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Clarence L. (Kelly) Johnson, Lockheed designer, already had made preliminary drawings of a similar machine, both with single fuselage, later to be modified to twin tail booms. Was it coincidence? Or was it simply an example of parallel development? Howard Hughes considered the coincidence 'strange'.
Wonder if it was ever test flown ?Charles
it evolved into the XF-11
In the first post, the bottom plane is the XF-11.
Too bas we didn't BUY it. Nothing could have caught it.
We SHOULD have bought these beasts ... but, typically shortsighted, we didn't.
I'd like to know where you got that from since the evaluations of the second XF-11 began in April 1947. The First flight of the XF-86 took place in October, 1947 and the first deliveries were made in May 1948. I doubt F-86s were being used as chase planes in the late 40s.During the evaluation of the XF-11, they told the Air Force where they would be and when, and the F-86s STILL couldn't find it or catch it. One F-86 got a gun camera pic of the outboard 4 feet of the wingtip, in one single gun camera frame, but it turned away so fast that the F-86 could not follow and disappeared from sight.