The ex-Ukraine Thread Bucc' Love-in...

[Listy]

I want one.

To burn right?

 

[aardvark64]

From the Old Lag's book of tales told to credulous, teenage, Airhead Tufty Club space cadets at Summer Camp. Are we sitting comfortably?

There was a story from Red Flag about two Buccanneers hiding under a Vulcan. All three travelling at ludicrously low level across the desert, of course. Just short of the target, the Vulcan was spotted and deemed "a kill". As it pulled up majestically from the desert floor, the two Buccanneers that had been lurking under it then had a free pass to the nearby target.

Gave the marshalls conniptions when they saw something as big as the Vulcan and its companions travelling that fast and so low; compounded when they realised what the RAF were actually doing.

Can anyone confirm this actually happened? I'm guessing it's apocryphal, but almost fifty years on I would love it to be true.

 

[NSP]

another picture showed branches caught in the rear of the bomb bay door.

On a spacey night when we were once again being shown various slides of NATO aircraft the presentation included close-up ones of various low-level types showing longitudinal scratches along the bellies smeared with tinges of dark green - allegedly a result of literally flying at tree-top height.

The ever-deepening cynic in me does latterly make me sometimes wonder as to the veracity of some of the explanations we were given back then, though.

 

[Yokel]

On another thread, I posed the question about how come the Buccaneer was well suited to carrier landing but the Sea Vixen was not. Although the operated side by side from RN carriers the Sea Vixen was an earlier design and predated the Buccaneer. On YouTube you can find documentaries with Sea Vixens and Scimitars operating side by side, and ones made a few years later with Sea Vixens alongside Buccaneers.

Were developments such as Boundary Layer Control the result of efforts to make carrier landing safer? Did it improve low speed handling?

 

[Electromagnetic]

On another thread, I posed the question about how come the Buccaneer was well suited to carrier landing but the Sea Vixen was not. Although the operated side by side from RN carriers the Sea Vixen was an earlier design and predated the Buccaneer. On YouTube you can find documentaries with Sea Vixens and Scimitars operating side by side, and ones made a few years later with Sea Vixens alongside Buccaneers.

Were developments such as Boundary Layer Control the result of efforts to make carrier landing safer? Did it improve low speed handling?

Captain Eric Brown (RIP) would have been a good man to ask that question. He must have made more carrier landings and in more aircraft than anyone else.

 

[Dreamseller]

The Buccaneer was the only aircraft made by Blackburn that didn't look like a pile of ass.

I'm not even joking they all look terrible:

Blackburn Aircraft - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Aerodynamics? What's that?

Firebrand isn't that bad, but yes most of them are awful.

 

[NSP]

Did it improve low speed handling?

Short answer: yes.

 

[robinrocket111]

Captain Eric Brown (RIP) would have been a good man to ask that question. He must have made more carrier landings and in more aircraft than anyone else.

He holds the Worlds Records most Carrier landings and the most Aircraft types flown.

 

[Electromagnetic]

He holds the Worlds Records most Carrier landings and the most Aircraft types flown.

Yes and both records are very unlikely ever to be broken.

 

[robinrocket111]

Yes and both records are very unlikely ever to be broken.

IIR didn’t the US navy try to get the record for deck landing, with one of their test pilots?

 

[Dicky Ticker]

On another thread, I posed the question about how come the Buccaneer was well suited to carrier landing but the Sea Vixen was not. Although the operated side by side from RN carriers the Sea Vixen was an earlier design and predated the Buccaneer. On YouTube you can find documentaries with Sea Vixens and Scimitars operating side by side, and ones made a few years later with Sea Vixens alongside Buccaneers.

Were developments such as Boundary Layer Control the result of efforts to make carrier landing safer? Did it improve low speed handling?

I believe it did. The whole thing about lift from a wing is that the amount of lift you get relies on the amount of air flowing over the wing. Fly fast and the air flow over the wing gives more lift that flying slow, to compensate at low speed the angle of attack (the angle at which the wing meets the airflow) has to be increased to try and get more lift.

If you can augment the natural flow of air over the wing with blown air it will increase the lift. Its basically the same reason that an aircraft carrier turns into the wind when launching or retrieving aircraft, the naturaly flow of wind over the deck gives a little bit more lift.

Blown air increased the stability at low speeds which when you are trying to land on a small deck is a good thing. Trouble is the blown air system needs to be designed in, takes up space and can be complex. Leading edge slats do something similar and are easier to manufacture.

 

[Electromagnetic]

IIR didn’t the US navy try to get the record for deck landing, with one of their test pilots?

A quick search found that a Canadian did 1000 landings and an American did 1200 landings and that the number of pilots reaching those figures is very small indeed, maybe single figures. No idea what the current figures and second place records are.

 

[Cold_Collation]

IIR didn’t the US navy try to get the record for deck landing, with one of their test pilots?

Yep. And the guy had a nervous breakdown before getting anywhere near Brown’s record. He had to stop.

 

[CaptainRidiculous]

Posted before about the Germans wanting to buy them...

 

[Deleted 184863]

Th

I believe it did. The whole thing about lift from a wing is that the amount of lift you get relies on the amount of air flowing over the wing. Fly fast and the air flow over the wing gives more lift that flying slow, to compensate at low speed the angle of attack (the angle at which the wing meets the airflow) has to be increased to try and get more lift.

If you can augment the natural flow of air over the wing with blown air it will increase the lift. Its basically the same reason that an aircraft carrier turns into the wind when launching or retrieving aircraft, the naturaly flow of wind over the deck gives a little bit more lift.

Blown air increased the stability at low speeds which when you are trying to land on a small deck is a good thing. Trouble is the blown air system needs to be designed in, takes up space and can be complex. Leading edge slats do something similar and are easier to manufacture.

There is a further advantage to blown air, which is that engine thrust is required to provide it. Additionally, the Buccaneer would land on a carrier with the airbrakes deployed also.



Jet engines tend to be slow to spool up from low power settings, which is very important if there's a need to go around. So, the more thrust needed down the approach, the quicker the engine response for a go around. Obviously the airbrake could be retracted faster than the engine wind up from the lower power setting had it not been deployed.
Pulling the gear up was the next most important factor, especially with an engine out. Indeed, several aircraft cannot be climbed with engine(s) out and gear down, and this was the death knell of the Air France Concorde.

 

[Roadster280]

At the risk of a massive thread diversion, I wonder how things would have panned out if the Falklands War had happened in 1978, just four years earlier? The RN would have had three carriers, ARK ROYAL, HERMES and BULWARK. ARK ROYAL would have had Buccaneers, Phantoms and Gannets. The other two were reduced to ASW-roled helicopter carriers at that time. SHAR was not quite in service, and INVINCIBLE still under construction.

I suppose the Buccaneers would have dispatched the ARG navy, had they come out to play, and the Gannets’ AEW would have been useful. But the ship itself would have been on its last legs. Not sure about Phantom vs SHAR in the roles required.

I expect a similar thing would have happened to what actually did in 1982, and they’d have been checking out EAGLE for spares or even refit (only scrapped in ‘82) and pressing for INVINCIBLE to be completed early, along with as many SHARs as could be produced. I would imagine Harrier GR3 would have been on board too.

I suppose one advantage would be that the Buccaneer could tank, so perhaps that might have changed the range of operations in scope on the ARG mainland. Phantom attacks on their airfields perhaps?

ETA: Thinking about it, no matter the naval situation, the political leadership wasn’t there. I don’t think Callaghan would have committed to the war regardless.

 

[Guns]

All Bucc posts now here https://www.arrse.co.uk/community/threads/the-ex-ukraine-thread-bucc-love-in.309487/

 

[Deleted 184863]

From the Old Lag's book of tales told to credulous, teenage, Airhead Tufty Club space cadets at Summer Camp. Are we sitting comfortably?

There was a story from Red Flag about two Buccanneers hiding under a Vulcan. All three travelling at ludicrously low level across the desert, of course. Just short of the target, the Vulcan was spotted and deemed "a kill". As it pulled up majestically from the desert floor, the two Buccanneers that had been lurking under it then had a free pass to the nearby target.

Gave the marshalls conniptions when they saw something as big as the Vulcan and its companions travelling that fast and so low; compounded when they realised what the RAF were actually doing.

Can anyone confirm this actually happened? I'm guessing it's apocryphal, but almost fifty years on I would love it to be true.

Can't confirm this incident is true. Can confirm that flying aircraft close enough to appear as one target, either on radar (easier) or visually, is a standard tactic. I've done it myself, often. The physics is straightforward and you can work out just how close to be for any particular radar and range.

The Americans, since they have a massive organisation, tend to follow doctrine. Americans aren't dumb, but their system sometimes requires them to act that way. I can remember one exercise where we used 3 different cheap tricks on successive sorties to beat them, and each time they would say "That cheap trick won't work again". And they were right, so we used a different one. And at the end of the third debrief, our weapons leader stood up and said. "You're right, none of these cheap tricks will work more than once, but there are 13 more sorties, and we have 23 more cheap tricks.".
Winning a 4v4 is a bit easier if you have 5 aircraft, and a lot easier if the opposition think you have only 4.

 

[Rapierman]

At 50:32 there seems to be a rocket assist on, never knew about that

 

[Deleted 184863]

At the risk of a massive thread diversion, I wonder how things would have panned out if the Falklands War had happened in 1978, just four years earlier? The RN would have had three carriers, ARK ROYAL, HERMES and BULWARK. ARK ROYAL would have had Buccaneers, Phantoms and Gannets. The other two were reduced to ASW-roled helicopter carriers at that time. SHAR was not quite in service, and INVINCIBLE still under construction.

I suppose the Buccaneers would have dispatched the ARG navy, had they come out to play, and the Gannets’ AEW would have been useful. But the ship itself would have been on its last legs. Not sure about Phantom vs SHAR in the roles required.

I expect a similar thing would have happened to what actually did in 1982, and they’d have been checking out EAGLE for spares or even refit (only scrapped in ‘82) and pressing for INVINCIBLE to be completed early, along with as many SHARs as could be produced. I would imagine Harrier GR3 would have been on board too.

I suppose one advantage would be that the Buccaneer could tank, so perhaps that might have changed the range of operations in scope on the ARG mainland. Phantom attacks on their airfields perhaps?

ETA: Thinking about it, no matter the naval situation, the political leadership wasn’t there. I don’t think Callaghan would have committed to the war regardless.

I think there's little doubt the Argies wouldn't have tried it against proper carriers.
Phantom was all weather, radar missiles, eight missiles total, supersonic, longer endurance, twice the radar range, two crew, yada, yada. It would have killed a lot more Argies than the SHAR did.
I've worked on exercise with the SHARs running one CAP and us (land-based) running another. We were at least 10 times more effective. We'd normally shot down the opposition before the SHAR had even detected them. Not because we were better aircrew, but because the weapon system was just so much more effective.
It's a bit difficult to be sure whether it was the withdrawal of proper carriers, or just the withdrawal generally, indicating unwillingness to defend the Falklands, that had the most influence on the Argie decision.