Unknown McDonnell-Douglas Fighters

Mark Nankivil

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Hi All -

Yet another model I photographed at the St. Louis Aviation Museum. Assuming it is a McDonnell-Douglas design, it does not match up with anything in Tony Buttler's book and is distinctly different than any of their ideas in the time frame of the 1970-80s. Any suggestions?

Enjoy the Day! Mark
 

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Wow, its the MiG MFI ;D ;D ;D

Intake and nose looks identical to the McDD ATF design attached. I bet this is an early 80s concept. Wing shape is similar to Rockwell HIMAT derived designs. Size looks smaller than the ATF though - maybe MiG-29 size with two F404 class engines? It is *possible* its part of the early work done with MBB on TKF-90, but it doesn't look quite right for that.

McDD played a lot with canards during the late 1970s and early 1980s.
 

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Planform is reminiscent of some of the MDC STOVL designs.
 
it is simmilar to the model 278 (navy stovl).
however, this is twin engine and more "delta" design, so it is not the same. ???
 
overscan said:
It is *possible* its part of the early work done with MBB on TKF-90, but it doesn't look quite right for that.

I could see it maybe being influenced by work done on the TKF-90, but not any TKF-90 concept itself. What was the timing between the TKF-90 and early ATF requirements?

MDD seems to have been playing around with similar configuarations. Compared to this one, however, Mark's model is clearly paying more attention to RCS reduction. I assume weapons carriage would have been conformal?
 

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Note that the drawing is of an air-to-surface configuration. The model Mark photographed looks air-to-air optimised.

MBB did some work with McDonnell-Douglas in the mid/late 1970s on agile fighters, while Dornier worked with Northrop. Here's the MBB ADF-80, with clear parallels to McDD Model 265 e.g. nose rudder. Model 265 was proposed for AFTI, and it was mooted at one stage for McDD and MBB to build a demonstrator together.

Source:
Bernd Vetter, Der Eurofighter, Motor buch Verlag, 2008
 

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Two 1972 Navy projects, one high wing and one low wing.
 

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1972 Navy fighter with Model 263 resemblance - looks like it might be V/STOL?
 

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1973 Navy Lightweight fighter - VFAX, as alternative to Model 263? Missiles are interesting - AIM-95 Agile perhaps?
 

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1975 USAF STOL fighter. All scans by Mark Nankivil.
 

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overscan said:
Two 1972 Navy projects, one high wing and one low wing.

And the high wing one having two wing braces either side, and apparently being able to be set vertically - setting the wing in an anhedral position.

Low wing having a secondary swing-wing on top of the fuselage.

The latter for increasing lift at low speed - former for reducing the lift of a high-lift wing???
 
I assume the strut braced wing is to minimize the weight of a very thin wing section.
 
Sundog said:
I assume the strut braced wing is to minimize the weight of a very thin wing section.

But there are also recesses in the side of the fuselage, I assume to accommodate the struts when they are rotated to the vertical. Also, the slight lip that extends out from the fuselage looks like it might accommodate a pivot for the struts.
 
starviking said:
Sundog said:
I assume the strut braced wing is to minimize the weight of a very thin wing section.

But there are also recesses in the side of the fuselage, I assume to accommodate the struts when they are rotated to the vertical. Also, the slight lip that extends out from the fuselage looks like it might accommodate a pivot for the struts.

The thing is, are those recesses or just "shadows" to emphasize the struts; granted, the light is at the wrong angle, but the idea is to highlight the features. I just don't see a reason for the wings to change angle, other than folding them for storage on the carrier. Maybe they telescope in over the top of the fuselage to reduce surface area and aspect ratio for high speed flight? A telescoping VG wing?
 
High wing strut fighter patent:
http://www.google.com/patents?id=fBl8AAAAEBAJ
("Extensible-retractable wing")

Worth a read, explains this odd design :)
 
What a thoroughly entertaining concept. Seems like an awful lot of heartache for another 20% wing area, if that. Certainly such a system puts F-8's variable-incidence wing to shame from a complexity standpoint. I'll take a rotary joint over a sliding one any day of the week, even Klebsday.

Piping fuel (never mind hydraulic fluid!!!) through such a joint is left as an exercise to the reader :p
 
This VTOL fighter came out of a stack of McDonnell Douglas conceptual artwork. My notes say "Model D-820" but I forgot how I arrived at that conclusion. Date unknown.
 

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Sundog said:
starviking said:
Sundog said:
I assume the strut braced wing is to minimize the weight of a very thin wing section.

But there are also recesses in the side of the fuselage, I assume to accommodate the struts when they are rotated to the vertical. Also, the slight lip that extends out from the fuselage looks like it might accommodate a pivot for the struts.

The thing is, are those recesses or just "shadows" to emphasize the struts; granted, the light is at the wrong angle, but the idea is to highlight the features. I just don't see a reason for the wings to change angle, other than folding them for storage on the carrier. Maybe they telescope in over the top of the fuselage to reduce surface area and aspect ratio for high speed flight? A telescoping VG wing?

Hi Sundog,

I took a closer look at the picture, and it looks like we're both a bit on the right track. I've magnified 3 sections of the picture to highlight areas of interest.

1: Strut Detail.

Point A is the ovoid top of the struts. At point B we can see a recess in the fuselage for the strut top.

Area C definitely shows depth to the struts, and there is, to my eye, depth shown in area D.

Add these two together and it's certain the struts retract flush with the fusealge BUT it's also obvious that the wing doesn't butterfly up like I though.

Now the section of wing between extended strut top and the recess doesn't appear to be curved, so the struts must either be able to retract - or the shape of the final dogleg of the struts in area E must be curved.


2. Wing-body interface.

Point F is the intersection of the wing leading edge with the fuselage. Now it's not so clear, but I think it could be showing that the wing sits on top of the fuselage, rather than blending in with it - as is more normal.

3. Fuselage bays.

I found this interesting. If you have retracting struts sweeping along the inside section of your wing then fuel/weapon pylons are going to be a problem. On close-up there are many surface doors on the lower fusealge that I think are weapon bays.

Bay 1 is in the right position for the front undercarriage - but really doesn't resemble any undercarriage doors, as far as I know - the closest thing I can think of to account or this is that it's a series of flip-out rocket cells (or micro-missiles).

Bay 2 could be a bisected bay for two missiles - two pairs of doors each, with one hidded by the fuselage curvature. Could have more doors than that and actually have the nose gear in there too.

Bay 3 looks like it could carry the same munitions as in 2.

Bay 4 looks like it could be much longer - longer legged AAMs inside perhaps.

No sign of main undercarriage - perhaps further down the fuselage, or perhaps this plane doesn't have undercarriage? I favour the former.

The Area I indicated with a '?' I initially thought might be a join between two moving sections (perhaps a la DH128 with it's nose-drop mechanism) but on reflection it's probably just to give an idea of the fuselage curvature, as there's a fainter line like it closer to the nose.

That makes for a puzzler of an aircraft - and I don't think it's of the same sort as show in the patent Overscan posted - as the strut top in that one moves with the wing. In 'our' aircraft the strut just appears to retract into the fuselage. Best explanation is yours Sundog - but why the retracting strut? Does the plane carry a large fuel load in the wing, and the struts support this until the fuel reaches a level where the wing can support itself? Thinking about the appearance of the wing-fuselage interface - perhaps the wing is mainly just one big fuel tank?

Starviking
 

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I don't understand your argument. It looks exactly like the patent design to me. The wing slides in until the struts are vertical in the provided grooves.
 
Hi,


here is a McDonnell-Douglas unknown and un-numbered designation fighter,fitted with
a Variable Geometry Engines,maybe just a hypothetical design.


http://arc.aiaa.org/doi/abs/10.2514/3.44373?journalCode=ja
 

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Forgoten fighters

This 3 view is only information, which I have saved.
Simply I think that is from this magnificent forum
any information or topic, of this projects
Thanks in advance
 

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Re: Forgoten fighters

ZacYates said:
Perhaps it's a Vigilante variant?

My first thought also ZacYates!

Look forward to finding out more ivran!!

Regards
Pioneer
 
Re: Forgoten fighters

Maybe the mythical Vigilante with a pair of J58s?
 
Re: Forgoten fighters

Here it's;

http://www.secretprojects.co.uk/forum/index.php/topic,6884.msg240902.html#msg240902
 
What was this,a hypothetical design or not ?.

https://apps.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a273685.pdf
 

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Apologies if this has been posted, but I can't find anything like this using search.

MDD evaluation of different VTOL configs using variable cycle engines, circa 1975-78.
614958
614959
614960
614961

And from an earlier report;
614962
614963
 

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