WHIFs found at HyperScale

[Green Dragon]

Ali just went up in a puff of smoke every damn time I tried it!! 

Doesn't magnesium do the "PUFF OF SMOKE"  trick if it gets hot?   I can recall participating in an unfortunate incident in a chemistry lesson in ??1964??.  It proved that if you drop a hot deflagrating spoon into  a largish saucer of magnesium powder, you can really annoy a chemistry master. I was just a witness (honest) and I was flash-blinded for several minutes!

With me it was in the mid seventies and several rolls of magnesium ribbon!

Paul Harrison

[kitnut617]

I've tried welding aluminum several ways back when I was on the shop floor (years ago, I'm a fabricator/welder by trade), with oxy/acetelyne I had a hell of a job doing it, but with mig or tig it was quite easy.  Never tried magnesium though --- mind you we had to make an aluminum ladel one time in college, the annealing process was the complete reverse on how you anneal steel. I had to do it twice because I got it too hot the first time and the bowl I had begun to bash out, just dropped out.  There was a brief shimmy then --- gone --

I don't think there was any welding involved with the Whirlwind structure though, primarily bolted or riveted I think

[Caveman]

I have had the opertunity to work with some pretty significant masses of magnesium alloys... Whilst I cannot say that I have seen them "puff of smoke" I pretty much heard it fizz when exposed to salt water...

Having recently watched the BBC's programme on F1 in the 1960s improperly treated magnesium alloys just make me uneasy

[RussC]

  My chem lab favorite was the spectral color lesson, take a heated probe tip, dip into various powders, put back into the bunsen and note the color through various filters to guess the compound from the list on the blackboard.

  After doing this, found one of the powders, a Sodium compound was a brilliant yellow even with a few grains. Russ next take on it, try a whole heaping spoonful, in the darkened lab. Never did find the front half of the spoon. Even the sound was spectacular and it was also the day I received one of my first dragon nicknames, and a day of detention.

  There were several Northrop Flying Wings using Magnesium parts and the XP-79 most prominently. I never knew it was non-strategic !

[kitnut617]

 There were several Northrop Flying Wings using Magnesium parts and the XP-79 most prominently. I never knew it was non-strategic !

The B-36 had huge amounts of skinning made from magnesium.

When Westland were trying to convince the Air Ministry to buy the Whirlwind, they had to show they weren't using any strategic material in the build during the design process, same reason De Havilland built the Mosquito out of wood.  Neither aircraft was deemed necessary to the war effort at the time of their conception.

Going back to the what-if in question, I've read an article in an Air-Britain magazine, and a Merlin powered Whirlwind was considered.  But because of what we've just discussed, the aircraft got bigger and bigger to accommodate the added weight. The result was the Welkin, and before it was called that, it was known as the Whirlwind Development Fighter.

Personally, I think an upgraded Whirlwind should look a bit like this --



This aircraft was powered by the same Merlins as the DH.103 Hornet, all 2030 hp each one

[Old Wombat]

Just popping back to the magnesium thing for a second:

How many people have, or have had mag wheels on their cars?

The "mag" is just an abbreviation of "magnesium".... true, it is magnesium alloyed with aluminium, but it still burns well.

Aircraft wheels were (are?), also, made out of magnesium-aluminium alloy, with a higher percentage of magnesium. Ye gods but they burned well when the base firies lit them up for training.

Also, when alight, they tend to explode when they come in contact with water - looks a bit like a phosphorus bomb.

[scooter]

Just popping back to the magnesium thing for a second:

How many people have, or have had mag wheels on their cars?

The "mag" is just an abbreviation of "magnesium".... true, it is magnesium alloyed with aluminium, but it still burns well.

Aircraft wheels were (are?), also, made out of magnesium-aluminium alloy, with a higher percentage of magnesium. Ye gods but they burned well when the base firies lit them up for training.

Also, when alight, they tend to explode when they come in contact with water - looks a bit like a phosphorus bomb.

As did the SeaSprite.  Loaded up with a torpedo and lots of jet fuel...

[RussC]

 There were several Northrop Flying Wings using Magnesium parts and the XP-79 most prominently. I never knew it was non-strategic !

Personally, I think an upgraded Whirlwind should look a bit like this --



This aircraft was powered by the same Merlins as the DH.103 Hornet, all 2030 hp each one

And it looks like a Welkin, except the wings would need to be longer!
Westland Welkin was a high altitude machine, long wings (PR19 might have some interest) and radar.
I scratchbuilt one in 144th, had a big offer for it after posting to Yahoo Small Scale Models. Some of these builds were the only one of their kind anywhere in that scale at that time.

[RussC]

Just popping back to the magnesium thing for a second:

How many people have, or have had mag wheels on their cars?

The "mag" is just an abbreviation of "magnesium".... true, it is magnesium alloyed with aluminium, but it still burns well.

Aircraft wheels were (are?), also, made out of magnesium-aluminium alloy, with a higher percentage of magnesium. Ye gods but they burned well when the base firies lit them up for training.

Also, when alight, they tend to explode when they come in contact with water - looks a bit like a phosphorus bomb.

  Aluminum powder and potassium Nitrate, the noisemaker of champions. I still sometimes can't believe I have all 9 fingers....

[PR19_Kit]

And it looks like a Welkin, except the wings would need to be longer!
Westland Welkin was a high altitude machine, long wings (PR19 might have some interest) and radar.

Hehe, dead right there! 

I have the Hallam Vac Welkin vacform and there's a LOT of wing on that thing! 

I think only the singleton Welkin MkII had radar, the more numerous Mk Is used the Mk1 eyeball as a pimary 'sensor system'.

[NARSES2]

Doesn't magnesium do the "PUFF OF SMOKE"  trick if it gets hot?   I can recall participating in an unfortunate incident in a chemistry lesson in ??1964??.  It proved that if you drop a hot deflagrating spoon into  a largish saucer of magnesium powder, you can really annoy a chemistry master. I was just a witness (honest) and I was flash-blinded for several minutes!

We are obviously gentlemen of the same vintage - something very similar happened to a chemistry class I was participating in. The whole lot of us got the slipper 

I've heard talk of Lithium being used in alloy form for aircraft construction ? handling that must make handling Magnesium a breeze 

[kitnut617]

I have the Hallam Vac Welkin vacform and there's a LOT of wing on that thing! 
I think only the singleton Welkin MkII had radar, the more numerous Mk Is used the Mk1 eyeball as a pimary 'sensor system'.

I've got the CMK kits of both variants in the stash, two of the Mk.II though because I intend to convert one to the proposal Westland made to the Air Ministry to improve the performance of it.  It was a real dog at altitude and the reason for that was the thick high aspect wing.  Westland figured if they increased the chord length by 20% it would solve the problem (which basically was it would only fly as fast as it would no matter how much power was added to the engines).

Incidently, the sole Mk.II was used way into the late 50's as a flying test bed for various things before it was scrapped.
The IAe.30 Nancu's wing looks almost like a scaled up Whirlwind wing, but why it was ever called the Argentinian Hornet I'll never know, it doesn't remotely look like a Hornet except for the engine nacelles.  It's fuselage was fashioned after the Me.262 for instance, being triangular in section.

[PR19_Kit]

AFAIK the Welkin was the first aircraft to encounter the 'Coffin Corner' where the outboard wingtip in a turn enters Mach buffet, whereas the inboard is flying slow enough to stall, both at the same time. This phenomemon was later made famous by the U-2 (and possibly the Meteor PR19 as well.....  )

I would imagine the Ju-86Ps and Rs would have had similar problems but I've not seen anything written about it in their context.

[Hotte]

Do 335:

http://www.network54.com/Forum/47751/message/1340733129/Do335+%27what+if%27


Hotte

[PR19_Kit]

That's a VERY strange colour scheme.......