The Road Not Taken: Vixen for the RAF

[Stan in YUL]

An thoughts about what a RAF Vixen would be relative to its sea going cousin?

How about a single engine version?

Tia
Stan in YUL

[rickshaw]

Tandem seater to bring the observer out of his coal hole!   

[PR19_Kit]

It'd need to have been a BIG engine to maintain a similar performance, and considering the manufacturer the Gyron would have been an obvious choice, but.....

DH themselves didn't do that at any stage, so there must have been a good reason. Two engines makes more sense for an all weather/night fighter from a redundancy point of view, and the Avon was the 'engine of choice' at the time.

[McColm]

There's an article about 'Vixen Versus  Javelin ' in the January 2022 issue of Aeroplane. The comparison table would suggest that the Javelin was faster than the Vixen and had more thrust.So a pair of Rolls-Royce Spey engines and a twin seat cockpit canopy is worth thinking about.

[Stan in YUL]

The scenario which came to mind was DH taking one last stab with the twin boom concept for the export market with a significant evolution of the Venom.

[kitbasher]

It'd need to have been a BIG engine to maintain a similar performance, and considering the manufacturer the Gyron would have been an obvious choice, but.....

DH themselves didn't do that at any stage, so there must have been a good reason. Two engines makes more sense for an all weather/night fighter from a redundancy point of view, and the Avon was the 'engine of choice' at the time.

A Javelin FAW.1 flew as a testbed for Gyron Junior engines.  See https://www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/291959988338958771/ and plenty more courtesy of Google.  There was an article about it in Aeroplane during 2017: https://docer.tips/aeroplane-monthly-2017-03.html.

Built an RAF Vixen a while ago (https://www.whatifmodellers.com/index.php?topic=21077.0) but feel the result could have been better. 


Definitely a subject ripe for whiffing, go for it (but stick with two engines).

[The Wooksta!]

I've got a RAF version part started, plus all the bits for the stretched one for GOR.339, which led to TSR.2.

Venom development was going single boom, with an all through engine and tail boom.  Again, all the bits are there for it, basically a Vampire T11 front end, Hunter rear fuselage and wing roots and reworked Hunter F1 wing.

[Gondor]

Venom development was going single boom, with an all through engine and tail boom.  Again, all the bits are there for it, basically a Vampire T11 front end, Hunter rear fuselage and wing roots and reworked Hunter F1 wing.

That sounds interesting

Gondor

[The Wooksta!]

I've yet to do any real work on it bar gather the bits and scratch the fin from plastic card.

[Beermonster58]

I have an idea for a PR version using the nose of an RF-4 grafted on to the Airfix kit?
Low level, wraparound camouflage.
Biggest problem though is finding an Airfix Sea Vixen at anything remotely resembling a sensible price!!
Just out of curiosity, does anyone actually know the real reason they did not reissue the kit a couple of years back? Plenty speculation of course! 🙄🙁

Allan

[The Wooksta!]

The pandemic running riot through India, so they missed their production slot presumably.

[Beermonster58]

The pandemic running riot through India, so they missed their production slot presumably.

Thanks for the reply. A favourite rumour seems to have been that the mould was damaged/broken!. Well,maybe we can hope for a future reissue?🙂

[jcf]

It'd need to have been a BIG engine to maintain a similar performance, and considering the manufacturer the Gyron would have been an obvious choice, but.....

DH themselves didn't do that at any stage, so there must have been a good reason. Two engines makes more sense for an all weather/night fighter from a redundancy point of view, and the Avon was the 'engine of choice' at the time.

I'd hazard that the 46.25" diameter of the Gyron was definitely a factor in it not being used in more projects.