[Llarry]

High-altitude intelligence-gathering balloons have been in the news recently. The Chinese are not the first country to use such means -- the US CIA floated high-altitude balloons equipped with cameras over the USSR in the 1950s and 1960s.

The Soviets tried to develop a rival to the early U-2 in the late 1950s. This was a modfication of the Yak-25 but with a new, much larger wing -- much like the RB-57D and RB-57F. Unfortunately, the Yakovlev Yak-25RV (NATO Mandrake) was not very successful and was not produced in any significant numbers.

Years later, and in reaction to the annoying CIA balloons floating over the Soviet Union, Myasishchev tried to develop a specialized high-altitude balloon interceptor, equipped with both guns and missiles. The original version was the M-17 and was not successful in the anti-balloon mission. A further developed version was the M-55 (NATO Mystic) and was more successful, though not in service until the late 1980s; it still flies today. Russia uses it for scientific purposes; I do not know if they have or still do use it for recon purposes. It holds a number of world records for altitude in a weight class heavier than the American U-2. But I believe that the U-2S has a greater ceiling by some thousands of feet.

[Lady Jane]

NASA’s GL-10 Greased Lightning.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA_G...ased_Lightning

[iminhell1]

Originally Posted by Dang3r

Its full moon again

this is how cheese slices are made

[Llarry]

Originally Posted by Lady Jane

NASA’s GL-10 Greased Lightning.

With a name like Greased Lightning, it'd better be fast -- very fast.

[Llarry]

According to a Dutch site that is expert on the P-3 Orion and variants, including the CP-140, a Canadian CP-140 is being fitted with 8-blade props for testing. These are the same props (NP2000) that have been fitted to USN E-2 and C-2 aircraft and USAF C-130H aircraft.

https://www.p3orion.nl/news.html

The E-2, C-2, C-130H and all P-3s and CP-140s are powered by the T56 turboprop engine and have used 4-blade props since the 1960s. The latest C-130, the J model, is powered by the AE2100 engine and uses 6-blade props.

This sounds like a move to keep the CP-140M in service for years to come.

[Lady Jane]

Beriev BE-200.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beriev_Be-200

[Dang3r]

[Dang3r]

Originally Posted by Lady Jane

Beriev BE-200.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beriev_Be-200

I would never understand why they built an aircraft primary for water landing purposes and attach jet engines on it.
The only way to power down a propulsion engine is a) cut off the fuel flow or b) extinguish the flame.
Even if you run them with continuing relight (steady ignition on) I would have a bad feeling.

[Llarry]

A Beriev jet seaplane holds a number of world records in the seaplane category. The Be-10 (NATO Mallow) flew in 1955 and was first publicly revealed at an air show in 1961. Not too many were built and it was replaced by the turboprop Be-12, which was more practical, and which Lady Jane posted earlier.

Photos of the Be-10 are hard to find.

[Llarry]

Originally Posted by Lady Jane

Beriev BE-200.

Little brother to the Beriev A-40 or A-42 (Be-42), which was a military design that flew late in the Soviet period. Just a few years ago, the Russian military finally ordered several.

[Lady Jane]

Ames-Dryden (AD)-1 Oblique Wing

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oblique_wing

[Llarry]

While Beriev has produced many seaplanes, the company has also produced Russia's airborne early warning (AEW) aircraft by modifying an Ilyushin IL-76 transport into the Beriev A-50 (NATO Mainstay.) The A-50 has been in service for decades.

More recently, Beriev has produced a prototype A-100, based on an improved IL-76MD transport. This new aircraft differs in apparently adding a significant SIGINT capability to the AEW role. (Note the many additional small antennas; frequently a sign of a SIGINT mission.)

[3.0L]

[3.0L]

Originally Posted by Llarry

While Beriev has produced many seaplanes, the company has also produced Russia's airborne early warning (AEW) aircraft by modifying an Ilyushin IL-76 transport into the Beriev A-50 (NATO Mainstay.) The A-50 has been in service for decades.

More recently, Beriev has produced a prototype A-100, based on an improved IL-76MD transport. This new aircraft differs in apparently adding a significant SIGINT capability to the AEW role. (Note the many additional small antennas; frequently a sign of a SIGINT mission.)

I believe the IL-76 is Russia's version/copy of the US C-141A. This is not the first time Russia copied a US aircraft design.

[Mari097]

running out of film not good enough to film the crash haha

[flybigjet]

Originally Posted by 3.0L

I believe the IL-76 is Russia's version/copy of the US C-141A. This is not the first time Russia copied a US aircraft design.

Go look at the AN-124 and C-5 as well.

The Soviets were notorious for industrial theft.

They actually made the AN-124 a few inches bigger so they could claim that "theirs was bigger".

They cheated, though. The AN-124 was unpressurized except for the crew compartment. They couldn't figure out a pallet retention system, so they used a flat floor and a winch. On the plus side, the floor was titanium-- since the Soviets were the only country on the planet with that much excess titanium available-- that's just insane.

Two other problem issues they ran into after they stole the C-5 plans were the T-tail and the rotating gear-- which is why they look a bit different.

I was able to tour an AN-124 after I showed the Russian crew my C-5. It's more or less a carbon copy if you know what your'e looking for.

R.

[JJ 911SC]

Originally Posted by flybigjet

... The soviets were notorious for industrial theft.

Я шокирован и потрясен, услышав это.

[Lady Jane]

Originally Posted by JJ 911SC

Я шокирован и потрясен, услышав это.

Captain Renaud to Rick in Casablanca.

[Lady Jane]

X-57 Maxwell


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA_X-57_Maxwell

[Jbrown7403]

Love these vintage videos!

[ezaircon4jc]

Originally Posted by 3.0L

I saw an aircraft get airborne in the overrun more than once when i worked SLC. Was not pretty.

[Llarry]

A look at Airborne Early Warning (AEW)...

The U.S. Navy found itself in trouble late in 1944. While dominating the naval war with Japan, the advent of the kamikaze threat, with Japanese pilots and planes using suicidal tactics to attack USN ships, created losses that could not be sustained, particularly as the Allies operated ever-nearer to Japan. Various tactics, such as the stationing of radar picket destroyers well away from high-value ships such as aircraft carriers helped, but then the destroyers became targets themselves for kamikaze attacks.

On a crash basis, the Navy began development of a radar system that could be installed in a carrier plane and flown out from the fleet, extending the radar horizon considerably. The result was a conversion of the TBM torpedo bomber, with a large radar installed where the torpedo/bomb bay had been and with a data link back to the fleet. The war ended before the resulting TBM-3W could make it to the fight, but the airplane entered fleet service in small numbers just after the war. At the same time, the Navy experimented with the same radar installed in B-17 bombers transferred from the Army Air Force (soon to be USAF.) But AEW was still in its infancy and not widely used in the fleet.

The next step was the installation of the same radar in the Douglas AD Skyraider (the A-1 of the Vietnam war era) and finally every carrier had an AEW capability.

At about the same time, a land-based barrier patrol force consisting of large radar-equipped Lockheed Constellations was formed and these flew (boring) barrier patrols off both coasts of the U.S. for years. (There were also radar picket ships in use at the same time and for roughly the same purpose: to guard against attacks on the continental United States by the Soviet Union.) By the 1970s, the whole barrier patrol scheme was abandoned. However, the Air Force also adopted the AEW EC-121 Constellation and these were vital to U.S. operations in the Vietnam war.

Carrier-based AEW took a major step forward in the late 1950s with the introduction of the Grumman E-1B Tracer, a twin-engine derivative of the S-2 Tracker ASW plane. The E-1B was replaced in turn by the turbine-powered, purpose-designed Grumman E-2 Hawkeye, which remains the Navy's carrier-based AEW aircraft today in improved form.

The USAF, having seen the value of the radar planes in Southeast Asia, replaced it's old EC-121 Constellations with a new Boeing 707-based Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) E-3 and these remain in service today and are critical to Air Force operations around the world. Several other countries bought the E-3 (the photo is of an RAF E-3D Nimrod.)

While this history has been U.S.-centric, there are other interesting AEW or AWCS aircraft in use around the world. Japan operates Boeing 767-based AWACS and I posted earlier about the Beriev AEW versions of the Russian Il-76.

All of the above radar planes use a rotating antenna. The innovative Israelis have come up with a different approach: fixed phased-array radars giving all-around coverage without rotating. They've fitted these to Boeing 707s as well as the more recent Gulfstream G550, which must take an award as one of the most odd-looking aircraft ever.