Horton Brothers Flying Wings

A4K said:

The Northrop N-1M - seems to be the right wing form, although fueslage seems a bit thin in your photo (maybe just the angle it's on?)

Click to expand...

The N-1M was a well known aircraft in the US that was flying in the US before WW2.

Northrop N-1M - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A4K said:

Interesting picture Graeme! Looks like a Ho VII in inverted dive to me...what do you reckon..?

Click to expand...

A4K said:

Scrub my Ho VII comment - What do you reckon of this, Graeme?
The Northrop N-1M - seems to be the right wing form, although fueslage seems a bit thin in your photo (maybe just the angle it's on?)

Click to expand...

Sorry Evan, my post was alcohol induced, I didn't intend for you to take me seriously. That photo has been around for years but become 'famous' around the time of the "Chariots of the Gods" release.

No I don't think its a Horten or a Northrop or an extra-terrestrial, but a staple mark, as explained in the site I posted...

"Not, it is not a "forgery", no, it is not a negative fault, neither something on the ground in the distance, and neither an extraterrestrial craft. It is the scratch mark caused by the staples that one put on the top right corner to hang it on a display panel, quite simply. That's why it's there in some prints, missing in another, that's why it "changes" with time."

Nice one, Graeme ...so when the mention the 'missing paperclips' in regard to secret aircraft projects, they're actually talkng about 'staples', eh?!

..But seriously, folks...

Re the Horten IV and VI: (From 'the world's vintage sailplanes 1908-45' by Martin Simons, 1980)

...Two Horten 6s were built. In March 1945, with the American armies 40 km away, one was test flown against the Horten 4. It was established that the performance in straight flight was as much better than the '4 as the '4 was better than the orthodox types. The work had to stop as the americans soon over-ran Goettingen. One of the new aircraft was destroyed on the ground by the conquerors, as were most German sailplanes at this time. The other Horten 6 and parts of several other flying wings were taken to the USA to be studied at the Northrop factory. Two Horten 4s survived the war in flyable condition. One was flown by the British Air Force of Occupation gliding clubs until it was badly broken in a landing accident. The other was taken to England, where it was flown at Farnborough but badly damaged. After repairs it was sold to Hollis Button in the USA.

Although capable of good flights in expert hands, the Horten 4 seemed to fall short of expectations. In 1959 the sailplane was the subject of a thorough study by the Aerophysics Department of Mississippi State University under August Raspet. The results were reported to the OSTIV congress in 1960. The researchers found that the flying wing had a number of serious defects. The Hortens, when they heard of these results, were convinced that the controls of the aircraft tested had been incorrectly rigged. If so, this would account for the poor results Raspets team obtained.

The Horten 4 in the USA was still extant in 1980 (time of writing). The aircraft including the Horten 6, sent to Northrops, were re-discovered in crated condition in the Smithsonian Institution's store in 1977, and will probably be preserved.

Horten 4, 1941: Span, 20.00 m. Wing area, 19.1 sq m. Aspect ratio, 21. Flying weight , 350 kg. Wing loading, 18.3 kg/ sq m.

Horten 6, 1945: Span, 24.20 m. Wing area, 17.75 sq m. Aspect ratio, 33. flying weight, 425 kg. Wing loading, 23.9 kg/ sq m.

(Photo caption mentions that 'so far as is known, the H6 never flew in the USA')


Existing Horten-Aircraft (From 'Flug Revue', September 1999)

Type / Werknr. / Location
H II 2 Muzeum Lotnictwa Polskiego, Krakau (components)
H II L 6 Deutsches Technikmuseum, Berlin
H III f 32 National Air Space Museum, Washington D.C.
H III h 31 Deutsches Technikmuseum, Berlin
H IV 26 Deutsches Museum, Flugwerft Schleissheim
H IV a 25 Planes of Fame Museum, Chino, USA
H VI V2 34 National Air Space Museum, Washington D.C.
H IX V3 40 National Air Space Museum, Silver Hill, USA

Hi Guys
Just read my way through the thread and one or two things flag themselves up to me.
First I must say that I have no real disagreements with the posts and I only picked up the thread from an interest in unusual designs.

Flag one. A great deal seems to be made about the stability of the smaller Horten wings. Well how many pilots would expect a high performance glider or fighter to be stable? Instability equals agility in a fighter. Yes it must be controllable but a stable fighter is slow to react can't turn or manoeuvre rapidly and so is an easy target.

Second flag. The Horten brothers large wing never really got out of development, in fact none of their designs did, but they showed enough promise to be carted off by the allies for further study.

Third flag. Governments do not need reasons to classify things and keep them under wraps. It is considered a good enough reason to try to hide something which will make the current government look bad and to keep previous government cook ups quiet in case they reveal yours next time they get in and to admit that Germany had aircraft designs which appeared superior to the allies would never have been countenanced directly after the war and at the beginning of the "Cold War" when Russia could have gained a possible advantage by studying them.

Fourth flag. Airfix produced a "Futuristic fighter aircraft design" which had the design features and was actually not too far off the F117 in concept and shape but looked smoother since current ideas on aerodynamics had not accepted the angular shape of the stealth aircraft as viable.

Final flag. Computer flying is not infallible. Check out the Paris airshow where the Airbus prototype crashed. It does not actually crash. It simply flies into the trees because the pilot and flight engineer are screaming at the computer to give them full power and the computer responds by saying that full power in the dirty configuration (Full slots, slats, flaps and gear down) will strain the airframe.

Yes I know that things have improved since then but how many more little gems like that one are waiting to be discovered? Sounds remarkably like an incident recently where an airliner failed to make the end of the runway because there was no throttle response. There is total deniability that this was a computer cook up since this will ground god knows how many aircraft.

Sorry for the Rant
Dragonsinger

Henk said:

I wrote to a magazine here in South Africa (WORLD AIRNEWS ) about the Horten 229 V3, but they made misstakes and just pissed me off so I told them, but ag ja they claimed that their info were correct. The response on that article were enormous and some even said that it should be brought to SA and restored here.

Here is a link to the magazine's website.

http://www.airnews.co.za/pages.php?page=default

Horten 18 America Bomber Part 5

This comes from Luft 46.









Henk

Click to expand...

Yes, great stuff, Henk; I always liked the Ho 229, and thought it was years (decades?) ahead of it's time. It's amazing to think that the Germans almost built the B-2 50 years earlier! Looks just like a B-2 from the rear . . . . .

wow! that's simply an amazing piece of aviation! I'd gladly build a model of that! =D

right now I'm building the 1:72 Revell Germany Horten Go 229. it's a lot of fun! 8D

Thanks SoD Stitch, I love to share what I have.

I would just love to go and see the real thing one day. Boeing is now working on a flying wing with NASA and it is looking good so far.

I'd love to go see the real thing at the NASM. but I hear it's not on public display anymore I wonder why? are they finally gonna restore it?

Trebor said:

I'd love to go see the real thing at the NASM. but I hear it's not on public display anymore I wonder why? are they finally gonna restore it?

Click to expand...

Go back and read p. 1, post #10; Henk mentions that the SASM is planning on restoring the one Go/Ho 229 they have in storage at the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center, but I'm sure it will be several years before it is put on display, if not more. There are several other projects that are taking priority over the Go/Ho 229 at the moment.

oh, well if I had the knowledge, I'd totally volunteer to restore the Ho-229.

Just catching up - a few comments....

Dragonsinger said:

Third flag. Governments do not need reasons to classify things and keep them under wraps. It is considered a good enough reason to try to hide something which will make the current government look bad and to keep previous government cook ups quiet in case they reveal yours next time they get in and to admit that Germany had aircraft designs which appeared superior to the allies would never have been countenanced directly after the war and at the beginning of the "Cold War" when Russia could have gained a possible advantage by studying them.

Click to expand...

The US had no reason to cover up flying any captured German aircraft, if anything the propaganda gods at the time would of put out word that the "Nazi" aircraft was inferior.

Dragonsinger said:

Fourth flag. Airfix produced a "Futuristic fighter aircraft design" which had the design features and was actually not too far off the F117 in concept and shape but looked smoother since current ideas on aerodynamics had not accepted the angular shape of the stealth aircraft as viable.

Click to expand...

Dragon - a few other model manufacturers put out similar models - "The F-19" as it was first touted - they looked nothing like the F-117 and gave no concept how the aircraft's stealth capability really worked. When I worked for Lockheed during the early 1980s we would scoff at those models and even burnt a few of them in effigy during tailgate parties in the parking lot of the old Burbank plant after work hours....

Actually there is a model of the Mig-37 Ferret E I think it was which was meant to represent Soviet Stealth Aircraft Approach which does bear a very good similarity to the F-117 Stealth Fighter. You should type the name in and look at what you come up with...

HealzDevo said:

Actually there is a model of the Mig-37 Ferret E I think it was which was meant to represent Soviet Stealth Aircraft Approach which does bear a very good similarity to the F-117 Stealth Fighter. You should type the name in and look at what you come up with...

Click to expand...

I'm totally aware of this other fairy tale and again it's nothing like an F-117 except it has a "V" tail - more fictional nonsense

Okay, but you have to admit it looks a heck of a lot closer than the F-119 model did. It actually looks like those reasonable models of an aircraft that are released by some artists before true details of an aircraft become available...

HealzDevo said:

Okay, but you have to admit it looks a heck of a lot closer than the F-119 model did. It actually looks like those reasonable models of an aircraft that are released by some artists before true details of an aircraft become available...

Click to expand...

It's closer than the F-19 model but still a joke - look at the air intake - it was believed by some wannabe aviation analysts that you have to shrink the air intakes - jet engines need air!!!!! Look at that great big speed brake - what you think will happen when its opened!!!!! I could go on and on....

These were derived from some one's imagination from the 1980s. Although interesting they should NOT be taken as gospel because those who came up with them didn't have a clue about the real deal.

SoD Stitch said:

There are several other projects that are taking priority over the Go/Ho 229 at the moment.

Click to expand...

Just out of curiosity (and forgive the ignorance)- like what?

There is only one existing airframe of the Ho-229 and it's a technological marvel for it's time. I'm sure it's not easy to restore a 60 year old aircraft but sometimes I wonder why it's just sitting in a closet.

Velius said:

Just out of curiosity (and forgive the ignorance)- like what?

There is only one existing airframe of the Ho-229 and it's a technological marvel for it's time. I'm sure it's not easy to restore a 60 year old aircraft but sometimes I wonder why it's just sitting in a closet.

Click to expand...

There's probably no money in the museum's budget to restore it - usually restoration is based on some benefactor throwing some money at the project.

It did come very very close to being restored.For the last time I was there one of the restorer's had just done the front of the B29.I asked would was his nest project was and he said it was the Horton ho 229.He told me one time that it was the most requested unrestored aircraft in there inter collation.I was told at that time it was to come out in 2 to 3 weeks.All the restorer's where very excised to start working on it.

I think the museum should try and get some museums in Germany to help out with the restoring project and to get people from aviation company's to help with it and they will get a lot of attention.

I wonder if they take public donations? A lot of people (it seems to me) are enthusiastic to see the 229 restored and I'm sure they (The NASM) can collect quite a bit from those fans.