Rolling the Lanc..

How about looping a Stirling?

A properly executed barrel roll is a 1g (or close to) manouevre. Should be within the capabilities of most aircraft when lightly loaded.

The problem is when it goes wrong and falls out of the top of a sloppily executed roll.

There lies a world of misery and pain. Very unlikely to be able to get it back.

Moggy

This is an excerpt from “FOREVER STRONG: The story of 75 Squadron RNZAF, 1916-1990” by Norman L. R Franks (which I’ve discovered is apparently a very valuable book).

Pilot Des Horgan remembers a trip to Hannover on the night of Sep 27/28 1943. He was flying a Stirling (EF148).

—-

“My first combat with this particular type of night fighter – JU88 – is something which I shall never forget. The target was Hannover. We had no problems on the outward journey and approached the target at the appointed time. The welcome can of orange juice had been downed and my toilet tin had been handed up and used for the usual nervous de-watering ritual. A couple of minutes to go and as usual, right on time to the very second, the target indicators started to fall.

We were flying at around 13,000 feet and as we prepared to run over the target, the reception from the local defence system started, and true to form put on the usual good show. Lots of flak and plenty of searchlights, the climax to our night’s entertainment was to come sooner than expected.

With our bomb doors open, my bomb aimer was giving me a true heading to run in onto the target indicators. Approximately two seconds before bombs away, the rear gunner informed me that a night fighter was approaching from below and dead astern. Our normal fighter affiliation intercom patter followed and we knew that as soon as he saw our bombs go, he would come forward and give us a fatal burst of cannon before we could even close the bomb doors. This is not exactly what happened.

When the rear gunner informed me that the night fighter had disappeared from sight under his turret, I sat back on the stick and the rear gunner had a sitting shot at the JU88, directly below, and he made no mistake. Unfortunately for me, in the heat of the moment I miscalculated a manoeuvre which I had practised on numerous occasions over England, and instead of slipping away to port or starboard as intended, my aircraft came over on to its back and literally fell out of the sky.

As I mentioned before, I will never forget what happened in the next couple of minutes. What actually happened when 20 tones of aircraft goes into a vertical dive, I know! I also know that I eventually regained control approximately 200 feet over Hannover, low enough fore me to see three people standing on a street corner. We made it back to base and on inspection in the morning, R-Roger was hopeless write-off, never to be flown again. Everything in the aircraft that was breakable was broken – a truly remarkable aircraft to fly reasonably well after such a hammering and to get us home in such a devastated condition.

Some weeks later, my wireless operator, over a drink in the Mess, asked me what street I had been looking for that night over Hannover”

So that’s a great story isn’t it? A little over imagined here and there … and inaccurate in at least one respect, EF148 did fly again after repairs but was lost in November over Berlin. All that said, it appears that Des pulled the aircraft more-or-less straight up and then dropped it over backwards. Fell into a loop?

Dizzy Addicot barrel rolled a (no self loadng cargo) VC10… much to the surprise of the wagon dragons in the back….

Weren’t the airliners carrying the prisoners back from Baghdad during the first Gulf War allegedly barrell rolled around the escorting Tornadoes and F-15’s, refer to Andy Sean Beans SAS book on the subject. Cough.

If the truth was told it’s amazing just what aerobatic manouvres have been carried out in some unlikely machines. I can’t remember which magazine I read it in, but there was an article some years ago entitled “You Can’t Loop Sawdust” telling of the day some pilot looped a MkI Anson. An aircraft which , it has to be admitted, was not exactly over endowed in the power department

Maybe I’m going off on a bit of a tangent, but there used to be a photograph doing the rounds of an inverted Victor, apparently in mid-loop. Can anyone quote chapter and verse?
Scuttlebut always had it that a One-Eleven was once looped. Again, can anyone throw any light on this?

William

As Moggie has pointed out , most aircraft can go round a barrel roll in theory .Even allegedly the Beverley (according to Western Squadron at Farnborough in the early 70’s – AFAIK it wasn’t attempted!) This discussion was triggered after seeing the F-28 barrel-rolled before the show.

If you read Alex Henshaw’s ‘Sigh for a Merlin’, he used to roll them on production test out of Castle Bromwich on occasion! 😮

I just spotted theis thread and was about to make the same comment. Amazing how some things stick in your mind

Unfortunately I have no idea now where I read this, so treat as apocryphal!

617 Squadron’s ex-Dam’s raid Lancasters were quite heavily stripped and compared to a fully equipped Lanc went like hell – known as “Clappers” because that’s what they went like.

Someone on an air test spotted a B17 on a weather flight, and slowly caught up with it. The Fortress pilot waited until they caught up, opened the throttles and drew away. Our intrepid Lanc jockey gave him a head start, put on full boost and proceeded to do a barrel roll AROUND the B17! 😮

(Now you see why salt should be taken with this tale until proven otherwise!)

Mickey Martin is also supposed to have looped a Lanc, but any witnesses are long gone and I can’t see thye BBMF trying to emulate him.

Adrian

The story I heard was the Lanc gained a little height on the B-17 and then proceed downhill at full bore and shut down the two engines on the B-17 side and roared on by on two!

i totally agree with you there TT. the Stirling has always been my favorite, ………
i wonder if enyone has “or attempted” to roll a B-52…..

Ahh, big group Stirling hug :p :p :p :p

Rolling a B52?

Only into the ground. 🙁

DS

The poor old stirling did receive a bad press but much of it was not the aircrafts fault – ie following the first test flight the angle of incidence on the wing was considered too low – but tooling for production was too far advanced for it to be changed on service aircraft – the solution was to create an amazingly complicated U/C – its achilles heel throughout its career- if you get the chance to see ‘Speed up on Stirlings’ a wartime production film recently re-released by IWM it shows a U/C retraction sequence – an amazing feat of engineering! And of course the wingspan was also clipped which limited the aircraft’s ceiling but also lead to the phenomenal roll rate mentioned above.

What people forget is that it was conceived pre-war and the concept of a four engined monoplane ‘heavy’ was revolutionary – the lanc, halifax et all benefited from lessons learned by Shorts.

The Stirling is and always has been my favourite aeroplane mainly because of its unjust treatment.

TT

i totally agree with you there TT. the Stirling has always been my favorite, out of the RAFs heavys. with that massive U/C and huge size. if there wings had never been clipped and the bomb bay designed better.. it would have been a world beater…still a awesome looking bomber…i never knew they where so agile.. well you learn something everyday..
i wonder if enyone has “or attempted” to roll a B-52…..

As Moggy posted previously there is a world of difference between a Barrel roll(where you have positive ‘G’ on the aircraft and systems) and proper inverted flying where you have reduced or negative ‘G’ acting on same,also if you have carburettors for your fuel system the simple fact of turning upside down will plonk the needle valve firmly shut..result engine stops.
If your engine does keep running it would eventually stop for two reasons
(1)The rest of the fuel system is not designed for neg ‘G’.
(2)The lubrication system is not designed for neg ‘G’.
Any aircraft that can sustain inverted flight has been specifically designed or
adapted.
In the excellent book ‘Tex Johnston Jet Age Test Pilot’ he writes about rolling the Boeing 707 prototype(well known) but also he rolled the B47 as well.
Wish i had seen the Vulcan being rolled at airshows that must have been a great spectacle!!

My late father (ex No.626 Sqdn, RAF Wickenby) was a Lanc pilot.
He told me that he saw one looped.

CL5, it’s taxing the old grey cells but I believe John Jordan showed us the photograph as a slide during a chat he gave to the group at our airstrip about 7 or 8 years ago.

🙂 BTW were the Lancs from Castle Bromwitch fully equipped before delivery to RAF? Radios and guns, and any loose objects?

That remain question to me since 1980.

Interesting Ozplane – where did you see that photo then? The only person who I was aware of having rolled a Wellington was W/Cdr Ken Wallis of autogyro fame.

I seem to remember a photograph of the late John Jordan flying either a Warwick or Wellington inverted down a beach in Norfolk. I also saw him complete his show at Henlow in his radioless Stearman, blissfully unaware that the Vulcan was holding out to the West, rapidly using up some of the Earth’s non-renewable resources. Definitely a great character.

Oh dear excuse me for breathing… 🙁

If you must. But do it quietly.

Moggy

PS: There maybe should have been a smiley on the original post. 🙂

You are just being silly now. Take some more of your pills and go sit in a darkened room 😡

The main problem was that the poor bomber crews rarely even saw the fighter that killed them, let alone had a chance to furball with it. 🙁

Moggy

Oh dear excuse me for breathing… 🙁

I do have a wartime cartoon depicting a Stirling swooping on ME109s which are scattering in panic – the caption ‘achtung Stirling!’ but I suspect its a bit fanciful!

The poor old stirling did receive a bad press but much of it was not the aircrafts fault – ie following the first test flight the angle of incidence on the wing was considered too low – but tooling for production was too far advanced for it to be changed on service aircraft – the solution was to create an amazingly complicated U/C – its achilles heel throughout its career- if you get the chance to see ‘Speed up on Stirlings’ a wartime production film recently re-released by IWM it shows a U/C retraction sequence – an amazing feat of engineering! And of course the wingspan was also clipped which limited the aircraft’s ceiling but also lead to the phenomenal roll rate mentioned above.

What people forget is that it was conceived pre-war and the concept of a four engined monoplane ‘heavy’ was revolutionary – the lanc, halifax et all benefited from lessons learned by Shorts.

The Stirling is and always has been my favourite aeroplane mainly because of its unjust treatment.

TT

Bearing the above in mind, were there any plans to mass produce the stripped out Sterling and fitting as many weapons as possible to it, making it an early gunship?

Or was the roll rate not so phenomenal to out manouver Axis fighters?

You are just being silly now. Take some more of your pills and go sit in a darkened room 😡

The main problem was that the poor bomber crews rarely even saw the fighter that killed them, let alone had a chance to furball with it. 🙁

Moggy