Allright, I was a little unfair about the Vulcan and take it back but I add the de Havilland Sea Vixen. Even the name “Vixen” is terrible.
To be fair to them, they’d run out of “V” names they could use and “Vixen” was about the only one left. In design terms it isn’t all that bad, but I agree it really is fugly.
The real Elegance is the Sr-71 BlackBird.
Great hight-tech perfomance and aerodinamic elegance
Greates trans-sonic airplain.
For the the best proportion of Elegance and Brutal force were the Mig-15 and Sabre - the best fighters of its time.
The SR-71 is very, very heavily optimised for a single operating point (Mach 3.0 cruise), and it shows. The engine intake cones, for instance, are designed to put the air going in through a long series of angled shock waves, which is almost the most efficient way of compressing it known (most aircraft only use one or two shock waves). Oh, and having seen one in the metal at Duxford a couple of years back I definately think it looks better in photos. Up close it looks very… handmade.
…additionally I have to inform you that the word means in german “to jerk off” (different spelling, same pronunciation).
We visited Wright Patterson Airfield National Air Museum in Ohio.
They had a SR-71 for display and it is a site to behold for sure.
Well there is this
I’m sure the USAF has rules against that sort of thing!
That’s not a fair competition! (-:
thats considering if the the f22 pilot is a 3 year old
Oh come on! The Phantom is not a natural, symmetrical beauty I agree; but it does have a rugged and aggressive look that is distinctive and fetching in its own right!
I love the phantom. It’s so pretty!
Chance Vought Cutlass
1950s Sci Fi looks
Best and Warm Regards
Adrian Wainer
Considering the Cutlass is a severely bastardised Lippisch/Arado design schema, powered by two of the very weakest and shittiest jet engines ever known to take to the skies, I fail utterly to see where you’re coming from, here.
Had the Cutlass been given decent engines, my view would differ.
However, according to the poor bastards who actually flew the thing, it was a bastard in the air, and almost universally disliked by those who had suffered its’ vagaries.
Regards, Uyraell.
I agree the Phantom classes as “functional beauty” rather than aesthetic beauty. In my view, the UK models are actually better looking, despite that the US models were better in performance terms.
Regards, Uyraell.
Harrier, yes. Swift, stylish, but not a favourite of mine.
My likes are, in rough order:
Me.262
F86 (same thing, really)
Gotha 229
Lippisch P13 -> XF 92, F102, F106.
Hawker Hunter
Fairey FD2
DH108
SR53/SR177
Bristol 188
Sud Ouest Trident
Phantom II
A5 Vigilante.
A3D Skyray
F111 Aardvark/ EF111 Raven.
Folland Gnat.
BAC Lighting.
TSR2.
Harrier.
SR71 Family.
After that, it gets a bit complicated, so, those will do for now.
(Sidelight: has any one ever considered what an aircraft design originating from a combination of Lippisch/Tank/Multhopp would have been like?)
Regards, Uyraell.
Working with BAE systems I can only say the Eurofighter Typhoon:
But I loved the Phantom when I was a teenager.The tail and the nose looked like it was coming out of a sci-fi movie.
While the EuroTyphoon is admirable, I’ve sought long and hard to really distinguish it, or its’ Rafale cousin, from the Saab Grippen family.
(I’ve always had the sneaking suspicion the Europeans merely copied the good points of the F16XL and re-shaped it a little, then jammed the F18 engines into the frame, so-to-speak.)
Yes, `tis an admirable and capable weapons platform/fightercraft. I’m just not certain what makes it outstanding, as such.
Regards, Uyraell.
The Gloster Javelin
http://www.btinternet.com/~javelin/p06_picture_galleries/p063_xa699/xa699_22.htm
Wash your mouth out with soap and water! That was a horrible, horrible aircraft - the only one I’ve ever heard of where engaging afterburner produced reduced rather than increased thrust.
Good site on it here though: http://www.thunder-and-lightnings.co.uk/javelin/index.php