir Michael Beetham) told the war cabinet that if tasked to destroy the runway, he'd want at least 25 and preferably 50 Vulcans to guarantee doing the job. Given that the bombing kit was designed for getting Bucket, Sunshine, Large onto Soviet Targets, getting so close to the runway was an impressive achievement.

[henry crun]

ATCO1962: Here it is, the moment of impact.


http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v712/crun9/Vulcan.jpg

[ATCO1962]

Thanks for that, Henry. Great shot:ok:

[Off-Black]

That Vulcan incident was at the opening of Wellington airport in 1959. At the south end of the runway there is about a 10-15 ft trench containing a road, with a sea-wall beyond, and I think the story is that the aircraft undershot the runway somewhat and clipped the edge of the drop-off to the road. The trench is known for causing localised air turbulence which the Vulcan pilot may not have been aware of. The aircraft recovered successfully to Ohakea where it was repaired and flown home some time later. The trench is still there incidentally, although the road will be tunneled and the trench eliminated this year I think as part of a runway lengthening scheme.
At the same airshow an RNZAF Sunderland dug a trench in the grass with it's keel during a (very) low pass. I don't know if that was before or after the Vulcan incident, but it can't have done the organiser's blood pressure any good.

[BEagle]

The plate below the starboard wing contained the atomising mixing devices for the chemtrail dispersants used to subjugate the UK populace in the 1970s......:eek:

Or it could have held the antennas for the all-but-useless ECM kit of the time such as Red Shrimp.

[diginagain]

First time I've noticed the divergent exhausts. Any noticable effects on OEI handling?

[anoxic]

A single engine out was a non-event and it was always assumed an engine failure would also remove the other one too and, therefore, it was always two engines out on the same side for training. No great problem unless at very low speed (ie go-around) when for several alarming minutes it didn't seem to matter which point of the triangle pointed forwards. Absolutely bags of power on the remaining two but it needed feeding in carefully as the speed increased.

[diginagain]

Thanks for that, anoxic; always nice to learn more about such a fascinating aircraft. :ok:

[markflyer6580]

Talking of noise-I was at Leeming many years ago when the vulcan was on its last season of airshows.

As it rotated the noise was so immense that the guy doing a stunt display on a quad bike stopped halfway up the ramp he was about to fly off to see what was going on!

as it was nobody was watching him at the time for obvious reasons.

Can't wait to see it fly again:D

[ZH875]

The only thing better than a Vulcan in the sky is:


http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v604/ZH875/4x.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v604/ZH875/4ship.jpg

But there were other V Bombers, although not as 'Great' deserve a bit of credit:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v604/ZH875/3vs.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v604/ZH875/trio.jpg

Weapons:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v604/ZH875/599bombs.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v604/ZH875/bsteel.jpg


And my all time favourite:

LOOK BEHIND YOU....

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v604/ZH875/Flyby.jpg

[anoxic]

If that last one was RAF Swinderby passing-out parade, then I think it was me! :ok: (Got in a bit of trouble for that one - for being a bit early).

[ZH875]

Anoxic, I have an original print of that Flypast, If I can find it, I will let you know the date and unit on the stamp.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v604/ZH875/50_cres1.jpg
(1979-1984)

[Tone]

Thanks for the picture VP8, I am not an expert but it looks like they were left with fairly minor & easily repairable damage. Worth all the effort & cost?

[ZH875]

Well worth the effort & cost. The Argentinians could not base their larger aircraft at Stanley, just in case the next raid made the runway unusable. The minimal damage also meant that when the FI were retaken the airfield did not need that much work to be able to be used by the RAF.

[Noah Zark.]

Archimedes & BEagle,
Thanks for the info. As a 'yoof' I used to go and watch the Vulcans and Valiants based at Finningley. I don't know what squadrons were operating there, although I did hear somewhere in later life that they were OCU's.
Wonderful memories!

[Synthetic]

Sorry to p1ss on your chips, but the only time a Vulcan ever bombed in anger it missed (the South Atlantic unpleasantness, for our younger readers…).

Scud - I think you miss the point. The mere fact that the Vulcan existed meant it did it's job. It is the reason that we do not refer to each other as 'Comrad'. :ok:

[chiglet]

My first "Impressions" of the Beast was at "Hyde County Grammar School".....
[It's on 8/9 mile finals to Manch and Woodford] when the "Skybolt" testbeds were on finals for Woodford.....that was1960[ish]
watp,iktch

[chevvron]

Re barrel rolling.
At the Farnborough show where it was done, the TP responsible apparently said 'well the Avro 707 did it, and the Vulcan is just a big '707, so why shouldn't it?'

[Shaggy Sheep Driver]

I have a video of 'Early Farnborough' which shows the Vulcan and the Victor doing the 'toss' bomb delivery technique - a pull up into a half-loop with a roll off the top, the bomb being released during the pull-up and the manouvre allowing the aircraft to be heading away from the area at high speed by the time the bomb goes off.

That is far more impressive in such a big aeroplane than is a barrel roll. :ok:

SSD

[chevvron]

Just remembered the pilot's name - Roly Falk

[Woomera]

Besides, without the Vulcan there would be one less James Bond film!!! :}

Tinpis. Yank tankers indeed! Wash your mouth out and go back to Dunnunda Forum!! :mad:

[BikerMark]

While everyone is going Vulcan barmy, let's not forget the other V's too.

The Valiant did an excellent job until fatigue caught up with it.

Personally, I think the Victor is a far more attractive and graceful aircraft than the Vulcan. Proved to be more versatile too.

Mark.

[G-SCUD]

One seems to have raised a few V-hackles… so for Henry C, Synthetic et al:
1. Observations regarding the effectiveness of a particular weapons delivery system are in now way any criticism of either (a) the top crews or (b) the totally awesome airframe. Having had the experience of working closely with the former, and close encounters with the latter is confirmation in itself!
2. Photos were very engaging and featured that all-time British success, the Vailant (that’s the aircraft, rather than the comic, featuring Captain Hurricane and the Wolf of Kabul… might have been the Hotspur, God knows…).
3. Using an aircraft to deliver thermonuclear devices was a dead duck when Pontius was a Pilot, so primary mission was a total non-starter.
4. The thought that a single aircraft type saved us from the red menace (rather than those pesky Ruskies deciding it was all bollux and let’s all just get some free market action) is preposterous and unworthy of further comment.
5. It’s time for my medication now… Night-night.

[Busta]

After leaving t'tin tringle I went to faster pointy things (it mattered more which corner was pointing forwards!) and found myself doing the WEP course. I stayed behind at cranditz after class one day and after calling some old pals to confirm details ( cep, stick interval, release height, attack angle etc ) ran some data through the rather primitive number cruncher. The answer, for what it was worth indicated the probability of a single hit on a Stanley size runway. Good or what!

It may be wrong to dismiss the effectiveness of the ' primary sunshine option' without fully appreciating the integration and involvement of all the other players.

Nothing matters very much, most things don't matter at all.

[Conan the Librarian]

Scud, you can only say that from the perspective of having survived it, so who knows? I am trying to research as many cold war links as I can, because miraculously, I survived it too.

We talk now of Trident having 150kt yield/ delivery vehicle and yet that is a pussycat compared to what was envisaged during the 50s especially, as the guidance and accuracy simply weren't there. 1, 4 and 9 Mt were more the norm.

I think the deterrant worked, though I would never like to see any point proved in such a way. The V focre was expensive in sterling terms but very cheap for what it did. Go on - bite:} I need new sources!


Besties,

Conan

[chevvron]

Biker Mark - you forgot to add the Victor could go supersonic if necessary.
(according to an ex-Farnborough OC Flying)

[Groundloop]

"Using an aircraft to deliver thermonuclear devices was a dead duck when Pontius was a Pilot, so primary mission was a total non-starter."

SCUD, could you please elaborate. As the Valiant was used to drop a series of H-bombs in the Grapple tests at Christmas Island it was shown to be possible. When the V-bombers where specified and designed ICBMs did not exist.

[LowNSlow]

Groundloop, I think he was having an in-joke type dig at Pontious' navigational abilities rather than the ability of any of the V-Force to make large areas of the Soviet Union rather warm. ;)

[BikerMark]

Chevvron - I think it needed to be a clean Mk1 going downhill to go past Mach 1 without too much drama. I'm told the later airframes with wing tanks, fixed leading edge droop etc. were a bit too draggy for such fun and games.

[Dan Winterland]

I think that a lot of people miss the point when considering the effects of the free fall Black Buck raids. The psycological effects of the guys on ground cannot be underestimated, let alone the Argentine high command. I bet the Argie Stanley laundry got a lot of underpants to clean that day!

Love the pictures, but I only counted 21 thousand pounders coming out of the bottom of the Vulcan. I thought real V bombers carried 35!

[BEagle]

But not very far......:p

[Snakecharmer]

Victor

Chevvron / BikerMark - I have it on good authority that going that fast in a clean Victor B1 was not that uncommon, but yes - downhill!

Let's not forget that the Victor could and did carry a greater bomb load than the other Vs - 35 x 1000 lb.

I remember chatting to an american engineer while delayed somewhere stateside - his comment: "The Victor - that was your 'Captain Nemo' airplane wasn't it?!". I guess the prototype looked the best but the B1 was pretty aerodynamically pure too. I understand that some refinements, such as auto-droop leading edges, were later inhibited due to unreliability / maintenance workload - pity.

In terms of meeting the original spec - it has to be the Victor every time - just a pity they never put bigger engines in the mark 1.

[Dan Winterland]

The Vulcan didn't carry it's load very far either. Don't forget it needed 14 Victors to get to las Islas Malvinas!!!!!

The main reason the Victor B2 wasn't as good at high Mach numbers was that to fit the Conways in, the wings had to be a lot deeper. This spoilt the almost perfect area ruling of the B1. this is why the 'Kuchmen carrots' or aerodynamic bodies were fitted to the trailing ede of the B2, to try and restore it. The B1 would go supersonic with little fuss whereas the K2 (don't know about the B2 as I was too young to fly it) would Mach buffet above M0.92.

The partially fixed out leading edge devices were as a resulty of the fatal crash of the prototype B2 into the Bristol Channel. The devices were atomatic - being controlled by IAS. A pitot tube dropped off when it's securing collar came undone at high speed and the devices deployed making the aircraft uncontrollable. The decision was to do away with the devices.

[chevvron]

At least one Victor was lost going supersonic due to an inadvertant pitch input causing the tail section to break off according to my OC Flying. He liked the Victor, and said he'd gone SS on more than one occasion, but then being a TP he could do that!

[Milt]

Chevvron

You presume too much.

Being a TP dosen't give you a licence to to be stupid.
Rather it causes a TP to be very cautious at the edges of an aircraft's performance, manoeuver and controllability envelopes. It's his job to set the edges of those envelopes with a bit of safety buffer to allow for inadvertant excursion beyond the edges of the nominated envelopes.

Compared with the Vulcan I found the Victor to feel a bit 'bendy' or delicate as though it would break easily with overstress. As a result I always instictively handled it with extra gentleness whereas the Vulcan felt like a fighter and one could readily manoeuvre through most of the aerobatics which did not involve negative g. The Valiant was a big bomb truck and flew like one.

Those descriptions are nothing like reports that a TP might make formally.

[RatherBeFlying]

As I recall, the goal of the Mt. Pleasant air raid was to deny the airfield to Argie fast jets, which could have made serious difficulties for the carrier force had they been able to base there.

That said, the Argentinians managed a nightly C-130 run with the help of radar to vector them well away from any Harriers.

The Argentinian radar operators proved quite clever as they knew when to hit the off button whenever a Shrike was about to drop in for a visit.

[Snakecharmer]

Wasn't the goal of the raid on Stanley to get the Argies to draw a circle, the centre of which was at Ascension, with Stanley on the circumference? Any circle thus drawn would take in the Argentinian mainland, thus encouraging the Argies to keep their AD assets back against the possibility of a V attack?

[Blacksheep]

Sorry to p1ss on your chips, but the only time a Vulcan ever bombed in anger Just a quick heads-up. The whole point of the 'V' Bomber force was never to need to drop a bomb. The threat was the thing - mutually assured destruction or MAD. That's why it was called the Deterrent force and we all (ground crew as well as those who flew them) did a pretty good job of making sure Europe stayed peaceful during the cold war...

... and we stroppy ex-'V'-force anti-heroes are always prepared to accept congratulations from grateful ex-civilians, down at the Rose and Crown. Or any other pub.

Make mine a 'Mickey Finn'. :ok:

[LTNman]

I did hear that the first person every to go supersonic facing backwards was a Victor crew member when the aircraft went Mach 1 in a shallow dive

[jh5speed]

Re barrel rolling.
At the Farnborough show where it was done, the TP responsible apparently said 'well the Avro 707 did it, and the Vulcan is just a big '707, so why shouldn't it?'


... and didn't the Boeing 707 prototype do a barrel roll too?

[Kermit 180]

http://www.aviationexplorer.com/707_roll_video.htm

Kerms :)

[Green Meat]

Just to return to the Falklands theme, I attended a lecture by Maj. Gen. Julian Thompson, senior commander with the RM forces. When asked for questions, and as the only blue suit in a sea of green, I felt beholden to ask about the contribution of the Vulcans. After a brief analysis of the actual damage caused by the Black Buck raids, Thompson waxed lyrical about the psychological impact of the Vulcan raids on the Argentinian troops and was highly complimentary about the use of airpower.

The rather young brown jobs sitting behind me could be heard to mutter "What's a Vulcan?" :)