I’m currently in the process of getting “Secret Allied Aircraft of WWII,” for more info. We’ll see how it goes…
Ha! Found it…It was the Lockheed L-133 Project.
From: http://tanks45.tripod.com/Jets45/Histories/Lockheed-L133/L133.htm
Engine: 2x Lockheed L1000 J37 axial-flow turbojets
Wing Span: n/a
Length: n/a
Height: n/a
Weight: n/a
Maximum Speed: n/a
Ceiling: n/a
Range: n/a
Crew: 1
Armament: 4x 0.50'' machine guns
History:
The Lockheed company was the first in the USA to start work on a jet powered aircraft, the L-133 design started in 1939 as a number of “Paper Project” by engineers Clarence R “Kelly” Johnson and Hall J Hibbard. By 1940 preliminary work on a company financed jet fighter had been started, which progressed to several different versions on the drawing board. In the mean time Lockheed were working on a axial-flow turbojet of there own design L-1000, which was intended to power the culmination of the fighter project the Model L-133-02-01, this was a single seat, cannard design powered by two L-1000 engines.
The design was noticed by the USAAF, but at the time they showed no great interested in the idea of a jet powered fighter and missed the opportunity of giving the USA a lead in this new technology. With out the support (and money) of the USAAF work on the L-133 fighter and it’s engine the L-1000 came to a halt.
How ever when the USAAF suddenly began to show interest in the idea of a jet powered combat aircraft in 1942, spurred on by intelligence reports of the advances in jet propulsion by the Germans and British, the USAAF would turn the Lockheed for it’s fist jet powered fighter the Lockheed P-80 “Shooting Star”
did the US get the Nazi scientists to improve on their jets design?
Well, if the US, and the UK for that matter, had put forth the R&D, they may have come up with some superior designs to the fragmented German efforts into jet research. Jet powered aircraft were simply not a priority in the U.S. where it was difficult to fund conventional projects like the P-38 in the late 30’s…
And quite frankly, the German designs were only superior to Allied Piston engined fighters, not their jets which lagged behind, but not by far…
Was searching National Archives and came upon this film title:
XP-59A–XFM-1 MULTI-SEATER FIGHTER, 1938
Is it possible it flew in 1938???
Summary: Reel 1: 480’. Detailed views of XP-59A; scenes showing flight test and aerial views of plane in flight. 1) CS XP-59A being pulled out of hangar and standing on ramp. 2) CS air scoops, XP-59A, SV, nose section, exhaust. 3) PS and DS plane on rap. 4) CS mid-section, 3/4 right view, tail section, SV engine cowling being removed, engines, FV exhaust, cockpit. Pilot closes canopy. 5) INT cockpit showing instrument panel. 6) CS flames coming from exhaust. 7) PS plane moving down runway, taking off. 8) LS plane in air, maneuvering against clouds, diving, coming in for landing. 9) CS pilot and civilian personnel. 10) MS pilot entering cockpit, plane takes off, flies, ascends rapidly. 11) Good AV’s of plane in flight and performing maneuvers. 12) Ground views of plane, CS RV, SV, flames shooting out ot exhaust. Reel 2: 414’. Ground views and aerial views of five-place fighter with two pusher type engines. Views of R.H. Woods, designer and Lt. W.W. Morgan. 1) CS & MCS XFM-1 showing cockpits in each nacelle. 2) MS pilot entering plane. 3) MS & CS of R.H. Woods, designer, and Lt. W.M. Morgan, pilot of plane. 4) PS plane taxiing in field, taking off, in flight. 5) AUS plane in flight, sideview. 6) CS three quarter side view. 7) CDS plane (good shot). 8) GS plane coming in for landing, passing camera.
Bell P-59 “Airacomet”
First prototype XP-59A flew on October 1, 1942. Top speed: 663 km/h at 9100 m.
http://www.nasm.si.edu/research/aero/aircraft/bellxp.htm
http://www.edwards.af.mil/history/docs_html/aircraft/bell_testing.html
Bell YFM-1 “Airacuda”
First prototype XFM-1 flew on September 1, 1937. Top speed: 490 km/h.
http://us.geocities.com/da-peacemaker/bell.htm
So it must be XFM-1 prototype in 1938.
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But that film reel summary says it’s a jet and in 1938 it flew. What gives?
So, in 1938 it must be XFM-1 prototype.
Edited: On the other hand, from personal geocities site cited:
Bell P-59 “Airacomet”
Fighter, 1941
Development:
P-59 was the first serious attempt to create a jet fighter in the United States. First prototype XP-59A flew on October 1, 1942. The experimental series YP-59A was built in 1944. A total of 66 P-59 were built.
No. Neither one saw combat. The Airacomet was basically a “proof of concept” plane intended to shake down jet technology that had been transferred from the British to the Americans. The flying wing was ahead of its time - way ahead of its time - and quite dangerous and unstable. The British had the Gloster Meteor which was sent to mainland Europe before the end of the war and flew missions but which was never sent across the German frontier because the English didn’t want their technology to fall into German hands. They were used to effect against V-1 pulse jets over England, however.
Don’t forget the English Gloster Meteor which was considerably ahead in production to American jet fighters.
My Dad worked on the engine for the XP-59a when the brass found out he worked for GE prior to 1942. Shipped him between Lynn, Ma and Muroc AFB a number of times.
32boom
What makes you think this would have been far superior to anything that flew in WWII?
Because the History Channel said so. And they’re ALWAYS right. :lol:
Maybe it wouldn’t have, but theoretically it was an excellent, viable design that never received the funding it should have. So we’ll never know, will we?
Well if the History Channels said so - sure this is true:)
There a lot of “theoretically superiority designs” in other countries exists, but if History Channels keep silence about that - there were never exists in practice.
Actually they had interesting designs from all countries and covered everyone…
They even had something on the Soviet jet-plane/submarine…
All round observation would be very difficult if not impossible and spending 2-3 hours on your chest would be very tiring. Designed by a nerd with little fighter experience.
edited to add; And ejecting would be fun
If you accept that the V1 was a jet than surly the first jet conflict must be that of a Meteor and a V1
I think the RAF term for the XP-59 was death trap which is probably why the US army dumped it very quickly. With the exchange of the Meteor and XP-59 the British got a lemon and the US got an excellent fighter with most if not all of it’s fault ironed out. This must have been a great design benefit to the US.
True, but the XP-59 was little more than a testing platform and a stepping stone to a real aircraft…
In his autobiografi Chuck Yeager states that the P-80A and the Me 262 had remarkably similar performance (he flew both). I think he was talked in terms of speed, range, climb, ceiling only, since I´ve (also) heard that the P-80 rolled better. Certainly the Me 262 was to avoid turning fights with US fighters in WWII. If the piston engined fighter wa´n´t in sight within the first 180 degrees og the first turn, the Me 262 pilot would have to straighten out or loose the speed (any thereby all) advantage and get in serious trouble.
The same thing applied to jet versus piston fighters in the Korean War.
(The British took the trouble of testing their Lightning (the jet aircraft) against a Spitfire in 1968, when it seemed there might be trouble withIndonesia (and its P-51 ecquipped air force). The conclusion was the same; the faster aircraft had nothing to fear as long as it kept the speed high).
Concerning prone piloting the Germans built an aircraft to test the concept (Berlin B9), and found it feasible, but the pilot needed physical training in addition to getting accostumed to the controls.
(Luftwaffe Test Pilot, Hans-Werner Lerche)
(Chuck Yeager´s book is quite entertaining!)
Can I revive this thread as I saw the History Channel programme with both the British English script and the American English script? I am a bit irritated at the attempt to re-write history.
[i]Quote:
Originally Posted by Nickdfresh View Post
Ahhhh, but there was American pre-War jet design that would have been far superior to anything that flew in WWII. I’m trying to track down info. on it. I think it never flew because the jet engine wasn’t yet there, and the RD impetus wasn’t yet a priority. But is was far more sophisticated than the XP-59…
What makes you think this would have been far superior to anything that flew in WWII?[/i]
Lockheed carried out a design study in 1939, really a back of a cigarette packet project for a design that came to be called the P133–here is all that is left of it
For 1939 it was really the sort of thing that schoolboys (all of us, I suspect) would have doodled into excercise books with a bit of inspiration from the Buck Rogers comic strips of the day. Lockheed presented the study to the USAAF in 1940/1941 but was rebuffed. The design clearly would have had serious problems had in actually have gone into production. The canard wings look cool and are common today, but in 1940 they were untested. It is questionable if they would have worked without the type of hydraulic-assisted flight controls that were only being introduced in the later war years. Certainly there was no electronic Fly by wire, even analog FBY that gives a pilot positive feedback. The specification for the ‘theoretical’ Lockheed L1000 jet engine called for a speed of 600mph. Had such a speed been achieved–which is quite unlikely, they would probably have run into the same trouble as Meteor and F80 pilots had with both turning circles and airflow disturbances. Aerodynamic knowledge had yet to evolve further. The lack of FBY also killed the US, Soviet and British ‘flying Wing’ aircraft that couldn’t be controlled effectively unitil digital FBY and on-board computers appeared in the late '60s. The wings of the P133 though, were of the then new NACA Laminar-flow design later incorporated into the P80 and the Mustang P51.
When Lockheed again started beating the drum about a jet aircraft in 1942 the USAAF revealed to them the existence of the YP59 Aircobra which, as we know was a total dog. The YP 59 was originally fitted with a US General Electric built version of Whittle W1 engine that had been the original prototype design fitted to the British Gloster E28/39- even when fitted with more advanced Rolls-Royce built Whittle Mk 2(W2/B23) the aircraft was still a dog. As Hap Arnold had been totally converted to the idea of jets by Whittle and Gloster on his first recce trip to Britain in 1941 and had seen the Gloster E28 flying–the USAAF canned the Aircobra and commissioned the P80 Shooting Star which was again fitted with a Rolls Royce built engine initially, although designed around the de Havilland H1 B engine. (In general production it was fitted with the Allison A35, a GE version of the same Rolls-Royce Nene engine that powered the MiG 15)
Two bits of information that popular histories (like the History channel) omit . As the US started gearing up for war in the second half of 1940, many of their top military and naval leaders, as well as War Industry, were appalled at how far behind they were in design and development compared to European nations in many fields. The RAF,for example, handed back or relegated to secondary duties many of the US aircraft they acquired in the early war years, including B17s, P38,s, P40s. The Tizard commission had handed over a veritable treasure trove of developments in radar, asdic (sonar), avionics, electronic warfare, jet-engines, codebreaking, nuclear research etc. which probably saved US science and industry five to ten years of R&D.
The second point is that Jet propulsion was not a secret in 1940. The British and German patents had been in the public domain since 1930 and history has forgotten that the Italians (surprise, surprise) actually made the first jet-powered flight outside of Germany–fully a year before the British. The Japanese, Russians, Hungarians (yes!) and French also had pre-war projects on the back-burner.
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Caproni Capini 1940
Every aviation power had a jet-engine programme either just before or during WW2—what the secret was, and only the Whittle/Rolls-Royce combination had addressed it before 1944, was the metallurgical problems of high-pressure and high temperature to ensure any decent level of reliability: a problem that Whittle and his teams had been working on since 1930. ( The Me 262’s Jumo 004 required a complete re-build after 10 hourss of operation)
That is why the first American and Russian jets flew with Rolls-Royce engines and why the Gloster Meteor was forbidden to fly over German occupied territory during WW2 despite being fully operational. The Air Ministry was not so much afraid that the Germans may learn anything from the engine design, but they may have learnt the metallurgical secrets.
Even with full co-operation with Britain and access to the German work after WW2, an indigenous American engine design didn,t appear until the 1960s-- so Lockheed would also have ended up with a dog.