@@arthurcrime first: the me p1101 was a planned testbed and actually completed (it lacked an engine and never flew though) and was found by the man who developed the concept for the bell X4 wich was inspired to design the bell X4 to test the idea. and seconds: was that a refference the görings dumb speech that brougth him his meanest nickname?
@@richardvernon317 - A rather unsuccessful twin engine torpedo bomber and reconnaissance aircraft for Costal Command. Unfortunately, due to engine placement the cockpit view to the side and aft was virtually zero making it "useless as a GR [General Reconnaissance] aircraft". It was unstable as well as grossly underpowered.
@@richardvernon317 - But it does sound better than the Curtiss Wright XC-76 Caravan, a twin engine, wooden transport of WWII. The first flight was very brief. The pilot immediately circled around and set the aircraft back onto the runway. On the second flight, the aircraft disintegrated in flight. A shame that CW did not bring in a few DeHavilland engineers as advisors on the wooden disaster. They did, after all, design the Mosquito, one of the greatest British aircraft of all time.
I would just like to note that the Me-262 is not the best example of early swept wing aircraft because its wings were not swept to increase its critical Mach number, but rather to change the distance between the center of lift and center of gravity. The original design had straight wings but the engine nacelles turned out to be heavier than anticipated, so the wings were adjusted to move them aft. It was simpler to change the wing angle than to redesign the fuselage and rearrange the structure and internal components. The wings ended up at the same slight sweep angle as the earlier DC-3 transport, which had slightly swept wings for the same reason.
Supposedly the bent wings of the B-25 resulted from a need to decrease the dihedral but it would have been too expensive to redesign the fuselage and engine nacelle interfaces. Seems to have worked out pretty well.
@@danpatterson8009 The strange inner wing shape of the Vultee A-31 Vengeance was a result of a CG miscalculation that required the wing to be moved back without redesigning the fuselage. And there was a field modification kit for the P-38 that involved cutting off the tail booms just forward of the horizontal tail and inserting angled spacer pieces to change the incidence of the tail a degree or two, later incorporated in production. Sometimes necessity is the mother of invention.
@@danpatterson8009 it’s my understanding that the cranked outer wing on the F-4 was similar, where it corrected flight problems w/out needing to make corresponding changes to fuselage & landing gear.
@@RCAvhstape ... I've read a lot of aviation books. Grumman made two huge mistakes in the '50s, the Jaguar and F11F Tiger. The former nearly bankrupted the company. The latter became an advanced trainer for the USN but the F8U Crusader was just a better jet (if Grumman had put a J-79 engine in the Tiger it may even be flying in squadron service to this day in some nations, it was that good). Grumman was reduced to making aluminum canoes during the '60s and '70s to make ends meet. Grumman now makes mail delivery trucks. The F4F stopped the Japanese. The F6F beat Japan. Now? The legacy is a puttering postal delivery van. :(
How many times do we hear the Military specification starts as "we need a plane to do X Y Z", manufacturer start cutting metal, has the first systems in testing and then gets told that "we need it to actually do A, B, C 1,2,3,4". And then everyone wonders why there was a significant overspend and it's late into service. Great story as ever.
Unfortunately those Military Specifications are based on expected threat capabilities of the enemy that you are expecting to fight and that is based on what intelligence you have. It also involves the fact that you don't expect the world to change that much in the geo-political sphere between when the project starts and when it enters service. It also has to take into account any technical breakthroughs that may happen within your own defence industry that makes the original specification redundant. All of these factor happen all of the time as the world does not stay static. Like this aircraft. No Radar in it because there is not one that will fit, until somebody comes up with a design that works and can be made to fit if the aircraft is modified. Same for the Jet Engine. Axial Flow rejected due to MTBF on current designs, then Somebody makes one that can meet the MTBF figures of the original engine selection.
We can be grateful that Hitler interfered with the spec of the Me262, making it a fighter bomber instead of a fighter and delaying the production of it by about a year, by then, too late to affect the outcome of WW2!
@@crossleydd42 That is a Myth. The Real Reason that the aircraft was delayed into service was because the Engines were not reliable enough for the Luftwaffe to accept them into operational service. Gloster Meteor had the same issues, plenty of airframes in 1943, but the engines were not good enough to safely allow the aircraft to do R&D and acceptance testing.
@@richardvernon317 Hitler's interference in April/May 1944 delayed production of a fighter version by about 3 months, until around September, when about 1/5th were fighters and only in November were 50% fighters. Other delays were certainly modifying the plane such as tricycle undercarriages and engine reliability, but, by that time, shortages of fuel which hampered training the jet's new pilots, plus overwhelming Allied planes, negated the Me262's effect on the war. Production rose into 1945, but few came into service by then. The main problem with Whittle's W1 engine was getting it to develop enough power. Frank Halford started work on redesign in April 1941 The resultant Halford H-1 first ran on 13 April 1942, and quickly matured to produce its full design thrust within two months. It's first proper flight was on 5 March 1943 in the prototype Gloster Meteor DG206/G at RAF Cranwell,
@@crossleydd42 There were many factors involved in the ME-262 production woes. One was the bombing of Germany, another was sabotage by slave workers, another was the difficulties with the metals and materials needed for the jet engines. Lastly, the evolving technology of the plane, first a tail dragger then a tricycle gear. Thanks
Fascinating as always - and great to see that the information Grumman gained from the variable wing technology was ultimately used in one of the great carrier aircraft, the F14 Tomcat!
Actually, what was learned from the ill-fated XF10F was put to good use on the General Dynamics F-111, because Grumman designed the wing sweep mechanism for the F-111 itself as a subcontractor.
Another excellent video Ed. The quote about "....entrance to the cockpit should have been made impossible" is usually attributed to an A&AEE report on the Blackburn Botha, although there are some doubts about that. It's quoted in lots of places but I don't think anyone has actually found the original report. But it certainly sounds like what someone would say about the Botha.
I've heard it about many planes, the Firebrand, the Blenheim, the Scimitar, the Lansen(!) (Why? Were the Swedes just being picky?), the Sea Dart.... Unfortunately the list is almost endless, but the Botha is probably the Ur example.
Abou that canopy story: Ever seen Hot Shots, the Top Gun spoof? I didn't know it was inspired by real facts! :-) One interesting fact you forgot to mention: The whole wing was actually translating it's position while changing sweep to retrim the aircraft, the lack of which was major problem on the X5. Only the later fixed inner wing gloves, as seen on the F111 etc. made that redundant. It has been written that this idea actually was directly copied from Vickers studies by Sir Barnes Wallis (Swallow etc.) The translating wing position has been described as a major reason for the extra weight. I'd say that the concept was actually spot on but just too advanced for the time. The double tail plane actuation is new to me. That seems to have been a stupid mistake indeed. Such a concept is simply asking for delayed reaction effects and thus pilot induced oscillations. One does however wonder how it would have done without that tail and that engine.
For its last several flights it was equipped with a Cougar style tail setup but it time was already up according to Corky. The plane had other flight control problems. The plane's wings were equipped with undersized ailerons and new type of spoiler system that didn't really work so the plane didn't turn very well. Corky did note that the one power dive he did in the Jaguar it quickly out accelerated the F-86 wingman like brick.
Actually the reason for the German Me-262 having swept wings was because the engines they ended up using was longer then those originally planned, with the engine much further forward of the leading edge.. This left the aircraft somewhat nose heavy. So to counter this problem they swept the wings back which moved the centre of gravity back.
Pregnant Frankenfighter Adipose Guppy Fat Goose Coming Loose NAVY - "We put our name on its fuselage in giant lettering before the thought, quality, utility, and aesthetics have even begun. That's how you know it's a great fighter jet!"
If it looks right, it'll fly right. If it doesn't look right, it'll be called the XF10F Jaguar then completely forgotten until resurrected in a RUclips video.
To be fair the design was not a complete lemon. An Air International article on this aircraft many years ago made a couple of interesting points - the initial elevator design was a failure but was replaced by a conventional surface that resolved controllability and the engine problems were somewhat resolved when Grumman, in their frustration, ignored the instructions and took the fuel control unit to bits themselves. Having undone all the securing screws that held the cover on the cover would not come off and as the only screws left were 2 that held the maker's nameplate on, they unscrewed those as well. One was short as was expected but the other was far too long and had penterated the guts of the control unit.
I had to go back and watch/listen again when I heard the story about the ejection seat and the landing, to make sure my ears or my mind were not betraying me.
1:40 fun fact: the Bell X5 was derived from the Messerschmitt P.1101 project, captured at the end of WWII, except that wings sweep could be change during the flight. It was already obsolete when it flew and there was no attempt to correct its flaws and try to make an actual fighter from it. It ended up as a test bench for swept wings, though jets improved so fast it was almost useless.
Both the X-5 and the XF10F Jaguar suffered from the same problem: serious stability issues whenever the wings were swept back and forth. Grumman learned from this and figured out how to make the whole idea work properly with the F-111.
You can add the F4D Skyray to that list too, but, Douglas was smart and designed the Skyhawk to take other size motors just in case something happened to the J40. They ended up with the P&W J57 if I remember correctly. J79 was also an easy fit. (For testing purposes).
@@aerospacematt9147 Aircraft designers from large companies have found that to be true too. Wing design looks easy but is rather complicated. But the rest...if it looks like it'll flow over the body, with exceptions for boundry turbulance, it'll be okay if you have a good wing design.
@@OldGeezer55 Yes, I agree. My A-4 Skyhawk should have flown, but an underpowered engine caused it to fail. I believe that the engine in this aircraft was one of the contributing factors to its demise.
Hold on, he rode on the nose of the plane while rolling down the Lakebed... holding on to the windshield frame for dear life? How do i picture that? Imagine being so frightened that you would do that - on a Jet with such a narrow track and high CG. Nuts! Absolutely Nuts!
I served as technical editor for a book on management written by a retired CEO/engineer who early in his engineering career had been employed at Westinghouse. During a conversation on his early career, he explained that he'd worked on jet engines there in the Gas Turbine Division and he eventually quit because the culture at Westinghouse at the time was toxic and because an engine they were developing was "absolutely awful" and his complaints to the project's manager about design flaws repeatedly were ignored. I cringed when I heard this and asked which Westinghouse engine he'd been working on. It was, of course, the J40. I then asked if he knew what eventually happened with the J40 and he responded that when he left he never looked back. So, more than a half century later, I was the lucky guy who had to fill him in. He didn't take the news well at all.
I do love how Brits can express ideas succinctly, while putting in some humor as well. Still, I have to think whatever aircraft that British test pilot was talking about, it couldn't have been worse than the Jaguar. Probably the worst aircraft I've ever heard of from Grumman.
It might have been a failure as an expected production plan but as a prototype for variable geometry wings it was a huge success considering that the lessons learned from it led to the best carrier based fighter ever produced, the Tomcat.
Curiously enough, good (that is to say *really* good) 'tho the Tomcat was, ........ well its argauble innit? Pilot reports suggest the humble Skyhawk could get past the big cats at times. Phantoms scored more kills Wildcats & Bearcats more again. An argument can be advanced for the Mitsubishi Zero Whilst Hornets can go head to head with Tomcats and win every time until they run out of fuel. You pays your money and .........
..forgive me, yes, sort of not the swing wing itself, but in the adaptive wing and control surfaces evolution learned from this design. More from Grumman's growing knowledge from designing, production, r&d and engineering/manufacturing projects, towards their in-house expertise in aerospace sciences ect, advancing powered, controlled, wing lift devices with augmented flight control mecha-electronic systems on the Jaguar. If a more powerful engine could, might've rebuilt into...?? but....
@@babboon5764 Are "Phantoms scored more kills" and "Wildcats & Bearcats more again." legitimate references given the difference in scale of war they and the F-14 were involved in?
@@scottfw7169 That was *kind of the point Scott* It doesn't make much sense to say ANY was the 'best' whatever type of plane ever'. You can show only that by many measures a plane was excellent for its time.
The first flight by a swing wing aircraft was a small scale model built by Barnes Wallis (it worked), he seems to get overlooked a lot these days, he also introduced 'geodesic' construction (for the gas bags in airships, it spreads the load evenly), that was based on a mathematical construct but he got the name wrong, it should be 'geodetic'.
Yeah, that horiz stabilizer looked like someone had spent too much time watching Buck Rogers. But I'm sure this thing went through some kind of wind tunnel testing. Wouldn't that catch these kinds of vicious flight characteristics?
@@KB4QAA A flying Instructor who once worked on Buccs told me that, brilliant tho the Bucc was ..... In a high speed stall the *only* option could sometimes be to eject - Because with the wing at 'just the wrong angle' its tail (one of several T-Tails rather similar in appearance to the Gruman Jagwah) was masked from the airflow by the wing so it was in partial vaccuum and doing not much by way of allowing control to be restored.
@@RCAvhstape Logical that it would be I guess. Before someone else points it out: Sailplanes *are* nearly all Tee Tail now but have far greater aspect ratios (thin wings to the rest of yer) so are unlikely to be so 'marked' ...... Especially as gliders don't often do the sorts of manoeuvers likely to lead to a high speed stall. (Yes I know soe are good aerobats but ....)
Designer: We've made sure we have as many common parts as our previous design as possible to streamline development and manufacturing so we can pass the savings on to you. Military: That sounds good. What did you manage to work in? Designer: Well, there's a spring, two screws, and some plastic doohicky that we aren't quite sure what it does, but take it out and the whole thing falls out of the sky. Military: So we saved money right? Designer: Well yes, but actually no. It's an unfortunately common story.
Actually the wing sweeping was another major problem, causing instability and pitch up. The solution was to pivot the wings off centreline, which the F10F obviously couldn’t do.
Such a long time to eventually realise it was a lame duck. Surely test flights would prove the engine to be inadequate and the extra size and weight would all contribute to a bird not able to fulfill the wishes of the Navy. Anyhow, great video Ed. Look forward to another.
With the engine in development at the same time as the aircraft, it would take more time than you might expect to determine that the engine design was just bad and would never be made to work. This very problem did in several late-war fighter projects when various super-engine projects just couldn't be made to meet desired performance or reliability.
It was a time of rapid technical development and learning. You learn what technology works after you have tried things that do not work. Unfortunately the perils of design-by-committee and mission creep are lessons that have to be re-learned by new generations who imagine that technical advances have made them smarter than their ancestors.
In fact Grunmans concept was partly based on a WW2 German test plane that indeed did fly with variable geometry wings though these could only be moved while on the ground.
I'd never heard of this dud developed by Grumman. Surprising. Grumman is one of America's most distinguished aircraft manufacturerers with an incredibley long list of successful machines. Even the best have their failures.
Ed Nash's Military Matters: Silly question: I was watching a video from another channel and on top of mixing up the facts or just getting the facts wrong altogether, the guy narrating actually referred the Rolls Royce "Nene" jet engine as the "Rolls Royce Nay-Nay"! Have you or anyone else ever heard "Nene" [neen] said that way?
Grumman,s only "Dead Cat" that didn,t happen. one old joke was that EVERY flight of the prototype was it,s FIRST flight because of the changes made on the insistence of the US Navy between flights. after the dust and smoke of the fiasco had cleared,the wife of one of the Grumman project engineers gave him a pair of Jaguar {animal} cufflinks to remind him that no matter how bad things might get later in his career,they were once a lot worse.
kinda crazy that with jet engines, radar, and variable wings they still had to specify all metal construction, but then again its only 5 years removed from wooden carrier decks
The American pronunciation isn't just the USA pronunciation. It is pretty close to the Tupi pronunciation, the tribe that gave the name for the cat to the Portuguese in Brazil, that lent the pronunciation to the North Americans. The British pronunciation is that of someone who read the name in a book, had never heard the word said, and just winged it.😀
Maybe it should have been called the "Grumman Turkey". They built so many LEGENDARY aircraft, perhaps we can forgive them for making one duffer! Prehaps it was the case that they put so much effort into solving the swing-wing, everything else suffered. Too many development projects in one project perhaps? Good vid though. Never heard of it before.
Ever think of doing one Ed on the Farman 222, the first plane to drop a bomb on German Soil and used in a rescue by James Denis of a group of men at the end of the Battle of France?
A Carrier aircraft that needs over 160kts before the tailplane control becomes effective? What on earth were they thinking when they chose that stupid Canard servo tab arrangement?!
It seems to me that this is a case of trying to stretch the boundaries of aviation in too many directions at a time in one aircraft, when they should have stuck with only one direction, the variable geometry wing.
"We need swept back wings, not straight wings for higher performance"...Now we have the likes of the F-18 that has essentially a straight trailing edge and a swept leading edge. I find it hard to believe they wouldn't have already experimented with that planform earlier instead of the complexity of variable geometry wings (which have now been abandoned)....or am I missing some other aspect of aircraft design/technology here? Incidentally, the F4D Skyray - with it's delta configuration - had it's first flight before the Jaguar (according to wikipedia), and that certainly wasn't straight winged.
Variable sweep designs turned out to be complex, expensive, and eventually not used. The Americans developed the F-111 and the F-14, while Europe developed the Tornado. All of these are out of production and out of service, except for a few Iranian Tomcats. That's all you need to know about variable sweep fighters.
I think it's probably a good idea to incorporate only one new and untested concept into an experimental prototype aircraft. Here we have an untested engine, an untested tail-plane, and a variable geometry wing. What could go wrong?
Thing suffered from committee problems, sounded good until everyone added their own ideas. I can think of more than a few times I wished that getting into something was difficult, but should have been made impossible, life can give you that Kind of stuff!
Of all the little entries in books I have read on the Jaguar I never read an assessment of the VG wings and it's impressive that even in this early attempt they actually worked Can't help but think if they would have just put a new tail on the aircraft given the engine it needed and maybe some area rule it might not have been such a piece of crap On a side note I couldn't picture landing that narrow undercarriage on anything other than a runway trying to get that thing aboard an aircraft carrier would have been a nightmare it's like grumman's own jet powered trans-sonic supermarine Sea fire
There was virtually no connection between the Jaguar and Tomcat, which began flying 17 or 18 years later. In between was the Grumman F-11 Tiger, notorious for literally shooting itself down and generally mediocre (just not as disastrous as the Jag). But that "family line" ended with the rejected Super Tiger F-11F-1 prototype. In fact, all of the later US swing wings were descended from research by NASA in the late '50s, followed by General Dynamics' F-111, including the rejected F-111B variant for the USN (in which Grumman was involved as a junior partner). In the late '60s, there was also a rejected Vought design, the V-507 two seat carrier fighter, and this may be regarded as the missing link between the F-111B and the Tomcat. None of these had much to do with the Grumman fighters of the 1950s. FWIW, the Vought V-507 was also influenced by the Dassault Mirage "G" - a promising swing-wing prototype from the mid-'60s, which did not enter production, but still holds some speed records. (Vought was a regular supplier to the French Navy, through which it had connections with Dassault.)
Actually, it was the British who came up with the "wing controlled aerodyne" as it was called by "Barnes Wallis", remember him? He died way before jet aircraft! In 1931 Westland-Hill built the Pterodactyl IV which could vary the sweep angle during flight, it assisted in longitudinal trim due to no horizontal stabiliser and was later used in Barnes Wallis's wing-controlled aerodyne. Later, the British experimented with "swept-wing" technology but decided against it which is when the US adopted it but not before the Germans had experimented with the possibility of adopting it for their Messerschmitt P-1101 jet fighter, so no, the US did not come up with "variable wing" technology, it was a British development that was later considered by the Germans who never got to use it and then abandoned by the British before the US took it on. Edit:- The Pterodactyl first flew in "1928" but it was the later Westland-Hill built ones of the early 1930's that had this technology, and so yes, a plane had flown with variable wing before you say!
Barnes Wallis died in 1979!!!! His swing wing designs didn't appear until the mid to late 1940's. The Westland-Hill Pterodactyl IV had a very small amount of variable wing sweep to provide longitudinal trim control in absence of a horizontal tail. It had nothing to do with improving the maximum and minimum airspeeds.
And for those wondering what happened to Meyer, I believe he went on to become CEO of Grumman. Have to do a video about him one day.
erm the first variable geometry wing airplane to start development was the me p 1101.
If this thing ever flies, you can call me Meyer. Sorry couldn't help it.
@@arthurcrime first: the me p1101 was a planned testbed and actually completed (it lacked an engine and never flew though) and was found by the man who developed the concept for the bell X4 wich was inspired to design the bell X4 to test the idea. and seconds: was that a refference the görings dumb speech that brougth him his meanest nickname?
@@Irobert1115HD it was, but it never flew, nor would of done, I believe.
Avery much fun video to watch to....Thanks Ed 😂👍👀
Corky's English test pilots quote was great, "The entrance into the cockpit was most difficult, it should have been made impossible".
The Aircraft in question was rumoured to be the Blackburn Botha.
@@richardvernon317 - A rather unsuccessful twin engine torpedo bomber and reconnaissance aircraft for Costal Command. Unfortunately, due to engine placement the cockpit view to the side and aft was virtually zero making it "useless as a GR [General Reconnaissance] aircraft". It was unstable as well as grossly underpowered.
@@scootergeorge9576 There is a reason its always in any ten worst British Aircraft lists.
THAT quote is a CLASSIC! LMAO!
@@richardvernon317 - But it does sound better than the Curtiss Wright XC-76 Caravan, a twin engine, wooden transport of WWII. The first flight was very brief. The pilot immediately circled around and set the aircraft back onto the runway. On the second flight, the aircraft disintegrated in flight. A shame that CW did not bring in a few DeHavilland engineers as advisors on the wooden disaster. They did, after all, design the Mosquito, one of the greatest British aircraft of all time.
I would just like to note that the Me-262 is not the best example of early swept wing aircraft because its wings were not swept to increase its critical Mach number, but rather to change the distance between the center of lift and center of gravity. The original design had straight wings but the engine nacelles turned out to be heavier than anticipated, so the wings were adjusted to move them aft. It was simpler to change the wing angle than to redesign the fuselage and rearrange the structure and internal components. The wings ended up at the same slight sweep angle as the earlier DC-3 transport, which had slightly swept wings for the same reason.
Supposedly the bent wings of the B-25 resulted from a need to decrease the dihedral but it would have been too expensive to redesign the fuselage and engine nacelle interfaces. Seems to have worked out pretty well.
@@danpatterson8009 The strange inner wing shape of the Vultee A-31 Vengeance was a result of a CG miscalculation that required the wing to be moved back without redesigning the fuselage. And there was a field modification kit for the P-38 that involved cutting off the tail booms just forward of the horizontal tail and inserting angled spacer pieces to change the incidence of the tail a degree or two, later incorporated in production. Sometimes necessity is the mother of invention.
Exactly. Another case of a German design with a fortuitous outcome being mistaken for technical prowess.
@@johnshepherd8687 There were many... And combined with the Nazi mastery of propaganda, luck, fluke and chance have survived the decades.
@@danpatterson8009 it’s my understanding that the cranked outer wing on the F-4 was similar, where it corrected flight problems w/out needing to make corresponding changes to fuselage & landing gear.
Summary: When life gives you Jaguars, make Tomcats. ;-)
Oh what a drag-uare respeccing the Jaguar
The wings are quite clever - The top brass? Nah, never.
The transition from Jaguar to Tomcat needed an intermediate step called the F-111 Aardvark. Yes, that was a Grumman/General Dynamics design.
@@Easy-Eight But the F-111 never had the makings of a varsity Grumman Cat.
@@RCAvhstape ... I've read a lot of aviation books. Grumman made two huge mistakes in the '50s, the Jaguar and F11F Tiger. The former nearly bankrupted the company. The latter became an advanced trainer for the USN but the F8U Crusader was just a better jet (if Grumman had put a J-79 engine in the Tiger it may even be flying in squadron service to this day in some nations, it was that good). Grumman was reduced to making aluminum canoes during the '60s and '70s to make ends meet. Grumman now makes mail delivery trucks. The F4F stopped the Japanese. The F6F beat Japan. Now? The legacy is a puttering postal delivery van. :(
@@Easy-Eight Grumman is now part of Northrop Grumman and doing quite well building rockets and spacecraft.
Well, you learn something every day. Good that Grumman survived that turkey!!!!
How many times do we hear the Military specification starts as "we need a plane to do X Y Z", manufacturer start cutting metal, has the first systems in testing and then gets told that "we need it to actually do A, B, C 1,2,3,4". And then everyone wonders why there was a significant overspend and it's late into service. Great story as ever.
Unfortunately those Military Specifications are based on expected threat capabilities of the enemy that you are expecting to fight and that is based on what intelligence you have. It also involves the fact that you don't expect the world to change that much in the geo-political sphere between when the project starts and when it enters service. It also has to take into account any technical breakthroughs that may happen within your own defence industry that makes the original specification redundant. All of these factor happen all of the time as the world does not stay static. Like this aircraft. No Radar in it because there is not one that will fit, until somebody comes up with a design that works and can be made to fit if the aircraft is modified. Same for the Jet Engine. Axial Flow rejected due to MTBF on current designs, then Somebody makes one that can meet the MTBF figures of the original engine selection.
We can be grateful that Hitler interfered with the spec of the Me262, making it a fighter bomber instead of a fighter and delaying the production of it by about a year, by then, too late to affect the outcome of WW2!
@@crossleydd42 That is a Myth. The Real Reason that the aircraft was delayed into service was because the Engines were not reliable enough for the Luftwaffe to accept them into operational service. Gloster Meteor had the same issues, plenty of airframes in 1943, but the engines were not good enough to safely allow the aircraft to do R&D and acceptance testing.
@@richardvernon317 Hitler's interference in April/May 1944 delayed production of a fighter version by about 3 months, until around September, when about 1/5th were fighters and only in November were 50% fighters. Other delays were certainly modifying the plane such as tricycle undercarriages and engine reliability, but, by that time, shortages of fuel which hampered training the jet's new pilots, plus overwhelming Allied planes, negated the Me262's effect on the war. Production rose into 1945, but few came into service by then. The main problem with Whittle's W1 engine was getting it to develop enough power. Frank Halford started work on redesign in April 1941 The resultant Halford H-1 first ran on 13 April 1942, and quickly matured to produce its full design thrust within two months. It's first proper flight was on 5 March 1943 in the prototype Gloster Meteor DG206/G at RAF Cranwell,
@@crossleydd42 There were many factors involved in the ME-262 production woes. One was the bombing of Germany, another was sabotage by slave workers, another was the difficulties with the metals and materials needed for the jet engines. Lastly, the evolving technology of the plane, first a tail dragger then a tricycle gear. Thanks
Fascinating as always - and great to see that the information Grumman gained from the variable wing technology was ultimately used in one of the great carrier aircraft, the F14 Tomcat!
Actually, what was learned from the ill-fated XF10F was put to good use on the General Dynamics F-111, because Grumman designed the wing sweep mechanism for the F-111 itself as a subcontractor.
You know, I don't usually laugh watching an airplane video. That canopy story sounds like a "Naked Gun" scene.
The F9F is an awesome looking aircraft-some how it just looks RIGHT.The Jaguar on the other hand...Great vid as always!
Corky Meyer wrote a book about his test pilot career. I'll be buggered if I can recall the title, but it was indeed entertaining.
Another excellent video Ed. The quote about "....entrance to the cockpit should have been made impossible" is usually attributed to an A&AEE report on the Blackburn Botha, although there are some doubts about that. It's quoted in lots of places but I don't think anyone has actually found the original report. But it certainly sounds like what someone would say about the Botha.
I've heard it about many planes, the Firebrand, the Blenheim, the Scimitar, the Lansen(!) (Why? Were the Swedes just being picky?), the Sea Dart.... Unfortunately the list is almost endless, but the Botha is probably the Ur example.
Great video, very in-depth with some great test flight tales!
Abou that canopy story: Ever seen Hot Shots, the Top Gun spoof? I didn't know it was inspired by real facts! :-) One interesting fact you forgot to mention: The whole wing was actually translating it's position while changing sweep to retrim the aircraft, the lack of which was major problem on the X5. Only the later fixed inner wing gloves, as seen on the F111 etc. made that redundant. It has been written that this idea actually was directly copied from Vickers studies by Sir Barnes Wallis (Swallow etc.) The translating wing position has been described as a major reason for the extra weight. I'd say that the concept was actually spot on but just too advanced for the time. The double tail plane actuation is new to me. That seems to have been a stupid mistake indeed. Such a concept is simply asking for delayed reaction effects and thus pilot induced oscillations. One does however wonder how it would have done without that tail and that engine.
"I'm OK!" LOL
For its last several flights it was equipped with a Cougar style tail setup but it time was already up according to Corky. The plane had other flight control problems. The plane's wings were equipped with undersized ailerons and new type of spoiler system that didn't really work so the plane didn't turn very well. Corky did note that the one power dive he did in the Jaguar it quickly out accelerated the F-86 wingman like brick.
This is true, the whole concept was to check out the translating swing wing, the rest of the plane built to carry it.
Barnes Wallace-- Mister Geodesic? Messerschmitt P.1101 is where the swing wing idea came from.
Actually the reason for the German Me-262 having swept wings was because the engines they ended up using was longer then those originally planned, with the engine much further forward of the leading edge.. This left the aircraft somewhat nose heavy. So to counter this problem they swept the wings back which moved the centre of gravity back.
„it would have to catastrophicly bad to not make the cut at that point - yep!…“
😂😂😂
The term 'wave drag' was coined right after this AC's first flight.
A shame there was no mention of Barnes Wallis regarding the variable geometry wing. People tried but it was he that was able to make it happen.
Mum, may I have a Tomcat?
Mum: No we have Tomcat at home
Tomcat at Home: Jaguar
:at home
:Joke
What a story! Great video - I'm gonna watch it again for the laugh lines! Thanks for your hard work!
That quote from the British test pilot was in reference to the Blackburn Botha.
Fat bumblebee might have been a more suitable name :-)
Pregnant Frankenfighter
Adipose Guppy
Fat Goose Coming Loose
NAVY - "We put our name on its fuselage in giant lettering before the thought, quality, utility, and aesthetics have even begun. That's how you know it's a great fighter jet!"
If it looks right, it'll fly right. If it doesn't look right, it'll be called the XF10F Jaguar then completely forgotten until resurrected in a RUclips video.
To be fair the design was not a complete lemon. An Air International article on this aircraft many years ago made a couple of interesting points - the initial elevator design was a failure but was replaced by a conventional surface that resolved controllability and the engine problems were somewhat resolved when Grumman, in their frustration, ignored the instructions and took the fuel control unit to bits themselves. Having undone all the securing screws that held the cover on the cover would not come off and as the only screws left were 2 that held the maker's nameplate on, they unscrewed those as well. One was short as was expected but the other was far too long and had penterated the guts of the control unit.
Very interesting, with a dash of humour here and there. Just the job.
I had to go back and watch/listen again when I heard the story about the ejection seat and the landing, to make sure my ears or my mind were not betraying me.
Haha yes! I started writing it up from his description, then realised in his own words was best.
Ah the bridges at toko ri. Interesting period in jet aviation. The terrifying tales of test pilots.
ending was a bit grim
One of the all time best carrier films.
@@cornishcactus yes but it makes a change.
You know that thing they say that "when a plane looks good, it generally is good"? Well this is the living proof.
1:40 fun fact: the Bell X5 was derived from the Messerschmitt P.1101 project, captured at the end of WWII, except that wings sweep could be change during the flight.
It was already obsolete when it flew and there was no attempt to correct its flaws and try to make an actual fighter from it. It ended up as a test bench for swept wings, though jets improved so fast it was almost useless.
Both the X-5 and the XF10F Jaguar suffered from the same problem: serious stability issues whenever the wings were swept back and forth. Grumman learned from this and figured out how to make the whole idea work properly with the F-111.
@@Sacto1654 The F111 was from General Dynamics, not Grumman, Did you mean the F14?
@@cvr527 Grumman was the subcontractor on the F-111 who designed the wing sweep mechanism.
The J40 could be named "killer" of a lot of promising projects. Threatned and damaged more US fighters than any Warsaw contemporary adversary XD
The F3H Demon suffered at its hands too, if I remember right.
You can add the F4D Skyray to that list too, but, Douglas was smart and designed the Skyhawk to take other size motors just in case something happened to the J40. They ended up with the P&W J57 if I remember correctly. J79 was also an easy fit. (For testing purposes).
Indeed: a lot of promising planes with interesting layouts and aerodynamic ideas, blasted by a "marvellous" jet engine that never was.
@@glhx2112 A shame, too, the Demon and Skyray were such cool-looking jets.
Love the commentary and the detail. Subscribed!
Another case of "To many cooks spoil the broth".
From a cousin, I love these videos across the pond.
The old saying is that if it doesn't look like it'll fly, it won't. were they wearing blinders? The tail and vertical stabilizer alone killed it.
I use that rule when I design flying model airplanes. I gotta say, sometimes something looks like it’ll fly, but it just doesn’t!
@@aerospacematt9147 Aircraft designers from large companies have found that to be true too. Wing design looks easy but is rather complicated. But the rest...if it looks like it'll flow over the body, with exceptions for boundry turbulance, it'll be okay if you have a good wing design.
@@OldGeezer55 Yes, I agree. My A-4 Skyhawk should have flown, but an underpowered engine caused it to fail. I believe that the engine in this aircraft was one of the contributing factors to its demise.
Hold on, he rode on the nose of the plane while rolling down the Lakebed... holding on to the windshield frame for dear life?
How do i picture that?
Imagine being so frightened that you would do that - on a Jet with such a narrow track and high CG.
Nuts! Absolutely Nuts!
I served as technical editor for a book on management written by a retired CEO/engineer who early in his engineering career had been employed at Westinghouse. During a conversation on his early career, he explained that he'd worked on jet engines there in the Gas Turbine Division and he eventually quit because the culture at Westinghouse at the time was toxic and because an engine they were developing was "absolutely awful" and his complaints to the project's manager about design flaws repeatedly were ignored. I cringed when I heard this and asked which Westinghouse engine he'd been working on. It was, of course, the J40. I then asked if he knew what eventually happened with the J40 and he responded that when he left he never looked back. So, more than a half century later, I was the lucky guy who had to fill him in. He didn't take the news well at all.
I do love how Brits can express ideas succinctly, while putting in some humor as well. Still, I have to think whatever aircraft that British test pilot was talking about, it couldn't have been worse than the Jaguar. Probably the worst aircraft I've ever heard of from Grumman.
The dry, deadpan humor always draws ne in and keeps me rolling!
Eric "Winkle" Brown was the cove. I bet he smoked a pipe, probably also drank lots of tea. Carry on, chaps.
Grumman rebuilt the Panther into the swept wing Cougar. Which worked well.
It might have been a failure as an expected production plan but as a prototype for variable geometry wings it was a huge success considering that the lessons learned from it led to the best carrier based fighter ever produced, the Tomcat.
Curiously enough, good (that is to say *really* good) 'tho the Tomcat was, ........ well its argauble innit?
Pilot reports suggest the humble Skyhawk could get past the big cats at times.
Phantoms scored more kills
Wildcats & Bearcats more again.
An argument can be advanced for the Mitsubishi Zero
Whilst Hornets can go head to head with Tomcats and win every time until they run out of fuel.
You pays your money and .........
..forgive me, yes, sort of not the swing wing itself, but in the adaptive wing and control surfaces evolution learned from this design.
More from Grumman's growing knowledge from designing, production, r&d and engineering/manufacturing projects, towards their in-house expertise in aerospace sciences ect, advancing powered, controlled, wing lift devices with augmented flight control mecha-electronic systems on the Jaguar.
If a more powerful engine could, might've rebuilt into...?? but....
So good they discontinued it and never flew a variable sweep design again.
@@babboon5764 Are "Phantoms scored more kills" and "Wildcats & Bearcats more again." legitimate references given the difference in scale of war they and the F-14 were involved in?
@@scottfw7169 That was *kind of the point Scott*
It doesn't make much sense to say ANY was the 'best' whatever type of plane ever'.
You can show only that by many measures a plane was excellent for its time.
Another good one. Thanks Ed.
The first flight by a swing wing aircraft was a small scale model built by Barnes Wallis (it worked), he seems to get overlooked a lot these days, he also introduced 'geodesic' construction (for the gas bags in airships, it spreads the load evenly), that was based on a mathematical construct but he got the name wrong, it should be 'geodetic'.
The first variable swept wings was the WW2 German ME p1101 but the wings had to be positioned before flight.
As always,great story telling.
Great video and great commentary as always nice one👍
Yeah, that horiz stabilizer looked like someone had spent too much time watching Buck Rogers. But I'm sure this thing went through some kind of wind tunnel testing. Wouldn't that catch these kinds of vicious flight characteristics?
Yes: Nothing odd about about it if you are familiar with transonic design. Compare to some British designs of the era like the Buccaneer, Javelin.
@@KB4QAA A flying Instructor who once worked on Buccs told me that, brilliant tho the Bucc was .....
In a high speed stall the *only* option could sometimes be to eject - Because with the wing at 'just the wrong angle' its tail (one of several T-Tails rather similar in appearance to the Gruman Jagwah) was masked from the airflow by the wing so it was in partial vaccuum and doing not much by way of allowing control to be restored.
@@KB4QAA the shape is similar but that arrangement to control it with a tiny canard seems pretty janky.
@@babboon5764 I believe that's common in a lot of T-tail designs.
@@RCAvhstape Logical that it would be I guess.
Before someone else points it out:
Sailplanes *are* nearly all Tee Tail now but have far greater aspect ratios (thin wings to the rest of yer) so are unlikely to be so 'marked' ...... Especially as gliders don't often do the sorts of manoeuvers likely to lead to a high speed stall.
(Yes I know soe are good aerobats but ....)
Designer: We've made sure we have as many common parts as our previous design as possible to streamline development and manufacturing so we can pass the savings on to you.
Military: That sounds good. What did you manage to work in?
Designer: Well, there's a spring, two screws, and some plastic doohicky that we aren't quite sure what it does, but take it out and the whole thing falls out of the sky.
Military: So we saved money right?
Designer: Well yes, but actually no.
It's an unfortunately common story.
sounds as though you have worked with engineers often enough... they think in interesting ways.
Thank you for the very intetesting video. The more i learn the more i know.
It's my understanding that the messerschmitt 262 had swept wings because of the fact that the landing gear was changed from a tail dragger to tricycle
Actually the wing sweeping was another major problem, causing instability and pitch up. The solution was to pivot the wings off centreline, which the F10F obviously couldn’t do.
Such a long time to eventually realise it was a lame duck. Surely test flights would prove the engine to be inadequate and the extra size and weight would all contribute to a bird not able to fulfill the wishes of the Navy. Anyhow, great video Ed. Look forward to another.
With the engine in development at the same time as the aircraft, it would take more time than you might expect to determine that the engine design was just bad and would never be made to work. This very problem did in several late-war fighter projects when various super-engine projects just couldn't be made to meet desired performance or reliability.
@@steveh1792 Ed's done some vids on them too!
Great video, thanks for sharing this history. Wish I could have flown with Meyer.
I wouldn't be surprised to hear it somehow also failed in it's role as range target.
It was a time of rapid technical development and learning. You learn what technology works after you have tried things that do not work. Unfortunately the perils of design-by-committee and mission creep are lessons that have to be re-learned by new generations who imagine that technical advances have made them smarter than their ancestors.
I was thinking of the "should be made impossible" quote from the beginning of the story.
“It’s a Jaaaaag!”
~ Jeremy “Jezza” Clarkson.
A "fat" Jag!
@@johnstirling6597 “Thicc” as the kids would say.
@@Hiznogood Or "Fick" as James May would say!
In fact Grunmans concept was partly based on a WW2 German test plane that indeed did fly with variable geometry wings though these could only be moved while on the ground.
Love your videos! Keep em coming!
I got the feeling the first person in line to use the XF10F as a range target was Corky . . . .
One of several 50s US Navy jet fighters ruined by the decision to use the Westinghouse J40.
I'd never heard of this dud developed by Grumman. Surprising. Grumman is one of America's most distinguished aircraft manufacturerers with an incredibley long list of successful machines. Even the best have their failures.
Ed Nash's Military Matters: Silly question: I was watching a video from another channel and on top of mixing up the facts or just getting the facts wrong altogether, the guy narrating actually referred the Rolls Royce "Nene" jet engine as the "Rolls Royce Nay-Nay"! Have you or anyone else ever heard "Nene" [neen] said that way?
Opening segment was from the William Holden film .. Korean War film .. Bridges of Tokyo Ri
But then Grumman went on to develop the F9F Cougar, the swept-wing version of the Panther. How did they solve the landing speed issue?
I believe it was a thick wide high lift wing. Take a look at the dorsal plan. There is a lot of wing there.
Given the available funding of the time I'm surprised the Navy didn't attempt to fly a large rock as well!
Hey Ed, I Love Your Work, I'm An Anglophile & I'm A Subscriber But At 1:20 While Your Talking About Grumman, That's A MIG-23 Flogger!
Yeah, I couldnt find a decent bit if footage of an f14 doing wing sweep! Ended up using the mig and tornado, was the clearest examples I could find.
@@EdNashsMilitaryMatters Hey Man, Thanks For Your Reply, I Just Wanted You To Know I Was Paying Attention. 8-)
Grumman,s only "Dead Cat" that didn,t happen. one old joke was that EVERY flight of the prototype was it,s FIRST flight because of the changes made on the insistence of the US Navy between flights. after the dust and smoke of the fiasco had cleared,the wife of one of the Grumman project engineers gave him a pair of Jaguar {animal} cufflinks to remind him that no matter how bad things might get later in his career,they were once a lot worse.
kinda crazy that with jet engines, radar, and variable wings they still had to specify all metal construction, but then again its only 5 years removed from wooden carrier decks
So was the UK test pilot Captain Eric 'Winkle' Brown RN?
Brilliant analogy of a poor plane. Well done Ed.
The American pronunciation isn't just the USA pronunciation. It is pretty close to the Tupi pronunciation, the tribe that gave the name for the cat to the Portuguese in Brazil, that lent the pronunciation to the North Americans. The British pronunciation is that of someone who read the name in a book, had never heard the word said, and just winged it.😀
Maybe it should have been called the "Grumman Turkey". They built so many LEGENDARY aircraft, perhaps we can forgive them for making one duffer! Prehaps it was the case that they put so much effort into solving the swing-wing, everything else suffered. Too many development projects in one project perhaps? Good vid though. Never heard of it before.
It looks like a suppository with wings. Ouch.
Oooh 00:23 - Me 262 prototype with tailwheel! Rara avis!
Ever think of doing one Ed on the Farman 222, the first plane to drop a bomb on German Soil and used in a rescue by James Denis of a group of men at the end of the Battle of France?
Oh yes! One day...
It’s a cool as hell plane with an amazing style. Despite how terrible it was I hate how it was blown to shreds instead of being preserved.
Yep, but the military is not a historical preservation society.
Are those introductory clips from The Bridges at Toko-Ri?
Excellent video
A Carrier aircraft that needs over 160kts before the tailplane control becomes effective? What on earth were they thinking when they chose that stupid Canard servo tab arrangement?!
It seems to me that this is a case of trying to stretch the boundaries of aviation in too many directions at a time in one aircraft, when they should have stuck with only one direction, the variable geometry wing.
At least the test pilot wasn't killed flying THIS particular aircraft
Combine several untested novel technologies with a thoroughly inadequate powerplant; what could possibly go wrong.
This is exactly what I experience when I make jets in Kerbal Space Program.
Ah, Ed...will we be debating aluminium next?
I still stand by the following, if an aircraft doesn't look good, it usually doesn't fly good.
I have often wondered about the pronunciation of a long U in that word when it contradicts so many rules!
The title alone made me like and subscribe.
"We need swept back wings, not straight wings for higher performance"...Now we have the likes of the F-18 that has essentially a straight trailing edge and a swept leading edge. I find it hard to believe they wouldn't have already experimented with that planform earlier instead of the complexity of variable geometry wings (which have now been abandoned)....or am I missing some other aspect of aircraft design/technology here? Incidentally, the F4D Skyray - with it's delta configuration - had it's first flight before the Jaguar (according to wikipedia), and that certainly wasn't straight winged.
Tubby cat😂 Great video sir👍
I hope Corky dined-out on some of this.
Variable sweep designs turned out to be complex, expensive, and eventually not used. The Americans developed the F-111 and the F-14, while Europe developed the Tornado. All of these are out of production and out of service, except for a few Iranian Tomcats. That's all you need to know about variable sweep fighters.
Grumman’s Only Alley Cat-too many innovations embedded in a single platform.
I think it's probably a good idea to incorporate only one new and untested concept into an experimental prototype aircraft. Here we have an untested engine, an untested tail-plane, and a variable geometry wing. What could go wrong?
Take that lesson, magnify it by a few thousand tons of steel and let the good idea fairy do her work!
Go look at the Gerald R. Ford aircraft carriers.
Thing suffered from committee problems, sounded good until everyone added their own ideas. I can think of more than a few times I wished that getting into something was difficult, but should have been made impossible, life can give you that Kind of stuff!
Just call it the "Jaaaaag" like Jeremy Clarkson
I had a motorbike in that category once.
Migs: Sexy ladies
jaguar: P l u m p
Of all the little entries in books I have read on the Jaguar I never read an assessment of the VG wings and it's impressive that even in this early attempt they actually worked
Can't help but think if they would have just put a new tail on the aircraft given the engine it needed and maybe some area rule it might not have been such a piece of crap
On a side note I couldn't picture landing that narrow undercarriage on anything other than a runway trying to get that thing aboard an aircraft carrier would have been a nightmare it's like grumman's own jet powered trans-sonic supermarine Sea fire
They did they changed the name to Tom Cat
If you put your beer goggles on it looks kind of like a Harrier.
There was virtually no connection between the Jaguar and Tomcat, which began flying 17 or 18 years later. In between was the Grumman F-11 Tiger, notorious for literally shooting itself down and generally mediocre (just not as disastrous as the Jag). But that "family line" ended with the rejected Super Tiger F-11F-1 prototype. In fact, all of the later US swing wings were descended from research by NASA in the late '50s, followed by General Dynamics' F-111, including the rejected F-111B variant for the USN (in which Grumman was involved as a junior partner). In the late '60s, there was also a rejected Vought design, the V-507 two seat carrier fighter, and this may be regarded as the missing link between the F-111B and the Tomcat. None of these had much to do with the Grumman fighters of the 1950s.
FWIW, the Vought V-507 was also influenced by the Dassault Mirage "G" - a promising swing-wing prototype from the mid-'60s, which did not enter production, but still holds some speed records. (Vought was a regular supplier to the French Navy, through which it had connections with Dassault.)
Grumman's next jet, the F-11F Tiger was a very good and successful design, and unlike this barely flying beer keg, paid attention to the area rule.
Actually, it was the British who came up with the "wing controlled aerodyne" as it was called by "Barnes Wallis", remember him? He died way before jet aircraft! In 1931 Westland-Hill built the Pterodactyl IV which could vary the sweep angle during flight, it assisted in longitudinal trim due to no horizontal stabiliser and was later used in Barnes Wallis's wing-controlled aerodyne.
Later, the British experimented with "swept-wing" technology but decided against it which is when the US adopted it but not before the Germans had experimented with the possibility of adopting it for their Messerschmitt P-1101 jet fighter, so no, the US did not come up with "variable wing" technology, it was a British development that was later considered by the Germans who never got to use it and then abandoned by the British before the US took it on.
Edit:-
The Pterodactyl first flew in "1928" but it was the later Westland-Hill built ones of the early 1930's that had this technology, and so yes, a plane had flown with variable wing before you say!
Barnes Wallis died in 1979!!!! His swing wing designs didn't appear until the mid to late 1940's. The Westland-Hill Pterodactyl IV had a very small amount of variable wing sweep to provide longitudinal trim control in absence of a horizontal tail. It had nothing to do with improving the maximum and minimum airspeeds.
@@richardvernon317
Aha, apologies, I was thinking RJ Mitchell lol, but yes, Wallis did die well after I stated, thanks for correcting me.