Historical, Alternate History, Modern Era or Future Tech, Weapons, Vehicles, Equipment and Tactics

I'm taking inputs! The noise kind of comes with the territory (it was the reason propfans didn't catch on IRL), but right now I'm looking for ways to reduce FOD risks for the centreline engine and improve its airflow.

BLC works at low speeds as well - I was actually inspired by the ShinMaywa US-2 flying boat, which uses it as a short take-off aid. In this case, it's mostly to fix the airflow to the pusher props, which is subject to some major flow separation from the fuselage.

I actually did consider Thunderscreech-style supersonic props, but that would've opened a whole new can of worms. Propfans have a bypass ratio closer to turbofans than traditional turboprops, so that probably would've been overkill as well. Wouldn't have helped with the noise, either.

Noted! The F/B distinction gets blurry at times, but I did forget about the prop/jet one. "Blender" sounds a bit close to "Blinder" as well.

I’d go with F for this one, light ground attack aircraft are usually grouped there. The one syllable restriction makes it a little tough, I’m thinking you may just want to go with a generically silly word simply to reference how odd the aircraft is. Freak, Fluke, something like that.

The only suggestion I’d have for the design would be to raise the rear engine up. Push-pull aircraft in that particular configuration usually have the rear engine mounted slightly high for better aerodynamic efficiency and to keep it clear of the ground.

From an aesthetic standpoint, you could also make it a little lumpier. Soviet aircraft often have a slightly bulbous quality to them.

Edited by archonspeaks on Jul 29th 2019 at 7:19:48 AM

Hmm, I don't know about that. The engine is already mounted near the top of the fuselage,◊ and raising it further might add a lot of drag. Plus a high thrust line would create a lot of downward pitch, which isn't ideal in a short take-off situation. I wonder whether it's viable to just accept damaged blades as a running cost for flying the plane off forward runways.

I suppose it ultimately depends on the cost and complexity of the engines. Though I’ll add that this is why push-pull aircraft usually use a shoulder or high wing. IIRC having the rear prop offset above the front ones increased its efficiency as well.

You could try canting the front props down slightly to make up for moving the rear one higher. That would bring the thrust axis back to center. The rear prop wouldn’t need to move up much higher, so it should be within the bounds for that sort of adjustment.

Edited by archonspeaks on Jul 30th 2019 at 5:23:52 AM

Right, will give it a try. Prop blades ought to be reasonably cheap to replace, so guess I'll write it into the backstory.

Just realised something that would've been problematic in a pre-FBW bird from the '80s: gun stabilisation. Early A-10s struggled with the GAU-8's recoil and smoke disturbing the airflow to the horizontal stabs; the LASTE upgrade in 1990 added automated attitude controls to keep the plane steady while firing. The Su-25 had a much smaller ammo reserve (the Soviets preferred rockets to guns), but even with shorter bursts, it still had issues with recoil.

I'm thinking that maybe the second crewmember can fiddle with the controls to manually stabilise the plane while the pilot fires the gun. It's going to be ridiculously janky, and keeping the gunsight on the target during long bursts would be quite an adventure.

Posted this in the wrong thread but I cut and pasted it here.

Just a thought about airships. Since Helium is expensive and hydrogen explodes, you might want to use a Helium filled envelope with Hydrogen ballonets. In the case of fire the Helium will stifle the flames much like how US aircraft carriers used CO 2 to stifle avgas fires.

The reason you'd use hydrogen in the first place is because it's both cheaper and more lifting than helium.

In what era?

Helium was only isolated in 1895 and was extracted commercially in 1903. That's pretty much the earliest I could see them made unless magic was involved.

Internal maintenance would be a challenge.

Oh yeah, breathing aparati are a must. Thankfully, Braidwood created that in 1863 so it's not impossible.

So I was really torn between putting this one here or in the scifi thread since its from a setting that literally bombed itself back to feudal and is rebuilding, as such they are... pretty schizo-tech, but I figured I would put it here since as an overall the tech lands somewhere around the 40s with some eccentricities...

One of those eccentrics is that flight technology actually started with VTOL, and never touched or bothered going down fixed wing flight...

And because of that I am wondering, would battle-carriers like the Ise make more sense in said setting due to the fact that fully capable aircraft could take off and land without the need for huge runways that take up the entire deck of the ship?

Or would carriers still develop out into there own dedicated "this ship does aircraft and nothing else" for other reasons like space for the machine shops and the like...

Relatedly, if its option 2, how would carriers differ in design if they didn't need the large runway?

Possibly both. Helicopters have been tremendously useful to modern warships for all sorts of things. You can transfer personnel, board vessels, conduct anti-sub warfare, spot targets over the horizon, and even launch ordinance. On the other hand, it makes more logistic sense to keep the helicopters in one spot.

But we can take the middle ground. Use carriers as mobile maintenance depots. If a helicopter needs repairs or maintenance you can crane it over to the carrier but otherwise keep it on the warship. You can still use the depot ship as a launch point for combat helis but you keep the flexibility of having a helicopter on most of your fleet.