[twowheelcossack]

While you're at it, make sure it's the two-stage supercharged-and-water injected version of the Double Wasp motor pushing it's top speed to 420.

If you ever find yourself around Rockaway Beach, or south Brooklyn take a side trip to Floyd Bennett Field. It is now not only a national recreation area, it is a righteous place to do donuts, practice wheelies, camp, fish, fly your r/c jet, get bitten by mosquitos that are like piranhas, and go to the FREE air museum. The museum isn't typical in that you can actually fondle the items on display and get up close and personal (I have a thing for the smell of old aircraft, this place was an olfactory buffet...) You can actually go inside these aircraft, some of which are in various states of restoration. There's even feral kittens for the kids to catch various diseases from. Fun for the whole family! (*fun not guaranteed, family not included)

DISCLAIMERS: Non-motorcycle related content. I've dealt with weeks of the Rossi vs Stoner hatefest, so you can deal this for a change. Pictures turned out to be too large, but I'm too buzzed to F with this thread anymore. Deal with it. Again.

Highlights:

The size of the hangar positively dwarfs even a Boeing Stratocruiser.

The engine display that featured a Pratt and Whitney R2800, and a Gnome Monosaupape engine which was an absolute jewel and a marvel of inefficiency all at once. Made right here in Brooklyn a hundred years ago! Fuggedaboutit...

A copy of the Wright Brother's first aircraft, and a quote by a disheartened Wilbur: "Man will not fly for a thousand years!", after which he probably exclaimed "Curses!". (see my avatar for a visual...)

The PBY Catalina being restored. Just, wow...

The battle-hardened Sikorsky Pelican with BROOKLYN painted on it's flanks. Fuggedaboutit...

The feeling of pride being in a place that is a shrine to the amazing technology and the unparalleled craftsmanship exhibited in the American aircraft/aerospace industry, and the people that wielded it.

Floyd Bennett Field

By the way, this place has enough juicy concrete to stage a war on, why people aren't doing track day or autocross events at this place is beyond me.

 

[Busy Little Shop]

While you're at it, make sure it's the two-stage supercharged-and-water injected version of the Double Wasp motor pushing it's top speed to 420.

If you ever find yourself around Rockaway Beach, or south Brooklyn take a side trip to Floyd Bennett Field.

Cool pics... if I'm ever in Brooklyn I'll check out Floyd Bennett Field...

I'd love to own a real Hellcat but the top speed of the F6F was 303 mph at
sea level and 376 mph at 23,400 ft...

I use to fly Warbirds on line which was an live internet air combat game...
with the call sign "-xlax-" I fought my way to high scoring ace in Wild Kitty
(FM2)... today I only play off line... but I hone my flight sim skills everyday
and I'm currently flying the F6F-5 Hellcat...

 

[DesperateSP2]

Want to talk aircraft and their engines especially?

BMW 801 radial, the "beating heart" of the Butcher Bird up until the Dora-9. Very nice engine, especially after BMW sorted the early reliability issues, but as with many German engines of WWII its high altitude performances left something to be desired.

Rolls Royce Merlin 60/70 series, the beating heart of the Spitfire IX which helped reverse the odds against the Butcher Bird. This engine was really "pushing the envelope" of '30s engine design and R-R rightly saw it as a stop gap solution until the Griffon came of age. Still it did its job more than well, not only in British aircraft but also being used to develop the Merlin-engined Mustang.

Everybody with some interest in aviation or engineering history will recognize the Napier Sabre, a H 24 cylinder monstrosity, as used in the Typhoon fighter-bomber and the Tempest fighter. It was the first aircraft production engine to pass the 2000 hp mark. All this performance came at a price though: reliability was always a big problem and performances fell off dramatically over 20,000 ft. I could rant and rave for hours about the reliability issues but the Typhoon (when everything was working right) proved to be an excellent aircraft, being able to intercept low-level FW-190 fighter-bombers and to smash armored columns with rockets and cannon fire.

Larry, you'd better check your link... that's a Wildcat, not an Hellcat...

 

[Busy Little Shop]

Larry, you'd better check your link... that's a Wildcat, not an Hellcat...

True... but I earned top gun in Warbirds flying Wild Kitty (FM2 Wildcat)... I
currently fly the F6F-5 Hellcat off online just to keep my stick and rudder skills sharp...

Get your copy of Warbirds here...

-xlax- Top Gun for a week...
Store: Total Simulation Series

 

[blackdog]

planes

F4U ONLY one f- them hellcats

 

[Busy Little Shop]

F4U ONLY one f- them hellcats

Just try and f- a Hellcat with your F4U... the F6F will fly up your ass and tickle
the inside of your eye ball and you won't know its there until you are farting
bullets... your call sign is going to be "chute" as in parachute Pudknocker...

 

[DesperateSP2]

Here's a tribute to the great US naval fighters of WWII.

Grumman Wildcat (called "Martlet" in British service). This particular aircraft is a Martlet IV (roughly equivalent to the US Navy F4F-4) refitted with the FM2 radio mast.

Grumman Hellcat. This is an F6F-3.

Vought Corsair. This is actually a Goodyear FG-1D, called "Corsair IV" in British service. British Corsairs had 8 inches clipped from the wingtips to improve roll rate and permit storage on their own carriers. For European operations they were originally painted in the the same camouflage as the Martlet above but switched over to US Navy/Marines deep blue once they were moved to the Pacific in early 1945. National roundels were also changed to resemble US insignia.

On the issue of the Corsair-Hellcat diatribe. The Corsair was actually widely believed to be the "hotter" of the two but it was a handful to fly. Charles Lindbergh, who flew the Corsair in the Battle of the Marshall Islands, reckoned it was not a good choice for a green pilot. The US Navy had serious problems qualifying the Corsair for carrier operations because of its many quirks: it bounced on landing, the long nose gave lots of headaches on taxing and of course there were issues with the enormous torque of the Double Wasp engine. But in the hands of experienced pilots it was a truly superb fighter. The Hellcat was not as "hot" as as the Corsair but it was a truly magnificent fighter. It was docile with no "quirks" or "funnies", a good choice even for green pilots, it had plenty of horsepower, it had massive firepower and, like all Grumman designs, it was massively overbuilt, being able to take ten times the punishment of the lightly built Japanese fighters. More critically the Navy could buy five Hellcats for the price of three Corsairs. The FAA (British naval air arm) Hellcats clashed with FW-190's over Norway many times and were more than able to take on the feared Butcher Bird with success.

 

[nomo]

Sorry to digress : even though everyone gushes over the Mustang , I've always loved the Lightning -- such a logical design .

 

[Busy Little Shop]

The US Navy had serious problems qualifying the Corsair for carrier operations because of its many quirks: it bounced on landing, the long nose gave lots of headaches on taxing and of course there were issues with the enormous torque of the Double Wasp engine.

True but deceptive...

What was different between the F6F and the F4U wasn't engine nor propeller
is was the degree of rudder effectiveness to arrest the enormous torque of
the propeller... the F6F sported greater rudder effectiveness and thus easier
on the pilot...

Both the F6F-5 and the F4U-2 employed the same Pratt and Whitney R2800
Double Wasp engine rated at 2,000HP for take off... but the enormous torque
of their engines will not effect the aircraft until you couple the available
torque to a prop... both the F6F and the F4U swung a 3 bladed Hamilton
Standard Hydromatic propeller of 13ft nominal diameter... the enormous
torque of a working prop is called the P factor... chief tool to counter the
propeller P Factor is the rudder... so as you raise power you apply rudder in
the direction of the propeller (US engines turn clock wise as viewed from the
pilots seat so its right rudder)... applying about 12º right rudder counters the
clock wise torque of the 13ft propeller... if you don't work the right rudder
against the propeller P Factor the aircraft will bolt to the left... look at film of
carrier take offs and you will note the F4U rudder is applied in the same
direction as the rotation of the prop... if the pilot fails to arrest to the
enormous torque of the prop the plane will torque roll to the left and into the drink...

 

[Busy Little Shop]

Sorry to digress : even though everyone gushes over the Mustang , I've always loved the Lightning -- such a logical design .

Razor back P51 is my favorite but go to 3.50 minute mark and learn how to start and fly a P38...

 

[DesperateSP2]

Cheers Larry. One of the torque related problems of the Corsair which always intrigued me was the "propwash" effect which made the left wing stall before the right one. This was fixed during production by fitting a 6" stall strip to the right wing outboard of the guns to ensure both wings stalled at the same time. Simple yet ingenious.

I think most of the aura of legend around the Corsair can be traced to the famous VMF-214 Marines squadron and Pappy Boyington. In my study I have an autographed print of Boyington's first kill while flying a P-40 for Chennault's AVG. It's a present from my father (who used to be a commercial pilot before retirement) who was always a huge Boyington fan to the point he insisted me and my brother watched Baa Baa Black Sheep regularly. I was unimpressed to say the least but those warbirds they had in the series were truly magnificent.

 

[Busy Little Shop]

Cheers Larry. One of the torque related problems of the Corsair which always intrigued me was the "propwash" effect which made the left wing stall before the right one. This was fixed during production by fitting a 6" stall strip to the right wing outboard of the guns to ensure both wings stalled at the same time. Simple yet ingenious.

I think most of the aura of legend around the Corsair can be traced to the famous VMF-214 Marines squadron and Pappy Boyington. In my study I have an autographed print of Boyington's first kill while flying a P-40 for Chennault's AVG. It's a present from my father (who used to be a commercial pilot before retirement) who was always a huge Boyington fan to the point he insisted me and my brother watched Baa Baa Black Sheep regularly. I was unimpressed to say the least but those warbirds they had in the series were truly magnificent.

Technically speaking the Prop Torque not prop wash makes
the left wing want to stall first because the aircraft constantly
tries to spin in the opposite rotation of the prop... if you ever yank
and bank an aircraft for real with a prop turning clock wise you will
notice it snaps left quicker than it will snap right... watch any prop
Carrier takeoffs and the pilots always banks towards the right and not
towards left because of the danger of a left prop torque induced stall
spin all the way into the drink...

Stall strips are equal and are designed to stall the inboard of the wings before
the outboards in order to preserve lift and aileron control... if the outboard of
the wings stall first then the aircraft will not pass flight test nor will any
current aircraft or airliner seeking FAA certification... a tip stalling aircraft is
considered evil whereas a inboard stalling aircraft is considered docile...

Cool... I also have a signed print from Pappy Boyington... he was at Oshkosh
sitting next to the Japanese pilot Masajiro "Mike" Kawato who shot him down
in WW2... Kawato's book published in 1978 is titled "Bye Bye Black Sheep," to
roast Boyington's own best-seller Baa Baa Black Sheep later made into a TV
series staring for me too the F4U...

 

[DesperateSP2]

May be it's some kind of cultural or language thing since around here "propwash" is used to describe exacttly the same effect....

Anyway here's one of my favorites.

Fairey Swordfish (this is a Mk III). Pretty much like the Dauntless it was an obsolete aircraft which not only did much more than everybody expected but outshone its intended successor(s).
Among its many exploits were damaging the Bismarck, making it an easy prey for naval gunnery, sinking a lot of U-boot (being a slow biplane has its advantages when flying out of small escort carriers... especially when there's no fighter opposition!) and knocking the Italian fleet out of the war in a single stroke.
You American may see this as a bittersweet act (Japanese military personnel visited Taranto days after the raid to collect intelligence and Admiral Yamamoto freely admitted he used this to plan the attack on Pearl Harbor) but it was one the great epics of WWII...

 

[Busy Little Shop]

May be it's some kind of cultural or language thing since around here "propwash" is used to describe exactly the same effect....

Its technical... true propwash is a spiraling slipstream around the fuselage
which strikes the left side of the tail causing the aircraft to yaw left on take
off to some degree... but prop torque comes from Newton's basic law of
motion which states that "For every action there is an equal and opposite
reaction." so as a engine spins the prop in one direction (action) the aircraft
wants to spin in the opposite direction (reaction)... P Factor is the term for
asymmetric propeller loading... the blades are meeting the airflow at an angle
which also causes the airplane to yaw to the left like when tail draggers (such
as the F4U and F6F) are at a high angles of attack during takeoff roll...

Warbirds like the P38 and P39 with tricycle landing gear maintain a level
attitude on the takeoff roll run so there is little or no P-Factor during takeoff
roll... but the effects of propwash are still felt...

 

[duckdawg]

Sorry to digress : even though everyone gushes over the Mustang , I've always loved the Lightning -- such a logical design .

the coolest plane ever...

 

[simonkobe]

the coolest plane ever...

Hawker Tempest

 

[Old Fart]

Then there's the F7F3 Tigercat. Now what could be better than two R2800 34W's connected together with just enough metal between them.

 

[rjjablo]

Radial

I bought my Dad the plans for a Radial Engine.

Ageless Engines

It has occupied him for the last two years.

Total cost is $500 plus just for materials.

 

[duckdawg]

sweeet...