Alternative Moonbats: A 'What if'

Hello!

My hoped for thread is about everything P-67 Moonbat-ish.

From; "What if they'd gone for less experimental eniges?"

To; "What alternate engines could/should they have tried?" Just how experimental at the time in question were turbo-props? How did they rate in power and performance?

'What if' alternates?

What if the Brits had cottened on to the idea instead of, say, the Westland Whirlwind?

What if Kurt had received the epiphany and worked on a 'Batlike' machine instead of his 'Falk' ?

Looking forwards to learning much from other forum members like always. :D
 
Westland's Dreadnought was a similar idea from the twenties, with the same fate; the prototype crashed. I suspect an all airfoil section aircraft is going to have the same problems as a flying wing, for the same reason, and not really become viable until computer controlled flight stability systems come along.

Until then, you're looking at an extremely twitchy beast, likely to kill more of it's own pilots than the enemy- if it can be flown in regular service at all. What a crack test pilot can manage may be completely beyond the ability of a raw second lieutenant, after all.

More powerful engines would likely only magnify the problems- fitting the thing with a pair of Griffons, for instance, it might actually reach it's limiting mach number in level flight.
 
It came too late. Jets and swept wings were seen as the way forward.

Some years earlier, its assorted wrinkles could have had the chance to be worked out. As it was, too slow, too twitchy, inferior to existing production aircraft. And the prototype destroyed by an engine fire.
Sadly, game over.
 
At work.

Interesting. Will look up your machine's referance (The Dreadnought) when I can.

As for stability and comparing it to total wing designs, the Horten bros managed a stable shape with their 229 and the much later Argentine transport machine.

I am thinking that hitting the mach limit in level flight at the times in question would be.......... bad?
 
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At work.

It came too late. Jets and swept wings were seen as the way forward.

Some years earlier, its assorted wrinkles could have had the chance to be worked out. As it was, too slow, too twitchy, inferior to existing production aircraft. And the prototype destroyed by an engine fire.
Sadly, game over.

*Nods*

Am happy to push the inception date forwards to give the idea more room to complete with real time reality.

Plus learn myself just how far 'Back' people had thought about blended anythings. :)
 
At work.

Egads! I'd forgottej about Burnelli! The twin engine/twin tail boom kind of hides the lines.

A 'Burnelli Moonbat' any one?

:D
 

Deleted member 94680

One of your problems seems to be the fact it was a Wartime development. Resources, engines, money, heck, even wind tunnel time were in short supply for something so experimental.

Is there any way to bring it into development earlier? Make the Model I more successful in the initial evaluation phase? Get somebody to “jump ahead” with some of the latter decisions?
 
Moonbats,

A blended shape like the XP-67 is an excellent solution if you have to drag around lots of internal volume. Large internal fuel storage, or space occupied by advanced ducting and heat exchangers could justify the increased frontal area. From the standpoint of interference drag reduction, a blended shape offers some advantages for multi-engine configurations. Look up the proposed prewar Miles blended body transports.

Dynasoar
 

Driftless

Donor
even wind tunnel time were in short supply for something so experimental.

That could make a nugget for a timeline with earlier large-scale wind tunnels as a POD. i.e. Everking's TL about the P-38 uses a different analysis of wind tunnel info to alternatively impact the development of that aircraft. You need somebody with serious aerodynamic knowledge to write it though....
 
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