Mega Mirage...

[Archibald]

In the fabulous article on the Super Mirages (July / august/ September 2004, n° 416/417/418) Le fana de l'aviation mention a mach 3 project from 1969. The picture was published in Aviation Magazine for Le bourget aerosalon of 1969.

I know that Jemiba or Deino already posted this image here (and in various forums, including Key Publishing)  but here's the whole article
(thanks Jemiba)  with a small comment below the picture. aparently this project was a small part of a mach 3 research effort in France in the late 60's...
The AdA was aprently interested, a general boasting "Mach 3 for our future combat aircrafts..." in 1967...

[PolluxDeltaSeven]

Le retour de Mirage Man!!!


Very interesting article... Now, it seams more logical to me...

Indeed, in the late 1960's, the Armée de l'Air planed to have in the 1970's an air force with:

-Mirage F1 as light fighter
-Jaguar A as light attack airplane
-ACF as large multirôle fighter/striker

The ACF could have had great abilities, including supersonic cruise and Mach 2,5+ speed at high altitude... But there still will be a gap in the AdA needs Because the Soviet Mig-25 were seen as the last threat over France territory...
France wanted to do some rechearch on the Mach 3 flights in order to have the experience to built in the next decade an operationnal plane able to replace the Mirage IV and/or complete the interception missions of the ACF...



Indeed, and that point is something very little known, during the late 1970's and probably the early 1980's, it appears that Mig-25R used to fly over Corsica Island and all over the French territory (from Marseille to German border, passing over Lyon (my city ) and all the nuclear power stations of the Rhône valley !!
Really!!
And it even happened that the Mirage F1 locked down the Mig on their radar and virtually "killed" them!! Of course, in order to avoid an interantional crisis, they were never alloweded to fire their missiles, but I can imagine that such a situation was very stressed for the pilots of both side!!

[Archibald]

Indeed, and that point is something very little known, during the late 1970's and probably the early 1980's, it appears that Mig-25R used to fly over Corsica Island and all over the French territory (from Marseille to German border, passing over Lyon (my city  ) and all the nuclear power stations of the Rhône valley !!
Really!!
And it even happened that the Mirage F1 locked down the Mig on their radar and virtually "killed" them!! Of course, in order to avoid an interantional crisis, they were never alloweded to fire their missiles, but I can imagine that such a situation was very stressed for the pilots of both side!!

wow! T'a vu ça ou toi ? je veut une source!!!!!  ^_^

aparently there was also some overflights of Albion by "lost" aircrafts... Hmm in the  regions you mentioned there's also Marcoule, Cadarrache and Pierrelate, sanctuaries of the French nuclear research...

These MiG-25 overflight remind me the article on the Iranians F-14 (in Le Fana, spring 2004) when the Iranians pilots narrate how they locked their AWG-9 on a MiG-25R in December 1976...

Pollux, I had imaginated a similar story with algerians MiG-25s (overflying Corsica!!) chased by Mirage IV changed into fighters... I have to check my hard disk...    

[Archibald]

Here we are
http://www.whatifmodelers.com/forum//index...wtopic=9618&hl=

[PolluxDeltaSeven]

Yes, I remember your backstory with Algerian Mig-25R, a very good one!!


For my sources, they are from former Mirage F1 pilots and from a friend of mine who still works for the Armée de l'Air at Mt Verdun (one of the biggest radar site in France, near Lyon)...

But you won't find anything official abou this!! Officially (and for obvious reasons!) nothing happened!!



But well, that not a very surprise... The Armée de l'Air is the world biggest user of "Top Secret"!! It won't surprise me if the toilet paper on the air base is marked with a big red "Top Secret" logo!!!

But seriously, their is a lot of thing like that in France... For example, you'll never know the real potential of the SPECTRA (ECM and probably active stealth system of the Rafale) and you'll never find any document with the name of the laser designer pods we sold to Irak in the 1980's...  :dum:  :dum:  

[Archibald]

Try to find something about "Mirage F-1EQ" on the web... just NOTHING. Particuarly the later variants, EQ-5/ EQ-6 / EQ-7 / ...  

I plan to make this MegaMirage... very, very ironically, the basis will be a MiG-25    with Mirage IV wings
(now I have to buy this Mirage IV   next week in Bordeaux ).
I plan to do something cool with the Mirage IV remains...

I think that the super-530 was able to intercept the MiG-25... after all, the Israelis managed to kill MiG-25 with improved sparrows in the 80's
I'm curious to know if the F-1 pilots atempted zoom-climbs...

I also remember that in air fan they talked about F-1Cs zoom-climbing after
U-2s...  

[elmayerle]

I'm thinking of doing one, too, Archibald.  Though I plan to use a mix of CF-105 & MiG-25 for the fuselage.  The front end of the Mega-Mirage sure looks like that of the CF-105.  For the wings, I may just use a 1/48 Mirage 2000 wing.

[Archibald]

I know that the canopy of the arrow is maybe better suited, but well it's too hard finding this Hobbycraft kit where I live   .
On the other hand, if I find one, the Arrow need a much better canopy and I received a wide variety of them from Heller this morning... including a F-15 one  
As I'm not a killer in modelling (or I lack the skill, or I'm lazy, or I hate complicate things   ^_^ )  I just plan to add the wings and canopy of the Mirage IV to a single-fin MiG-25...
Four more big AAM for the La-270!!!!

The CF-105, F-106 and Mirage IV are one of the few aircrafts with V- windshield (bad forward view, but so cool!!!)

Something terrific would be grouping the MegaMirage, Delta-III, Arrow and
F-108... we need a Delta III kit (I know Thorvic scratchbuilded one)

Wait to see your model impatiently elmayerle...  

[Phnx28]

W00T W00T! I almost started this thread myself with a basic question post yesterday, but I'm glad Archibald beat me to it with his vastly superior illustrated post. I completely agree, we need a High-Mach theme groupbuild or such around the F-108/MiG-25/Delta-III/Arrow/ACF "Mega Mirage," perhaps also with whatever Mach 3-ish project Saab was looking into if ever it did?

[Archibald]

There was also the F-103, YF-12, English Electric P.42, Hawker P.1134, F9U...

And this gorgeous one, the Griffon III (two variants, one was a derivative of the standard griffon , the other of the target drone CT-41). 1958...
Enjoy!!





Hmm we can add some bombers to the lists (XB-70, M-56, Su T-4, B-58B, Valkyrie)

[Archibald]

I bought the MiG-25 three weeks ago and compared it with the Mirage IV I already have. It seems that the wings fit nicely to the MiG... If I can't find a Mirage IV in Bordeaux next week, I'll ask the wings and canopy to Heller, saving some euros... ^_^
But I really prefer having a complete Mirage IV, just for recycling the fuselage and undercarriage (I've got some ideas on this subject )

Aparently Tony Buttler want to make a book on the French secret projects, but even him has few datas about this MegaMirage. In the event, if this book is published, it could be the perfect complement to Jean cuny's work (which extend only to 1960, and is 20 years old... but still very interesting!!)

[PolluxDeltaSeven]

Try to find something about "Mirage F-1EQ" on the web... just NOTHING. Particuarly the later variants, EQ-5/ EQ-6 / EQ-7 / ... dry.gif

Well, the only information you'll get on the Mirage F1-EQ laser designator pod will be that they use a French ATLIS with Russian missiles, but that's wrong. Just a mistake a lot of people did because the XX pod of the irakis looks like the ATLIS pod...

But whatever, it doesn't really matter, it was just an example of the crazy Secret Mania in France!!

I think that the super-530 was able to intercept the MiG-25... after all, the Israelis managed to kill MiG-25 with improved sparrows in the 80's
I'm curious to know if the F-1 pilots atempted zoom-climbs...

I also remember that in air fan they talked about F-1Cs zoom-climbing after
U-2s...

Yes, the Super 530 was able to intercept the Mig-25: this missile was designed to intercept aircrafts flying at Mach 3 at 72000 ft... The missile itself fly at Mach 4,5...

And as far as I know, the Mirage F1 probably tried a zoom-climbs... After all, the position and the route of the Mig was already known, so an intercetion wasn't a problem...
But the Mirage probably had only few seconds in contact with the target, while a Mega-Mirage could probably intercept and escort a Mig-25!!

[Mossie]

also with whatever Mach 3-ish project Saab was looking into if ever it did?

I don't know of a Saab Mach-3 Project, but the A-36 might have made a good basis:



The A-36 was a nuclear strike bomber conceived around the time of the Viggen.  It was designed to top out at Mach 2.14, but it looks like it could go faster, has a look of the second of Archies Griffon III's.  No idea if this was ever looked into though.  The Sweedish officials had to make their mind up as to which one was going to be built & picked Viggen because it was seen to be a more versatile design.

Oh, while we're talking about Mach 3 aircraft:


     

[Archibald]

Firefox at mach 3 ? you're kidding! Clint will explain you that it could fly at mach 6

And yes, the A-36 is a god basis for a mach 3 fighter... particularly with a BIG and powerful Olympus... why not the Concorde variant ?

[Mossie]

You've got me there Archie!  I've got the book, picked it up & it clearly says "it can fly at over 4,000 mph" on the back cover.  Don't know where I got mach 3 from.  :dum:  But still, I like to use any opportunity to get a pic of Firefox in!!!

It's a shame there's no kit of the A-36, I'd love to build one.  You'd probably need something even more powerful than the Olympus to propel it to mach 3, either a new engine or a development.  I vaguley remember reading that even there was still more development potential in the Olympus over & above the 593 (although the way my memory was about Firefox I can't be sure!     ) so maybe you could eke another 10,000lb or so out of it.....

I'm really enjoying these French designs that you keep coming up with, it's about time that Ian Allan Publishing launched a 'French Secret Projects' series.  The amount that you pull out of the hat Archie, you could write them!