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Little known / experimental aircraft

sevenhelmet

Low calorie attack from the Heartland
pilot
I have time in that airplane, flying with a famous Navy instructor named Gallagher... "the Spinmeister".

I got a bunch of landings. What a hoot! The Navy had it restored back around 2010, and I flew it right after that.
It is beautiful.

I also flew it while I was a student at USNTPS. Oct 31, 2014. They really should have a pilot signature book, I bet there are a lot of well-known names who have also flown it.
 

Randy Daytona

Cold War Relic
pilot
Super Moderator
The F-16XL seems like an intriguing design. Wikipedia says it was able to achieve super cruise capability. Would like to hear what some of the fast movers here think of the machine.


31745

NASA F-16XL #2 conducting laminar flowresearch

31746

An air-to-air left underside view of an F-16XL aircraft. The aircraft is armed with two wingtip-mounted AIM-9 Sidewinder and four fuselage-mounted AIM-120 AMRAAM missiles along with 12 Mark 82 500-pound bombs.

31747
F-16XL and a conventional F-16
 

Flash

SEVAL/ECMO
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
The Douglas A-26 - later B-26 - Invader. One of the many US twin engine bombers powered by 2 Pratt & Whitney R-2800 Double Wasp engines, the Invader was an exceptionally long-lived aircraft. First flown in July 1942, it stayed in the US inventory until 1972. Anyone else want to chime in on what other WW2 piston airplanes had such longevity?

While not WWII vintage a few piston powered aircraft had long service careers. The French flew the A-1 until the 70's and they then donated them to a few of their African allies to include Chad, which apparently kept them 'in service' until 1987. The Navy didn't retire its last EC-121's until 1982, the last ones flew with VAQ-33. We also flew C-1 Traders until 1988, 32 years after it first started service.
 

Griz882

Frightening children with the Griz-O-Copter!
pilot
Contributor
While not WWII vintage a few piston powered aircraft had long service careers. The French flew the A-1 until the 70's and they then donated them to a few of their African allies to include Chad, which apparently kept them 'in service' until 1987. The Navy didn't retire its last EC-121's until 1982, the last ones flew with VAQ-33. We also flew C-1 Traders until 1988, 32 years after it first started service.
The F-4 Corsair stayed on duty from 1941 until 1969…not too bad.
 

Griz882

Frightening children with the Griz-O-Copter!
pilot
Contributor
We shouldn’t forget the short-lived Hafner Rotobuggy…

31750
The thing actually flew but was apparently quite a beast at anything over 45mph in the air.
31751
In the end they simply created larger gliders to carry jeeps into combat.
 

taxi1

Well-Known Member
pilot
Didn't the T-28 stick around until the early 80s?
I spoke with a guy once who used it to fly into thunderstorms, in pursuit of science. He said it was bulletproof. Literally. Googling...of course it is on the internet.

The aircraft was a 1949, T-28 Trojan highly modified to withstand hail up to 3 inches in diameter, severe turbulence, icing, and lightning. It had armor plating on the leading edge of the wings and tail and had a bullet proof, lexan and metal reinforced canopy.

ans0107hpb.jpg


 

Pags

N/A
pilot
Had to read this a couple of times for it to make sense to me. It was the F4U Corsair, the F-4 Phantom, and the A-7 Corsair II.
The jury also would have accepted AU-1 Corsair. They served long enough to end their careers painted in the gull grey and white scheme.
 
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