Oddball, Experimental, or One-off

[red750]

In 1961 Donald Reid designed and built a single-seat craft (32.83 ft or 10 m length) capable of flight and underwater movement, the Reid Flying Submarine 1 (RFS-1). A 65 hp (48 kW) engine mounted on a pylon provided propulsion for flight; a 750 W (1 hp) electric motor in the tail provided underwater propulsion. The pilot used an aqualung for breathing underwater. The first full-cycle flight [underwater at 6.5 feet (2 m) depth, airborne at 33 ft (10 m) altitude] was demonstrated on 9 June 1964. Reid, his craft, and his son (the test pilot) appeared on the U.S. game show "I've Got A Secret" on March 15, 1965.

 

[Old Koreelah]

If the aim was to get into the Guiness Book, then I guess it was a success.

[facthunter]

It didn't sea  service It was sub optimal.  Nev

[Area-51]

Well it succeeded at something at least...

 

Not a good submarine, not a good aircraft. (They probably failed the drug test)

 

Just like...;

 

Not a good car, not a good aircraft.

 

Or... ;

 

Not a good motorbike, not a good helicopter.

 

 

[pmccarthy]

There are plenty of boats left under the sea but there has never been a plane left in the sky.

[red750]

The Partenavia P.70 Alpha was a 1970s Italian two-seat light aerobatic trainer designed by Luigi Pascale and built by Partenavia.

 

The Alpha was a low-wing monoplane with a fixed tricycle landing gear and powered by a 100 hp (75 kW) Rolls-Royce Continental O-200-A engine. The Alpha first flew on the 24 April 1972 but only one was built and it did not enter production as the company was pre-occupied with producing the Partenavia P.68.

 

[facthunter]

Boats go to the bottom edge of the sea and planes to the bottom edge of the sky. Nev

[onetrack]

That's a nice-looking little aircraft, bit of a shame it didn't go into production. I wonder what happened to this one? Probably scrapped after testing I suppose, as with all large companies.

[BrendAn]

1 hour ago, onetrack said:

That's a nice-looking little aircraft, bit of a shame it didn't go into production. I wonder what happened to this one? Probably scrapped after testing I suppose, as with all large companies.

I thought the same . Very nice .

[facthunter]

Why do they have rearward sloping vertical stabilisers? Totally inappropriate and only for looks (unless it's high subsonic).  Nev

[BrendAn]

18 minutes ago, facthunter said:

Why do they have rearward sloping vertical stabilisers? Totally inappropriate and only for looks (unless it's high subsonic).  Nev

 don't most light planes have them.

[facthunter]

Doesn't make it right. Just for looks,. Doesn't help spin recovery. Nev

[skippydiesel]

Probably says something about my aesthetic standards - I prefer the straight vertical fin eg old Cessna's, Mooney (sort of strait)

[facthunter]

Mooney is forward depending on where the trim is. 

[marshallarts]

Very entertaining thead!  Only just came across it, and a few things definitely caught my eye.

 

That OMA SUD aircraft has a fuselage that is eerily similar in shape to the Flaris light jet which has been under development for the last few years.

 

And the Lear Fan - I remember buying a magazine way back in the 1980s which had an article about that sad tale.  I recall a story that the project had missed a deadline that was the last day of a calendar year, so to try and help out, the potential customer declared that the following day was the 32nd of December!  But sadly it wasn't enough to save the project.  Not unlike the Beech Starship I guess - both somewhat ahead of their time.  At least Beech did build a few of the Starships - I think 1 or 2 are still flying.  Sorry if this has all been mentioned already, I haven't been through the whole thread.

[red750]

On July 12, 1988: The Scaled Composites Triumph made its first flight at the Mojave Airport in Calif. The Triumph was a U.S. twin-engine, business jet prototype designed and built by Burt Rutan's Scaled Composites for Beechcraft, known officially as the Model 143. The Williams FJ44 turbofan engine shared the maiden flight. The aircraft is a three lifting surface design, with both a small canard, and a small conventional horizontal stabilizer in a T-tail configuration. 
Originally, three versions of the all-composite aircraft were envisioned, one powered by piston engines, one by turboprops and one by turbofans. The only one built was the turbofan version with engines mounted on top of the wings, which was first aircraft to be powered by the Williams International FJ44 engine. 

 

[red750]

The Doblhoff/WNF 342 was an early experimental tip jet helicopter designed and produced by Wiener-Neustädter Flugzeugwerke. It was the first helicopter to take off and land using tip jets to drive the rotor.

 

The WNF 342 is closely associated with an ambitious requirement issued by the German Navy that sought an aerial observation platform that would be suitable for use aboard not only relatively compact ships but even its extensive submarine fleet as well. Friedrich von Doblhoff, an Austrian designer and helicopter pioneer, opted to produce a response; work on the venture commenced in 1942. The Reichsluftfahrtministerium (RLM) (the German Reich Aviation Ministry) quickly took an interest in the venture, extending its support and financial backing for development.

 

A total of five prototypes would be sequentially built, each one incorporating the lessons gained from its predecessor and thus incorporating improvements as testing continued. Changes included the adoption of more powerful piston engines, redesigned rotor blades, and an enlarged cabin. The final revision produced was the V4, which featured a twin-seat cabin arrangement along with redesigned flight controls. It performed limited flight testing over a total of 25 flight hours before the rotorcraft was captured by the United States military.

 

[facthunter]

Looks like an autogyro to me.  Nev

[BrendAn]

2 minutes ago, facthunter said:

Looks like an autogyro to me.  Nev

 

[BrendAn]

36 minutes ago, red750 said:

The Doblhoff/WNF 342 was an early experimental tip jet helicopter designed and produced by Wiener-Neustädter Flugzeugwerke. It was the first helicopter to take off and land using tip jets to drive the rotor.

 

The WNF 342 is closely associated with an ambitious requirement issued by the German Navy that sought an aerial observation platform that would be suitable for use aboard not only relatively compact ships but even its extensive submarine fleet as well. Friedrich von Doblhoff, an Austrian designer and helicopter pioneer, opted to produce a response; work on the venture commenced in 1942. The Reichsluftfahrtministerium (RLM) (the German Reich Aviation Ministry) quickly took an interest in the venture, extending its support and financial backing for development.

 

A total of five prototypes would be sequentially built, each one incorporating the lessons gained from its predecessor and thus incorporating improvements as testing continued. Changes included the adoption of more powerful piston engines, redesigned rotor blades, and an enlarged cabin. The final revision produced was the V4, which featured a twin-seat cabin arrangement along with redesigned flight controls. It performed limited flight testing over a total of 25 flight hours before the rotorcraft was captured by the United States military.

 

it amazes me how much freedom these designers were given back then. so many strange aircraft were built

[facthunter]

There was certainly NO SHORTAGE of weird designs but many were dangerous. It's understandable to want to produce something revolutionary and become famous and live the good life. Over time there have been many designs that were death traps and some just a bit harder to manage and with good training went on to be very successful. It doesn't usually happen by accident though . Nev

Edited July 25, 2023 by facthunter
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[Old Koreelah]

2 hours ago, facthunter said:

There was certainly NO SHORTAGE of weird designs but many were dangerous. It's understandable to want to produce something revolutionary and become famous and live the good life.

Some of these innovations were more acts of desperation by nations beng defeated- both German and Japanese.

2 hours ago, facthunter said:

Over time there have been many designs that were death traps and some just a bit harder to manage and with good training went on to be very successful. It doesn't usually happen by accident though . Nev

Nev I realise what you meant by that, but it could be argued that some progress was made by accident: some wartime deathtraps killed more test pilots than enemies. Perhaps each accident fed improvements in design and procedure. 

[facthunter]

I meant you don't get good design OR good training by ACCIDENT. Sorry.  Accidents investigated properly advance things but some designs should never get past the concept stage.  You can build models and use wind tunnels etc  Nev

[red750]

The Rutan Model 72 Grizzly is a tandem-wing STOL research aircraft designed by Burt Rutan, now preserved at the EAA AirVenture Museum, Oshkosh. The aircraft exhibited excellent Short Take-Off and Landing (STOL) capabilities, proving that this is also possible with a Rutan-typical canard design.

 

This composite-construction aircraft features three lifting surfaces: A front wing with approximately half the span of the main wing and a classical cruciform empennage. Front and main wings are connected by a pair of struts with square cross-section which also serve as fuel tanks. Both wings carry Fowler flaps on part of their span for STOL. The fixed tail-wheel undercarriage has four low-pressure, small-diameter main-wheels, on two cantilever spring struts, with a spring mounted tail-wheel assembly. The four-seat cabin is completely enclosed with a combination of flat, squared and outward-bulged tear-drop shaped windows.

 

The Grizzly is intended for use as a bush plane with unique safety and comfort, the four-seater could be used by two persons as a camper for back-country activities with its seats folded to become a 6 ft (1.8 m) long bed. A planned amphibian version of the Grizzly was never realized. Use as a bush plane may conflict with the Grizzly's low wings and Fowler flaps which might interfere with vegetation or obstacles.

 

The only performance spec on Wikipedia is a stall speed of 35 kn (40 mph, 65 km/h).

 

 

[Old Koreelah]

I hadn’t seen that aircraft before. I’ve always liked Rutan designs, but most were very impractical for our type of flying. This one looks to have lots of potential, except for those pesky low wings getting wacked by bushes, sheep and roadside guideposts.