Aircraft General Discussion

Clive,

I'm not old enough, did see a lot of the hovercraft take to the water including the SRN4.

Bob

One sighting of each test flying in the South West. What was HEARD many times, were the B36s inbound from the States - ("6 turning, 4 burning" the most instantly recognisable aircraft noise ever.

rgds

Bill

No, Sir, that is a standard Land Rover that crashed into grandad's garden workshop .

You'v probably seen the program, but tonight I watched Guy Martin, and the "Last Vulcan Flight", good program. Sad to see such a machine go from the sky.

It was interesting to hear that it was only 5 years after the Lancaster entered service that the design of the Vulcan started.

Ian S C

Back in the day when I worked on AEW Nimrod, the Battle of Britain flight got relocated to Waddington whilst their home runway was being resurfaced. This was also just after the Vulcans had been withdrawn from Germany and decommissioned. We managed to wangle a tour round all the aircraft and went on board the Vulcan after crawling all over the Lanc. It struck me then how little separated the two aircraft in their technical feel. The Vulcan still had the electromechanical bomb computer and a lot of the internal structure and fittings were not widely different to the Lanc. Clearly their capability were far apart but in terms of the build not so much.

As an aside I was informed that they were a right b*****d to start if they had been left out in the rain. The switchgear was housed in a bay to the rear of the cockpit area and the seals were not to good. If they got wet everything would trip out repeatedly. Sort of could you keep the war going 'till we get there situation.

The other amusing story was every aircraft arrived back in the UK with nose full of german wine as the camera gear had been previously removed. Fine by the camp CO so long as he got a crate. Well they were unloading the plonk in one of the hangers and omitted to adjust the center of gravity by pumping fuel around. Half way through the operation the aircraft sat on its tail leaving the main hatch about twenty feet up in the sky!!! It only happened the once otherwise the booze cruises would have been stopped.

regards Martin

Were you now Carl. Fortunately I've forgiven you by now. Good to know someone cared. :0)

Our governments seem to have a habit of doing that to Nimrods. Beats me why the RAF or the contractors don't just park them up somewhere and pretend to have scrapped them. It's only a matter of time before someone decides it all been a great mistake. With CGI these days you could still give the journo's something to show on the news.

regards Martin

Hello Martin,

I redeemed myself after that by going up to Kinloss after Abingdon shut and spending 4 years on NMSU, doing Nimrod majors. I then went on to the line at Kinloss where I spent the rest of my time until I left the RAF in 2002.

Unfortunately the story with the Nimrod was that many risks were taken with that aircraft by shortsighted bean counters without anyone in particular taking ownership of them. That resulted in the completely avoidable deaths of 15 good men. And that is the real reason why the Nimrod was scrapped.

Wasn't sure whether to post this here, or in the discussion about 'unique'

**LINK**

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/01/12/spectacular-cloud-spotted-australia-passenger-plane/

... but it's pretty !!

MichaelG.

Spectacular! Andrew will be rushing to the airfield to hitch up his trailer!

Norman

Had a very similar formation over the N Sea, East of Bacton this morning. Not quite as 'viewable' as there was partial cover above and below, but one very large patch in the clear initially. Viewed, but not photographed, 'cos I was having breakfast in bed. 'Tis a hard life for wrinklies!!

rgds

Bill

Similar to mountain wave or lenticularis.

Forms downwind of an obstruction and only in a stable atmosphere (shallow temperature lapse rate).

in UK our climate is normally one with unstable atmosphere - when a cloud forms the top keeps rising until it runs out of moisture because the condensation process releases latent heat and keeps the air mass buoyant . If the atmos is stable due to prevailing conditions (even possibly an inversion) then a mass of air pushed up by land features (orographic uplift) will sink back to its undisturbed altitude, but may oscillate around that level, and can do for a hundred or two miles. Should that oscillatory movement of air happen at around the dew point of the air mass, clouds as seen will form. The water molecules forming those ridges of cloud are actually travelling through them, evaporating in the descent and recondensing in the climb.

It's a beautiful world!

Edited By Edward Crouch on 28/01/2017 09:02:55

.

Thanks for the explanation ... and the punchline

MichaelG.

Wave forms when there is a stable layer of the atmosphere trapped between two unstable layers. Ideally the stable layer is around the height of the obstruction that sets off the wave. Unlike waves in a stream waves in the atmosphere can go to many times the height of the obstruction setting off the wave.

Although I have flown in wave with lenticular clouds, in my experience the classic lenticular cloud is relatively rare in the UK. There's a tendency to assume no lenticular equals no wave; not so. I used to start my gliding club lectures on wave flying with three pictures, all taken at over 20000 feet, and not a lenticular in view.

There is often a lot of low level cloud mixed in even when conditions are right for wave. The trick is to work out what is going on. Some signs are a cloud edge that doesn't seem to be moving across the ground, and small wisps of cloud moving vertically. Of course local knowledge is vital, so always identify the local club experts and listen and watch. When they launch you want to follow!

Here's a picture of a wave flight, nothing spectacular, my logbook notes 7500ft. I think the town at centre bottom is Wooler in Northumberland:

There is a hint of laminar flow over the top of the cloud mass. I think the cloud is a mix of stable flow and roll cloud that sometimes forms under the wave flow. The critical points were that the cloud wasn't moving across the ground and the tatty bits of cloud at the lefthand edge were forming and dissipating very quickly and wisps were flowing vertically.

It's an out of this world ethereal experience flying in wave. The wind can be strong (60+ knots) and you may be climbing at many hundreds of feet per minute. But the air is apparently absolutely still. I often 'fly' hands and feet off the controls and just let the glider climb. It's just like sitting in the armchair, if rather colder.

The downside is that the turbulence below the wave system, when taking off and landing, can be some of the worst you'll ever encounter.

Andrew

A couple of pictures of Gibralter in March 1942, the aircraft is a Beaufort and the view is from the side hatch where a K gun was temporarily mounted, must have been a bit draughty. My father was the pilot and they were en route to Ceylon, quite an adventure for a 22 year old.

Mike

Re. wave activity, there is a series of aircraft manouevring lectures given by American Airlines instructor Warren Van der Burgh under the generic title of 'Children of the Magenta', on Youtube **LINK**. We used to use them for refresher training and I would class them as the best instructional videos I have seen. They are fascinating in their detail regarding aircraft operation and the wave reference is at about minute 22 in the CFIT programme. I have sat through these programmes at least 40+ times and still enjoy them. Essential watching for any aviation nuts and particularly the 'heavy metal' operators!

rgds

Bill

Just saw the picture of the Princess. I am afraid I am guilty of being involved in is destruction. A friend's Father used to cut aircraft for a living and the money was good helping him in my two week holiday from tool making apprenticeship.

Did not the "down wash" from a wave cloud system cause a lot of damage in Sheffield towards the end of the 1960s?

JA

A number of years back a glider in Canterbury (NZ) was caught in the up, then down of one of these wind formed wave clouds, it broke the glider, 2 (I think) killed. On a brighter note altitude records have been broken in these systems in this part of NZ. Steve Fosset.

Ian S C