Saab Draken WHIF Ideas

[Archibald]

What a mess !!!! Don't apologize, I had fun with that... 

[GTX]

you had fun - I'm still chuffed!

Regards,

Greg

[Archibald]

Chuffed - file 404 on this word - What does it mean ?

[pyro-manic]

Very happy/pleased. 

[Archibald]

To forgive all the above (where are the Men In Black when you need them ?  )

Here's the story of Maple Leaf Drakens

The year was 1958. While Canada struggled to finance the outstanding but very expensive Arrow, Sweden quietly developed the single-engine, more modest Draken.
Early Drakens J35A were a bit underpowered as RM6A lacked thrust. The RM6C was late...

Then came the black Friday, 20th February 1959. The day the Arrow was cancelled and replaced by BOMARC missiles.
The RCAF still had a need for a strike fighter. Many aircrafts were considered, among them the CF-104 was the main contender. Canadair already planned to build them in Montréal.
But that was not to be the case.
After the Arrow cancellation a reduced Avro team under leadership of Jim C. Floyd had toured Europe and the USA to try selling the Arrow program, prototypes or at least some advanced technology to a foreign customer. Rolls Royce had declined any interest in the Iroquois, but France and Sweden had.
At the time SAAB was a bit worry about Draken flying characteristics due to its double-delta wing. What was worrying was also the lack of power of the RM-6A turbojets, limiting J-35A to mach 1.8.
Floyd proposed to build a RM6A / Iroquois hybrid. The PS.13 was much bigger and would never fit within Draken rear body. But both engines were more or less RR Avon derivatives, using advanced technologies.
In the end a deal was struck between Orenda and Svenska Flygmotor on one hand, Avro Canada and SAAB
The aim was to turn the Swedish machine into a high-tech strike fighter, by salvaging as much technology as possible from the Arrow program.

Result was the Super Draken. The PS-6C was really a cross between the RM-6B and a scaled-down PS.13 Iroquois. By using high-tech from the Iroquois and Swedish knowledge in afterburners, the resulting engine was rather similar to the earlier, cancelled RR RB-106.
At 16 000 Ibs its dry thrust was superior to the afterburning RM-6B while afterburning thrust rose to 22 000Ibs. This was possible thanks to massive amounts of titanium in the engine.

Another great achievement of the program was the FBW system borrowed from the Arrow.
The system also controlled the small canards which had been added to improve performances at take off.
Store pylons were also added to carry A2G weapons, as the machine was now optimised for low-level strike. It was then found that having a single seat machine was not desirable for strike not long-range interception. As a consequence the Super Draken was based on the Sk35C two seats variant. As the canopy was too limited it was replaced by a TF-104 unit which looked better. A Cyrano II multirole radar was in the nose.

Arrow RL-204 barely avoided scrapping and was send to Sweden were it received Flygvapnet roundels. In exchange a J35A was send to Canada and received Maple Leaf roundels.

The result was the best strike fighter in the world. It was produced in large numbers for Sweden, Canada Switzerland and Denmark.

[dy031101]

These are taken from the Japanese anime "Konpeki no Kantai".

Afterlife Germany modified the design for CATOBAR use on their aircraft carriers.  Unfortunately, in order to establish Japan as the only competent nationality in the anime, German pilots ended up being portrayed as too stupid to shoot straight or use missiles, allowing Japanese to easily slaughter them with modified Hawker Hunters. 

[elmayerle]

The issue of IAPJ that had the in-dpth coverage on the Draken included a whole page on studied but never built vesions, complete with lots of drawings.  Can some one scan those in and post them here?  There were a number of interesting ones.  Me, I'm tempted to start with the J79-powered one, replace the J79 with a F404/F414/RM12 and add Fieri inlets, ala' F-105, and see what other improvements I can make (a blown, frameless windscreen sounds like a good start).  Now that I've got full data on the basic Draken's stores capacity, thanks to that sales brochure I picked up off eBay, I can look at "interesting" loadouts.

[dy031101]

Air Vector states that J-35, as a delta-winged aircraft, has a long takeoff run.

Would it have mattered for any possible navalized version if the aircraft was to be launched off a catapult?

[Ed S]

Air Vector states that J-35, as a delta-winged aircraft, has a long takeoff run.

Would it have mattered for any possible navalized version if the aircraft was to be launched off a catapult?

Probably wouldn't have mattered.  They flew the F7U and F4D off carriers and both of them are tailless designs.

Ed

[dy031101]

Probably wouldn't have mattered.  They flew the F7U and F4D off carriers and both of them are tailless designs.

I take it that both have a long takeoff run, too?

Come to think about it, any navalized J-35 could also have been modified with an extensible nose undercarriage leg like the one on F-4K......

So to imagine a navalized version, can I get away with just giving the land-based Draken folding outer delta, extensible nose gear leg, one centerline pylon instead of two to represent weight-saving necessiated by airframe strengthening, and arrestor hook instead of the tailwheels?  Or should I really incorporate some of the features posted by other thread participants?

[elmayerle]

Well, the Draken, as designed, has both a centerline and two other fuselage hardpoints, each rated for 500 kg carriage.  The outboard wing segments can also handle one 500kg stores carriage or three 100kg stores (gotta love the official brochure for checking these things).  For a carrier version, I'd suggeset twin nosewheels with the extendable nose wheel leg, and the catapult link on the gear rather than using a catapult bridle for each launch.

[RP1]

Oh how I love the Draken. One thing I worry about with a navalised version is the length of the main undercarriage legs - how much clearance is there once a store (or more likely, fuel tanks) is carried?

RP1

[Arc3371]

Any interesting (and not to serious) discussion about "Super Draken", it is in Swedish but has nice pics

http://forum.soldf.com/index.php?showtopic=36581

Picture from above

[Weaver]

Well, the Draken, as designed, has both a centerline and two other fuselage hardpoints, each rated for 500 kg carriage.  The outboard wing segments can also handle one 500kg stores carriage or three 100kg stores (gotta love the official brochure for checking these things).  For a carrier version, I'd suggeset twin nosewheels with the extendable nose wheel leg, and the catapult link on the gear rather than using a catapult bridle for each launch.

Danish ones and later Swedish ones had a pylon under each intake as well.

[dy031101]

Well, the Draken, as designed, has both a centerline and two other fuselage hardpoints, each rated for 500 kg carriage.

Danish ones and later Swedish ones had a pylon under each intake as well.

I'm thinking one based on either David or Filip, the versions with two side-by-side centreline hardpoints and an uprated engine.  I'm under the impression that reverting to the single centreline hardpoint scheme of Adam through Ceasar could save the weight of that extra pylon and its plumbing......

If the machine came along in parallel with their real life land-based counterparts, birdle would probably have been more likely than the then-new tow bar scheme.