Back to the Future - Jack Northrop

Some fairly steep banking in that video. No hint of the instability that crashed one.

When I finally got to see a B2 I was surprised at how small it seemed. The B1 is a giant by comparison.

Kelly (wingnut)

Amazing stuff and hat off to the test pilots.

The flying wing is not dead yet:

Funny how they put a faux cockpit on the front of that drone. Methinks a people sized wing would have to be even larger than that scales up to be productive.

Kelly

I once bought a book about Northrop's flying wing about 25 years ago. In it, Jack Northrop maintained that it was politics that killed the B35/B49 programs. He claimed that the DOD types brought him into a closed door meeting one day, said they had no confidence that the Northrop company could meet their contract obligations, and demanded that Northrop sell his company to General Dynamics. Northrop claimed that when he asked what would happend if he refused to sell, the DOD types replied, "You'll be G-dd-mmed sorry."

Needless to say, Northrop refused to sell his company to General Dynamics. According to the book, the day after he refused to sell the Air Force abruptly cancelled his contract for the Flying Wing bombers, and immediately dispatched a team of experts to Northrop Field in Hawthorne CA where they proceeded to chop up the 13 YB35's and YB49's that were outside in the final assembly area. The Air Force then gave General Dynamics the green light to begin production of the by-then obsolescent B36 Peacemaker, which served SAC as a long range heavy bomber for years until the B52 squadrons became fully operational.

It was a sad ending to what was a viable but technically challenging design. Northrop could not at the time the book was published mention anything about the B-2 since it was still Top Secret, and he died before the B-2 was declassified and shown to the public. In the end, I believe he must have felt vindicated to have his concept brought into service fifty years after the cancellation of his first flying wing bomber design.

DD

Back to the Past

As a kid, my Dad ran a little airline out of a little airstrip that is now Ontario International and, with privileged status and being crazy about airplanes, I had the run of the field. In one corner, Jack Northrop rented space to store planes, which were mostly Scorpions but there were flying wings there as well sitting in the vineyards on concrete pads.

And, since they were never locked and usually had the entry ladders nearby, well, it was a pretty neat place to explore. Hot as hell, of course, in the California sun. In the cockpit under the clear canopy was like being one of the ants I used to fry with my magnifying glass. Because of the santana winds, there was sand on the floors and seats and instrument panel, and I remember an overwhelming sadness at these great planes that were waiting for the knacker's yard, where they would become Schlitz beer cans. It wasn't long before they were gone.

And, on the other side of the field, there was a company busily converting old Catalina flying boats into "flying yachts" with luxurious interiors, wrap-around lounges in the old gun blisters and even streamlined dinghies tucked under the wings.

Looking back, it was a very cool place to grow up, and I've never gotten aviation out of my blood these many decades later.

So how was the headroom inside those Wings? Northrop has proposed a civil version, but I wonder how practical that would have been.

Kelly

The wings of the B-35 were thick enough to completely enclose 4 of the enormous Pratt & Whitney R4360 "Corncob" engines, which measured 55 inches in diameter. I am not sure what the headroom was like in the bomber itself, but Northrop had made some futuristic-looking artist renderings of a gallery-style passenger cabin in a much larger flying wing that would have had a bank of forward looking windows in the lower wing leading edge. This was very much someone's fantasy, but it sure would excite one's imagination about the possibilities.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northrop_YB-35

Wikipedia has much to say about the flying wing. Their summary may best describe why in the end it was cancelled:

I guess you could say that Jack Northrop was a dreamer who's ideas were before their time, and did not become reality in the 1940's in part due to his maverick temperament. It was a great idea, and eventually became a great airplane. But it was not to be while Mr Northrop was still alive. Sad to say, but true.

DD

Also sad that not a single B-35 or B-49 survived for any museum, or have I missed one?

Kelly

You did not. They were all destroyed. Quite the pity.

DD

Good to know. I had not heard of that book before.

Interesting tidbit in the linked article that the pilot's seat was on a vertical jack to get the pilot up into the bubble!

Kelly

there are many things we will never know about. i heard that 50 new unassembeled P 51 's were chopped up for scrap in a hanger by LAX about 20 years ago by a scrap man also. you just never know

travler

the first one if those i owned cost me 25000 dollars and i flew it away, but that was in the 60's. my how things have changed.

travler

I think that these are great ideas for commercial use. I don't know how I feel about them. I like the idea of natural light. What will it be like to be in first or business and have very little window light. Not even thinking about coach passengers. You could be 15 or 18 seats abreast.

The civil version of Northrop's wing had an observation lounge in the leading edge -

http://davidszondy.com/future/Flight/northrupwing.htm

Kelly

From the Northrop brocuhure:

Meh thinks the flying wings of the past was not to be pressurized: Huge windows and observation lounges would blow out when the cabin pressure builds to 8 psi..