EE Lightning

[ElectrikBlue]

I have an idea I'm working on at the moment for a "Super-Lightning", which involves full delta wings, undercarriage moved to the fuselage, wing pylons, and the inlet moved to the chin.

It doesn't tick all the boxes but my 'Super Lightning' (I think I used the F.7 designation) gives an impression of what a delta-winged Lightning would look like and would have looked cool in the classic West Germany Phantom type scheme.

SPINNERS : Lightning with Fishbed delta wings is really cool! 

EB

[SPINNERS]

I have an idea I'm working on at the moment for a "Super-Lightning", which involves full delta wings, undercarriage moved to the fuselage, wing pylons, and the inlet moved to the chin.

It doesn't tick all the boxes but my 'Super Lightning' (I think I used the F.7 designation) gives an impression of what a delta-winged Lightning would look like and would have looked cool in the classic West Germany Phantom type scheme.

SPINNERS : Lightning with Fishbed delta wings is really cool! 

EB

Well spotted  . They are 1/48 scale Fishbed wings with fuselage spines as intake trunking.

[Mossie]

SPINNERS,

I actually like that derivative with the delta wings and the engines mounted on the side of the fuselage.   

There was a real world project to fit a delta wing to the Lightning too.  It was one of several studies called P.6.  The P.6/1 was a single engine version of the Lightning, not looking unlike the Su-7:
http://www.secretprojects.co.uk/forum/index.php/topic,1206.0/highlight,p%206+english+electric.html

The P.6/2 was much closer to the Lightning/P.1B with a slightly deeper fuselage & Sapphire engines.  One version had the P.1B wing, another a another a delta.  A full delta was breifly investigated, but at that time not a lot of information was available on that type of wing, so EE favoured a tailed delta.  It kept a similar tail to the Lightning & in planform the wing looked exactly like the standard wing if continued the trailing edge to the fuselage.  There were other P.6 studies, but they didn't bear much realtionship to the Lightning.

[Spey_Phantom]

BUMP

i was doing some reading in a new book i bought a a rumage sale this morning and i found a very nice part about the Kuwait Lightnings.

apparently, Kuwait overestimated the lightnings capabilities when they bought them. they could barely get them in the air and its range was to limited. it was then they replaced them with Mirage F1's in the 70's.
but here's the interesting part, after the lightnings were withdrawn from service they were put up for sale and the Egyptian Air Force was very likely to buy them, but they turned down the offer cause they wouldnt be able to get a good spares supply from the UK.

so it would have been very likely that Israeli Kfirs would have encountered the Egyptian lightnings.
would the lightning have been a good dogfighter 

[jcf]

BUMP

i was doing some reading in a new book i bought a a rumage sale this morning and i found a very nice part about the Kuwait Lightnings.

apparently, Kuwait overestimated the lightnings capabilities when they bought them. they could barely get them in the air and its range was to limited. it was then they replaced them with Mirage F1's in the 70's.
but here's the interesting part, after the lightnings were withdrawn from service they were put up for sale and the Egyptian Air Force was very likely to buy them, but they turned down the offer cause they wouldnt be able to get a good spares supply from the UK.

so it would have been very likely that Israeli Kfirs would have encountered the Egyptian lightnings.
would the lightning have been a good dogfighter 

Kuwait took the Lightnings out of service in 1977, the same year Sadat visited Jersualem and started the process that led to the
peace treaty signed in 1979. Its doubtful that if Egypt had purchased the Kuwaiti aircraft that they would have been in service
much before 1980 for logistics and training reasons. The timeline thus makes it unlikely that Egyptian Lightnings would have seen
combat with Israeli aircraft. Even if events were changed the outcome of such a meeting would probably be typical of such combats
between Arab and Israeli air forces, with victory going to Israel.

The Lightning was pretty much a point defense interceptor designed to take out bombers, however, it was quite maneuverable.

The result of a dogfight between roughly equivalent airframes usually has as much to do with the pilot as the aircraft.
According to a quote about flying against Australian Mirage IIIs from F/Lt. Trevor MacDonald-Bennett in the chapter
"The Lightning Compared" in Lightning From the Cockpit by Peter Caygill:
"... overall we were pretty evenly matched. We had a theoretical advantage in out-and-out performance terms, but this
could very easily be lost by superior flying by the opposition if we were not careful."

Jon

[rickshaw]

Please bear with me as this is my first effort at "what-iffery".  This is how I visual an upgraded Lightning.  Its basically a variation on the EE P.8 with larger engines (Olympus or perhaps Conways - personally I favour the Conway as its basically the same diameter as an Avon and offers similar thrust but for much lower fuel consumption) and a much larger radome, which necessitates a chin intake. Its a two seater of course.

[Mossie]

Lightning + Crusader = Lightsader???  Nice re-design, never really thought about a chin intake on the Lightning family.

[rickshaw]

I realised today while I was thinking about this design that I'd forgotten to give it any guns.  So I've modified it to now carry two 30mm Adens plus two Blue Dolphin BVR missiles.

[raafif]

just a heads-up ....
the Japanese home-marketed version of Trumpeter's 1/72 EE Lightning F6/F2A includes what-if JASDF markings.

And for inspiration, over on ARC (Aircraft Resource Center) there's this great Hunter in postwar/early JASDF colours ...
http://www.aircraftresourcecenter.com/Gal8/7001-7100/gal7095-Ryoushi-Walton/00.shtm

[Jschmus]

Normally, I deploy something like this in "Whiffs You Have Found", but it's ARC's Silly Week, and that would be redundant.



An interesting concept for a strike fighter Lightning.

http://www.aircraftresourcecenter.com/Gal10/9401-9500/gal9486-Lightning-Newstead/00.shtm

[ysi_maniac]

Nice designs WOW!

[KJ_Lesnick]

I really like that Delta Winged Lightning F/A-8 concept

[tanktastic43]

Great delta designs. 

tt43.

[GTX]

Some mindless toying with Rocket assisted Lightnings:



The first one still has one Avon with the lower one replaced by a rocket, whereas the second is pure rocket power.

Regards,

Greg

[rickshaw]

The second is pure rocket power.

"Light blue touch paper and withdraw to a safe distance"? 

Alternatively, "by god, it went like a cracker.  Couldn't clear the airfield perimeter before it ran out of juice but it was going like the clappers by then!"