Ideas that worked, ideas that didn't...

[Thud_and_Blunder]

I was reading the A400 thread, and Suit made the following observation:

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" size="2">In my day there was a proposal to fit the Lockheed C-141 Starlifter wing with Rolls Royce engines to a Belfast fuselage as a GENUINE turbofan powered strategic transport for the RAF.</font>

This reminded me of the way the RAF/RN had to have their original F4s redesigned to take Speys and various other goodies, while the WAH64 needs a Euro-donk. Daftest idea I remember seeing was when the RAF first looked at buying the Chinook; a Flight mag from the mid-60s showed how British industry proposed fitting it with a 4-Gnome arrangement, making it look like a fling-wing VC10.

The Brits aren't the only ones guilty of this. The cousins took Canberras and did strange things to them, whilst the Sovs took a stray B29 and persuaded comrade Tupolev to make clones, right down to the unexplained little gadgets and gizmos that had no apparent use.

So, what's the best/strangest/daftest not-invented-here idea you've ever seen in the military?

[L J R]

I was particularly happy with Orv and Wilbur's 'Flying Machine' made from bicycle parts. No future in it really.....

[Archimedes]

Ooh, several possibilities in the great ideas that never quite made itcategory:

1. The VTOL pad from which one of the initial designs for TSR 2 was meant to leap above the trees (P.17D, was it?)
2. Both the tail-sitting fighters dsigned in the US(the Pogo and the Salmon).
3. The nuclear hand grenade. Yes, someone did run with this idea until:
Squaddie 'And how does Sir expect me to get TF out of the way of the blast?'
Sir: 'Ah. Er....Um....'

[Blue Stuff]

1. The rubber deck trialled by Eric 'Winkle' Brown in the '50s, as a means of recovering jet aircraft to carriers. The idea was that the landing gear could be removed, providing more room for fuel. A DH Vampire was used for trials, and landed on its belly on said rubber deck, with assistance from an arrestor hook. Produced some interesting footage!

2. Anything designed by Bohm und Voss in 1945.

3. Those peculiar gyrating machines which Igor Sikorsky experimented with for years; they'll never fly ...

Blue.


[This message has been edited by Blue Stuff (edited 19 June 2001).]

[newshound]

http://www.edwards.af.mil/gallery/html_pgs/images/bomber/yb49_072.jpg

[Gainesy]

Not sure if these are good, bad or just wacky:


1]That hydraulic davit/crane thing that Heinz Frick (I think) proposed to grab on to Shars so they could be operated from small ships.

2]"Travelator" type cockpit floor in the Tu-95. Roll out of seat onto floor & it dumps you through the escape hatch.(Yes, Really).

3] That idea of hanging three Gnats, each with a bucket of sunshine, under a Vulcan to use as manned stand-off delivery systems. High-morale job there then.

[Grey Area]

The worst of both worlds!
http://trc.dfrc.nasa.gov/gallery/photo/X-Wing/Small/EC87-0271-001.jpg

[Stress Snake]

Ideas that didn't:

2 Gp
MAMS

Ooh I'm going straight to hell for that!

[Jozza]

There was once this wonderful contraption called the "Sky Car".

http://lava.larc.nasa.gov/MOVIES/THUMB/LV-1998-00125.jpeg

There is a spectacular movie clip of it at http://lava.larc.nasa.gov/MOVIES/MEDIUM/LV-1998-00125.mov
It consisted of what looks like an extremely heavy chassis and engine driving the forerunner of a rotor blade. Needless to say it never got off the ground, it just bounced around a lot. Some poor bug*er it actually sitting in it, and by the looks of things, he was lucky to escape with his head still attached. :)

[Up Very Gently]

Commissioned Navigators.... http://www.pprune.org/ubb/NonCGI/tongue.gif

[Blue Stuff]

Gainesy,

Ref. your point 3: what a wonderful idea - it would give chopped studes a chance to excel! :)

Blue.


[This message has been edited by Blue Stuff (edited 21 June 2001).]

[attackattackattack]

I'm sure I heard once that the Soviet Union was experimenting with Helicopter ejector seats. If this wasn't dodgy enough I think they were connected to explosive bolts on the rotor roots.

[This message has been edited by attackattackattack (edited 20 June 2001).]

[Tobbes]

attack cubed,

Yes, the Ka-50 HOKUM does indeed have an ejector seat . . . which would make life interesting!

Tobbes

[John Nichol]

Does the Hokum have ejection seats? I thought the idea was binned. I did see some fantastic footage of testing helicopter ejection seats though. It was fully automated with the rotors being blown off in sequence and then the seats going out. Pretty impressive though a touche dodgy if a bolt didn't blow.

If I remember correctly the lower 2 seats in the B52 are downward ejecting? which might be interesting.

[ragspanner]

I believe the spams did a lot of work with helicopter ejector seats around the time of the Vietnam war .The seat sequencing & rotor blade removal were overcome,apparently some 'poof' thought it might not be a 'fun' thing to be happening in the midst of a large rotary wing formation !.
PS. Did'nt the Sov' Navy have a VTO a/c (powered by 4 hoover motors & 2 stroke,Hormone ?) with auto -eject ?. The Harrier GR3 had side slip dets that activated rudder pedal shakers at 4-6 degrees 'ish, in the Red Harrier you would be launched !

[This message has been edited by ragspanner (edited 20 June 2001).]

[Man-on-the-fence]

Rags

It was the Forger. If I knew the official designation I would be a spotter :)

[Archimedes]

Yak-38 or Yak 36MP, wasn't it? http://www.stopstart.fsnet.co.uk/smilie/spotter.gif

JN, yes the downward ejector seats on the B-52 were interesting (but possibly offered a little more chance than the rear crew of V-bombers had?), but I'd have thought that the downward firers on the F-104 could have been marginally more alarming....

[snaggletooth]

The idea for the non-winch equipped Belvedere to extract troops from jungle clearings.

A platform would be lowered to the troops upon which they would place themselves & their kit. Once troops secure the aircraft crewmen would start shovelling ballast into containers connected to the other end of the lowering ropes. Once the weight of the ballast was greater than the weight of the troops... QED.

Reminds me of a Hoffnung story regarding a builder & his barrel :)

The above system was trialled, in the 60s I think, but never used in anger.

------------------
Lend me £10, I'll buy you a drink & Mother wake me early in the morning...

[Thud_and_Blunder]

Good stuff so far.

I was hoping the thread might throw up a few more instances where something that worked in the place of origin was changed by new users for rational or other reasons.

In the heli world, you have the example of the original Huey which, when produced by Agusta as the AB204, had a monstrous carbuncle appended to the rear of the cabin to hold a RR Gnome. Why did they feel they had to change it from the well-proven/highly dependable T53 (which they then used in the AB205s)?

The Brits took the S58/H34 and initially shoved a Napier Gazelle in the front - arguably an improvement, as at least the cab presented less of a fire risk by using AVCAT, not AVGAS. However, the AVPIN used to start the bloody thing probably outweighed this particular advantage. Perhaps that's why they then shoved in 2 licence-built T58s (that Gnome again..), angled down toward the ground like 2 blinking great vacuum cleaners and necessitating yet more weight/CofG malarkey with the vastly over-engineered nose doors. And how about that ship-towing bracket - I've seen the photo of Walter pulling a Ton-class vessel, but why?

We could also re-open the old saga about the US forcing NATO around 1951 to abandon the winning 7mm cartridge - 'cos it was too puny (or too European...) - then unilaterally going for the even teenier 5.56mm.

Got any more?

[Chinese Vic]

How about replacing a fantastic aircraft with a bomb bay that could carry 4 ASMs and could sit 20 feet above the water at 500+kts , with a converted Eurojet that could only carry two missiles more slowly not so low or so far?

[newshound]

A self-righting ejection seat, as shown in this China Lake test:

http://www.nawcwd.navy.mil/~bronkhor/clmf/images/pro-ject.JPG

[Cyclic Hotline]

Sikorsky installed ejection seats into their ground test S61 for installation in the S-72. The ejection sequence commenced with the explosive bolts on the blades; if I recall correctly it fired 3 blades followed milli-seconds later by the remaining two. I have seen video of this system in action, blades off, crew through the sklights!

The KA-50 Hokum does have ejection seats installed; http://www.army-technology.com/projects/ka50/index.html

That sorry looking AB-204, has a direct descendant in the US military arsenal. The UH-1F was a T-58 powered variant operated only by the US Airforce. The Pope used to have an AB-204, but he got rid of it. Not very confidence inspiring that, is it!

Two of my personal favourites were;

The external pax seats for the Kaman K-max! ;)

The JATO braked C-130 test flown for hostage recovery. Fired the bottles on finals and burned to the ground on landing. WOW.

[This message has been edited by Cyclic Hotline (edited 21 June 2001).]

[TqNrT4NgGreenlightCWP]

How about that F-111 Cockpit ejection module - always wondered what the FRC drill was for 'FIRE IN FLIGHT - COCKPIT'. Nothing quite like taking the emergency with you!

And another story worth repeating was the flying club bar, when the discussion was along the lines of this thread. Bright young thing asks the club's oldest member what he thought was the best invention he had seen in his flying years. after considering this weighty matter, he replied "Ailerons. We used to warp the wings, you know..."

[Blue Stuff]

What about the time-honoured tale of NASA's quest to develop a pen which would write under zero-G conditions? Millions of dollars and months of research resulted in a sophisticated gas-pressurised pen.

Meanwhile, the Russians thought long and hard ... and decided to use a pencil.

Today, NASA's pen resides in the 'Innovations' catalogue, alongside the solar-powered torch and the submersible hairdryer. I guess they're still trying to recoup some of their costs. :)

Blue.

[Gainesy]

Ref. T&B's comment on the re-engineering of the RAF/RN Phantoms with R-R Speys, I remember a quite senior RAFG mate (whose name escapes me) saying "Anybody knows that if you spey a bitch it's arse gets bigger and it slows it down".

[oldbeefer]

The RAF's decision to pay aerospatial to remove the 5th tank from the Brit Pumas only to bemoan the lack of range for the next31 years! By the way T&B, welcome back cobber.

[cheese]

Female aircrew
(fair enough, I guess they used to be called air defenders)

[nosefirsteverytime]

http://www.edwards.af.mil/gallery/html_pgs/images/bomber/yb49_072.jpg

Ladies and gentlemen, the first stealth bomber (and to think they've found a way to detect them using mobile phone waves! Dunno whether to piss myself worrying or piss myself luaghing!)

[nosefirsteverytime]

Here's a pic of that Herc that was supposed to get those guys in Iran

http://www.theaviationzone.com/images/hercules/other/bin-1/ymc130h_01

verti-herk! :)

[This message has been edited by nosefirsteverytime (edited 22 June 2001).]

[nosefirsteverytime]

BUGGER!

oh well, here's the link (I hope!)http://www.theaviationzone.com/images/hercules/other/bin-1/ymc130h_01.jpg

[mr hanky]

Re the F-111 escape module - the drill for "Fire in the Cockpit" was to smother it with the navigator...but seriously, it was nice knowing that you wouldn't be turned inside-out by an 800kt ejection, and that when you landed (rather firmly by all accounts)you'd have a ready-made survival shelter or boat (with bilge pump - another job for the nav...)

[This message has been edited by mr hanky (edited 25 June 2001).]