I am sorry but this is going to sound rude but please read the thread, a number of forumites have spent some time looking into this and give reasons why it is not a specific type. The information is already there.
I have no aircraft knowledge but I have eyes and can reason.
What I have learnt is that the Northrop designs changed after the Beta with the wing being lowered to physically pass under the fuselage as Beermat has explained.
This picture shows this lower wing very clearly and is not a feature that the mystery plan exhibits and I would suggest too big a feature to change on a rebuild.
And again here
The Alfa and Beta the wing is higher up on the fuselage like this.
As previously stated in the thread Northrop made no end of versions with everything from en enclosed cockpit at the front passing through twin cockpits to a single right aft.
If it is a rebuild then fitting a fixed undercarriage or fitting better streamlining is practical, in my view moving the wing is not, moving the cockpit would be a lot of work.
On the basis that nobody has been able to find a matching aircraft I think it fairly reasonable to assume it is either a one off or a rebuild.
In my view the easy to see design feature is the position of the wing vertically and the straight to undercarriage and then dihedral wing are the defining features. If it hasn’t got these it isn’t the mystery plane.
Then there are the flaps. Still researching this. The mystery aircraft appears to have solid single flaps as apposed to perforated and/or split flaps.
I hope this helps but we have already been over this, It just isn’t any well known plane or this thread would have ended long ago with the experts, I am not one of them, we have on here.
Yes I looked at Vought and then there was the Northrop connection. The well forward leg cowling gave scope for knuckles but whilst I can see fitting a fixed undercarriage as possibly becoming a necessity why would you move the cockpit which, to me looks further back on the mystery plane.
The beauty of coming to this site, and this tread, that I learn so much.
I have just found the following
Mystery plane has flaps which appear not to be split and are not perforated.
From A History of Aerodynamics: And Its Impact on Flying Machines
I would say that the G21 is unlikely
The Gribovsky G15 has no dihedral
The Ki-15-III was the final version of the aircraft to be developed, and was also the fastest. It was designed in 1939, and was powered by the much more powerful Mitsubishi Ha-102 radial engine. This gave it a top speed of 329mph. This was similar to the speed of the new Mitsubishi Ki-46, but the new aircraft was expected to out-perform the Ki-15-III in every other way, and so work on the Ki-15-III came to an end.
Not a III but a II
Then you read this
The Ki-15 first came to the attention of the outside world in 1937 the Asahi Shimbun, a leading newspaper, was granted permission to buy a civil version of the aircraft, and to use it to try and set a record time for a flight between Japan and Britain, timed to mark the coronation of George VI. The second prototype, with the type name Karigane I (Wild Goose I) was completed in March 1937, and delivered to the newspaper, which named it Kamikaze (Divine Wind)
and think you are onto something. But unfortunately not this one but the Ki-15 certainly meet the wing/undercarriage requirements,
Bl#34y hell I see what you mean by big now.
Is it a fair conclusion to reach that this plane is, as several have already said, a bit on the rare side. We have all looked at hundreds of planes, saying close but it has not got such and such.
Maybe, if it is a one off we are asking it to fit too many parameters some of which may have been varied for the special.
If we then make the assumption, it is based on a known airframe which one best fits.
Very crudely is it right to say that it is relatively easy to rearrange the internal layout of the fuselage moving cockpit and fuel tanks about to suite requirements. Also lengthening the fuselage is relatively easy. More difficult and expensive would be making changes to the wings.
So if we ignore fuselage layout/length and tailplane configuration and just take the radial engine, the fixed undercarriage, the straight wing section to the undercarriage and then the dihedral and look for these features alone and then refine that to a very forward leg fairing I think we have a very clear contender, which others have already mentioned, Northrop.
They made no end of permutations of cockpit position on the Alpha/Beta etc range right from fully forward to fully back including passenger cabins and two seaters. The dihedral is there with the straight centre section and the fairings, not a knuckle but at least protruding forward of the wing leading edge.
So why would the knuckle be necessary? If it is a racer would it be better aerodynamically? Could it be necessary to move the undercarriage forward for centre of gravity reasons. Some models have bracing struts on the undercarriage but not all.
So here are a number of images of Northrop airframes from the period illustrating the similarity and the variety of cockpit layouts.
Northrop_XA-16_051116-F-1234P-086
Northrop_Delta_A61_1_RAAF_Photo_Via_Brendan_Cowan
However, after the Alpha and Beta models the wing drops and passes under the fuselage so IF it is a Northrop then it would have to be derived from an Alpha or Beta.
This Gamma clearly shows that.
The VAL does not have the straight section of wing out to the undercarriages but the Ki-15 does.
Picture removed as it was a film mock up and not the genuine machine.
Vought comes to mind for obvious reasons but I couldn’t find anything similar at all.
Please feel free to tear my reasoning apart.
I think I am done but it has been interesting looking.
Sign In
