strap on the De Havilland Mosquito

[namvet]

man is this thing loud !!

[TVDOC]

Well......when you are sitting in the cockpit of an aircraft that is built nearly entirely of fabric (linen) covered wood, and less than four feet from the unmuffled exhaust of two 1500 HP, V-16 Rolls-Royce "Merlin" engines, it's gonna be loud.........

The "Mosguito" was built as a fast tactical bomber, and there was no room in the specs for sound deadening materials.....due to its high top speed (at the time of initial production it was the fastest combat aircraft in the world), and high wing-loading, every ounce of extra weight added would result in reduction of its bomb load, which was marginal at best at the time. The initial production aircraft didn't even carry guns for self-defense, due to weight restrictions.

doc

[namvet]

those props and engines are a little to close to the pilot.

[Starbuck]

Looks like a lot of fun!

Anyone else notice the amount of stick motion it takes to keep the Mosquito in position? I'm a glider pilot, and we use very little motion to control gliders - at least in high performance ships. Trainers use a lot of stick, the way the Mosquito was.

Don't know all that much about WWII aircraft, but it looks like he formed up with a Lightening and a Mustang. Nice!

[TVDOC]

Looks like a lot of fun!

Anyone else notice the amount of stick motion it takes to keep the Mosquito in position? I'm a glider pilot, and we use very little motion to control gliders - at least in high performance ships. Trainers use a lot of stick, the way the Mosquito was.

Don't know all that much about WWII aircraft, but it looks like he formed up with a Lightening and a Mustang. Nice!

What you are seeing is the result of a LOT of engineering compromise......the aircraft is inherently unstable, and after takeoff, you'll notice that he is unable to achieve level flight (hands-off) using the elevator and rudder trim tabs due to the short-coupled design, and the constant variations in the engine thrust.........you'll also notice that he has difficulty keeping the engines synchronized, which adds to the problem.

The "Lightning" had similiar characteristics, however the long-boom, twin-tail design made flying it less challenging.......

doc

[namvet]

they have my respect. flying that thing to Germany and back had to wear them out

[Starbuck]

That 'instability' issue showed up in a lot of WWII aircraft, it seems. I know the B-26 Marauder had that reputation and a lot of them crashed while the engineers worked it out. The joke was they would take off 5 minutes apart and hope they didn't run into each other......

[Zathras]

Don't know all that much about WWII aircraft, but it looks like he formed up with a Lightening and a Mustang. Nice!

Actually the single engine fighter is a late war Spitfire and the other aircraft is actually a De Havilland Vampire, one of the first jets used by the RAF and RN.

[Starbuck]

Actually the single engine fighter is a late war Spitfire and the other aircraft is actually a De Havilland Vampire, one of the first jets used by the RAF and RN.

Good eye! I just keyed in on those twin booms and ignored the fact that there was no propeller!

[Zathras]

Good eye! I just keyed in on those twin booms and ignored the fact that there was no propeller!

Hard to see what they were at first due to the distortion caused by the canopy of the Mossie...had to rewind a couple times to ID the other aircraft.