Disclaimer:
I am not a nazi sympathizer, wehraboo, skinhead, right-wing-nut or other extremest.
Messerschmidt Me.262 took to the sky at the RIAT exhibition
Just because (copy) of old plane flying.
Disclaimer:
I am not a nazi sympathizer, wehraboo, skinhead, right-wing-nut or other extremest.
Messerschmidt Me.262 took to the sky at the RIAT exhibition
Just because (copy) of old plane flying.
Luftwaffe!
I feel like the sounds of the engines taxiing is what diesel bros want their turbos to sound like. Anyways, so cool and this plane has legitimacy in the history of aviation. It was the world's first operational jet-powered fighter aircraft and influenced the designs of the F-86, MiG-15, and B-47.
The swept wing benefits of the 262 were an accident. They were intended to be straight. Center of gravity problems due to the changes in engines necessitated a sweep aft.
I was so fascinated by the ME-262 as a kid. Built a few models of them.
Realy cool. Did they reproduce the engines or rebuild some old ones? Is this a reproduction plane or a restoration?
That would be something cool to see in the air.
VolvoHeretic said:Realy cool. Did they reproduce the engines or rebuild some old ones? Is this a reproduction plane or a restoration?
These planes where being build for many years (I believe the project was bought and moved at least once). They have made a few of them, most of which are the two seat trainer / night fighter version, so the single seat one is rare for the repros. They are complete reproductions, not restorations. As in every part had to be custom made (certainly many common aircraft parts where used, but structurally, basically all custom).
The engines are modern (General Electric J85) in a housing the size of the original Jumo engine. They of course are more powerful and WAY lighter than the originals. I am sure they also of course fixed the fragile nose gear the 262's where known to have.
The Jumo 004 turbojet engine would operate around 10 hours before failure, often times less, while producing a modest 2,000 pounds of thrust. A more reliable and far easier engine to acquire and maintain is the General Electric J85. This engine has been around for many years in military aircraft and is also available as a commercial engine as the CJ610. In its non-afterburning configuration, the J85 produces around 2,500 pounds of thrust. While the J85 sounds like a comparatively simple choice to replace the Jumo, it also posed a significant problem.
Each Jumo 004 weighs over 1,500 pounds and is mounted ahead of the airframe’s center of gravity. The J85 weighs around 400 pounds, and if it was mounted in the same position on the wing, the aircraft would be around 2,200 pounds lighter but that would shift the center of gravity too far aft (too tail heavy) for safe flight. After some innovative engineering, the solution was brilliantly simple – use the engine casting for the Jumo 004, but alter the interior of the casting to accommodate the J85. In short, the J85 was mounted inside the shell of the Jumo engine and thus the weight and balance problems went away and the new engines would not alter the profile of the engine nacelles.
https://www.cybermodeler.com/special/stormbird.shtml
Point of trivia: If you look at a picture of an original, you will see a small ring in the center of the motor inlet. That was a pull ring to start a small engine needed to spool up the engine to ignition light off speed (many thousands of RPM).
I am actually a bit shocked I have not seen more evidence of any of these at airshows. They have been flying for a while, and it would be very cool to see on in person, even if it is a repro. I am going to the last Reno Air Races this year... so maybe?
Here is a pic of the engine housing:
After some innovative engineering, the solution was brilliantly simple – use the engine casting for the Jumo 004, but alter the interior of the casting to accommodate the J85. In short, the J85 was mounted inside the shell of the Jumo engine and thus the weight and balance problems went away and the new engines would not alter the profile of the engine nacelles.
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And car people think it is cool to put retro valve covers on a LS engine.
"Yeah, we will just put the modern engine inside the casing for the old engine. It will look stock!"
It makes me wonder what the performance difference is... And why NO afterburner? 
In reply to Noddaz :
Probably to not go mach. And rip the wings off?
In reply to VolvoHeretic :
The ground crew in this video appears to be nearly as old as the plane.
VolvoHeretic said:In reply to Noddaz :
Probably to not go mach. And rip the wings off.
Oh, what a downer you are!
Even if it is probably true.
Didn't Germany have a large number of Fighter Jets that were used to fight the Alias? I would imagine that there are some in Area 51 or The Smithsonian in storage that are flyable still. 
Not really a large number, (about 1500, they made 35,000 Me109s) but the US at least did take as many as they could find for evaluation. I am sure all are now valued parts of museum collections. I remember a story of an airbase they where flying them into. As noted, the engines where rather fragile and short lived so they likely became unflyable rather quickly anyway.
In a somewhat related story. Apparently Jay Leno blew up the engine in his Chrysler Turbine car, so he enlisted some of the (rather old) people who where involved with building them to built him another one (or rebuild his, not sure)!
In the above video, I like how the engine crew member stood just a few feet away from the Jet engine intake. Now a days they wound get sucked inwards, and Diced.
Most (all?) of the currently flying Me 262s are new builds with genuine Messerschmitt serial numbers and modern engines. Paul Allen's museum was working on getting an original 262 flying with Jumo engines with some of the hot section parts copied with modern alloys. I don't know what happened to it when the museum's collection was sold. They did run it and do some taxi tests. They even use the original donkey motor @aircooled mentioned to spin up the engines:
aircooled said:Not really a large number, (about 1500, they made 35,000 Me109s) but the US at least did take as many as they could find for evaluation. I am sure all are now valued parts of museum collections. I remember a story of an airbase they where flying them into. As noted, the engines where rather fragile and short lived so they likely became unflyable rather quickly anyway.
In a somewhat related story. Apparently Jay Leno blew up the engine in his Chrysler Turbine car, so he enlisted some of the (rather old) people who where involved with building them to built him another one (or rebuild his, not sure)!
The US def utilized their capture of some of the Me 262s to influnce the designs of the F-86 and B-47 airframes. The Soviets used their Me 262s to influence the design of the MiG-15 (weird how the F-86 and MiG-15 look so similar!).
... something something "Yeah, and those Fokkers were in Messerschmidts!"
/Got nothin'.
Wow!
aircooled said:Not really a large number, (about 1500, they made 35,000 Me109s) but the US at least did take as many as they could find for evaluation. I am sure all are now valued parts of museum collections. I remember a story of an airbase they where flying them into. As noted, the engines where rather fragile and short lived so they likely became unflyable rather quickly anyway.
Also not helping with keeping the German warbirds flyable: Many of the jet and rocket fighters were mostly made of plywood. Although the Me262 was aluminum, IIRC.
In reply to MadScientistMatt :
I always found it amusing that the Luftwaffe focused on short range fighters (to shoot down Allied planes over Germany, so the people could see it) that not only did they usually only have 90 minutes or so of fuel, but even some of their airplanes had an expected overhaul time shorter than some American planes' sorties.
The German airforce in WWII was primarily designed as a tactical airforce that supported the operations of the army (e.g. blitzkrieg). Thus they had no long range bombers and had no need for longer range fighters. They did however have a long range maritime patrol aircraft (FW200). Not needing long range fighters meant they could keep their planes small and light, which like cars, give a general performance advantage (not to get into the weeds, if you are wondering why they were not generally faster, that has a lot to do with available fuel octane!).
The lack of long range fighters and bombers of course became a rather notable issue during the Battle of Britain, where they could only affectively attack as deep as about halfway into England. Where as it had little effect on the eastern front against the Russians since that was primarily a tactical battle and neither side did much of any strategic bombing (attacking factories etc).
fascinating to learn that about their usable hours. It makes me want to fire up aces high 3 just to putter around in a 262.
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