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Douglas-1211

In 1950, the United States Air Force 1051-started looking for a replacement for the strategic bomber, Convair B-36. In the end the contest won by the firm of Boeing with aircraft in-52 "Stratofortress". The second contender was the Convair aircraft company YB-60 - a jet version of the B-36 with eight turbojet engines and swept wings. It was in this competition that several other very interesting projects of various companies came forward. The least known perhaps was the Douglas-1211-J project.

Initially the project was simply 1211, but options to it began to add the letters: A, B, C and so on. The United States Air Force was represented by option (J), which had included the establishment of a bomber with swept wings and four turbo-prop engines. The claimed aircraft performance was very high even on modern notions: the takeoff mass of 146,000 kg maximum range was to be 20,400 km and a combat radius of action of 8,050 km. The maximum speed was 830 km/h, and a ceiling of 16500 feet. In order to get such outstanding characteristics, Douglas used not only turbo-props (all other firms used turbojet engines in their proposals), but also other creative solutions.

Despite the large size of the aircraft with a wingspan was 70 meters, 49 meters length, and the height of 13.5 m, placed inside the 77,300 kg of fuel. Therefore, 22,600 kg fuel (almost one-third of the total) was placed in four external tanks. The placement of such tanks on the thin and long wing could cause the take-off the ends would have touched the ground. And so the external fuel tanks were fitted with its own landing gear [actually, take-off gear], which was jetisoned after take-off. The main undercarriage was a classic scheme, which retracted in flight.

The aircraft was equipped with attack and navigation equipment to detect and to attack ground targets, as well as equipment warnings about attacks of the enemy. Defensive armament consisted of a 20 mm cannon with a radar, located in the rear part of the fuselage. Also Douglas expected to equip the aircraft with Hughes MX-904 air-air guided missiles. One option provided for suspension under the wing of the plane on special pylons two Douglas F4D-1 fighters.

Bomber could carry both nuclear and conventional bombs. The crew of the aircraft consisted of nine persons, including replacement pilots. Commander, co-pilot, mechanic and Navigator of the were in the upper cockpit, avionics engineer and bombardier in the front. Both cabins were sealed. The emergency bailout of aircraft was to be through a hatch on the underside of the fuselage behind the front counter. Instead of the armament, in hanging containers could be regained, photographic or other sensors, electronic warfare, infrared or dipole decoys and there was even accommodations in containers of additional personnel from outside the core crew.

The main reason why the United States Air Force was not interested in so promising machine at that time was the lack of suitable turboprop engines. In 1949 the Northrop began to develop turbo-props HT-35 Typhoon and Wright developed the HT-37. The power of these engines was 5000-8000 HP (it will be recalled that the power of the Soviet NK-12, standing on the TU-95 was 12,000 HP) and they were to powere the coaxial propellers with a diameter of 4.3 m. After the decision to build the B-52 with eight turbojet engines, work on these engines was discontinued.

Douglas then used turbojet engines in this project. The 1211 option-R-45 was the installation of four turbo-props and two turbojet engines. But in this case there was a significant degradation of performance data. When loaded the weight of 108,000 kg had combat a radius of 8,000 km at a speed of 635 km/h and at an altitude of 12,000 meters. The latest version of the project was 1211-W, which was supposed to put up four and four turbojet engines. But in the end, even this option was rejected.

The Douglas Model 1211-J bomber should have been large enough. The large elongation fuselage had a length of about 49 m, the sweep wing span reached 70 m. The proposed swept wing could provide high flight data. An aircraft equipped with four turboprop engines could reach speeds of up to 830 km / h and fly at a distance of almost 20,400 km. The combat radius was equal to 8050 km. The estimated ceiling of the car is 16500 m.

During the development of the project, an unpleasant feature of the selected scheme was found out. To achieve the required flight range, the aircraft had to carry approximately 77.3 tons of fuel. Despite all efforts, the designers could not place all the necessary fuel tanks inside the wing and fuselage. It was possible to place no more than 55 tons of fuel inside the aircraft, i.e. about 70% of the required amount. Because of this, four additional tanks with 22.6 tons of kerosene were forced to enter the fuel system. Such tanks should have been suspended under the wing, between the pairs of engines and under the consoles.

After that, the developers of the project again had problems. A wing with a wingspan of 70 m, loaded with fuel in the internal and external tanks, had to seriously bend. Moreover, on take-off the wingtips could hit concrete strips with corresponding sad consequences. For this reason, an external pair of fuel tanks was equipped with resettable additional landing gear. They had to keep the tanks at the correct height above the surface of the runway and protect the aircraft from damage.

Apart from the large size and original structure of the fuel system, the Douglas Model 1211-J bomber was a typical representative of its class of equipment. The crew and payload, as well as part of the fuel, were supposed to be inside. On the wing were four engine nacelles. In the rear part of the fuselage attached swept plumage. According to calculations, the normal take-off weight of a promising aircraft was 146 tons.

On take-off, it was planned to use its own chassis in combination with additional drop-down racks. Due to the emptying of the tanks and reducing the load on the wing, it was possible to land only on its own chassis. The main landing gear was placed in the internal nacelles, another rack was in the nose of the fuselage.

It was planned to use Wright XT35 Typhoon turboprop engines with a power of 5500 hp each. everyone. In addition, the possibility of using other turboprop engines was considered. The version of the “1211” project using turbojet engines was worked out. The engines were planned to be equipped with dual coaxial propellers with a diameter of 4.3 m.

To accommodate a crew of nine people, the Model 1211-J aircraft had to receive a two-tier sealed cabin in the bow of the fuselage. In the upper part of the cockpit there were places for two pilots, a navigator and a flight engineer. In the lower one, which had a nasal blister, places for a scorer and an avionics engineer were provided. Six people were supposed to fly the plane. In addition, in the cockpit there were places for three pilots who, during long flights, could take control.

High speed flight made it possible to simplify defensive weapons. To protect against enemy fighters coming in from behind, the aircraft had to use one automatic gun of 20 mm caliber. The gun was equipped with a remote control system. In addition, the possibility of equipping the bomber with units for hanging air-to-air missiles was considered.

In the fuselage cargo bay, weapons with a total weight of up to 20 tons could be placed. The heaviest ammunition for the Douglas Model 1211-J was to be a new 43,000 pound non-nuclear bomb (about 19.5 tons). In addition, the aircraft had to carry various nuclear weapons of suitable dimensions and weights.

In general, the 1211-J project looked interesting and promising. However, according to some characteristics, he lost to the development of other project participants. In particular, the leadership of the Boeing project had already been outlined. Among the shortcomings of the Douglas project were excessively large dimensions that made operation difficult, as well as turboprop engines with inadequate performance. As the development program of the promising bomber was implemented, the military began to prefer turbojet engines.

It should be noted that Douglas specialists, seeing the new desires of the customer, made attempts to update the project. So, in the “1211-R” variant it was proposed to use a set of six engines: four turboprops and two turbojets. According to calculations, such a power plant did not give special advantages. Cruising speed was only 655 km / h, and the combat radius was reduced to 8000 km. Thus, the aircraft with a combined power plant in terms of flight data almost did not differ from the base Model 1211-J.

The latest version of the Douglas Model 1211 project was a project with the letter "W". Again trying to improve performance and meet the requirements of the military, aircraft designers decided to equip the aircraft with four turboprops and four turbojet engines. Any serious advantages were still missing, which led to a halt in development.

Along with attempts to improve aircraft performance by changing the composition of the power plant, Douglas specialists tried to solve other problems. A typical disadvantage of jet fighters of that time was the small radius of action, because of which they could not defend long-range bombers on most of their route. In order to defend bomber formations since the late forties, various projects of the so-called parasitic fighters - light aircraft suspended under a bomber and delivered to the place of a possible battle.

In the fighter carrier variant, the Model 1211 did not receive an internal pair of additional tanks. Instead, it was proposed to install nodes for mounting two F4D Skyray fighters. Such “flying aircraft carriers” could accompany the bomber formation and, if necessary, detach the fighters. The task of the latter was to fight enemy fighters and protect their bombers.

The competition to develop a promising long-range bomber lasted several years. The number of contestants was constantly decreasing: the first unsuccessful projects were stopped already in mid-1946. The Model 1211 project was developed until the early fifties. All work on it was stopped shortly after the military chose Boeing's proposal and supported the further development of this project. The result was the appearance of the strategic bomber B-52. The Douglas project went to the archive.