Wannabe Aircraft Designer, Age 13

[AeroplaneDriver]

I was over at my parents' house today going through some old junk in the basemen when I came across a box full of old aircraft drawings.  From the associated stuff and some vague memories I've determined these were all drawn between the ages of 12-16.  

Before I settled on flying airplanes I aspired to design them.  Unfortunately my lack of mathematical aptitude cut any kind of engineering future short, but it was still neat to look back over the things I drew as a kid.

First up are a couple of homebuilts I designed around the age of 14 when I was on a big ultralight/homebuilt kick.  For some reason the twin-boomer has an explosive release noted on the boom (WTF??)  





Next area couple of Hawk derivitives.  The first is a very early attempt at a single-seater, the second is later and the associated notes show that it has enlarged intakes and deeper rear fuselage for an afterburning RB.199.  It also has T-45 style airbrakes and a tailhook for carrier ops.





Next are a couple clearly inspired by the Monogram and Testors F-19 models of the early 80s.





Next up are a pair of pusher designs.  The first appears to be a Merlin-engined racer named "Midnight Angel II" (here I must confess that Iwas
a big fan of the Pat Benetar "Shadows of the Night" video with the similarly named T-6-hey, I'm a child of the 80s!)

[AeroplaneDriver]

The other pusher is a twin turboprop COIN/CAS platform, likely influenced by the turboprop COIN design BAe shopped around at one point.



Now a pair of very similar RN carrier based fighters.  I remember drawing one of these in Geometry class when I was 13 (perhaps the reason why I cant manage the math needed to be an engineer!)  The stumpy-looking one is carrying a bomb which is conveniently labeled as being a 1000-pounder!  





And finally, since we embrace all whiffery here, a few car designs from my exotic car phase when I was learning to drive around 15-16



The Porsche Speedster updated for the 80s!

[rallymodeller]

Nice work there, sir! And may I complement you on your marker work in the last Porsche pic? Well done!  

And I really like the stumpy RN fighter. Looks like a good candidate for an EFA kitbash...

[Tophe]

Wonderful dreams of a young teenager engineer...
Most of all I love the Venom II twin-boomer, and I do appreciate such a temporary twin-boom-tail that could be released to make a flying wing, uh, for some reason, yes  

[lancer]

Some amazing ideas you had there aero.  

[Archibald]

My biggest regret : beeing unable to draw aircrafts like that!
Now, all you have to do is modelling that, particularly the Super Hawk
^_^  

[The Rat]

Bloody 'ell I wish I could draw like that! Some sweet concepts there, and they should be shown the plastic!      

[John Howling Mouse]

"Problem these days is that kids just don't draw anymore.  Too much X-box and Nintendo.  That's why we're going belly-up..."

--- Unnamed Crayola Executive

 

[Shasper]

you MUST build the SUPERHAWK ASAP!

THats the sweetest idea I've ever seen!


Shas B)

[Captain Canada]

Awesome stuff, Nick !

I really like the superhawk as well...and the twin engined pusher. Too cool !

They look very similar to a few that I drew as a kid. Ollie did some when he was a punk as well. Mind you, that was only 3 years ago !

 

[nev]

Awesome stuff, Nick !

I really like the superhawk as well...and the twin engined pusher. Too cool !

They look very similar to a few that I drew as a kid. Ollie did some when he was a punk as well. Mind you, that was only 3 years ago !

Except Nick has drawn proper designs, whereas all yours are drawn dropping bombs, firing guns etc!       One of you obviously took this a lot more seriously than the other  


About the maths - Nick, when I was a student I was mates with a few aeronautical engineering students and they did a lot of serious, heavy duty make-your-brain-hurt maths.  I've got an A-level in maths and a degree in chemistry (some hard maths in there), but what they had to do was just scary.

[elmayerle]

I did a fair bit of the heavy math in both undergrad and grad school, but haven't used it that much in design per se.  Still, though, there are times when it is needed.

You need the maths far more as you get into the analytical side of things.

[ysi_maniac]

I like Hawk 200 and I have found very inspiring your studies on monoplace Hawk.

 

[AeroplaneDriver]

Before I settled on flying airplanes I aspired to design them.  Unfortunately my lack of mathematical aptitude cut any kind of engineering future short, but it was still neat to look back over the things I drew as a kid.

Some great drawings there Nick!

Maths, maths, maths.....

When I was in school I hated maths, even though I liked technical/scientific concepts and read about them fanatically. When I started my tertiary education studying mechanical engineering in 1994 I was sure I would flunk out after the first semester - after all I sucked at maths didn't I? Well a strange thing happened, after that first week of sitting in lectures feeling like calculus had chose me as it's personal enemy I suddenly found it was beginning to make sense to me.

I sometimes think one's appitude for a skill may well only manifest it's self later in life (or maybe I had grown up in the five years between high school and actually starting my student career and had stopped goofing off). So don't be discouraged about maths, I found that a good teacher made a world of difference to my understanding!

Anyway, I digress - fantastic drawings, maybe we can look forward to some more of your ideas - possibly draw some new ones?

Well...this old build started out as a drawing.  In fact the plan view was cut out to serve as a template for the wings.