The USAF 1960s programme that led to the F-15 was won by McDonnell Douglas, but other fighter design houses had offered rival concepts. The most exciting of these unsuccessful designs was offered by North American, and was designated NA-335. In many ways its configuration resembled the later Sukhoi T-10. The Sukhoi T-10, after much modification, became the now ubiquitous ‘Flanker’ series. The American design differed in two significant ways: it lacked the gap between the engine nacelles, and it had only a single vertical fin.

The ventral gully produces complicated airflows and can offer some separation issues for air-launched weapons, but it does allow the rear fuselage to add significantly to overall lifting area contributing to the fighter’s performance. The 335’s single-tail (backed up by large ventral fins) would have made the aircraft inferior to a twin-tailed aircraft like the F-15 in controllability at high alpha, but it would have been lighter and simpler. However, the ‘335s significant leading edge roots would have aided its ability to generate high alpha angles. Even with folding, it is harder to see how the large ventral fins would not necessitate a very tall stalky undercarriage.

The sabre-shaped wings are particularly interesting – they feature similar wingtip curvature to the T-10, potentially causing issues at high transonic speeds and ruling out the use of tip-mounted missiles.

Keep this blog alive!

To keep this blog going- allowing us to create new articles- we need donations. We’re trying to do something different with Hush-Kit: give aviation fans something that is both entertaining, surprising and well-informed. Please do help us and click on the donate button above – you can really make a difference (suggested donation £10). You will keep us impartial and without advertisers – and allow us to carry on being naughty.

What was the most combat effective piston-engined fighter ever made? An analysis can be found here.

The Hush-Kit Book of Warplanes is incredible, come and check out its reviews here.

Follow my vapour trail on Twitter: @Hush_kit

Here’s a very quick guide to some interesting books for aviation enthusiasts.

Ultimate Fighter: Lockheed Martin F-35 Joint Strike Fighter

Bill Sweetman (2004)

Superbly well-researched and wonderfully readable, this book has also aged extremely well. Sweetman’s deep understanding of the subject and his clarity of thought makes this a must-have for those interested in modern military aviation.

Flight to Arras 

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1942)

Probably the only masterpiece of literature that tells the true story of a single Bloch MB.170 reconnaissance mission. This haunting book details the thoughts of a man who has watched the destruction of his nation, as he flies a pointless – and likely suicidal – mission.

A Passion for Wings: Aviation and the Western Imagination, 1908-1918

Robert Wohl (1996)

This book looks at how the arrival of the aeroplane affected the Arts in the West. Though a trifle dry in places it is full of extremely interesting images and accounts. When originally released it was favourably reviewed by no less a figure than J.G. Ballard.

What was the most combat effective piston-engined fighter ever made? An analysis can be found here.

You may also enjoy top WVR and BVR fighters of today, an alternate history of the TSR.2, an interview with a Super Hornet pilot and a Pacifist’s Guide to Warplanes. Want something more bizarre? The Top Ten fictional aircraft is a fascinating read, as is the The Strange Story and The Planet Satellite. The Fashion Versus Aircraft Camo is also a real cracker.

Follow my vapour trail on Twitter: @Hush_kit

When music is terrible the artist will often describe it as ‘experimental’ to avoid criticism, the same is often true of prototypes and experimental aircraft. Given the parade of ludicrous machinery that test pilots were required to fly, the long career of Captain Eric ‘Winkle’ Brown is all the more remarkable. Test pilots deserve everyone’s respect.

To keep this blog going- allowing us to create new articles- we need donations. We’re trying to do something different with Hush-Kit: give aviation fans something that is both entertaining, surprising and well-informed. Please do help us and click on the donate button above – you can really make a difference (suggested donation £10). You will keep us impartial and without advertisers – and allow us to carry on being naughty.  A big thank you to all of our readers.

11. SNECMA C.450 Coléoptère

‘Roll out le barrel’

The ‘Beetle’ was based on an idea that would be politely referred to as unorthodox, and never looked like actually working. It barely had any features that weren’t radical – a VTOL (vertical take-off and landing) jet designed to sit on its tail and transition to level flight courtesy of an annular wing, making Thunderbird 1 look conventional. It resembled an eel sticking its head out of a sunken galleon’s cannon.

A few vertical flights were made but on the first tentative attempt to transition to level flight, the Coléoptère became uncontrollable and the pilot, Auguste Morel, was forced to eject, sustaining serious injuries in so doing. The Coléoptère really put the mental into experimental.

(Top 10 jumpjet fighters here)

10. Supermarine 508/525

‘Unwheelistic’

After the Beetle, the Supermarine 508 appears almost conventional. In fact, in some respects, like its straight wing, it was old hat. Like its near contemporary it was the product of several evolutionary dead-ends, so much so that it is remarkable that it eventually spawned an operational aircraft. The 508 was designed as a response to the questionable idea that the undercarriage of naval aircraft should be dispensed with, and that they should instead be catapulted into the air and land on a giant mattress. The aircraft was also intended to be armed an enormous recoilless gun that fired massive shells – and threw out a weight of equal mass behind it to compensate for the kickback. It also required the aircraft containing it to be huge, and have a butterfly tail to avoid losing the tail the when the gun was fired. This straight-winged behemoth was expected to be supersonic, thanks to thin aerofoils. Even the Admiralty quickly realised that wheel-less aircraft firing artillery shells at Soviet bombers was not the way forward. Rather than doing the sensible thing and scrapping the 508, the design was pursued with retractable undercarriage- the extra bulk of which meant it was now definitely subsonic. Straight wings being so ‘40s, it was redesigned with swept surfaces and a cruciform tail, and redesignated the Type 525. The latter flew for less than a year before it crashed, killing test pilot Lieutenant Commander TA Rickell. It was developed into the Supermarine Scimitar, and probably shouldn’t have been.

Ten worst British aircraft here

9. Convair F2Y Sea Dart

‘Special porpoise fighter’

The Convair F2Y Sea Dart was one of a string of attempts to create a fighter aircraft that could operate directly from water. The Sea Dart was probably the most ambitious, attempting to create a supersonic fighter that could also land and take-off from water. Unlike conventional floatplanes and flying boats, however, the F2Y was intended to take off and land using ‘hydro-skis’ which extended from the underside of the aircraft to form a planing bottom. Various layouts were tried as the effects of ‘tramping’ (fierce bouncing on waves or water surfaces) almost broke the back of a test pilot. These problems solved, various aerodynamic problems were coming to light, but a demonstration flight was planned for dignitaries over San Diego Bay anyway. As the pilot, Charles E. Richbourg, lined up for a high-speed pass, he lit the afterburners, which triggered violent pitching, causing the airframe to break up in mid air. And that was the end of the aircraft, the concept and, sadly, the pilot.

8. Qaher F-313 

‘The Plastic Persian’

Everything about the Qaher F-313 is spectacularly incompetent, not least the very obviousness of the fact that it is not a real aeroplane. It is supposedly a stealthy fighter aircraft prototype developed by the Iranian state aviation organisation. It is in reality a mock-up of something that looks vaguely like a stealth fighter, presumably for ‘domestic propaganda’. “The advanced aircraft with an advanced appearance has a very small radar cross section and is capable of operating and flying in low-altitude,” said Iranian defence minister Brigadier-General Ahmad Vahidi. Which is presumably true, on the basis that radars would have difficulty picking up a chipboard model aircraft sitting on the ground, and it is pretty much only capable of operating a low altitude, on the basis that it doesn’t fly. If it could fly, according to a long queue of industry experts, its thick wing and odd fixed canards would light up radar scopes like Christmas trees, just before the nozzle-less jet engine melted the rear half of the aircraft – as long as it had not attempted any high-alpha manoeuvres, in which case the engine would already have flamed out. In any case, enemies would have plenty of time to prepare given the 260 knot maximum speed suggested by the ‘prototype’ aircraft’s airspeed indicator. The comic ineptitude continued with the Minister of Defence insisting a video released to the world’s press featured a flying demonstration of the prototype, while the designer admitted that the footage actually featured a small-scale model. Which was the only honest thing about the whole bizarre episode. At least no-one died (assuming the designer hasn’t suffered an ‘accident’).

7. Stipa-Caproni

‘Tigermoth in the the belly of a whale’

File under W, T and F. There are bad ideas that seem good at the time. The Stipa-Caproni ‘(Barely) Flying Barrel’ was one of the other kind. In the early 1930s, Luigi Stipa developed the idea that blowing an aircraft’s propeller through a duct running the length of the fuselage would increase the propeller’s efficiency. Caproni was compelled by the fascist government to build an aircraft to Stipa’s principles. The result was a bizarre fat tube with tiny wings that looked from the side like the ugliest cartoon aircraft ever, and from the front, like an accident involving a Miles Magister and a length of water main. To Stipa’s credit, it did fly, but very slowly, as any increase in propeller efficiency from the duct was more than offset by the drag of the huge fuselage. It was also found to be very stable – so much so that it could more or less only fly in a straight line. Stipa later complained that the jet engine was ripped off from his ideas. On the plus side, it wasn’t fatal – indeed, it would be pretty hard to injure yourself at the speeds the Stipa-Caproni flew.

6. Bristol 188

‘Filton Failure’

The 1962 Bristol 188 is undoubtedly an attractive aircraft and was rather fast, briefly hitting an oddly appropriate top speed of Mach 1.88. A shame then that it fell completely and utterly short of what it had been designed to do, which was fly at speeds above Mach 2.6 for sustained periods. The Type 188 was conceived to research heat build-up in airframes at high supersonic speeds, as this was feared to be a limiting factor for some of the very fast military aircraft then on the drawing board. Three were built, at fabulous expense, from (very heavy) stainless steel, assembled with specially developed welding techniques, with an exotic cockpit refrigeration system and fused quartz canopy, all intended to resist the high skin temperatures the aircraft was expected to meet and never did. Unfortunately, Bristol forgot about fuel tankage. Even with de Havilland Gyron Junior engines that were less thirsty than the originally planned RR Avons, the 188 could barely stay in the air for 25 minutes, and could not get near its intended speed. Despite this, it was the most expensive British research project to date. An embarrassing dud, not redeemed by muttered excuses about providing data for Concorde’s development. At least everyone who flew it survived.

5. Douglas X-3 Stiletto

‘Jetship dominatrix’

Like the Bristol 188, the Stiletto was designed for fantastic speeds and was completely incapable of reaching them. Douglas had a proud history of high-speed research aircraft in the late 1940s, with the Mach 1 (just) D-558-1 and the superb Mach 2 D-558-2. The X-3, intended for an airframe-scorching 2,000mph, looked as if it was going that fast sitting on the ground. In fact, it could only just exceed Mach 1, and only then in a dive. Much of the blame can be laid at the door of the engines – Douglas realised during the design phase that the J46s they intended to fit had grown too large and too heavy during the powerplant’s development, and had little choice but to fit smaller J34s of lower power. By the time the X-3 flew, in 1953, it was obvious that it was useless for high speed research. A few flights by Air Force pilots were made, and a few more to test the stability of the aircraft’s layout, during which it was discovered that the aircraft suffered from ‘inertia coupling’ at supersonic speeds, a phenomenon that led to control inputs in one axis leading to violent, unintended movements in other axes. The X-3 would have been useful investigating this phenomenon, as the Air Force was starting to lose F-100 Super Sabres to the condition. Unfortunately, NACA pilot Joseph Walker was making a test flight when a particularly harsh pitching movement overstressed the airframe. Much is made these days of X-3 data helping the F-104 programme, but it’s hard to see how much could have been provided as only 51 flights were made, and those of necessarily short duration.

4. DFS 346

‘DFS Sale now on!’

As the Second World War lumbered to a close, Germany’s aircraft designers realised that the main frontline fighters were based on 1930s designs and erupted into a frenzy of creativity, churning out new concepts and forms like there was no nazi tomorrow. One of these was the DFS 346, dreamed up before the company sensibly realised its limits and went into furniture sales. The 346 was intended to go supersonic before anyone was really sure what supersonic flight was all about. As such it had a highly swept wing and carried the pilot in a glass nose in a prone position, which it was thought would help him remain conscious at high speeds, or possibly pretend to be Superman. A partially complete example was taken back to the Soviet Union after the war, and wind-tunnel tests revealed dangerous aerodynamic flaws. The Soviets – with their characteristic lack of prissiness – decided to test it anyway. On the first, gliding, flight, test pilot Wolfgang Ziese barely retained control of the wayward 346, descended too fast and smashed his face on the canopy on landing. Unpowered research continued until 1951, some three years after a Russian-designed aircraft had gone supersonic. Finally, powered tests were carried out, whereupon all control was lost and Ziese bailed out. The 346 may at least have contributed to Soviet supersonic research, though probably not much, and its chief benefit was likely to have been in persuading the Soviets that flying face-first at high speeds was not a good idea (though Winkle Brown noted this position had some advantages). Its pilot survived, which is a point very much in its favour, though not unscathed.

Read ‘Dismantling the Spitfire myth‘ here

3. Bell X-5

‘Nazi swinger’

Taking an aircraft designed during the super-advanced ‘Luft ‘46’ phase of WW2 and adding ‘50s US high technology? What could possibly go wrong? In the late 1940s, Bell, builders of the first supersonic aircraft, came by a German prototype with some unusual features. The jet-powered research aircraft Messerschmitt P.1101 recovered from Oberammergau by advancing US troops had wings that could have their sweep angle adjusted on the ground. Bell decided to go one better and develop the P.1101 with wings that could vary their sweep in the air. The result was a machine with a stall so vicious that one false move would lead to a spin that could not be recovered from, perhaps unsurprising given the tiny tail surfaces. Nevertheless, it took two years and 200 flights before the apparently inevitable crash happened, tragically with the loss of pilot Captain Ray Popson. The US government quietly dropped plans to tart up the design and sell it as a low cost fighter to NATO countries, but was able to claim that research into variable geometry had been useful.

2. Christmas Bullet

‘Christmas whoppers’

The designer of the 1919 Christmas Bullet, Dr William Whitney Christmas, was such a liar and fantasist that in some respects it’s a wonder that he actually went to the trouble of building an aeroplane at all, rather than just telling people he had. In fact, Christmas seemed to have persuaded his backers to finance him on the basis of two previous aircraft that there is no evidence ever existed. The Bullet, most definitely did, though most of the claims its owner made for it – that it was the world’s first cantilever-wing aeroplane, that it was the first with a plywood monococque construction, that it was in any way airworthy – proved false. ‘Bullet’ was, though, an apt name for a projectile that invariably harmed anyone it came into contact with. Christmas managed to find funding to build two ‘proof of concept’ aircraft to demonstrate his ‘ideas’ of a deliberately flexible wing inspired by those of birds, and tepid support from the US Army, which leant an engine for ground-testing and the services of a test-pilot, Cuthbert Mills. A flight was attempted in the first aircraft, whereupon the wings peeled off during take-off and the aircraft crashed, killing Mills. Christmas claimed that the aircraft had reached a speed of 197mph. A second aircraft was built, and a propeller issued by the Army, despite the loaned engine having been destroyed during the unauthorised flight as Christmas had kept this secret. The second aircraft also crashed, also fatally. Christmas was still trying to sue people for claiming the aircraft had killed its pilots as late as 1930, and insisted the aircraft had reached a speed of 222mph. Fraudulent and lethal, the Christmas Bullet only avoids the top spot on the basis that few people (still too many) took it particularly seriously at the time.

1. Republic XF-84H

‘Noisecorvette’

The Republic XF-84H combined terrible (and bizarre) characteristics with a conceptual dead-end, and a shabbily run programme; it is clearly the winner. Jet engines of the time had poor acceleration and endurance,  so the earlier F-84 was redesigned around an Allison T40 twin linked turboprop driving a highly unorthodox propeller designed to revolve at supersonic speeds (conventional propellers lose efficiency as the speed of their blades approaches Mach 1), and an afterburner on its jet exhaust. As such, it was designed to be the fastest propeller driven aircraft in the world, at about 670mph, and the Guinness Book of Records gave the XF-84H some credibility by claiming this record for the aircraft in 1997. Guinness was wrong. The vibration of the propeller shaft and uncontrollable snaking in flight meant that the aircraft probably failed to exceed 450mph, and even piston-engined propeller aircraft have gone much faster than this. To add insult to injury, the supersonic propeller was so loud that it could be heard 25 miles away. Close up, the horrific howl caused headaches and nausea, and an engineer and a crew chief both experienced violent fits triggered by the sound. Edwards AFB made the test crews tow the aircraft a long distance out into Rogers dry lake before testing the engine. Twelve flights were made from 1955, all by Republic test pilots – eleven by Hank Beaird (ten of which were cut short due to some technical problem or other) and one by Lin Hendrix, who threatened to fight anyone who made him fly the aircraft again. The only flights made were the manufacturer’s proving programme, and it’s tempting to conclude that this was only completed to avoid financial penalties. No USAF pilot flew the ‘Thunderscreech’. It would probably have killed someone – possibly from the noise alone – if its pilots hadn’t refused to fly it, or the USAF not seen sense and belatedly cancelled the programme.

Dedicated to the memory of Eric ‘Winkle’ Brown

What was the most combat effective piston-engined fighter ever made? An analysis can be found here.

You may also enjoy top WVR and BVR fighters of today, an alternate history of the TSR.2, an interview with a Super Hornet pilot and a Pacifist’s Guide to Warplanes. Want something more bizarre? The Top Ten fictional aircraft is a fascinating read, as is the The Strange Story and The Planet Satellite. The Fashion Versus Aircraft Camo is also a real cracker.

Follow my vapour trail on Twitter: @Hush_kit

Matthew Willis is a writer and journalist specialising in naval aviation. He is the biographer of A&AEE and Fairey test pilot Duncan Menzies. His book on the Fairey Barracuda will be out later this year.

 

If you want something done slowly, expensively and possibly very well, you go to the British. While Britain created the immortal Spitfire, Lancaster and Edgley Optica, it also created a wealth of dangerous, disgraceful and diabolical designs. These are just ten plucked from a shortlist of thirty.  In defining ‘worst’- we’ve looked for one, or a combination, of the following: design flaws, conceptual mistakes, being extremely dangerous, being unpleasant to fly, or obsolete at the point of service entry (and the type must have entered service). Grab a cup of tea, and prepare for ire as you read about ten machines they wanted your dad, grandad or great grandad to fly to war.

Help Hush-Kit to remain independent by donating here. Donations enable us to carry on creating unusual and engaging articles.

10. Blackburn Beverley

 

 

9. Supermarine Scimitar

Take an aircraft so dangerous that is statistically more likely than not to crash over a twelve year period- and arm it with a nuclear bomb. Prior to this, ensure one example crashes and kills its first Commanding Officer, in front of the press. There you have the Scimitar. Extremely maintenance heavy, an inferior fighter to the Sea Vixen and a worse bomber than the Buccaneer; the Scimitar was certainly not Joe Smith’s finest moment. It was the last FAA aircraft designed with an obsolete requirement to be able to make an unaccelerated carrier take-off, and as a result had to have a thicker and larger wing than would otherwise be required. Only once did a Scimitar ever make an unassisted take-off, with a very light fuel load and no stores, and then just to prove that it could be done

‘Vixen vapour rub’

The Royal Navy’s Sea Vixen fighters were death traps. 145 Sea Vixens were built, of these 37.93%.were lost over the type’s twelve-year operational life. More than half of the incidents were fatal. The Sea Vixen entered service in 1959 (despite a first flight eight years earlier), two years later than the US Navy’s Vought F-8 Crusader. The F-8 was more than twice as fast as the Sea Vixen, despite having 3,000Ibs less thrust. The development of the Sea Vixen had been glacial. The specification was issued in 1947, initially for an aircraft to serve both the FAA and the RAF. The DH.110 prototype first flew in 1951, and one crashed at the Farnborough the following year. This slowed down the project, which was then put on hold as the DH and the RN focused on the alternative DH.116 ‘Super Venom’. Once the project became prioritised again, it was substantially redesigned to fully navalise it. Then when the Royal Navy gave a firm commitment, it requested a radar with a bigger scanner and several other time-consuming modifications. All of which meant it arrived way too late- its peer, the F-8 remained in frontline service until 2000, its other contemporary, the F-4, remains in service today- the Sea Vixen retired in 1972. Fifty-one Royal Navy aircrew were killed flying the Sea Vixen.

4. Saro Lerwick

‘Fat boy swim’

Despite possessing a decidedly cuddly aesthetic the Lerwick was a killer, difficult to handle in the air or on the water and a miserable combat aircraft. Recommended to be scrapped in 1939, the Lerwicks were pressed into service due to the lack of any alternative and of 21 built, 11 were lost, 10 in accidents and one simply disappeared. Its main problems were the old chestnuts of lack of power coupled with an inexplicable lack of stability. The Lerwick could not be flown hands-off, a serious flaw for a long range patrol aircraft nor could it maintain height on one engine. It was prone to porpoising on landing and take off and possessed a vicious stall. Added to this structural concerns (the floats regularly broke off) and a woefully unreliable hydraulic system and it is amazing that the diminishing number of Lerwicks managed to remain in use until the end of 1942.

 

3. Blackburn Botha

‘Botharation’

 

Another great Blackburn design, the Botha was damned from a chronic lack of power. Its poor performance meant it was never to enter service in its primary role as a torpedo bomber. Had that been all it would have been nothing worse than an obscure mediocrity but Blackburn had cleverly made it extremely difficult to actually see out of the aircraft except dead ahead. This posed something of an issue for an aircraft now intended for reconnaissance and the Botha was supplanted by the Anson, which it had been supposed to replace. Passed to training units the Botha’s vicious handling traits conspired with its underpowered nature to produce a fantastic amount of accidents. Yet somehow it soldiered on until 1944 and a terrifying 580 were built.

 

2. Blackburn Roc

‘Death metal Roc’

The Roc was a fairly innocuous flying machine, however as an example of the wrong concept applied to the wrong airframe to produce a useless combat aircraft it is hard to beat. The ‘turret fighter’ that was so inexplicably popular in Britain just before the war was most memorably realised in the Boulton Paul Defiant, an extremely well-designed machine (considering) that did surprisingly well given that it had to lug around a draggy, heavy turret to no good purpose. The Roc by contrast was lumbered with a massively over-engineered airframe – a legacy of its being derived from a dive bomber – had a less powerful engine and was over 100 mph slower. How an aircraft that could not attain 200mph was expected to survive, let alone fight, in 1940 is one of the enduring mysteries of the early war period, as is the fact that its only confirmed ‘kill’ was a Ju 88, one of the world’s fastest bombers.

1. Blackburn ‘Twin Blackburn’ or ‘TB’

‘The conjoined flip-flop’

Apparently named after a disease, the TB was a bad aircraft that could not perform the one task it was designed for and thus set a precedent for many Blackburn designs to come. The Twin Blackburn nevertheless saw service for a year or so before it was finally put out of its misery and all nine examples were scrapped. Intended to destroy Zeppelins, the floatplane TB was supposed to climb above them and drop explosive Ranken darts on any insolent dirigibles foolish enough to approach its precious airspace. Unfortunately, the poor underpowered Twin Blackburn was unable to drag itself to airship operating altitude, even after its deadly cargo of explosive darts had been cut by two thirds. Furthermore the structure, which consisted of nothing more complicated than a couple of B.E.2 fuselages lashed together with a new set of wings and a vast amount of hope triumphing over experience, was not very rigid and the action of warping the wings flexed the poor TB so much it could end up turning in the opposite direction. The observer sat in one fuselage, the pilot in the other and communication was impossible except through waving, presumably to prevent either expressing to the other their true opinions of the designer of this radical machine. As if that were not enough, the wooden floats were mounted directly below the rotary engines. Rotaries drip out a lot of oil and as a result the TB’s floats would often catch fire. It would be nice to say that despite all this the TB inspired the fantastic Twin-Mustang but of course it didn’t.

Thank you for reading Hush-Kit. Our site is absolutely free and we have no advertisements. If you’ve enjoyed an article you can donate here. Without donations we can’t carry on.

At the moment our contributors do not receive any payment but we’re hoping to reward them for their fascinating stories in the future.

 

10 worst German aircraft here

“If you have any interest in aviation, you’ll be surprised, entertained and fascinated by Hush-Kit – the world’s best aviation blog”. Rowland White, author of the best-selling ‘Vulcan 607’

NOW AVAILABLE: The Hush-Kit Book of Warplanes, a gorgeous heavily illustrated – and often irreverent- coffee-table book covering the history of aviation 1914 – the present.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Have a look at 10 Best fighters of World War II , top WVR and BVR fighters of today, an interview with a Super Hornet pilot and a Pacifist’s Guide to Warplanes. Was the Spitfire overrated? Want something more bizarre? The Top Ten fictional aircraft is a fascinating read, as is The Strange Story and The Planet Satellite. The Fashion Versus Aircraft Camo is also a real cracker. Those interested in the Cold Way should read A pilot’s guide to flying and fighting in the Lightning. Those feeling less belligerent may enjoy A pilot’s farewell to the Airbus A340. Looking for something more humourous? Have a look at this F-35 satire and ‘Werner Herzog’s Guide to pusher bi-planes. In the mood for something more offensive? Try the NSFW 10 best looking American airplanes, or the same but for Canadians. 

The F-35 is at the forefront of avionics, but its slow gestation will mean others will harvest the research that led to this technology. Other than its claimed ‘stealth’, all of its key technologies will, if they prove effective, be integrated onto other aircraft. The technology race is an odd one, where neither pioneers or the military have an advantage. 

Never be the pioneer. The Eurofighter Typhoon pioneered voice control interface for fighter pilots and now, after spending millions achieving it, has a system way less advanced than the Siri on your iPhone. The large touch screen display which has cost a fortune to develop for the F-35 has also taken so long to develop that it is technologically behind the systems used by high-end graphic designers. The idea so beloved of Hollywood films that the military has secret technologies years ahead of consumers like you is not true. Military project contractors (at least in the US and Europe) make more money if their programmes run slowly, and they are also free to escalate the cost as they wish. Producers of high street merchandise still exist in a real state of free market capitalism and must produce things as quickly and economically as possible, and in many ways are light years ahead of the military.

Outside of this, there is also the situation regarding how pioneering technologies, despite what may be stated, are not tied to particular aircraft models. The F-35 is an interesting case in point, despite claims by Lockheed Martin that all rival fighters are obsolete – which of the F-35’s key technologies could not be added to conventional, and higher performance, airframes? Its innovative cockpit display? No, as the Gripen NG which is about to fly will have one as good. The situational awareness derived from its computing power? Moore’s law is seemingly unstoppable, so it seems unlikely that it would be difficult to equal or surpass this in a few years time (the fast jets with the greatest computing power are the latest iterations of the F-15) . Its radar stealth? This is its strongest card, but in most likely situations the carriage of cruise missiles by a conventional aircraft would create a similar level of survivability. The role of stealth in air-to-air combat remains a complete unknown, as no LO or stealth aircraft has ever fought in air-to-air combat. Working through the F-35’s shopping list of unique features reveals that the most of these aspects could be fitted to fourth generation platforms which have superior reliability, and therefore, sortie rates. The F-35’s much-vaunted lead in connectivity via datalinks will also be challenged rather soon by the Gripen NG.

Thank you for reading Hush-Kit. Our site is absolutely free and we have no advertisements. If you’ve enjoyed an article you can donate here– it doesn’t have to be a large amount, every pound is gratefully received. If you can’t afford to donate anything then don’t worry.

Top Ten Most Boring Aircraft in History! Werner Herzog’s guide to pusher aircraft,
A thoroughly disrespectful guide to the 10 most attractive Canadian aircraft , A thoroughly disrespectful guide to the 10 most attractive US aircraft A thoroughly disrespectful guide to the 10 most attractive US aircraft , Review of the Eurofighter magazine , F-35 overexposure , Review of the Eurofighter promo film, Review of the F-35 website

Follow my vapour trail on Twitter: @Hush_kit

You may also enjoy top WVR and BVR fighters of today, an interview with a Super Hornet pilot and a Pacifist’s Guide to Warplanes. Want something more bizarre? The Top Ten fictional aircraft is a fascinating read, as is The Strange Story of The Planet Satellite. Fashion Versus Aircraft Camo is also a real cracker. 

Follow my vapour trail on Twitter: @Hush_kit