July
19
has any propeller aircraft ever broke the sound barrier in a dive?
Author: admin Category: 5
I heard a rumor that the P-47 could break the sound barrier in a dive
I am only level one so i can’t rate your answers but i would like to thank all of you who took the time to provide an answer to my question
I love it, "normally", "not officially"… How ’bout NO! If a propeller driven aircraft breaks the sound barrier, it’s in pieces.
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July 19th, 2010
Not officially, but the P-51 and P-38 (and presumably the P-47) had controllability issues and a number of crashes after a dive that were associated with approaching Mach 1…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sound_barrier
When approaching Mach 1, the flow over the horizontal stabilizer forms a shock wave, causing the elevator to flutter, become completely ineffective, or immovable. A crash is often the result.
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July 19th, 2010
Not to my knowledge. They have a variety of difficulties at that speed that prevent it. Perhaps a turbo shaft style engine would if it were specialized but i doubt it.
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Commercial pilot. Single/multi-engine. Instrument rated.
July 19th, 2010
I’m sure they could in a dive. But controlability needs to be taken, overspeed would take place because the fuselage probably wasn’t designed for these speeds. The wings would flutter. You would lose a lot of control, and probably end up crashing. So I doubt it has ever been attempted.
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July 19th, 2010
There were unconfirmed reports that a sonic boom was heard from a P-51 during WWII that was diving at very high speed, right before it crashed into the ground, indicating it would have been traveling at least Mach 1. Further reports cast some doubt as to whether it was a sonic boom, or just the plane crashing. No one to that point had heard a sonic boom (from a plane) before, and no one really knows for sure. Some of the witnesses said later that they were sure they heard a cracking boom right before the plane hit the ground, and they were looking around for another explosion but found none.
One soldier said that many years later that he heard one from an F-15 flying over his house, and only then remembered the incident in Europe, and realized it was a sonic boom.
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Saw it on the history channel.
July 19th, 2010
A HUMAN BEING IS GETTING READY TO MAKE AN ATTEMPT TO BREAK THE SOUND BARRIER FALLING FROM A HEIGHT OF 122,000 FEET.
From Wikipedia:
Propeller aircraft were, nevertheless, able to approach the speed of sound in a dive. This led to numerous crashes for a variety of reasons. These included the rapidly increasing forces on the various control surfaces, which led to the aircraft becoming difficult to control to the point where many suffered from powered flight into terrain when the pilot was unable to overcome the force on the control stick. The Mitsubishi Zero was infamous for this[citation needed] problem, and several attempts to fix it only made the problem worse. In the case of the Supermarine Spitfire, the wings suffered from low torsional stiffness, and when ailerons were moved the wing tended to flex such that they counteracted the control input, leading to a condition known as control reversal. This was solved in later models with changes to the wing. The P-38 Lightning suffered from a particularly dangerous interaction of the airflow between the wings and tail surfaces in the dive that made it difficult to "pull out", a problem that was later solved with the addition of a "dive flap" that upset the airflow under these circumstances. Flutter due to the formation of shock waves on curved surfaces was another major problem, which led most famously to the breakup of de Havilland Swallow and death of its pilot, Geoffrey de Havilland, Jr.
All of these effects, although unrelated in most ways, led to the concept of a "barrier" that makes it difficult for an aircraft to break the speed of sound.[5]
[edit] Early claims
There are, however, several claims that the sound barrier was broken during World War II. Hans Guido Mutke claimed to have broken the sound barrier on April 9, 1945 in a Messerschmitt Me 262. Mutke reported not just transonic buffeting but the resumption of normal control once a certain speed was exceeded, then a resumption of severe buffeting once the Me 262 slowed again. He also reported engine flame out. However, this claim is widely disputed by various experts believing the Me 262’s structure could not support high transonic, let alone supersonic flight.[6] The lack of area ruled fuselage and 10 percent thick wings did not prevent other aircraft from exceeding Mach 1 in dives. Chuck Yeager’s Bell X-1, the F-86 Sabre (with Me-262 profile [7][8]) and the Convair Sea Dart seaplane exceeded Mach 1 without area rule fuselages. Computational tests carried out by Professor Otto Wagner of the Munich Technical University in 1999 suggest the Me 262 was capable of supersonic flight during steep dives. Recovering from the dive and the resumption of severe buffeting once subsonic flight was resumed would have been very likely to damage the craft terminally.
On page 13 of the "Me 262 A-1 Pilot’s Handbook" issued by Headquarters Air Materiel Command, Wright Field, Dayton, Ohio as Report No. F-SU-1111-ND on January 10, 1946:
"Speeds of 950 km/h (590 mph) are reported to have been attained in a shallow dive 20° to 30° from the horizontal. No vertical dives were made. At speeds of 950 to 1,000 km/h (590 to 620 mph) the air flow around the aircraft reaches the speed of sound, and it is reported that the control surfaces no longer affect the direction of flight. The results vary with different airplanes: some wing over and dive while others dive gradually. It is also reported that once the speed of sound is exceeded, this condition disappears and normal control is restored."
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wiki
July 19th, 2010
Certainly not the P47, the wing is too thick.
There were various incidents when people survived what they used to call ‘compressibility’ problems. Nasty things like controls locking up or reversing. Raymond Baxter had that in a Spitfire when diving to avoid an Me163. It was encountered more often in aircraft with thicker wings because the airflow locally exceeds M1.0 earlier.
Most transonic experiences before Area Rule was found and implemented resulted in death. I presume that doesn’t count.
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July 19th, 2010
The Supermarine Spitfire could break the barrier in a dive but as already mentioned there was no controllability so normaly resulted in a crash. Supermarine pionerred the stabilator (movable tail plane) to increase controllability but it never made it past the prototype. The information gain was laster given to the US for there supersonic projects.
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July 19th, 2010
yes, my yard spinning wheel has an a windy day
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July 19th, 2010
I love it, "normally", "not officially"… How ’bout NO! If a propeller driven aircraft breaks the sound barrier, it’s in pieces.
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