After the hullabaloo over the spitfire thread. Lets have a picture thread of your favourite aircraft.
On of my favourites, the Lockheed F104 Starfighter.
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Looks a bit too phallic!
I think that's secretly why lots of men like certain 'planes....
Anyway, sorry to do this so early on, but...
END OF THREAD.
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Ah the widowmaker, thats a good start:
And I'll see your Starfighter with a Sunderland
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coz it means I'm off somewhere nice
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Yummy
At risk of upsetting the hippies..
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CaptainFlashheart started a thread like this ages ago, it ran to about 8 pages!
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The Ligntning
A few bits of frippery and a pilot strapped to two socking great huge engines. Lovely.
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Is it true they never got one to it's top speed becasue it was a bit too 'lively'?
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The F4-U corsair very pretty.
Darn it Andituk beat me to it, awesome machines.
Nippy.
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DeHaviland Vampire, just a bit different, no other reason.
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Love the Vulcan though.
An excellent choice joolsburger. ^^
I love the stories about the Blackbird - when the RAF first spotted one it was a Lightning pilot who saw it and, on closing the gap with it, the Blackbird just buggered off.
No-one believed the pilot because everyone knew (or thought they knew!) that the fastest thing around was the Lightning...
Saab Viggen
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My fave would have to be the aircraft my Gramps flew 8)
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Any Harrier, but the Shar in particular.
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END OF THREAD.
He was right. The shot of the underside was the one I went on, G-BOAF. Happy times.
These put on quite a display fo sho:
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Saw one of these at Eastbourne a few years ago. Make a fantastic noise.
B1 bomber
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Can I have 2?
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Icarus C42, for the simple reason that I flew one on Monday!
P51-D Mustang
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Piaggio Avanti
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Comanche
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These things were just amazing when they first came out
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Agricultural...
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Tupolev Tu-95 Bear
Can't post any pics works filter 🙁
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@PetePoddy
You beat me to it.
My father designed bits of Lightnings and knew a few pilots too. During the Cold War years I'd heard most of the Lightning stories, some apocryphal and some that turned out to be true, like the interception of a Lockheed U2 at 78,000 feet and some wild reports of the top speed.
I've also heard one or two stories that aren't widely known, for example the rivalry between Lighting and Phantom crews allegedly resulted in an extremely low pass of a Phantom airfield by a Lightning that resulted in several perforated eardrums of the maintenence staff working in an open hanger at the time and that Lightning pilots were warned against goading Phantom pilots into mock dogfights after complaints from demoralized Phantom crews... All hearsay of course.
the single greatest british invention
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But I always drew Lightnings in my exercise books at school.
Purely for conversational value (also featured on the Chinook thread):
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Love the vampire and the harrier, but this always gets me.
They used to use my old school as a practise target, it was on a big hill and they would often fly past down in the valley below us. Awesome.
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[i]I've also heard one or two stories that aren't widely known, for example the rivalry between Lighting and Phantom crews allegedly resulted in an extremely low pass of a Phantom airfield by a Lightning that resulted in several perforated eardrums of the maintenence staff working in an open hanger at the time and that Lightning pilots were warned against goading Phantom pilots into mock dogfights after complaints from demoralized Phantom crews... All hearsay of course. [/i]
There was similar rivalry between the Chinook crews and Phantoms in the Falklands (post war when they kept a squadron of Phantoms there). The Chinooks apparently won when they dropped tons of water from an firfighting bucket all over the airfield...
TU-144 deserves a mention I guess, so near, and yet so far...
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[i]Is it true they never got one to it's top speed becasue it was a bit too 'lively'? [/i]
My father flew them. there were few in Germany that in his words were "sporty, even by Lightning standards", that would outrun most things (early 70's) including 104's. He tells a story once of diving from a great height and the thing was still accelerating as he pulled out of the dive... There were reports of taking gun camera shots of U2, but he reckoned that was just to piss off the 'mericans. Low down Spey engined (British Phantoms) were pretty fast, but above 20K ft or so the Lightnings would out turn them and it was game over. He always said the hardest things to shot down were Buccaneers.
He always loved flying the Hunter, lousy fighter though as it was so docile, he hated the Phantom (big, heavy, bloke in the back telling you what to do) and he thought the Tornado would kill him: In the early days there was trouble with some of the flight systems not 'talking' to each other which made flying it a bit interesting some times...
It has to be the Lightning for me too - awesome machine.
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And all V-Bombers together (for Elfin)
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Not really a plane 'geek' but finishing work in Knutsford this week so I thought I'd have a trip during my lunch hour to Manc airport to see the Emirates A380 (?) leave. Impressive. Very, very impressive...
Some great photos. Recommend Skunk Works as a great book on the subject.
Woosh:
[url= http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4081/4860526964_48357445e0.jp g" target="_blank">
[url= http://www.flickr.com/photos/egg_n_bacon/4860526964/ ]Typhoon heading towards space[/url] by [url= http://www.flickr.com/people/egg_n_bacon/ ]jwrfooo[/url], on Flickr
Big:
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[url= http://www.flickr.com/photos/egg_n_bacon/4860527734/ ]B52 static display[/url] by [url= http://www.flickr.com/people/egg_n_bacon/ ]jwrfooo[/url], on Flickr
super guppy is rather impressive and incredibly ugly
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Most successful fighter ever made
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My brother in law made a bit of mess with a F15
http://www.militaryphotos.net/forums/showthread.php?81457-F-15E-Crash-at-RAF-Lakenheath
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Just because flying one is almost better than sex... 😳
Right Lightning buffs; just off the phone from the old man trying to pin this down. In his words they were operationally limited to about 1.7 mach simply because the airflow around the nose cone could get all (something technical...) and it could damage the engines. Apparently acceleration was the thing rather than flat out speed... He reckoned the fastest he ever went was about mach 2 in the winter (again for some technical reason about dense air?) sorry, I tried to pay attention, but it's mostly Greek to me...
Really? No one going for the P51b Mustang?
My brother in law made a bit of mess with a F15http://www.militaryphotos.net/forums/showthread.php?81457-F-15E-Crash-at-RAF-Lakenheath
Well, clearly not his fault, was there a skip nearby?
CharlieMungus - Member
Really? No one going for the P51b Mustang?
Well, I went for the 'd' - see page one. Is that close enough?? 🙂
Loads of great stuff up there
andituk - thanks for the Warthog - I was entering this thread thinking i'd have to go find a picture but no, beaten too it! In my old plane spotting days I was at a club where they had a crew in doing a presentation - think I was around 13-14 at the time... looong time ago
F15 - lovely bird - at it's inception it was the only plane to be able to accelerate whilst in a vertical climb.. 😯
Actually it was Lairyplanes that got me into photography, a long, long time ago...an uncle worked for BAE, we went to few air-shows with him - great memories of getting a 'boost' to try and see things by standing on his aluminium case after he'd put his old screw thread Pentax together....
CharlieMungus - Member
[i]Really? No one going for the P51b Mustang?[/i]
Well, I went for the 'd' - see page one. Is that close enough??
the 'D'? ****ing splitters!
BTW, there is a story of a Lightning "kill" - the only one during it's thirty year career - the victim being a Harrier which had gotten into trouble over Germany resulting in the pilot ejecting. Apparently the pilotless Harrier continued on it's wobbly course and a Lightning on patrol was vectored in to bring it down before the errant jump-jet crashed somewhere in densely populated Holland.
Can anyone add any credence to this?
+1 for the SR71, boys own stuff, and it did nothing more scary and destructive than take a few "holiday pictures"
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Really? No one going for the P51b Mustang?
Pah! Mass-produced rubbish. The P47 Thunderbolt was a far better plane!
(OK, maybe it was a little pricey though)
Vulcan and spitfire just 'cos they are beautiful. No other aircraft comes close IMO - ecept perhaps the concorde
But the one I would have loved to fly in is
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Now thats when flying was luxury
And of course the one that was noever built!
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Designed in 1929, the "Flying Hotel" was the most luxuriant airplane ever thought up. Designed for the 1040s, it was planned to have:
Main Lounge 36 ft high, 9 decks, 3 Kitchens, 13 pantries, writing rooms, 2 public dining rooms, (the main dining room converts into a dance floor for 100 couples), orchestra platform, 3 private dining rooms capable of feeding 40 people, 4 deck tennis courts, 6 shuffle board courts, 6 quoits pitches, library, 1 gym with dressing rooms and showers, 1 men's Solarium w/16 couches and a masseur, 1 womens Solarium w/16 couches and a masseuse, 1 children’s playroom, 1 doctors office with waiting room, barber shop, hairdressers salon, 2 bars, 1 store, 1 huge promenade deck, 1 Veranda Cafe seats 90, 18 single state rooms, 81 double state rooms, 24 suites w/ baths, 179 sleeping rooms, air-conditioning through out, and 155 crew members, from cooks to bus boys
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One of my favorites the fantastic Mossie!
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Jimbo wins IMO!
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Wins!
Always SR71 for me. Read somewhere about crew setting a couple of speed records - just because - on its retirement flight.
For looks I always used to like F16. Just a nicer looking plane than F15 and F18 of similar period
Saw Typhoon in action at this year's Moto GP and that thing was impressive
What about this chap? Beautiful, I reckon.
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I'd like one of these:
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can't do photos, but, afer a nice Berks bimble me and gf got (later than expected - thanks punctures, no really, THANKS punctures) to White Waltham airfield, and wandered in. mmmmm - that's a Hurricane over there (30 yds), blimey that's a Spitfire behind it, I could have walked up and touch them, no crowds, nothing. Anyway we sat outside, admired the view and ordered lunch, generally enjoyed the ambience - sunny, a little windy, very few people around, Anway a few chaps in overalls came out of the clubhouse, chatted, and then walked over to the planes, some tyre kicking, CRACKING engine noise, then they both taxied together,along the grass, to runway, for a truly glorious moment I though they we're going side by side, but the Hurricane went first, then Spitfire, the noise was awesome, up, bank right, circle round and then waggling wings over the field, absolutely directly above us - fully side on, felt like 100 ft but I suspect it was higher.
To cap it all the bloke next to me was a spotter and he mailed me a cd of the entire sequence.
happy days
BTW, there is a story of a Lightning "kill" - the only one during it's thirty year career - the victim being a Harrier which had gotten into trouble over Germany resulting in the pilot ejecting. Apparently the pilotless Harrier continued on it's wobbly course and a Lightning on patrol was vectored in to bring it down before the errant jump-jet crashed somewhere in densely populated Holland
The Harrier story I'm aware of (I think I read the accident report BITD on a RAF base somewhere) was one on a test flight. There was a seat malfunction and the pilot was ejected and unfortunately killed. The Harrier flew on and something was scrambled to intercept and the cockpit was empty, canopy blown out, etc. I wasn't aware it was shot down though - maybe it's a different example? Will have a google...
gusamc - awesome. Got those pics on this thread.
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My boss used to work on the same base as Lightnings, apparently one had a runaway engine situation that the pilot could not shut down and as the speed was picking up quickly he was ordered to eject. After ejecting it carried on in level flight reaching some very large mach numbers (which were quickly classified "and no don't ask again sonny") before crashing in the sea.
He also tells a story of the Vulcan that the apprentice nearly backflipped off the maintenace jacks whilst trying to be clever with the undercarriage.......eek.
the single greatest british invention
Don't talk crap.
I saw the F35 display at Farnborough, albeit only from a distance. It was unbelievable, as was the noise. Like tearing the very fabric of the universe apart along with the rules of physics.
I saw the Typhoon to but it wasn't quite as good 🙂
ooooooh TSR-2 eh Ming?
Harrier Jump jet!!
The mighty PR-9 Canberra
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Best part of my Army career so far was spent working on 39 Sqn with these great recce aircraft.
[b]I saw the F35 display...[/b]
Has the US-made F-35 displayed anywhere in the world, yet?
Even though my favourite is Concorde, I'm loving the Dakota DC3 ^^^. One flew over us when riding Rivington pike a few months ago, so low we saw the pilots.
+1 for TSR2, my old chap worked on that too.
Apparently the prototype left it's Lightning chase plane standing during an early acceleration test, no mean feat by any standards, let alone those of a heavy strike jet.
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anyone else making plane noises to themselves while looking at these pics?
[b]Apparently the prototype left it's Lightning chase plane standing during an early acceleration test, no mean feat by any standards, let alone those of a heavy strike jet.[/b]
The only thing faster was the axe wielded by the politicians.
@Jimbo that's very true.
In 1965, Britain was skint and went cap in hand to the World Bank. America threatened to veto loans unless the British government cancelled TSR2, which itself was an export threat to the F-111 and F-4.
Britain had at this point agreed to sell Lightnings to the Luftwaffe who were extremely keen to get them. The Germans backed out when the British government agreed to the sale, but warned that it could not guarantee spare parts - again, after pressure from the Americans.
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I've got lots of fond memories of this old girl:
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