Yes, the one on the left is the Alekseyev I (for Istrebitel, meaning fighter)-211. It was totally underpowered with it’s TR-1 turbojets. When the batch of British engines was bought in 1947, Alekseyev redesigned it a bit and came up with the I-215 with two Derwents. This gave enough power for the pretty heavy jet (armament was either three 37mm or two 57mm cannon), but it was discovered it needed a bit of structural tweaking on the wins.

A two-seater I-212 was also under development, until Yakovlev made his comments to Stalin. Following that, both Alekseyev and Sukhoi’s design bureaus were disbanded with both ending up as forced labourers in other design bureaus. Sukhoi of course got fully rehabilitated and re-opened his design bureau, Alekseyev stayed at TsAGI and went on to do various projects like air-to-air refuelling and hydrofoil boats.

Nope, the C-135E and KC-135E’s are all re-engined with second-hand airliner engines. That’s what makes them E models Sean. What is that saying again: know your enemy as well as you know yourself 😉 The -E’s all have TF33 turbofans which were scavenged from retired 707 airliners. That’s why AMARC used to have a whole lot of civilian 707s parked there with full inventory numbers and everything: those aircraft were bought by the USAF just for the engines, the airframes themselves were good enough to provide shade for rattlesnakes and roadrunners.

The last J57 turbojet powered KC-135A/Q probably was retired or rebuilt somewhere in the very early 1990s, but some testbeds definately flied longer than that. I think NASA’s NKC-135A still flies occasionally with the old stovepipes.

Increased leukaemia around Greenham Common? I think the reason for that is far more horrifying and less far-fetched than just some hydrazine spills… GC was actually the site of a pretty nasty nuclear accident back in 1958, when a nuclear-armed B-47 burnt up on it’s alert apron after another B-47 had dropped some improvised napalm a few metres away…

From http://www.cdi.org/Issues/NukeAccidents/accidents.htm :

*February 1958, Greenham Common Airbase, England

A B-47 bomber experiencing engine trouble during takeoff jettisoned two full 1,700 gallon fuel tanks from an altitude of 8,000 feet, which missed a designated safe impact area and exploded 65 feet behind a parked B-47 loaded with nuclear weapons. The resulting fire burned for 16 hours and caused the high explosives package of at least one weapon to explode. The explosion released radioactive material, including powdered uranium and plutonium oxides, at least 10 to 20 grams of which were found off base. An adjacent hangar was also severely damaged, and other planes nearby had to be hosed down to prevent their ignition by the intense heat fueled by the jet propellant and magnesium in the B-47. The fire killed two people, injured eight others, and destroyed the bomber.

The Air Force has never officially admitted that nuclear weapons were involved in this accident. The Air Force and British Ministry of Defence agreed in 1956 to deny the existence of nuclear weapons in any accident involving U.S. nuclear weapons stationed in England. In 1985, the British government reported that the accident involved a parked B-47 that was struck by a taxiing B-47 on a training exercise, omitting any mention of the ensuing fire.

“Activists Claim Proof of Nuclear Accident,” San Francisco Examiner, July 15, 1996, p. A-11; Shaun Gregory, The Hidden Cost of Deterrence: Nuclear Weapons Accidents, Brassey’s UK, London, 1990, p.152; From a report on Greenham Common Accident, “Broken Arrow,” Center for Nuclear Disarmament, London, England, July 1996, http://www.cnduk.org/brokenarrow/index.html .

Won’t do much good for the prizes of real-estate in the area, i guess.

Don’t forget you have to buy quite a bit of concrete too, just to take up the place and weight of the systems you just removed.

What probably comes closest are the various designs/studies for supersonic bizjets derived on mostly the Su-27, but also on the MiG-25. I don’t think they would have been much cheaper as the combat aircraft, but you have to take the redesign, interior and (likely) lack of large-quantity orders into consideration as well. Of course, the original Dassault Mystère/Falcon 20 bizjets was roughly a re-fuselaged Mystère fighter.

In the US, quite a few prototype fighters flew under civilian designations. The F-20s and YF-22s for example. And you can always ask BAe how much G-VTOL had cost.

Thread re-opened to give it a last try at everyone showing their skills in behaving themselves and staying on-topic.

Too bad the article doesn’t mention any specific details about the operational qualities (or lack thereof) in the F-2. I don’t think i have ever heard anything about the problems with the radar being resolved, for example.

With the order now cut to only some 90 of those Sumodarts, their production still outnumbers that of the F-1 it has now almost replaced in JASDF service. The program has been cut just in time to save the F-4.