Construction help needed! Ship-/Seaborn fighter

[Romantic Technofreak]

I know that most of you prefer to talk about airplanes that really flew and I understand that. But sometimes I feel the need to "construct" something nobody seemed to think about. Maybe some of you enjoy to join in this effort. O.K., lets go ahead:

The idea is the following: to construct a seaplane that is a fully adequate fighter compared to it´s land- or flatdeck-based rivals. For what could you use it?

1. To give traditional warships their own air cover

2. To give air cover to merchant ships without carrier escort. This was also undertaken by CAM ships like this one:

http://www.fleetairarmarchive.net/Ships/Michael_E.html

But unfortunately, as long as you use nearly unchanged land-based fighters like the Hurricane here, the aircraft is either lost when it has to go down or must use the nearest friendly base for landing (sometimes British pilots made it to Soviet airfields on the Kola peninsula).

3. To protect remote islands without sufficient airstrips. Sometimes the Japanese tried that with float-equipped Zeros or reconnoisaters, but this was not very successful.

So, how could such an airplane look? When you compare the side-view of a Horten-style flying wing like this aircraft (PUL-10 prototype):


http://www.nurflugel.com/Nurflugel/Horten_Nurflugels/PUL-10/pul-10.jpg
(take the lower address please)

with the side-view of a raceboat like this one:

http://www.f1boat.ru/html_eng/gallery/1.html

you see a certain similarity. The idea is, to put the engine into the fuselage behind the pilot and to drive the rear-mounted propellor by an ankle shaft, so it can be shifted when in danger to touch the water. Dornier used this technique in the Do 26 four-engined flying boat for the rear engines.

The aircraft´s wing could be used as fuel tank. The nose is free to be equipped with guns. The Horten wing design gives good flight and landing characteristics, so the plane could comparedly easy land on the water and be picked up by a ship. On calm sea, it could take-off also very easy (if you employ an additional waterscrew), as raceboats tend to lift very fast, you see. On rough sea, I don´t know, but anyway the plane is designed for catapult start. For gliding stability on the water it might be necessary to put the aircraft on skis, like the Convair XF2Y-1 Sea Dart seaplane jet fighter.
Pusher propeller and tailless design would make the airplane at least equal to any traditional fighter equipped with an engine of the same performance.

Your comments please, gentlemen. And your construction remarks and ideas![8)]

[Corsarius]

Someone beat you to it, RT. I think your plane would look like this:

http://sfstation.members.easyspace.com/sra-1.htm

http://worldatwar.net/chandelle/v1/v1n3/saro.html

Enjoy.

[GregP]

To operate from the sea, the fighter would have to have a stepped hull. The Sea Dart, SAR/1, and almost all OTHER seaplanes have had stepped hulls from right after seaplanes were invented. Check out any "float" ona floatplane or any flying boat (one that actually flew).

The reason is to break surface tension and get the aircraft plaining (up and out of displacement mode, like a speedboat after it accelerates and "planes")

If you add a hull to the Horetn design, then you have to keep the wings out of the water on both takeoff and landing. If the wing dips into the water, the fighter will cartwheel and crash.

So, the hull will HAVE to be lower than the Horten's fuselage, and some form of "tip float" or "sponson" would have to be used.

An interesting question, and one we probably need to think over for awhile before saying that we're smarter than all those successful seaplane designers out there.

Nice question! Can I propose antigravity drive? Like ... science fiction?

No? OK, I need some time ...

[Corsarius]

What about using the "Ekranoplan" concept like the Caspian Sea Monster et al? I mean, you're not going to have a fighter there, though.

[Ricky]

Could a system of retractable wing-tip floats, not unlike those used on the Catalina, be usefully employed to provide 'stabilisers' but keep drag down to a minimum?

As to the Saro design - lovely, but it does look a little large to be a successful competitor as a fighter. However, looks can be deceiving...

[GregP]

The SARO flew VERY well as a fighter, but was about 100 mph slower than the land-based competition. Maneuverability-wise, it was a fighter.

I LIKE the idea of retractible tip floats, but wonder about the hull. This is something thatnever HAS been successfully licked by the designers, though the Convair Sea Dart came close and DID break Mach 1 in a dive once. I think the main obstacle to something like the Sea Datr is salt water. A flying boat is mostly out of the water while the Sea Dart was wet all over ... so it was a study in rapid corrosion unles it was washed down quickly after every flight.

Getting the plane up and out of the water means extra drag ... and letting it sit down in the water means a real maintenance nightmare and possible engine flame-out die to water injestion in any but smooth seas.

Hhhmmmmmmmm .... need some time .....

[Romantic Technofreak]

Thank you for your contributions, gentlemen, and go ahead with more!

Greg: The Sea Dart had no stepped fuselage like a flying boat has or the the floats of a floatplane have. See this French link for a drawing. It shows a little fin near the rear end, but this is definitely no step:

http://www.histoiredumonde.net/20_eme_siecle/avions/us/seadart.html

The Sea Dart was able to lift from its skies. Like a raceboat also tends to lift, although its constructors and its pilot do everything to keep it on the water. The raceboat cartwheels, once in the air, because it gets no more additional thrust. So, my idea is, to provide it with additional thrust by an airscrew, thus converting the uncontrolled lift of a raceboat into the controlled one of an airplane.

Ricky: I would not use wing-tip floats. A raceboat uses to have stabilizers right beside the fuselage. In the position of these stabilizers I would put rectractable floats - or skies. They prevent cartwheeling like Greg mentioned. I leave it open if they might need a stepped bottom structure. If retracted, they are nearly integrated in the wing bottom structure.

Corsarius: As much as I know, the SR A.1 was considered too heavy compared with a conventional fighter. It also depends on the use of a turbojet, while I try to construct a piston-engined fighter. The Ekranoplan, I think, can only glide, not fly, and for this it is only a transport craft (hopefully one does not jam Capilatus´ oil drilling platform when reactivated[8D]).

Greg again: We may be smarter because we see that all in retrospective and after years of comparison, as the people of WWII did not have the same chance, even if they were the best aircraft engineers. The Horten brothers lacked support nearly all the time, and the Japanese, not knowing them, did not ask them for something to defend the Solomones;).
And today? Small seplanes seem to see a renaissance for tourism and leisure, while raceboat sport is quite popular. Why not combine them? The development cost? Ah, I forgot...! But technically-romantic people like me, or us, are allowed to dream...!:)

[Romantic Technofreak]

Greg, I did not see your last answer because I was just writing my one. You really tell the problems this thing would have: Cold water, if only in drops, touching the hot engine after a flight would flaw the motor block, at least after some landings, as happened also to conventional seaplanes (like the Graf Spee´s Arado Ar 196). And the highly corrosive salt water would care for a generally short endurance. But I still speculate that people who might employ a "Rufe" or "Rex" or a shipboard Hurricane-for-waste, might have given credit to my design...?[8)]

[GregP]

Hi RT,

The Sea Dart DID have a step, but the step was retractible. The "skis" formed the step to get the Sea Dart planing and able to accelerate in a mode other than displacement mode. Sorry for not stating that at the outset.

The subject of this thread gives pause and makes me want to think of a way to make a really neat seaplane of some sort ... but then I think about all the problems with seaplanes and maybe it isn't so great. Once you put a seaplane in water, it is a piece of junk, and it will corrode away under you. The hope is that you get enough use out of it before that happens to make the cost worthwhile.

Sure, there are some OLD seaplanes out there but, if they ARE old, they don't spend much time in salt water, and probably don't spend much time on water - period.

A landplane, on the other hand, can last much longer.

So, I'm starting to ask myself, why go to the effort when runways are avialable most of the time, especially for Military efforts.

Civil floatplanes are very handy, but they aren't fighters and would be a joke, Militarily speaking, in a war. Navy or Air Force fighters, on the other hand, have land bases and carriers to use .... so the alure of a seaplane fighter is slowly being lost on me.

It would be burdesome and inconvenient to have to use a crane to lift it into and out of the water, so we are left with wheels, probably of the retractible type. Therefore, we are stuck with a hull and wheels. The hull is less than aerodynamic, and the wheels add weight. If you HAVE to have wheels, why not use them?

Come back to me about why you want this again ...

[Romantic Technofreak]

I think I can conclude that most people here see my concept as generally feasible, although there might be some differences in detail. For more, I cannot hope in a discussion like this one. In modern days, you can make the thing mainly from plastic, so it should not corrode too easily. It surely would be an unique, nice-looking machine. If it would be a commercial success too, I don´t think so![8D]