Aircraft that never quite made it.

I've decided to put up a thread featuring some of the aircraft designs that never made to operational status for whatever reason, be it : (a) Too late for service, (b) a better alternative was available or (c) it was just useless!!!

Lets see some of those designs!!!

 

Short Shetland - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

to start things off, here's a design for a long range Recce flying boat , the Short Shetland

 

Only one ever made
Messerschmitt Me 263 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

From my cousins across the water
FR Fireball - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

TSR2 what a missed opportunity. An aircraft that was the best in the world!

 

What about the Bell YFM-1 Airacuda? Design caught my eye ever since I saw it, both because of its boldness and its looks.

Airacuda Info

 

Sorry for coming back so soon, but just couldn´t let this one slip by unnoticed:

McDonnell XP-67 "Bat" Info

The McDonnell XP67 Bat; impressive kite, cute as a Yank pin-up :wub:

 

Boy, am I in love with this thread!

Check out one of Adolf´s children: Arado Ar E.555 series Luft '46 entry

Beautifully futuristic kite, one of the Amerika Bomber designs.

 

Fisher XP-75 / P-75 Eagle - History, Specifications and Pictures - World Military Aircraft

As such, the XP-75 featured the wing element of the outdated and outclassed Curtiss P-40 Warhawk, a tail section from the Douglas-produced Dauntless dive bomber, an under-fuselage scoop similar to the North American P-51 Mustang and the main landing gear of the Vought F4U Corsair. The resulting aircraft was perhaps one of the ugliest designs to ever be conceived of.


It doesn't say so this article, but a book of mine states this plane was designed and built to prevent General Motors from having to build the B-29.

 

Sorry for coming back so soon, but just couldn´t let this one slip by unnoticed:

McDonnell XP-67 "Bat" Info

The McDonnell XP67 Bat; impressive kite, cute as a Yank pin-up :wub:

They do say where aircraft are concerned, 'If it looks right, then it is right', and the XP67 'looks right'. A good looking aircraft.

As for the TSR2, certainly a lost opportunity as it had all the hallmarks of being a great aircraft.

 

I also have to agree that this is a good thread.

How about the Blackburn Botha with it multitude of problems!

Blackburn botha - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Tom

 

15-seater, which would have gone into solid production had the Horsa not been successful. Only 18 built.

Steve W.

 

Hi guys,

Hope you do not mind me sticking one in for fun.....
The Martin Baker M.B. 5 Single engined Interceptor Fighter with a max speed of 460mph at 20,000 feet.

Best Regards

mace

 

Mace,

Super aeroplane the M.B.5, just born too late!!

Tom

 

15-seater, which would have gone into solid production had the Horsa not been successful. Only 18 built.

Steve W.

Just imagine three of these flying whales swooping down on Pegasus Bridge...

 

Hi,
I am enjoying this thread. What about the Supermarine Spiteful - no finer pedigree imaginable but it hardly made it into the air.
Tom.

 

Actually, two prototypes and sixteen production aircraft were built before the war ended, aloing with the contract....

 

Gotthard Heinrici
Short Shetland - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

to start things off, here's a design for a long range Recce flying boat , the Short Shetland

The Shetland was a serious thought.
This flying boat dock built at Castle Archdale was done so with her in mind.







This was built in December 44 / January 1945.


I would add this flying abortion to the list.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saro_Lerwick

http://www.rcaf.com/aircraft/patrol/lerwick/index.php?name=Lerwick

Taken staright from the drawing bopard this aircraft was little short of a death trap.
No one who flew in it had a good word to say about it, unstable both in the air and on the water , on paper she reads well but in reality she wasa monster.
Pilots who flew her called her the "Flying Pig".
One of her nasty habbits was a vague throttle control when you openned them power developed more on one side than the other - brilliant when taking off.
F/lt. Eddy Edwards was given the job of converting 422 to this type - when supervising Sid Butler this happened , and they found themselves leering of the flightpath towards the mountains on the south shore , by good luck the fault corrected itself and they avoided disaster.

The next day the same aircraft misbehaved on landing and her tail came off, again with Sid Butler.

I saw a note in 209 ORB in which one pilot gamely chased a Condor in one , the longer legs on the Condor soon left the Lerwick out of range, the few shots exchanged at range hit nothing.

Although she saw limited service it was need which took her there not any reocrd of being airworthy or reliable , 21 of them were built and within a year she was obselete.
It is more by good luck than anything that she didn't kill all who flew in her, she had that potential.

 

Anybody thought of the Avro Arrow, designed and built in Canada and then scrapped (all 6 of them including all plans and drawings) by the damn Conservative Gov't in Canada