After the Spitfire?

[foxmoth]

In the Spitfire thread there are a few comments about which A/C people would most like to fly after the Spit.
Mine would be the Mossie, what would others like?
(Or the Hornet, to try the 'Zurakowski roll' - anyone know why it is known as a roll when it is really a double turn?)

[DOC.400]

If Jim could fix it for me, I have always wanted to do a catapult carrier take off and landing. What a blast!!!!

Although wouldn't mind getting hands on a Hercy bird for some fun.

[Flatus Veteranus]

Foxmoth

Zurakowski was a test pilot for the Gloster Aircraft Company in the '50s. Glosters produced a PV version of the Meteor F8 with rocket rails outboard of the engines, which they tried to sell as a FGA aircraft - without much success. "Zura" used to demonstrate this at Farnborough and elsewhere. His pièce-de résistancewas an astonishing maneouvre to which he gave his name - "The Zurakowski". The aircraft was pulled up into a vertical stall (as for a stall turn). Full power was applied as the speed fell off and, at the critical moment, an engine was cut on one side, full rudder applied, opposing aileron as for a stall turn and - with some luck - the aircraft could be induced to perform a perfect cartwheel through 360 degs and then recovered accurately into a vertical dive.
When I say "luck" I mean that you needed more than that! We never managed to replicate the manoeuvre in our T7s at CFS - we always spun off at about the 270 deg point. One of us phoned Zura and asked him why. "Ah, but you must 'ave ze rockets to build up momentum in ze yawing plane; you must 'ave ze big rudder to control ze yaw; and MOST IMPORTANT you MUST 'ave ze ejection zeat!"
A great man was "Zura" - in my book the prince of test pilots. Story has it that if he had been Chief TP instead of ATP at the appropriate time, the Javelin would never have had its tailplane grafted on and would have been a good aircraft.

PS I should add that, to develop the thrust needed to perform the manoeuvre, it had to be entered at quite low altitude. Spin recovery in the Meteor was straightforward, but consumed a fair amount of height. Even with the bang-seat (Mk 1), Zura was sticking his neck out and could not really afford to screw up.

[ 30 December 2001: Message edited by: Flatus Veteranus ]</p>

[henry crun]

FV, re Meteor spinning. Do you why it was not practised, even dual, at AFS ?, it was a big no no. Consequently stories grew about non recovery etc.

I did my first one on joining 29 with an ex trapper named Gus Devillez and afterwards wondered what all the fuss was about.

[foxmoth]

The version of the Zurakowski roll I had seen
( only on paper) was a stall turn followed by opening up on one engine to go the OPPOSITE way to the vertical, was this ever performed or just the commplete circle described? Also understood it was first done in the Hornet (Later version of the Mossie).

[henry crun]

Foxmoth, I am quite sure that the only maneouvre of this type was the one well described by FV above.
Also that Zurakowski was the only pilot to do so and that only on the special Meteor 8.

I have also never heard of it described as a roll, I think this is another case of something being misnamed by someone who had never seen it.

[Flatus Veteranus]

Henry Crun

Re spinning the Meatbox. I think it depended on your dates at AFS. There was no spinning when I went through Driffield in '51. It was introduced to the syllabus (dual only) sometime during my time at Middleton (52-53) and became the bee in the CFS trappers' bonnet. I never understood why, because it was very difficult to spin a Meatbox inadvertently. In a vertical stall you held everything firmly central - firmly because the stick wanted to thrash around in a hammerhead stall. The trappers had commented adversely on the 208 pilots' spin recovery technique just before I joined the squadron early in '54. Although I was supposed to be a flight comander (and not Sqn QFI), I was "joed" to check everyone out in the T7 and spun myself stupid for my first week on the Squadron. Standard drill was to enter above 20,000 ft, power off, bootful of rudder and stick hard back at about 120 KIAS. The dear old thing did a sort of barrel roll, hesitated and waffled around a bit, and then the nose went down and a quite sedate rate of spin built up. Recovery was full opposite rudder, pause, and then firmly and progressively forward with the stick with neutral aileron (although this was not as critical as on some swept wing types). Too harsh a forward movement of the stick could rock the aircraft into an inverted spin. I had this shown to me by a rather arrogant trapper on their next visit, although it was contrary to MODFOs. Trouble was, on recovery from the inverted spin, the aircraft got into an inverted spiral - not funny. IAS and neg "g" built up very quickly and I started to "red out". We rolled out of it below 5,000 ft with one engine flamed out and both of us badly shaken. A brand new T7 was overstressed and never flew nicely again.
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