I had a friend who served in the USAF in Korea and Vietnam. He flew the F-86, F-104 and F-4. Although the latter two were operationally superior, he said the F-86 was by far the most elegant.
I spent Thanksgiving in Osan Korea in 1976 and 1977. The ROKAF was still flying the F-86. It was a very quiet jet, rugged, and appeared to handle well. 🤠
Hindsight makes it easy to identify missteps and dead-ends, but the true appreciation of history is understanding what people knew at the time and why they made the decisions they did.
The OG Fury wasn't even a mistake, per se... even at the time everybody knew this was an interim aircraft at best.... and they also knew they had to keep the employees busy. Everybody from the engineers to the shop floor gains experience, rinse repeat. The Fury is one of hundreds of Cold War 'make busy' projects... congressional pork, military bloat, favors to unions, etc. Most of these projects were never meant to be world beaters.
The early Jet Age, from the mid-40s through the 1950s, could be considered a second Golden Age of aviation. given the breakthroughs and speed of advancement of aviation technology.
@@control_the_pet_population At the time it was anything but "wrong". You got to compare it to the FH-1 Phantom, navalised Vampires, the P-80 being tested on FDR
@@control_the_pet_population Certainly those things exist, but a lot of programs and orders were also cancelled outright with the end of the war. Jet technology was recognized as the coming thing, so it would make sense to continue those programs, knowing that initial efforts are likely to be learning experiences that would benefit the programs that follow.
It's not the Sabre's cousin, but its daddy ... The XP-86 also started out with a straight wing The swept-wing Sabre would only fly about 1 year later - an eternity in aviation design back then Contemporary USAF fighters were also still straight-winged
This comment here is more factually valuable than that stupid guy in a comment targeting me for some odd reason on saying that FJ-4 is a saber where we know why on that already but not on FJ-1's design. Why it looks similar to skyknight and why did the said airframe came to be. Nope other dude continued being useless. Either way thank you for actual valuable information.
@annoyingbstard9407 on a different comment section some dude was busy trying to tell me something that I already know and stated instead of telling anyone why the FJ-1 look the way it is. Its from the comment saying FJ-1 looks like the Skyknight.
@@croskerk The FJ-4 is more akin to the latest Sabre model, the F-86H, with both having a deeper fuselage, bigger intake, cannon ... but there's also lots of differences. No idea how that dude came to compare the FJ-1 to the F3D Skyknight. They're conceptually completely different except for having straight wings and being USN planes ...
@Wannes_ true, I can see that the airframe style, but other then that, F3D is thicker with 2 engines and 2 radars compared to FJ-1. F-86H I havent heard of but nice to hear of. Interesting to still hear that USAF and USN still somehow work together despite their differences.
I had always assumed that the Fury preceded the Sabre, and the F-86 was a really fast redesign, but you make a good argument that they could be considered siblings. Given the primitive state of jet engines and overall jet technology, I'd say the Fury was a pretty good try at a difficult requirement with what was available. Even in falling short, it provided valuable service and experience--fortunately without the spilled blood of other designs.
Thanks for the comment. I think siblings is right. My understanding is that they both have the same parent design - I think it was NA-134 - that when first drawn up used a Goblin engine. That was in 1944. The Navy then commission the Fury prototypes on the 1st of January 1945, the Air Force order the three XP-86 prototypes in May. Both designs moved to the J-35, but obviously only the Fury ended up using it in production. Ultimately, operating off a land base meant that the XP-86 could be lighter in construction, slimmer wings etc. The Air Force's performance requirements were also harder to meet, hence the design divergence and eventual swept wing. Someone, somewhere must have a PhD on Sabre history and variants. It has to be one of the biggest topics in aviation history!!
The Sabre DEFINITELY came after the FJ-1 Fury (by a year). The FJ-2 was derived from the Sabre. They are definitely “related”. The FJ-1 is a jet version of the P-51 like the Supermarine Attacker is a jet version of the Supermarine Spitfire Mk 14 & Spiteful.
I've been curious about the seemingly odd transition from FJ-1 to FJ-2, and why this sabre relative seems to be forgotten and unused... This video answered all my curiousity, much appreciation for this! Talking about this, do you plan on covering FJ-2/3 soon? I'm curious about how they become navalized, and why 2 and 3 are often grouped together
It's not that odd a transition Bot XFJ-1 and XP-86 started as straight wing designs Emerging technology meant North American started looking at swept wing, Same happened with the Thunderjet / Thunderstreak ; the F9F Panther / Cougar ; the Supermarine Attacker was developed into the Type 510 / Swift , all essentially adding the new fad in wing design to a proven fuselage as a low risk change
The 1940s pretty much saw jet engines develop from "lab" prototypes with potential into just practical planes with performance improvements over prop-driven planes. E.G. the FJ-1's cruising speed was about the same as existing fighters' top speed. Carriers added challenges on top of the usual speed-climb-maneuverability, being able to take off from the relatively short deck, being controllable at a relatively slow landing speed, and the mechanical stresses of landing. It's easy, nowadays, to think dismissively of 1940s and 1950s jet fighters, but at the time they were driving the state of the jet aviation art.
The ability of jets to pound much more air out the back end than a propeller was the ultimate reason jets were developed and props were deprecated. Even though the early jets were no faster than their prop counterparts, anyone observing could see that props were at the utmost limits of their performance development (later props would develop greater efficiency though) and jets were the way forward.
Although it sounds like this aircraft didn't do too well I do like it's chunky looks and straight wing design.... neat looking aircraft and thanks for bringing it to light!
I feel that some American manufacturers just had a better take on how to design naval aircraft for shipboard service. Grumman, for years, had "it" when it came to this, with the A-6 Intruder and the whole Grumman cat series, starting with the Wildcat and culminating in the Tomcat. North American seemed much more aligned to the Air Force's tastes than the Navy.
It's well known that it takes a special knowledge base to make a carrier plane, they have totally different structural requirements than a land plane. A designer could always estimate, but the experienced names makers knew just how strong things needed to be, the best way to get that at the lowest cost in weight, this stuff wasn't free knowledge that was just out there, a lot of it was basically proprietary or held by the experienced makers. At best you could poach their designers, but even they didn't usually have it all stored in their heads, and knowing how to design something isn't the same as knowing how to build it. That's why it wasn't uncommon for a company with no experience in carrier planes to actually work with one that did to advise them on how to do it. I believe Lockheed did that for the S-3. And of course the knowledge isn't static either, you might have built prop planes for a carrier, but building a fast jet will take a whole new set of lessons, and you missed out on a generation or two. Sad that Grumman went away. It really made me appreciate just how good the F6F and F4F were when I read about the terrible difficulties they had trying to use the Seafire and Sea Hurricane. The F4F has a lot of drawbacks as a fighter, but it was much better as a carrier plane, to the point that the pilots would prefer an F4F to a Seafire. The operations with those were almost suicidal when you look at the loss rate. That also explains why they felt that the F4U was acceptable for carrier ops while the US rejected it. Look what they were using before. The book is called "They Gave Me A Seafire", it's quite good. It was also interesting that he made it clear that the pilots considered the F6F and F4U essentially equal aircraft, even though the Corsair was much faster. You don't spend much time at top speed, and in all normal flight modes, in climb and turn, etc, the Hellcat was equal or even better than the Corsair. It was also eye opening that FAA pilots were being issued MkI Sea Hurricanes through 1943, and were glad to have them. They didn't seem to feel that they were particularly disadvantaged, he just mentions that the armament was weak, but the Mk.II had much worse range because the engine was more powerful to make up for the added weight, but the fuel capacity was the same. They also didn't seem to feel that the Hurricane was particularly worse than the Spitfire. So just because you don't have the ultimate most modern aircraft available doesn't mean that you aren't an effective fighter force. Some of that may be the difference in the role a carrier pilot plays, but I thought it was interesting. The way a lot of people talk you would think that the guys who were stuck Hurricanes or P-40s would be bitter and upset that they had to fly outdated planes while others got the newest and best stuff, but in reality they are all viewed as modern fighters and they were glad to have them at all. In 1943 the older Hurricanes were still only a couple years old. I feel like most of the ranking and nitpicking comes from people after the war. I never once saw this guy complaining that their Hurricanes were outdated and unable to deal with the most modern German equipment. Not being able to land them safely was a far bigger concern.
It's always a good day when Not A Pound For Air To Ground posts. A very interesting video about the Sabre's less successful sibling. Unlike a lot of the early jets, I don't think giving the Fury more thrust would've actually solved much. It would've helped with flight performance, but not the durability or the landing characteristics. It's a bit amazing how the Sabre and the Fury are really siblings. One defined an era of fighters, the other is barely remembered.
Well as someone from the UK, I have always called it Pax River, on the basis that if I tried to pronounce the whole word I would get it wrong. I admire the narrator for trying, out of curiosity, how is Patuxent pronounced correctly?
Recommended (and pretty much only) printed media specifically covering the Fury series for anyone wanting more is via the “Detail and Scale” Series of 1980s publications and Ginter Books more technical “Naval Fighters” series. I believe both series are recently back in reprint…
I agree, I tried to do that once for a school project and found out it's extremely hard to sound like that, to get it the way you want it to sound. A valuable talent.
Each video you post is interesting, and very enlightening on subjects of Cold War aviation that I had little to no knowledge of. Please keep up the great stream of quality work! Now then, I also want to thank you for indirectly proving a point of mine I made in an argument not too long ago. I had a brief, yet energetic discussion with some folks who claimed the F-14 would have been a terrible aircraft in Vietnam. I disagreed, but they seemed to believe that the word of a couple of Israeli pilots and the earlier F-14's lack of better thrust-to-weight and average acceleration simply meant that it was a worse dogfighter than the Phantom was (even though we all know it wasn't). The discussion moved to how the Navy had the F-14 because they didn't want to use the F-111B, failing to realize that the F-111B wasn't a very good design to be operating off of a carrier for multiple reasons, and they made the claim that the Navy didn't want to use an Air Force-designed aircraft because it would hurt their pride. I argued that you can't really use a land-based aircraft for carrier duty because of the stresses it undergoes during operations, but this aircraft (the FJ-1) and the F/A-18 (being a redesign of the YF-17) were their two big gotchas in proving me wrong. In response, I claimed that the F/A-18 was not the same as the YF-17 in that its structure was fundamentally different because it actually was built for carrier duty where the YF-17 wasn't. In the words of an old Navy carrier video, "it takes more than a tailhook to earn your sea legs." Sure the two jets look similar on the surface, but internally and structurally they are completely unique from one another; besides a prototype and production aircraft are also quite different. They told me how the FJ-1 was basically "just a jet-powered P-51," and once again I disagreed on the grounds that due to its propulsion and layout that the Fury was a completely separate aircraft. I acknowledge that NAA used the Mustang as a framework, but everything beyond that was different. Bringing to light the rather lack-luster performance of the Fury does then somewhat prove that it is difficult to use a land-based design for carrier duty. I don't believe NAA produced an ill-suited aircraft for carrier duty on purpose, but more because it wasn't necessarily their forte. Thankfully they did go on to give us the Sabre, which these guys also claimed had the FJ-2/3 as derivatives, but either didn't know about or had a disconnect about the Sabre's origin story until I called them out on it. Thanks for reading if you made it this far, and I hope you have a great rest of your day/night :)
Pilots who transitioned from the F-4J phantoms where disappointed that the F-14A did not accelerate as well as their previous aircraft and did not see it as an improvement in performance. The F-4J probably had superior maneuverability though most of the flight envelope other than at very low speed.
@@gort8203 How did the F-4J have superior maneuverability to the F-14? I'd understand if it had better acceleration since the J79 had gone through iterative improvements on the Phantom models, and the TF-30 was famous for not being the best, but how did the F-4J have better maneuverability?
@@razgriz4978 The F4J was the hot rod of F-4s. I have not seen an EM diagram of these two, nor read pilot reports of dogfights between them, which is why I said probably, and at higher speeds. But the F4J had a better thrust to weight ratio than the F-14A, and as I said pilots who transitioned felt the F-14A was sluggish. Acceleration and sustained turn rate are both products of excess thrust. The F-14 could probably turn a tighter radius when slow with the wings out, but at higher speeds the F-4J probably had some advantage in sustained turn and use of the vertical.
@@gort8203 I believe the edge goes to the F-14. There's a Periscope US Navy training film that highlights the Tomcat's maneuvering capability over the F-4, and of course the A-4 and T-38s at TOPGUN. Plus John Chesire, who flew both, said that the F-14 has superior turn rate and radius. He didn't say at what speeds, but if I could infer I'd believe the F-14 has the advantage across the board based on that the Periscope Film tells us that the F-4 pilot "just has to stay alive," or that even if an F-4 and F-14 go into the vertical, the Tomcat will still win.
It was an informative and wonderful introduction video about furious sabers aircraft, which was first jet engine aircraft's designed by the US after WW2... Thank you for sharing
An interesting video. I was never aware of the straight wing, naval variant. I get the impression that 'conservative' was the driving force in its design. It also seems obvious that NAA's limited experience with producing naval aircraft showed quite glaringly with this aircraft's structural failures on carrier landings. Thank you for another informative video!
Learning about planes on my own before the internet either was a thing or was an accessible thing to most people I never know what to think about the fj1 fury the first time I learned of its existence was in these airplane cards which my dad used to get me in my early teens before they got expensive and it was just a few paragraphs about the plane that it was what are the Navy's first jet fighters and most literature said it was the predecessor to the f-86 sabre My own conclusion on what led the fury down was a combination of the the insistence of the United States Navy of a straight wing and Allison's G35 not producing enough power I mean if you look at the Phantom which may have had just A pinch over 3,000 lb of thrust from it's pair of Westinghouse engines and keep in mind Westinghouse never really made a spectacular jet engine the empty weight of the Phantom was about 2000 pounds less then the fury and its maximum takeoff weight less You got to give North American and McDonell who literally had never made either a carrier-borne aircraft or a jet fighter credit for what they did pull off I feel like if the fury had just a little bit more development time even with the straight wing it could have been a much better aircraft and different engine and a little bit more time to sort out the structure could have had North American making its own F9F panther The epilogue here is that Grumman would make the United States Navy's first really good operational jet fighter in the form of the F9F Panther and Mcdonell"s banshee wasn't far behind even though the navalized Sabre ended up being a mixed bag and when allowed to design a scratch built carrier borne fighter the United States Navy would get the really good FJ-4 Fury which was absolutely not related in any way to the f-86 Sabre And as this video points out when operated from land the FJ-1 wasn't a horrible aircraft if unremarkable it just was underpowered but it gave something for nugget Navy fighter pilots that was jet powered but not overwhelming.
No wonder the FJ Fury wasn't used by the USAF. These early Navy jets kept the fleet on the high seas. Thanks for putting this together. I liked that you used the correct pictures. Many documentaries use the wrong aircraft--because that's what the producers had. For example, this 1943 propaganda film shows Dauntless dive bombers and Avenger torpedo bombers filling in for Japanese aircraft. I need to look at them again but I recall SNJ or AT-6 trainers standing in for Zeroes in "December 7th." I could be wrong. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/December_7th_(film)
it served as a teaching point for the engineers at North American during the difficult transition from Propeller fighters to transonic/supersonic fighters. They learned what didn't work, and what ideas and design features did matter. Most aviation companies had such an aircraft like Chance Vought F6U Pirate. Learning through failure is very important, particularly in engineering, especially when transonic and supersonic aerodynamics were still in their infancy and everyone was still trying to figure out the mysteries of how to do it properly.
But like he says, they developed the F-86 basically in parallel. So they learned what did work from that and what didn't from this. I think the main issue was that they didn't know how to make a carrier plane, and the engine just wasnt enough. The straight wings are not the real problem, they had plenty of successful straight wing jets.
Now wasn't the FJ basically a P-51 with a jet? Or the wings of a P-51 anyway? The tail looks similar as well. They assumed that the best wing in the war could be improved with a jet engine, but it wasn't as good as swept wings.
The P-51 was operated off an aircraft carrier during WW2 (as was the B-25 (not just for the Doolittle raid but actually landing on a carrier after having a tail hook fitted)). The FJ-1 had the tail surfaces, wing and cockpit off the P-51L as its design basis wrapped around the somewhat defective J33 and then J35 engines. The centrifugal J33 required a more rotund fuselage than the later axial flow J35 and the Sabre got the longer and more powerful J47 integrated.
The Fury has its Paul Blart like handsomeness and purpose but looks like it came from the Grumman stable. This aircraft is validation for the necessity of composite powerplant designs for carrier use of the time like the Ryan Dark shark, Curtiss XF-15C, and another successful NAA design the AJ Savage.
Makes you wonder how many other terrible attempts in history were actually just a little development away from being legendary aircraft, except they were just cancelled outright. And it's interesting that it looks like something that came from Grumman. It's like NAA didn't know anything about building a carrier plane, so they said "okay, so how would Grumman do this?" And basically made a jet Bearcat.
The P-51 did not have laminar flow wings despite the fact that remains a very popular opinion for some reason. It had a very efficient wing, but it did not incorporate laminar flow technology.
I believe the J-35 was some of the issue. I build a 1:10 scale RC model of the FJ-1 with a electric powered ducted fan . It has a much hugher thrust to weight ratio and flies awesome. Its a bummer the full scale was so short lived. But the F-86 fixed most of the issues the fury had.
The Fury was 3000 lbs lighter than the Panther, but the Panther had a better engine with 56% more thrust. Simply put, with the available engines, the Navy wasn’t ready for jet carrier ops.
This is why they kept the Corsairs and the Skyraiders. Basically, the _carriers_ weren't up to jet ops. It took the steam catapult, the mirror landing system, and the angled deck to bring the carriers themselves into the jet age. Thank you Royal Navy.
Couldnt disagree more. The FJ-1 bridges the gap to the FJ-2. It allowed the team to build up a base of knowledge for the future improved designs. It was a necessary and successful intermediate step
We must also remember the aircraft carrier flight deck was straight design then even the Panthers and early FH1 Phantoms were all straight wing design, this began to change with the Angled flight deck design, I agree the FJ2 and FJ3 are F86's, the FJ4 though there is a difference in shape of fuselage that is between the F86 and FJ-1 Fury
First registered supersonic flight (by an experimental aircraft) to the Mach 2+ F4H Phantom II in 11 years ... aviation never progressed faster than back then
A question, off topic: The Jumo engine used in the first generation German jets was notoriously sensitive to throttle control but the contemporaneous Whittle engine is not characterized like that. How good or bad was the Whittle engine throttle response? Posting here because this is a recently posted clip to a technical channel.
At about 02:28 in this video: _"Patuxent River"_ {Maryland, USA} is pronounced 'pah-tux-ent'. At least that is how I pronounce it. I know because before I was in the US Coast Guard I was in the US Navy, and was stationed at _'Pax River'_ from mid-1983 to early 1986. And it took me a while to get the pronunciation correct myself...😊
FWIW: I retired from the US Coast Guard in 2003, near Elizabeth City, North Carolina, which is next to the _"Pasquotank River."_ {I pronounce it 'pas-quo-tank'.} It is the odd little coincidences in life that make things interesting...😊
@notapound >>> *_"All the fuel was contained in the fuselage. The wings were dry, which it turned out was a good thing as they had a propensity to fall off on landing."_* *OOPS...🤦♂️*
@@annoyingbstard9407that’s something of an exaggeration regarding swept wing science - akin to saying that missile technology was “known” in the Victorian era just because people had built practical rockets. In reality, they knew what worked through trial and error, but didn’t really know how or why it worked! In both cases it was largely German WW2 advancements (that fell into allied hands from late ‘44 onwards) that took little-understood concepts and made them into forensically-proven technology.
Interesting that you implied the Navy seemed irritated that the Fury struggled to takeoff without catapult assistance. It seems an odd concept today that any non V/STOL jet could’ve got off a carrier without using a catapult. I’m sure I read somewhere in the long-distant past that a lightly-fuelled Skyhawk or Corsair could get off unassisted as long as there was a good wind-over-deck and that, loaded with a just a pair of Sidewinders, these were the carriers’ emergency air defence if the Cats went down and F4s or F14s couldn’t be launched. Any veteran naval aviators here that can back that up or debunk it?
A squadron of A-4s were carried on CVS (ASW) Essex class ships to act as self defense fighters. There are some great pictures of A-4s with sidewinders sitting on the cats.
Well,you did say the Fury was a pretty good trainer,and that it did'nt kill it's pilpts.Not all first gen jst aircraft can say that!BTW the US was'nt alone in jet-izing piston aircraft.What was that ugly Soviet thing?The Yak 15?(Had to google IT) Also by the way I really like your vids and how you present them.Subbed.
The straight winged XF-86 was essentially a lightened FJ-1. The author apparently ignores the later FJ-2 and FJ-3 swept wing versions, analogous to the F9 Panther/Cougar.
It fires the imagination to wonder what would have happened if the jet engines of the time had matched the designs that made it to the flying stage. Even into the 50's, engine design was the hold-up in performance, not the aircraft design.
Its was not just jet engines that needed development. An aircraft is a complete package, and every part of that package must function properly with all of the other parts. Wings, engines, fuselage, landing gear, pilot life support systems, control services, avionics, weapons systems, inlet ducts, exhaust management, and numerous other components need to be properly designed and integrated into the whole. Drastically upgrading only one component, without a corresponding upgrade in other components, seldom results in success.
An engine is an engine, no matter what type it is, as long as it is powerful, and the speed of sound barrier taken into account, in their aerofoils. Swept or maybe definitely not.
8:53 Was it a pretty terrible aircraft? Yes but it was not alone. There were plenty 1st generation jet fighter that were terrible. The Fury was one of many jets that could be better classified as a bailing out trainer. Instead of a fighter.
North American Aviation sought a contract to develop a jet fighter , the War Dept and Army Airforce at the time turned them down due to the P51, and other programs . Meanwhile the Navy sought a navalized P51this led North American to propose a jet Fighter , this led to the development of the Fury Program the FJ-1 was built first.
I've often said that the FJ-2, FJ-3, and FJ-4 should have been designated the F2J, F3J, and F4J respectively due to the fact that each was so radically different from its predecessor, especially the FJ-4 which looked absolutely nothing like the FJ-1. That said, I have also been told that the Navy couldn't change the designations due to having to get permission from Congress to make purchases of new a/c and a new designation might have caused undue(?) scrutiny of the new a/c.
Eh ... If you look at the advancements during the first 66 years of flight during which we went from Kitty Hawk to our first landing on the Moon - they were truly stupendous compared to the last 60 years of flight ... So - yes - there were some missteps along the way ... .
Has any one noticed that aircraft engines have always been the limiting system from Wright Brothers to f-35 melting their tell planes and a tendency to strip their turbine blades out the back.
The choice of straight wings for the FJ1 had nothing to do with keeping the aircraft conventional as a backup design in case the swept winged F-86 wasn't a success. The FJ1 was designed, and prototype construction started before the end of WWII. It was only after Germany was defeated in May of 1945 that America gained access to German data on swept wings. Even after that the US Air Force still put their money on the straight winged F-80. It wasn't until the early 1950's, and the Korean War, that the advantages of having swept wings on a fighter was fully recognized. In fact, all of the first generation US jet fighters, (and some second generation fighters), had straight wings. Look at the McDonnell FH Phantom and F2H Banshee, Republic F-84 Thunderjet, Grumman F9F Panther, Northrop F-89 Scorpion, Curtiss XF-87, and Vought F6U Pirate. These were all early US straight winged pure jet fighters, and none were intended as "backup" designs for more advanced swept winged jet fighters. Some of these designed later evolved into more advanced swept winged designs, just as the FH1 did, but none were "backup" designs.
It's a dead end that will be successful a few times in naval avation history despite being tryed almost every new contract... Namely the F-4 Phantom II, F-35 Panther Su-33 Flanker-D are exemples of Land planes actually working as Navy planes.
@@croskerk That's because the FJ-4 was derived from the Sabre while the FJ-1 was not. The FJ-1 preceded the Sabre and is substantially different in more ways than wing sweep. The resemblance is just that, as resemblance.
@gort8203 i already know that FJ-1 and 4 are very different. Though I never knew much of FJ-1 than FJ-4. I honestly dont know what jet came out around FJ-1 to lead the FJ-1 to said design, but FJ-4 is more determinable as it was around the time swept wings are coming in full swing.
@@croskerk I didn't tell you the FJ-1 and -4 were different, which you could already see. What you didn't seem to understand was why the FJ-4 looked more like the Sabre than the FJ-1 did. I can't tell what you mean by: "what jet came around to lead the FJ-1 to said design". If your "said design" is the FJ-1 then nothing led to it. It was North American's first jet fighter, and was based more off the P-51 than anything else. If your "said design" is the FJ-4, it was derived from the F-86. The F-86 was not just an FJ-1 with swept wings, it was a different airplane.
@gort8203 i never said that FJ-4 was FJ-1 with swept wings. Dude, I was literally stating differences on looks from a comment. I didn't come here for a full course history lesson that is obvious. I said that I already knew that the FJ-4 was built off of the Saber design, yet somehow your small brain doesn't seem to comprehend on building off of someone's comment. The dude earlier said that FJ-1 looks like an F3D skynight, and I was adding on the fact that the FJ-4 is more saber than FJ-1. Maybe there is some reason why FJ-1 looks similar to F3D. I acknowledge that the title may be a wee bit wrong on the saber without being direct. somehow, your dinky brain doesn't seem to understand that and only out there to give out info that doesn't seem to help the conversation and learning about. In short, no one asked for your damn opinion, so shut up unless there is actual information needing to be corrected or the information you are giving is in value of a conversation. Which has 0 value of this conversation rather than stating the damn obvious but more in-depth. In return, you wasted your time because you're trying to prove a point that was already proven way before you jumped in. I see absolutely nothing here on your end telling us why the FJ-1 looks like skynight and continued to say that FJ-4 is a saber that I already know and stated. In short, read the damn thumbnail. The primary commenter already knew thumbnail is wrong, I continued that FJ-4 is more saber than FJ-1, and you're just now adding onto useless information but more in-depth
I have to disagree with you on one point, which you make repeatedly in this video. The F-86 certainly wasn’t “the best fighter of its generation”! The MiG-17 was better, but the best was undoubtedly the Hunter.
I had a friend who served in the USAF in Korea and Vietnam. He flew the F-86, F-104 and F-4. Although the latter two were operationally superior, he said the F-86 was by far the most elegant.
I spent Thanksgiving in Osan Korea in 1976 and 1977. The ROKAF was still flying the F-86.
It was a very quiet jet, rugged, and appeared to handle well. 🤠
Hindsight makes it easy to identify missteps and dead-ends, but the true appreciation of history is understanding what people knew at the time and why they made the decisions they did.
The OG Fury wasn't even a mistake, per se... even at the time everybody knew this was an interim aircraft at best.... and they also knew they had to keep the employees busy. Everybody from the engineers to the shop floor gains experience, rinse repeat. The Fury is one of hundreds of Cold War 'make busy' projects... congressional pork, military bloat, favors to unions, etc. Most of these projects were never meant to be world beaters.
The early Jet Age, from the mid-40s through the 1950s, could be considered a second Golden Age of aviation. given the breakthroughs and speed of advancement of aviation technology.
@@control_the_pet_population At the time it was anything but "wrong".
You got to compare it to the FH-1 Phantom, navalised Vampires, the P-80 being tested on FDR
Good insight! Thank you!
@@control_the_pet_population Certainly those things exist, but a lot of programs and orders were also cancelled outright with the end of the war. Jet technology was recognized as the coming thing, so it would make sense to continue those programs, knowing that initial efforts are likely to be learning experiences that would benefit the programs that follow.
It's not the Sabre's cousin, but its daddy ...
The XP-86 also started out with a straight wing
The swept-wing Sabre would only fly about 1 year later - an eternity in aviation design back then
Contemporary USAF fighters were also still straight-winged
This comment here is more factually valuable than that stupid guy in a comment targeting me for some odd reason on saying that FJ-4 is a saber where we know why on that already but not on FJ-1's design. Why it looks similar to skyknight and why did the said airframe came to be.
Nope other dude continued being useless.
Either way thank you for actual valuable information.
@@croskerk. Wtf? 😂
@annoyingbstard9407 on a different comment section some dude was busy trying to tell me something that I already know and stated instead of telling anyone why the FJ-1 look the way it is.
Its from the comment saying FJ-1 looks like the Skyknight.
@@croskerk The FJ-4 is more akin to the latest Sabre model, the F-86H, with both having a deeper fuselage, bigger intake, cannon ... but there's also lots of differences.
No idea how that dude came to compare the FJ-1 to the F3D Skyknight. They're conceptually completely different except for having straight wings and being USN planes ...
@Wannes_ true, I can see that the airframe style, but other then that, F3D is thicker with 2 engines and 2 radars compared to FJ-1.
F-86H I havent heard of but nice to hear of. Interesting to still hear that USAF and USN still somehow work together despite their differences.
I had always assumed that the Fury preceded the Sabre, and the F-86 was a really fast redesign, but you make a good argument that they could be considered siblings. Given the primitive state of jet engines and overall jet technology, I'd say the Fury was a pretty good try at a difficult requirement with what was available. Even in falling short, it provided valuable service and experience--fortunately without the spilled blood of other designs.
Thanks for the comment. I think siblings is right. My understanding is that they both have the same parent design - I think it was NA-134 - that when first drawn up used a Goblin engine.
That was in 1944. The Navy then commission the Fury prototypes on the 1st of January 1945, the Air Force order the three XP-86 prototypes in May. Both designs moved to the J-35, but obviously only the Fury ended up using it in production. Ultimately, operating off a land base meant that the XP-86 could be lighter in construction, slimmer wings etc. The Air Force's performance requirements were also harder to meet, hence the design divergence and eventual swept wing.
Someone, somewhere must have a PhD on Sabre history and variants. It has to be one of the biggest topics in aviation history!!
@@notapoundExcellent thoughts and comments. As if we needed another reason to visit NAS Pensacola. Your videos are much appreciated.
The Sabre DEFINITELY came after the FJ-1 Fury (by a year). The FJ-2 was derived from the Sabre.
They are definitely “related”.
The FJ-1 is a jet version of the P-51 like the Supermarine Attacker is a jet version of the Supermarine Spitfire Mk 14 & Spiteful.
I've been curious about the seemingly odd transition from FJ-1 to FJ-2, and why this sabre relative seems to be forgotten and unused...
This video answered all my curiousity, much appreciation for this!
Talking about this, do you plan on covering FJ-2/3 soon? I'm curious about how they become navalized, and why 2 and 3 are often grouped together
I'd love to see a video about the FJ-3 as well, my Dad was an engine mechanic for VMF-333's (Fighting Shamrocks) Furys when he was in the USMC.
It's not that odd a transition
Bot XFJ-1 and XP-86 started as straight wing designs
Emerging technology meant North American started looking at swept wing,
Same happened with the Thunderjet / Thunderstreak ; the F9F Panther / Cougar ; the Supermarine Attacker was developed into the Type 510 / Swift , all essentially adding the new fad in wing design to a proven fuselage as a low risk change
The 1940s pretty much saw jet engines develop from "lab" prototypes with potential into just practical planes with performance improvements over prop-driven planes. E.G. the FJ-1's cruising speed was about the same as existing fighters' top speed. Carriers added challenges on top of the usual speed-climb-maneuverability, being able to take off from the relatively short deck, being controllable at a relatively slow landing speed, and the mechanical stresses of landing. It's easy, nowadays, to think dismissively of 1940s and 1950s jet fighters, but at the time they were driving the state of the jet aviation art.
The ability of jets to pound much more air out the back end than a propeller was the ultimate reason jets were developed and props were deprecated. Even though the early jets were no faster than their prop counterparts, anyone observing could see that props were at the utmost limits of their performance development (later props would develop greater efficiency though) and jets were the way forward.
Much awaited, much appreciated looking forward to excellent insights as usual from you.
Thanks. Just an appetiser for Friday… which is on the legendary Pirate
Although it sounds like this aircraft didn't do too well I do like it's chunky looks and straight wing design.... neat looking aircraft and thanks for bringing it to light!
I feel that some American manufacturers just had a better take on how to design naval aircraft for shipboard service. Grumman, for years, had "it" when it came to this, with the A-6 Intruder and the whole Grumman cat series, starting with the Wildcat and culminating in the Tomcat. North American seemed much more aligned to the Air Force's tastes than the Navy.
It's well known that it takes a special knowledge base to make a carrier plane, they have totally different structural requirements than a land plane. A designer could always estimate, but the experienced names makers knew just how strong things needed to be, the best way to get that at the lowest cost in weight, this stuff wasn't free knowledge that was just out there, a lot of it was basically proprietary or held by the experienced makers. At best you could poach their designers, but even they didn't usually have it all stored in their heads, and knowing how to design something isn't the same as knowing how to build it. That's why it wasn't uncommon for a company with no experience in carrier planes to actually work with one that did to advise them on how to do it. I believe Lockheed did that for the S-3.
And of course the knowledge isn't static either, you might have built prop planes for a carrier, but building a fast jet will take a whole new set of lessons, and you missed out on a generation or two. Sad that Grumman went away. It really made me appreciate just how good the F6F and F4F were when I read about the terrible difficulties they had trying to use the Seafire and Sea Hurricane. The F4F has a lot of drawbacks as a fighter, but it was much better as a carrier plane, to the point that the pilots would prefer an F4F to a Seafire. The operations with those were almost suicidal when you look at the loss rate. That also explains why they felt that the F4U was acceptable for carrier ops while the US rejected it. Look what they were using before.
The book is called "They Gave Me A Seafire", it's quite good. It was also interesting that he made it clear that the pilots considered the F6F and F4U essentially equal aircraft, even though the Corsair was much faster. You don't spend much time at top speed, and in all normal flight modes, in climb and turn, etc, the Hellcat was equal or even better than the Corsair. It was also eye opening that FAA pilots were being issued MkI Sea Hurricanes through 1943, and were glad to have them. They didn't seem to feel that they were particularly disadvantaged, he just mentions that the armament was weak, but the Mk.II had much worse range because the engine was more powerful to make up for the added weight, but the fuel capacity was the same. They also didn't seem to feel that the Hurricane was particularly worse than the Spitfire. So just because you don't have the ultimate most modern aircraft available doesn't mean that you aren't an effective fighter force. Some of that may be the difference in the role a carrier pilot plays, but I thought it was interesting. The way a lot of people talk you would think that the guys who were stuck Hurricanes or P-40s would be bitter and upset that they had to fly outdated planes while others got the newest and best stuff, but in reality they are all viewed as modern fighters and they were glad to have them at all. In 1943 the older Hurricanes were still only a couple years old. I feel like most of the ranking and nitpicking comes from people after the war. I never once saw this guy complaining that their Hurricanes were outdated and unable to deal with the most modern German equipment. Not being able to land them safely was a far bigger concern.
It's always a good day when Not A Pound For Air To Ground posts. A very interesting video about the Sabre's less successful sibling.
Unlike a lot of the early jets, I don't think giving the Fury more thrust would've actually solved much. It would've helped with flight performance, but not the durability or the landing characteristics.
It's a bit amazing how the Sabre and the Fury are really siblings. One defined an era of fighters, the other is barely remembered.
We just refer to “ Patuxent River” as “Pax river”.
Paux, oui? 🙂🇨🇵☺️👍
Yeah but it was nice hearing him say the whole name.
Yeah that's something only someone who lives in or around that area would probably know! 😅
Well as someone from the UK, I have always called it Pax River, on the basis that if I tried to pronounce the whole word I would get it wrong. I admire the narrator for trying, out of curiosity, how is Patuxent pronounced correctly?
@@marktuffield6519 paa-tux-int
Recommended (and pretty much only) printed media specifically covering the Fury series for anyone wanting more is via the “Detail and Scale” Series of 1980s publications and Ginter Books more technical “Naval Fighters” series. I believe both series are recently back in reprint…
I do like listening to you of a morning, you have a lovely voice and a clear, steady diction.
I agree, I tried to do that once for a school project and found out it's extremely hard to sound like that, to get it the way you want it to sound. A valuable talent.
The FJ-1 was a direct derivative of the P-51 Mustang (specifically the Sea Horse navalised variant).
Each video you post is interesting, and very enlightening on subjects of Cold War aviation that I had little to no knowledge of. Please keep up the great stream of quality work!
Now then, I also want to thank you for indirectly proving a point of mine I made in an argument not too long ago.
I had a brief, yet energetic discussion with some folks who claimed the F-14 would have been a terrible aircraft in Vietnam. I disagreed, but they seemed to believe that the word of a couple of Israeli pilots and the earlier F-14's lack of better thrust-to-weight and average acceleration simply meant that it was a worse dogfighter than the Phantom was (even though we all know it wasn't). The discussion moved to how the Navy had the F-14 because they didn't want to use the F-111B, failing to realize that the F-111B wasn't a very good design to be operating off of a carrier for multiple reasons, and they made the claim that the Navy didn't want to use an Air Force-designed aircraft because it would hurt their pride. I argued that you can't really use a land-based aircraft for carrier duty because of the stresses it undergoes during operations, but this aircraft (the FJ-1) and the F/A-18 (being a redesign of the YF-17) were their two big gotchas in proving me wrong.
In response, I claimed that the F/A-18 was not the same as the YF-17 in that its structure was fundamentally different because it actually was built for carrier duty where the YF-17 wasn't. In the words of an old Navy carrier video, "it takes more than a tailhook to earn your sea legs." Sure the two jets look similar on the surface, but internally and structurally they are completely unique from one another; besides a prototype and production aircraft are also quite different. They told me how the FJ-1 was basically "just a jet-powered P-51," and once again I disagreed on the grounds that due to its propulsion and layout that the Fury was a completely separate aircraft. I acknowledge that NAA used the Mustang as a framework, but everything beyond that was different. Bringing to light the rather lack-luster performance of the Fury does then somewhat prove that it is difficult to use a land-based design for carrier duty. I don't believe NAA produced an ill-suited aircraft for carrier duty on purpose, but more because it wasn't necessarily their forte. Thankfully they did go on to give us the Sabre, which these guys also claimed had the FJ-2/3 as derivatives, but either didn't know about or had a disconnect about the Sabre's origin story until I called them out on it.
Thanks for reading if you made it this far, and I hope you have a great rest of your day/night :)
Pilots who transitioned from the F-4J phantoms where disappointed that the F-14A did not accelerate as well as their previous aircraft and did not see it as an improvement in performance. The F-4J probably had superior maneuverability though most of the flight envelope other than at very low speed.
The F-111B was not an Air Force design. The general configuration of the aircraft was determined as much by Navy needs as those the Air Force.
@@gort8203 How did the F-4J have superior maneuverability to the F-14? I'd understand if it had better acceleration since the J79 had gone through iterative improvements on the Phantom models, and the TF-30 was famous for not being the best, but how did the F-4J have better maneuverability?
@@razgriz4978 The F4J was the hot rod of F-4s. I have not seen an EM diagram of these two, nor read pilot reports of dogfights between them, which is why I said probably, and at higher speeds. But the F4J had a better thrust to weight ratio than the F-14A, and as I said pilots who transitioned felt the F-14A was sluggish. Acceleration and sustained turn rate are both products of excess thrust. The F-14 could probably turn a tighter radius when slow with the wings out, but at higher speeds the F-4J probably had some advantage in sustained turn and use of the vertical.
@@gort8203 I believe the edge goes to the F-14. There's a Periscope US Navy training film that highlights the Tomcat's maneuvering capability over the F-4, and of course the A-4 and T-38s at TOPGUN. Plus John Chesire, who flew both, said that the F-14 has superior turn rate and radius. He didn't say at what speeds, but if I could infer I'd believe the F-14 has the advantage across the board based on that the Periscope Film tells us that the F-4 pilot "just has to stay alive," or that even if an F-4 and F-14 go into the vertical, the Tomcat will still win.
It was an informative and wonderful introduction video about furious sabers aircraft, which was first jet engine aircraft's designed by the US after WW2... Thank you for sharing
An interesting video.
I was never aware of the straight wing, naval variant. I get the impression that 'conservative' was the driving force in its design.
It also seems obvious that NAA's limited experience with producing naval aircraft showed quite glaringly with this aircraft's structural failures on carrier landings.
Thank you for another informative video!
"conservative" indeed...
Just by looks I thought it was reminiscent of a P-47, F6F, or F8F modified to have a jet engine.
Learning about planes on my own before the internet either was a thing or was an accessible thing to most people I never know what to think about the fj1 fury the first time I learned of its existence was in these airplane cards which my dad used to get me in my early teens before they got expensive and it was just a few paragraphs about the plane that it was what are the Navy's first jet fighters and most literature said it was the predecessor to the f-86 sabre
My own conclusion on what led the fury down was a combination of the the insistence of the United States Navy of a straight wing and Allison's G35 not producing enough power I mean if you look at the Phantom which may have had just A pinch over 3,000 lb of thrust from it's pair of Westinghouse engines and keep in mind Westinghouse never really made a spectacular jet engine the empty weight of the Phantom was about 2000 pounds less then the fury and its maximum takeoff weight less
You got to give North American and McDonell who literally had never made either a carrier-borne aircraft or a jet fighter credit for what they did pull off
I feel like if the fury had just a little bit more development time even with the straight wing it could have been a much better aircraft and different engine and a little bit more time to sort out the structure could have had North American making its own F9F panther
The epilogue here is that Grumman would make the United States Navy's first really good operational jet fighter in the form of the F9F Panther and Mcdonell"s banshee wasn't far behind even though the navalized Sabre ended up being a mixed bag and when allowed to design a scratch built carrier borne fighter the United States Navy would get the really good FJ-4 Fury which was absolutely not related in any way to the f-86 Sabre
And as this video points out when operated from land the FJ-1 wasn't a horrible aircraft if unremarkable it just was underpowered but it gave something for nugget Navy fighter pilots that was jet powered but not overwhelming.
Another great vid on the obscure. Love it ❤
No wonder the FJ Fury wasn't used by the USAF. These early Navy jets kept the fleet on the high seas.
Thanks for putting this together. I liked that you used the correct pictures. Many documentaries use the wrong aircraft--because that's what the producers had. For example, this 1943 propaganda film shows Dauntless dive bombers and Avenger torpedo bombers filling in for Japanese aircraft. I need to look at them again but I recall SNJ or AT-6 trainers standing in for Zeroes in "December 7th." I could be wrong.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/December_7th_(film)
it served as a teaching point for the engineers at North American during the difficult transition from Propeller fighters to transonic/supersonic fighters. They learned what didn't work, and what ideas and design features did matter. Most aviation companies had such an aircraft like Chance Vought F6U Pirate. Learning through failure is very important, particularly in engineering, especially when transonic and supersonic aerodynamics were still in their infancy and everyone was still trying to figure out the mysteries of how to do it properly.
But like he says, they developed the F-86 basically in parallel. So they learned what did work from that and what didn't from this. I think the main issue was that they didn't know how to make a carrier plane, and the engine just wasnt enough. The straight wings are not the real problem, they had plenty of successful straight wing jets.
@@justforever96 and NAA learned and made teh FJ Fury carrier airplane.
How many successful straight wing jets did NAA crate again?
@@justforever96 I don't care what his point is, I was making my Own point.
I really just am enjoying that it looks like an F4F Wildcat decided to try on a jet engine
Now wasn't the FJ basically a P-51 with a jet? Or the wings of a P-51 anyway? The tail looks similar as well. They assumed that the best wing in the war could be improved with a jet engine, but it wasn't as good as swept wings.
The P-51 was operated off an aircraft carrier during WW2 (as was the B-25 (not just for the Doolittle raid but actually landing on a carrier after having a tail hook fitted)).
The FJ-1 had the tail surfaces, wing and cockpit off the P-51L as its design basis wrapped around the somewhat defective J33 and then J35 engines. The centrifugal J33 required a more rotund fuselage than the later axial flow J35 and the Sabre got the longer and more powerful J47 integrated.
The Fury has its Paul Blart like handsomeness and purpose but looks like it came from the Grumman stable. This aircraft is validation for the necessity of composite powerplant designs for carrier use of the time like the Ryan Dark shark, Curtiss XF-15C, and another successful NAA design the AJ Savage.
Makes you wonder how many other terrible attempts in history were actually just a little development away from being legendary aircraft, except they were just cancelled outright.
And it's interesting that it looks like something that came from Grumman. It's like NAA didn't know anything about building a carrier plane, so they said "okay, so how would Grumman do this?" And basically made a jet Bearcat.
The P-51 did not have laminar flow wings despite the fact that remains a very popular opinion for some reason. It had a very efficient wing, but it did not incorporate laminar flow technology.
I believe the J-35 was some of the issue. I build a 1:10 scale RC model of the FJ-1 with a electric powered ducted fan . It has a much hugher thrust to weight ratio and flies awesome. Its a bummer the full scale was so short lived. But the F-86 fixed most of the issues the fury had.
Excellent video.....Thanks.....
F-4 Phantom 2 Shoe🇺🇸
Sometimes, the best lesson is taught by failure. Its contribution can be indispensable.
Like you said it's a evolutionary step toward carrier jet fighters, a necessary step too.
The Navy begging the Air Force for kit, that's a change of pace.
The Fury was 3000 lbs lighter than the Panther, but the Panther had a better engine with 56% more thrust. Simply put, with the available engines, the Navy wasn’t ready for jet carrier ops.
This is why they kept the Corsairs and the Skyraiders. Basically, the _carriers_ weren't up to jet ops. It took the steam catapult, the mirror landing system, and the angled deck to bring the carriers themselves into the jet age. Thank you Royal Navy.
Couldnt disagree more. The FJ-1 bridges the gap to the FJ-2. It allowed the team to build up a base of knowledge for the future improved designs. It was a necessary and successful intermediate step
We must also remember the aircraft carrier flight deck was straight design then even the Panthers and early FH1 Phantoms were all straight wing design, this began to change with the Angled flight deck design, I agree the FJ2 and FJ3 are F86's, the FJ4 though there is a difference in shape of fuselage that is between the F86 and FJ-1 Fury
Very nice and very informative. Well done. Thank you!
This must have been a very exciting time in aviation development.
First registered supersonic flight (by an experimental aircraft) to the Mach 2+ F4H Phantom II in 11 years ... aviation never progressed faster than back then
A question, off topic: The Jumo engine used in the first generation German jets was notoriously sensitive to throttle control but the contemporaneous Whittle engine is not characterized like that. How good or bad was the Whittle engine throttle response?
Posting here because this is a recently posted clip to a technical channel.
At about 02:28 in this video:
_"Patuxent River"_ {Maryland, USA} is pronounced 'pah-tux-ent'. At least that is how I pronounce it.
I know because before I was in the US Coast Guard I was in the US Navy, and was stationed at _'Pax River'_ from mid-1983 to early 1986. And it took me a while to get the pronunciation correct myself...😊
FWIW: I retired from the US Coast Guard in 2003, near Elizabeth City, North Carolina, which is next to the _"Pasquotank River."_
{I pronounce it 'pas-quo-tank'.}
It is the odd little coincidences in life that make things interesting...😊
The FJ-4 wasn't a navalized Sabre really anymore.
It’s not Friday but I’m very happy
@notapound >>> *_"All the fuel was contained in the fuselage. The wings were dry, which it turned out was a good thing as they had a propensity to fall off on landing."_*
*OOPS...🤦♂️*
I believe that the FJ-1 was on the drawing board before information on swept wing technology was available.
The advantages and disadvantages of swept wings were known in the 1920s. These were naval aircraft.
@@annoyingbstard9407that’s something of an exaggeration regarding swept wing science - akin to saying that missile technology was “known” in the Victorian era just because people had built practical rockets. In reality, they knew what worked through trial and error, but didn’t really know how or why it worked!
In both cases it was largely German WW2 advancements (that fell into allied hands from late ‘44 onwards) that took little-understood concepts and made them into forensically-proven technology.
@@neilturner6749 Oh god, teenage wehraboo alert. Goodbye.
Given that the engine could only be accessed by a top panel, it's too bad they didn't (couldn't?) use the Grumman-patented Sto-Wing feature.
Interesting that you implied the Navy seemed irritated that the Fury struggled to takeoff without catapult assistance. It seems an odd concept today that any non V/STOL jet could’ve got off a carrier without using a catapult.
I’m sure I read somewhere in the long-distant past that a lightly-fuelled Skyhawk or Corsair could get off unassisted as long as there was a good wind-over-deck and that, loaded with a just a pair of Sidewinders, these were the carriers’ emergency air defence if the Cats went down and F4s or F14s couldn’t be launched. Any veteran naval aviators here that can back that up or debunk it?
A squadron of A-4s were carried on CVS (ASW) Essex class ships to act as self defense fighters. There are some great pictures of A-4s with sidewinders sitting on the cats.
Well,you did say the Fury was a pretty good trainer,and that it did'nt kill it's pilpts.Not all first gen jst aircraft can say that!BTW the US was'nt alone in jet-izing piston aircraft.What was that ugly Soviet thing?The Yak 15?(Had to google IT)
Also by the way I really like your vids and how you present them.Subbed.
You could have added the later follow up FJ-4 Fury.
"Not a pound for air to ground" ... and the FJ-4 was a ground pounder
The straight winged XF-86 was essentially a lightened FJ-1. The author apparently ignores the later FJ-2 and FJ-3 swept wing versions, analogous to the F9 Panther/Cougar.
That tubby fuselage was due mostly to the centrifugal-flow engine, that's why the FH-1 looks so much sleeker.
Invention is a process, the Fury is a good first step.
Move the wings forward, move the nose wheel to the tail, and stick a prop on it and it’s a bearcat.
It fires the imagination to wonder what would have happened if the jet engines of the time had matched the designs that made it to the flying stage. Even into the 50's, engine design was the hold-up in performance, not the aircraft design.
Its was not just jet engines that needed development. An aircraft is a complete package, and every part of that package must function properly with all of the other parts. Wings, engines, fuselage, landing gear, pilot life support systems, control services, avionics, weapons systems, inlet ducts, exhaust management, and numerous other components need to be properly designed and integrated into the whole. Drastically upgrading only one component, without a corresponding upgrade in other components, seldom results in success.
J is only the manufacturer code used by the US Navy. The USAAF just used NA when needed.
So, you're saying that the wings falling off on landing is a bad thing ? 🤔
I dont think you understand how the United States Navy works.
At least the front didn't fall off.
An engine is an engine, no matter what type it is, as long as it is powerful, and the speed of sound barrier taken into account, in their aerofoils. Swept or maybe definitely not.
Speaka da English, my friend?
8:53 Was it a pretty terrible aircraft? Yes but it was not alone. There were plenty 1st generation jet fighter that were terrible. The Fury was one of many jets that could be better classified as a bailing out trainer. Instead of a fighter.
FIRST GEN JET FIGHTERS AAAAHHHHHHHJ *FADES OUT AGGRESSIVELY*
North American Aviation sought a contract to develop a jet fighter , the War Dept and Army Airforce at the time turned them down due to the P51, and other programs .
Meanwhile the Navy sought a navalized P51this led North American to propose a jet Fighter , this led to the development of the Fury Program the FJ-1 was built first.
Why so fat? They did not use axial-flow turbojets like the Germans, but the fat centrifugal compressor that the English developed.
Love the dry comments and understatements.
It was derivative of captured German technology (FW TA-183 Huckbein)
I've often said that the FJ-2, FJ-3, and FJ-4 should have been designated the F2J, F3J, and F4J respectively due to the fact that each was so radically different from its predecessor, especially the FJ-4 which looked absolutely nothing like the FJ-1. That said, I have also been told that the Navy couldn't change the designations due to having to get permission from Congress to make purchases of new a/c and a new designation might have caused undue(?) scrutiny of the new a/c.
There seems to be a lot of FJ-1 in the T-28.
Eh ...
If you look at the advancements during the first 66 years of flight during which we went from Kitty Hawk to our first landing on the Moon - they were truly stupendous compared to the last 60 years of flight ...
So - yes - there were some missteps along the way ...
.
Has any one noticed that aircraft engines have always been the limiting system from Wright Brothers to f-35 melting their tell planes and a tendency to strip their turbine blades out the back.
Yes, it’s even an industry standard, and often mentioned in articles about early developments of a particular aircraft.
It was back in the day, but not always ...
At least the early F-4s were speed-restricted by the canopy design
Same for the XF8U-3
The choice of straight wings for the FJ1 had nothing to do with keeping the aircraft conventional as a backup design in case the swept winged F-86 wasn't a success. The FJ1 was designed, and prototype construction started before the end of WWII. It was only after Germany was defeated in May of 1945 that America gained access to German data on swept wings. Even after that the US Air Force still put their money on the straight winged F-80. It wasn't until the early 1950's, and the Korean War, that the advantages of having swept wings on a fighter was fully recognized. In fact, all of the first generation US jet fighters, (and some second generation fighters), had straight wings. Look at the McDonnell FH Phantom and F2H Banshee, Republic F-84 Thunderjet, Grumman F9F Panther, Northrop F-89 Scorpion, Curtiss XF-87, and Vought F6U Pirate. These were all early US straight winged pure jet fighters, and none were intended as "backup" designs for more advanced swept winged jet fighters. Some of these designed later evolved into more advanced swept winged designs, just as the FH1 did, but none were "backup" designs.
Guppy mouthed aircraft, swollowing as much air as possible.
Damn, It was a 1st generation jet designed in 1945, no less than the F80 which was also a turd.
What the hell? Is it Friday?!
Ha! A bonus this week as I felt guilty putting out a short video that doesn't really get to a satisfying conclusion...
So North American took their very successful p-51 wings, tail, and canopy and built it around a first generation jet engine.
It's a dead end that will be successful a few times in naval avation history despite being tryed almost every new contract... Namely the F-4 Phantom II, F-35 Panther Su-33 Flanker-D are exemples of Land planes actually working as Navy planes.
A very weird fighter to put it lightly.
Looks a bit like the Skyknight
I know right
FJ-4 looks more like a sabre then the FJ-1
@@croskerk That's because the FJ-4 was derived from the Sabre while the FJ-1 was not. The FJ-1 preceded the Sabre and is substantially different in more ways than wing sweep. The resemblance is just that, as resemblance.
@gort8203 i already know that FJ-1 and 4 are very different. Though I never knew much of FJ-1 than FJ-4.
I honestly dont know what jet came out around FJ-1 to lead the FJ-1 to said design, but FJ-4 is more determinable as it was around the time swept wings are coming in full swing.
@@croskerk I didn't tell you the FJ-1 and -4 were different, which you could already see. What you didn't seem to understand was why the FJ-4 looked more like the Sabre than the FJ-1 did.
I can't tell what you mean by: "what jet came around to lead the FJ-1 to said design".
If your "said design" is the FJ-1 then nothing led to it. It was North American's first jet fighter, and was based more off the P-51 than anything else.
If your "said design" is the FJ-4, it was derived from the F-86. The F-86 was not just an FJ-1 with swept wings, it was a different airplane.
@gort8203 i never said that FJ-4 was FJ-1 with swept wings. Dude, I was literally stating differences on looks from a comment. I didn't come here for a full course history lesson that is obvious.
I said that I already knew that the FJ-4 was built off of the Saber design, yet somehow your small brain doesn't seem to comprehend on building off of someone's comment.
The dude earlier said that FJ-1 looks like an F3D skynight, and I was adding on the fact that the FJ-4 is more saber than FJ-1. Maybe there is some reason why FJ-1 looks similar to F3D. I acknowledge that the title may be a wee bit wrong on the saber without being direct. somehow, your dinky brain doesn't seem to understand that and only out there to give out info that doesn't seem to help the conversation and learning about.
In short, no one asked for your damn opinion, so shut up unless there is actual information needing to be corrected or the information you are giving is in value of a conversation. Which has 0 value of this conversation rather than stating the damn obvious but more in-depth. In return, you wasted your time because you're trying to prove a point that was already proven way before you jumped in.
I see absolutely nothing here on your end telling us why the FJ-1 looks like skynight and continued to say that FJ-4 is a saber that I already know and stated.
In short, read the damn thumbnail. The primary commenter already knew thumbnail is wrong, I continued that FJ-4 is more saber than FJ-1, and you're just now adding onto useless information but more in-depth
i hate when video end at midsente
So. How are things going with this channel.
I have to disagree with you on one point, which you make repeatedly in this video. The F-86 certainly wasn’t “the best fighter of its generation”! The MiG-17 was better, but the best was undoubtedly the Hunter.
P-86 can be considered as redesigned P-51.
Ugly is correct . . . euch