This Supersonic Age
 

New to me full colour 1950's video including a splendid glossy All-Black Valiant

see here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-CTsFwJ9Sk

So which country was producing all those fantastic aicraft designs in the 1950's? They must have a really impressive aircraft industry by now...

:bored: Shall we now compare your lots 'firsts' with the USSR. Thought not.

Good link 'thawes'.

Loved the mass Jav scramble.....and that LOW pass from the Swift.
The black Valiant was the 'Black Bomber', which was one of the 3 original Valiant prototype's of which this was an advanced version, or B.2 and painted gloss black.
It was intended as a "pathfinder", penetrating to a target area at low level and marking it with flares for a follow-up strike by other bombers. The Air Ministry ordered 17 B.2s, including two prototypes and 15 operational aircraft, in April 1952. Only one was actually completed, flying for the first time in September 1953.
For center of gravity reasons, the B.2 featured a fuselage stretch forward of the wings for a total length of 34.8 meters (114 feet), in contrast to a length of 33 meters (108 feet 3 inches) for the Valiant B.1. Since the B.2 was intended for low-level operations, the wing was strengthened, which required rethinking the main landing gear. The B.2's main landing gear, featuring four wheels instead of two, retracted backwards into fairings called "speed pods" in the wings.
The Air Ministry eventually realized that target marking was an outdated concept. Although the Valiant B.2's low-level capabilities would later prove to be highly desireable, the B.2 program was cancelled in 1955. The B.2 prototype was used for tests for a few years, including evaluation of the tanker system, then incrementally destroyed in the humiliating role of "ballistic target" for ground gunnery.
And of course we all know what happened when the B.1 Valiants were moved over to the low-level role for which they were not designed for but the cancelled B.2 was.......spar fatique and withdrawn from service....:ugh:

Fantastic film but is it just me who has no sound with it??

No sound for me either. Wonder if it was shot with a camcorder in a cinema?
Great film though...

Oh to have been alive to see airshows like that. Laughed seeing the guys right next to the runway edge, best view I've had so far was from the top of a squadron minibus some years back (and about 700m from the display line:bored:)

Two's in asks;


"So which country was producing all those fantastic aicraft designs in the 1950's? They must have a really impressive aircraft industry by now... "

Actually, THAT country now has the 2nd largest Aerospace industry on the planet, your point?

Would you care to cite a source for that claim, pr00ne?

http://www.sbac.co.uk/community/news...p?n=2525&p=931

Ba boom!

So again, excellent that we have a really big Aerospace Industry (Aerospace Industry also includes the manufacters of barf bags and earplugs), but list all those successful (in terms of sales) British designed aircraft that are in production today or planned for the near future. Let's take out all the ones that were planned or designed more than about 20 years ago, (Nimrod, Harrier, Hawk, Merlin) but keep in all the commercial airliners where we do more than make an excellent wing set.

Just curious; As a soon-to-be AeroEng graduate I'm supposed to take an interest in these things ;)

pr00ne asks Two’s In what his point is
Without wishing to put words into Two’s In’s pen, my point would be to ask what that ‘2nd largest aerospace industry’ actually does in real aircraft terms.

That magnificent British Movietone film above was made at what we now know to have been the apogee of the British aviation industry (aerospace hadn’t been invented). That industry was clearly one of the great national aviation industries in the world, and it depended on extraordinary companies like Avro, Bristol, de Havilland, English Electric, Fairey, Folland, Gloster, Handley Page, Hawker, Percival, Shorts, Supermarine, Vickers, Westland.....

Over the decades, all of those companies except Westland eventually coalesced into one, which called itself British Aerospace. British Aerospace thus became the sole inheritor of a uniquely inspirational and successful aviation ethos. But the sad thing was that, by then, it was no longer building any whole aircraft on any scale, with the possible exception of Hawk. Everything else was collaborative. Some collaborations were highly successful - such as with Airbus, where British Aerospace became an important part of the amazing success story that took on the otherwise total American hegemony in the big airliner stakes.

But then British Aerospace changed its name to BAE Systems. Henceforth, refer to them as British Aerospace at your peril. That should have told us all we needed to know. The company was no longer interested in being the sole upholder of the great British aviation industry. It sold its stake in Airbus, and partly decamped to America, there to build fighting vehicles and guns and submarines. and other non-aviation stuff.

So now there are virtually no aircraft projects left from that once wonderful aviation industry, regardless of what the SBAC’s statistics tell you. Yes, I know you can point to the collaborative Typhoon and F-35 Lightning 2, and...... erm..... Nimrod MRA4. And of course Hawk, thank goodness for Hawk.

I believe we have sold our magnificent, uniquely inspirational aviation heritage down the river.

That’s my point, pr00ne. Sorry if it went on a bit.

airsound

Where we are now we can't do anything about, just enjoy those fantastic shots of beautiful aircraft, (apart from the Javelin).:{

Let's not forget the 'bullying' of previous British and Canadian governments by the USA to ensure cancellation of excellent aircraft such as the TSR2 and Avro Arrow.

Don't know why there is no sound, as the credits at the end give a narrator. If it was shot with a camcorder in a cinema, then surely that would record the sound also? Strange that Twenty Century Fox should be involved in such a short film on Farnborough that no one seems to have seen before? I only have footage of that show on DVD in b/w and would love to have a DVD of this with sound, of course. Looks like the air-to-air footage was taken from a Beverley, judging by the high tailplane.:D

Valiant B2
 

Does anyone know of any good still shots of the Valiant, like the one of the Victor in the 'just a picture' thread?.

Valiant main gear
 

I was looking at the main gear on the Valiant. The gear looked to me to be a 4-wheel bogie exactly like the main Vulcan gear, but folding up and retracting backwards into the wing instead of forwards.

Weren't the production versions twin tandem type swinging sidewards in an outward direction up into the wing?

Anyone know why it changed?

Excellent clip, by the way!

From 'Thunder and Lightning'. Do a Google. Or maybe this'll work

http://www.*************************...t/history.html

Great movie- thanks very much for posting it. Always had a soft spot for the Valiant- my uncle (ex RAF) gave me a model of one when I was about 8- remember carrying it home in the back of Dads cortina!

Ok, can't resist- fantasy airforce time? Always wondered about a high wing Nimrod variant with a couple of rotary cruise missile dispensers in an enlarged bomb bay, with a "Victor" style dropped nose containing a second missile bay full of self defense sidewinders/AMRAAMs etc...

Ok, I'll fetch my coat..:O