TSR.2 - The Plane Shot Down by its Own Government
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- čas přidán 11. 01. 2018
- The Plane that saw the end of the leadership of British aviation, the BAC TSR.2 was a world beater at the time but couldn't survive a government that no longer wanted it.
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Presented by
Paul Shillito
Written and Researched by
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in the early 70's I had a maths teacher who had worked on the TSR2 development, he was very bitter over its cancellation. Many a maths lesson was dodged by asking him about the aircraft and as a result I have had a life long interest in it and aircraft generally. Ironically my mathematics is rubbish.
Duncan Hesketh Hahaha. A fantastic story! Thanks for sharing!
Did you learn or remember anything that might out of the ordinary about TSR2 from this chap?
Duncan Hesketh cool
its quite possible we did learn something from him that now, after over 40 years, has become common knowledge. I remember he told us they showed up for work one day and all the jigs and fixtures were dragged out in the yard and the partially completed air frames were being scrapped off. He was very bitter towards the government (both sides) . Hindsight is perfect, and it would appear he was correct bless him, good old Mr Dawson.
+ Dylan Milne Aside from the projected superlative performance of the TSR2, it was perhaps the first plane to make extensive use of Integrated Circuits in its avionics. The processed wafers were sold off as jewelery with several mounted on a neck chain. What a sad end !
Brought tears to eyes watching this. I remember as a young lad (7) asking my dad what he was working on (English Electric Clayton). told me about the TSR2 and told me it was very fast . I said "was it as fast as this?"(repeatedly punching my hand flattened hand ever faster through the air). He kept jokingly saying "No, faster than that"! I didn't believe him. Remember the day he came home after being made redundant, mum explained what it meant, I said "great you can spend more time at home". Wish he was still here to show him this. Love you Dad.
What did your dad work as?
Not quite sure, probably a fitter. he worked later for BAC ?BAe at Strand Rd and then Salmesbury as a planning engineer working on the jaguar finally.
Touching story mate
@@dukedepommefrites8779 liar
Still have not got over it
My Father was part of the crew that dismantled and rebuilt the TSR-2 into Cosford Museum, he always said it was the best aircraft the RAF never got.
It was originally intended (when planned) to be in service around 1964-5, i.e. the point when it was cancelled, and it wasn't at that point projected to be in service until 1970. It was cutting edge and took too long to develop, unfortunately. It looks absolutely amazing, though.
Liar
Sam u have no proof
@@wbertie2604 1970 had been by far early enough for this brilliant craft .. !
Cosford is a great museum 👍
Target practice? That is like a punch in the balls for the engineers on the project. Shame on the RAF.
Cancelling a project is one thing, conducting a 'book burning' another ..
well, that explains tesla
Labour Government
That reveals the corruption involved.
they did the book burning to the arrow as well
@@holderheck That's funny, I just watched this and had exactly the same thought. The Arrow was Canada's own moment to wrest ignominy from the jaws of greatness.
18.98 hz -- the resonant freq of the human eyeball and the weird things I never thought I might google.
I wonder if you could have a home alarm system to put that out if you were being broken into lol
As long as its not permanently disabling you probably could get away with it.
it doesn't actually do anything harmful, but it can make you see spots if you listen to it for a while. It goes away after a minute or two of not listening. There are a couple of videos on youtube of just a straight track of that frequency for an hour or so. Give them a listen. It's a weird sensation.
i kinda want to play a soundbite of that frequency now just to see what would happen for myself
Mmm...good idea for a weapon
Burning everything, even photos and film, now that's strange, and kinda suspicious of an ulterior motive
Not really. When projects get scrapped, especially forward-thinking ones...the worry about spies etc come into play. And they burn it all.
Exactly. Churchill ordered the same fate for the Bletchley Park computer. And that same guy was voted Britain's greatest. Really? National pride and serving the will of the nation's people is something politicians are incapable of. Their arrogance will not allow for such weaknesses. They work to hidden agendas, their paymasters of none identifiable ilk . Britain is not alone suffering from this sickness, the western world is riddled with it.
This is a myth. There are two complete airframes including engines on display at RAF Cosford and IWM Duxford plus various cockpit sections such as the one at Brooklands. I know I just traveled halfway around the world to see them'.If the government was trying to obliterate it from history why are they given pride of place in government funded museums? And there is lots of video available of XR219 flying.
@@Completeaerogeek Do you think that when they were cancelled they put two complete airframes on display? I would imagine you ask those museums if they came with those engines or if they were retrofitted years later. And what year they rolled into the museum...
Post your results here.
@@Completeaerogeek I've seen the TSR-2 there too.
Im a proud british engineer and this makes me sick to the bottom of my stomach. Bloody politics.
I'm not an engineer and totally agree.
All because a weak stupid Labour Government.
@@Trillock-hy1cf The MacMillan government wanted to cancel it too. Harold MacMillan was persuaded to wait until after the election.
What sealed the TSR2s fate wasn't a Labour government but the introduction of ICBMs. The TSR-2 was intended to extend the life of the V-bomber force by attacking Soviet airfields. The TSR-2 was planned in the 1950s but its development was proving to be protracted with an in service date the same year as the data that the V-bomber force was to be retired. As such it had no clear mission and in 1963 (when the Polaris deal was signed) it was slated for cancellation unless export orders were forthcoming. They were not.
TSR2 was going to get cancelled whichever government took office in 1964. In fact, given the Wilson government's intention to focus on the 'White Heat of Technology' and government funding of such projects the Wilson might have been a marginally better bet, but we're talking a 2% chance over a 1% chance.
What was discussed (on paper) was a bigger version of the TSR-2 as the original form had a small bay for either conventional weapons or reconnaissance equipment. With the lack of export orders and the apparent prevalence of the F-111 in terms of orders and those based in the UK on SAC airbases it was felt that an F-111 version was a better bet. In the end the UK couldn't afford that (being on the gold standard when the USA was looking to break out of that to make Vietnam war costs more affordable meant that it was hard to earn enough USD to pay for it) and that failed and instead Tornado was developed under Panavia with a LOT of UK technology involved.
So the short version is that it wasn't any government but the development of ICBMs, protracted development, and lack of export orders.
@@wbertie2604 Thanks for the info. I was ranting due to a vague memory if it from way back when.
It was ahead of its time back then, expensively so, and the UK was not in a fit state financially being a few years after WWII.
But what was sad, if I remember correctly, that just about all the airframes, jigs etc., were all scrapped just about leaving no records at all of its existence.
I could be wrong again though....:)
@@Trillock-hy1cf Given that there are two at Cosford, they weren't all scrapped. Scrapping jigs is just par for the course as they take up space. Plenty of jigs got scrapped for stuff that was produced at the end of the production runs, and documentation was often poor. The latter is a reason they couldn't keep the last Vulcan flying - not enough documentation to refer to and not enough ability to transfer information from the last people that did maintain them to a new maintenance crew to keep up an airworthiness certificate. It's not so bad for something like a Spitfire as they are relatively simple.
Developed the world's first working practical jet engines... And then sold them to the soviet union.
The only nation to develop an orbit capable rocket, and not use it.
Nearly was the first to break the sound barrier... Then scrapped the project and sold the plans to the US, including the fully moving horizontal stabilizer, without which the US was struggling with the X-1.
Britain: Throwing away its hard earned bleeding edge aerospace technology since WW2.
Still, Eric Brown said he had broken the sound barrier first, no officially maybe but what a guy.
@@Chriswizzv12 I was about to say that George Welch actually broke the sound barrier before Yeager in an early test variant of the F-86 Sabre (funny, due to your current username) in a powered dive. In fact, he was told to stop doing it and instead went up a mere 20 minutes before Yeager's official flight and did it AGAIN. A lot of similarities, especially personality-wise, between Welch and Brown. Good reading out there on both remarkable men. Also fun to note, it's been said a few Allied pilots broke the barrier in dives with their prop planes during WW2... a few survived to describe the effects of mach jump, though they didn't know that's what it was at the time... and I'm sure many more impacted the ground with their fighters when the controls locked up and they couldn't bail out. One guy barely survived when his P-38 did it, heavily damaged itself, and pulled out just before impacting a wheat field in France.
@@pencil12345 Yeah, the cancellation of the later Apollo missions was a crime against humanity. They cited funding issues... yet kept funding the war instead. Incredible.
The smart play would have been to go to the moon. "Our" Government went to Vietnam instead. Military contractors bribed more people..
@@30AndHatingIt
These projects were cancelled during the Cold War, what in fucking tarnation is your priority in this timeline? Total submission to the USSR? The USSR does not care what you want to fund in some idealistic bubble, it knows that if America withdraws geopolitically it gets free reign to KGB takeover neutral or Western-leaning nations and politically pressure them to encroach upon the USA and embargo America where history will not have the USSR collapsing in 1991 but America instead.
Priorities, get them straight. And no the USSR will not let you opt out. You're inside the conflict and locked in because external forces will force you into it. You do not get to divorce yourself from the international matters of the Earth, you're not your own planet.
A perfect example how a generation of very talented and skillfull engineers and manufacturers is " destroyed " by their own governement
The aircraft industry was not without it's problems 51% of the Supermarine Scimitar aircraft were lost to accidents and 38% of the de Havilland Sea Vixen aircraft were lost to accidents. A whole host of British aircraft at the time had serious problems resulting in not only death but huge monetary cost with early retirements and badly needed upgrades.
Maybe so; you seem to be an expert - and I admit, I 'm not.... But, let's face it: if a governement is WILLING to help an industry ( any industy ! ) things can be solved very easely sometimes - if not, it's mostly a bad sort of political agreements ( or politicians ? ) that ruins the future of a company - or companies...
Roger Thijs I'm an amateur really I wouldn't agree completely with politicians killing companies. I haven't been completely straight because of a couple of things as the first two aircraft I mentioned were carrier based. The carriers they were on were often the fault of the losses - realistically they were too small for jet operations and not all of the equipment was up to scratch to support the aircraft. Additionally the valiant's fatigue and easily retirement was due to new the use of new materials - being an industry leader often came at large cost.
Also the government often used badly designed aircraft specifications which asked for contradictory traits and outdated needs, changed the specifications at little notice and cancelled them in much the same fashion.
The state of the aircraft industry was in part due to the government and many other additional factors. The government had already made large cuts in the 50s to the aircraft industry due to aforementioned problems and a need to reduce defence spending. TSR.2's cancellation was a nail in the coffin to our struggling industry.
Ok; point taken. Thank you very much for willing to give this comment. Remains the fact that so many talent is spoiled and wasted by wrong decisions and a completely lack of long - time vision, during decades ...and still happens these days.
Not really the tsr2 was an inferior plane to what the americans already had in service amd was costing more money to develop thats what killed it
the avro arrow suffered the same fate on cancellation, luckily quite a few of the workers ignored the order and took plans home with them instead of destroying them.
My mother was an engineer on the AVRO ARROW. She was one of the chief designers. Due to political forces the project was cancelled (excuse was implementation of Bomark Missle system) and the world class engineers, recruited by my uncle for AVROE from all over the world (he was a structural design engineer on the Spitfire in WW2 and a designer of the Argonaut satellite), went mostly to NASA. A generation brain drain that probably had long term effects on Canada's tech industry future.
My mother worked there as well. She was a technical illustrator/draftsperson from England.
Brain drain, sounds like new Jesus brand bleach! Protect your kids by sanitizing their minds.
Nobody can stomach the taxes or the weather....life in canada just sucks. Nothing is special about it....we make room for you in America...plenty of everything and we arnt pussys so we get things done.
@@dhardy6654 get boned you inbred hick
@@dhardy6654 you forget the pothole
There is only a few channels I like the video before watching and this one tops the list. I never fail to learn something.
It is a gem of a channel. Glad I happened upon it.
Stanton Bentley we are all lucky we found Paul. A gem of a channel is an excellent description!
I have to thank google's algorithm for finding it for me.
I always learn something when I watch these well done videos.
I agree, it's one of the best, accurate no nonsense channels on youtube today and I'm glad I found it as well...no bullshit, no clickbait or hype, just straight up facts and I find his quiet spoken manner very soothing.
This is so similar to the Avro Arrow in Canada, especially at the termination and destruction of the program.
Ian Colquhoun exactly what I was gonna say. Such a waste.
Was thinking the same.
Except the tsr2 was actually a good aircraft unlike the arrow
Will Harriss how was the Arrow not? It reached Mach 1.98 in a climb whilst STILL accelerating. Its engines were so powerful they literally warped a B-47 testbed aircraft beyond repair. It would've also been the first FBW aircraft in the world to enter service (title held by the F-16).
My thoughts exactly.
Sounds like exactly what happened to the Avro Arrow in Canada. Whatever happened was an international conspiracy
Our politicians take their orders and payoffs from the U.S.- that's only what you can expect from corrupt people.
Russians?
The Avro Arrow cancellation cost 30,000 jobs over night. Even the engine which the French wanted was destroyed.
@@igorbardales1771 not this time.
If you study very carefully the pictures of the TSR2 + the Avro Arrow.
You will find they are indeed the same plane?...
I don't know why the British Government cancelled the TSR2 project. Politics truly shot down this fine aircraft and it's own British pride.
because labour is the party where the fascists went to hide after WW2. They only act in german interests.
Ballistic missiles were better.
Same thing happened to the XB-70.
@@bfc3057 wrong. It did work, but our government was forced to cancel it, by the Americans. Get yr facts right.
@@bfc3057 Everybody knows, except you it seems, that we were forced to cancel it, because the Americans wanted to secure export orders for the F1-11. TSR2 was a far more effective platform than any of the V bombers. It was politics that killed it, NOT as you claim, technical difficulties. By the time the project was cancelled, the majority of technical issues had been resolved.
The fact remains that it's high cost and late arrival killed the program, it would be obsolete by the time it was fully operational.
I remember walking home from school and seeing the TSR2 flying overhead accompanied by escort jets. An amazing sight for us kids.
Now tell me you went to some early The Police, Joy division or Depeche mode gigs and I will die jealous
.....LOL! ;)
So lucky
When I was a kid, my Dad used to tell me that we're great at inventing stuff, completely missing the point of it, and then selling it to other countries to buy back for twice the price. It is hard to deny we do seem to have a habit of it...
“Extra management input…”
As an engineer, I can relate to that problem.
Whoever called for the burning of the components should have been burned themselves instead.
BAC did this for symbolic reasons as much as anything else. Primarily to draw attention to the cancellation of the project after so much time, effort and cash had been spent.
Maybe if they just drank some bleach.. the Catholics are using it as a new miracle cure!
If any of the british junk is so great why not just build more of it? Its like the Concorde...yeah it did its job but it still sucked and only a few were built because it sucked. Everyone acts like its all the legislation regarding noise control but thats just false in a big part. Its that the damn plane simply sucked too much fuel for the load that it could carry....so in fact the olympus engines sucked. Its not a conspiracy that makes euro's suck...its that they suck and cant figure that out, sort of a self fulfilling conspiracy....and thats all it is.
@Matthew Morycinski exactly....like say the Boeing fiasco right not...2 shit bird 3rd world aircrews put brand new aircraft in the dirt in 3rd world countries... The first officer in the Ethiopian crash had 300 hours...not in type but total time as a pilot! Then a bunch of pussies blame the manufacturer and then totally unrealated countries ground the jet. Hey, i think Boeing should have restarted the 757 line and made brand new 757s which are awesome aircraft...these clowns are talking about some old 1950s slide ruler junk that never even delivered a useable aircraft.
@@dhardy6654 only a few were built because america couldnt make their version work! this caused them to throw the toys out of the pram and ban concorde from flying over nearly any american airspace. this crippled concorde financially.
concorde did not suck in any way shape or form, it supercruised at mach 2 and 60,000 feet without using afterburner in the late 60s (something america claims to have invented in the 90s) and concorde wasnt even the 1st plane to supercruise either, that was the (english electric) lightning in the late 50s!
Indeed: this sounds an awful lot like the Arrow. To the day he died my Dad (ex-RCAF) never forgave them.
I thought of the Arrow, too.
Laura Halliday cancellation of arrow was a genuine shame but hope the super arrow project goes through the political and engineer ing hurdles and becomes a reality .
I had the Arrow on the brain from seeing the thumbnail, and most in the comments too did I see, the Arrow died in 1959. I believe the same aerodynamicist who did the Arrow worked on the Concorde, which bears a strong resemblance with the delta wings.
My thoughts exactly! Avro Arrow all the way! Although the story of the Arrow is, if anything, even more tragic, since it was probably a much larger part of the smaller Canadian aerospace industry, and all we've got left of it is a cockpit and some models they dragged out of Lake Ontario. But the parallels are so close they're almost spooky, IMO.
Yes, this story appears to be a carbon copy of the development and brutal cancellation of the Arrow. Please somebody explain THAT parallel.
The Canadian Avro Arrow suffered the same fate with some very similar circumstances and time frame, surrounding its demise. Coincidence perhaps?
Not coincidence. Both were obsolete aircraft.
@@Inspadave Not WHATSOEVER! Far from obsolete. They were cutting edge and it took ages before the altitude and speed rating of these crafts would be accomplished. Once the mold is built production is cheap compared to having start from scratch. These crafts were above anyone else's abilities and were considered an unfair advantage. My grandfather was an Air Force mechanical engineer. He worked on these.
There were recent plans to bring back the Avro to replace Canadian F18 instead of F35s
It is the same
America pays for its extermination... Sorry, liberations... By selling its weapons to vassals.
If the vassals make their own superior planes the Americans can't charge for cheap crap (like the F-35, a jet that cannot reliably beat any technologically similar craft in the air).
It's pretty straightforward.
Ahhh, same thing that happened to the Avro Arrow. So, now it all makes so much sense now.
the Avro Arrow was an even greater achievement. What a shame for Canada: from the Avro Arrow to Truedeau, a study of rapid decline
@@christiane.g.4142 ....The Arrow was a conservative party cancellation, because it was a liberal party project. Good ol' Deifendorfer!
Yup! I thought the exact same thing!
@@LoneBrowncoat Dief was a 'red tory' and well to the political left.
@@conveyor2 ...he was a goof, reference the Bomarc missle debacle!
Politicians: preventing useful technology from falling into mankind's hands for at least 12,000 years...
Slavery depends on politicians doing just that.
@@TheBuccy and here we are again with a weak virus and Orwellian governments worldwide.
For the life of me I’ll never understand why, even to this day Britain passionately hates its Aerospace projects. From the TSR 2, to the Black Arrow, and Skylon, it’s almost as if the UK is determined to destroy its own Aerospace industry.
Well there were so many self hating white liberals in Britain who blames themselves for much of the worlds problems. They figured if they could destroy Britain as a power than the world would be a better place.
Its like our government in Australia hating our car industry, they purposely destroyed it and made sure it wasn't coming back.
My guess would be under the desk payments from the US defence industry
Because "BRITAIN RULES THE WAVES", not the skies. The admiralty would never allow the RAF to be preeminent. Simple as that.
UK should definitely invest more in space exploration although i'm not sure Skylon is the best project to pursue.
but dick less conservatives plugging bloated defense contracts to make themselves rich and suck up all the tax payer money from the other more useful projects is not the best way forward.
in the coming decades drones & ICBMs will make a lot of the fighters & bombers obsolete.
This is criminally undersubscribed channel. You guys are awesome.
8:53 -- "... in an unprecedented move both before and since..."
*cough* AVRO ARROW *cough cough*
I like how you get around the use of 4:3 footage by leaving space and separating it smoothly with footage of you. Clever and subtle
Also you do realise that when the Americans were running into difficulty with the development of their F-111 they actually sent a delegation to view the TSR.2 under the auspices of buying into the program, when in actual fact they were there to glean what they could in order to learn & incorporate lessons learnt by the Brits into their own design - i.e. Spying!
The us bribed, blackmailed British MP,s to hold and screw up using this project,that's why they threw those engineers into one company without any planing of the mergers and no allocation of jobs,the f111 was ten years to late,the British were doing engineering,the us used corruption they did the same to Canada,that's why both project were completely destroyed,they made sure they were completely unrecoverable.
It's so sad to think that the British killed its own Aerospace industry. I'm an American and proud of my Aerospace industry but I really wish the British had been able to continue theirs as well.
Exactly what I was going to say. Like intentional sabotage. How could they not see this?
Jerjer B The Americans are partly the cause of the demise of the British aerospace industry (just like they did to the Canadian aerospace industry with the Avro Arrow). The US does not like competitors and wants military exports all to itself.
After WW2 they were leading in computers as well. Threw that away too.
Scotland Forever
Yes it was the Americans. The same goes with the Russians, but russia has stronger sense of patriotism so their aerospace industry persist despite economic setbacks.
It's a common theme in so many area that America is absolutely ruthless in promoting their manufactures and using all means available to remove competition. We've seen it in rockets, computing, both commercial and military aviation, agriculture and probably everything else as well. And then, if you'll excuse me saying so, Americans wonder why everyone laughs at them when they claim to the best and first at everything.
I was interviewed and subsequently employed a chap who was the Lead Manufacturing Engineer on TSR2. I remember asking him during my interview about the demise of the aircraft. His view was that 'productionising' the airframe manufacture would have crippled BAC back in the day. The machining requirements were too stringent for the n/c machines of the day. It's one thing to invest heavily in a prototype/pre-production example, but there was no chance of the production item being financially viable.
Good video. I remember reading aviation magazines in the USA around 1964 about TSR.2. Even American aeronautical experts conceded it was superior to the American "TFX," which became the F-111. The decision to cancel TSR.2 was - as Droid points out - a huge blow to the British aerospace industry. It was also another big contributor to the infamous "brain drain" of the period, which saw many of Britain's most capable engineers and scientists - disgusted with the hostile attitude of their own government towards excellence - leave the country for more hospitable territory. The biggest benefactor was the USA, whose aerospace industry got a very solid boost from the influx of British ex-pat talent. In fact, despite the starring role Werner von Braun & his Germans played, the country of origin for the largest number of foreign scientists and engineers in the US space program was Great Britain.
This story sounds a lot like the Canadian Avro Arrow.
I concur with your comment. It would not surprise me if the Americans took all the R and D from both countries for their aerospace industry
This story reminds me of the Canadian plane ✈️ the Avro Arrow.
That's quite a sad story. As an American I would feel terrible if we had anything to do with stifling innovation.
Time to start feeling terrible.
Don't feel bad!!..all these winners forget completely about reneging on their WW2 debt owed for the enormous loans to our "allies" straight out of US taxpayers pockets!!! ...that's why they backed off their programs..US said "well hell of your doing that good PAY US BACK OUR FRIGGIN MONEY!!!
I don’t know anything about international political arm twisting that killed other countries aerospace programs, but the US certainly did it to themselves when they ordered the destruction of the SR-71 Blackbird tooling in 1968.
Good News: We didn't.
@mandellorian = Uneducated little Jackass. Go curl up with your consolation prize conspiracy theories, loser punk.
My dad was a great aircraft enthusiast. He grew up in the 50'2 and 60's. He always talked about the TSR.2 debacle, and with a tone of regret. I never got the opportunity to find out more about what he was talking about, and his recollections of the time. Many thanks for this little presentation, it makes a lot more sense of what he was talking about and his memories of this plane.
I worked with old software guys who worked on the TSR2. They said the budget ran wildly over and it was still not right.
Really feels like the UK gov has a fetish for destroying the nation's technology industry, with short-sighted excuses such as 'it costs too much' without seeing the future revenue these industries bring.
its likely down to backhanders........'if you support our project, we'll pay for you to have a cruise or lend you a yacht' all successive governments are guilty of it.... they only care enough to get voted back in in 5 years time...thats why this crap tends to happen at the beginning of a term...
Nope, the problem is that Britain is no longer an Empire, and can't afford huge defense projects.
It can have healthy & competitive industries, when making components, or in joint ventures.
It's because they don't want you to succeed too much. They are globalists, they do not put Britian first, but building a one world govt first. They have to reduce you to the lowest common denominator or their schemes can't work.
While Harold Wilson scrapped TSR2 he also destroyed the Black Night rocket and the Isle of Wight space lauch pad, E.G destroyed a complete swath of British aeronautic/aerospace industry, probably on the behest of his Soviet mates/
The Isle of Wight launch pad was decomissioned in favour of launching from Australia which continued into the 1970s. Apparently dropping debris if there was a failed launch in a busy shipping channel wasn't considered helpful. It's also hard to recover it from the sea if there is a failure.
P.S. I am not a fan of Wilson, just historical accuracy.
Man, Im a huge fan of military planes, specially of vintage; and you make fantastic videos and explanations! Even my children have enjoyed it! Congrats for this fine production!
Hawker Hunter was one of the best jets ever produced. Brits have a long history of making very capable aircraft.
Well.........At least until The 1960's.
The Vampire: *sweats very nervously*
It baffles me how much British politics seemed to actively destroy their own industry to step back in favour of the US. There were remarkable know how and products once.
WorldWideWanderlust The UK is/was better than the USA at so many things...but we can't have that can we.
Curious Droid - Another good YT clip from you but a little misleading - The son in law of Winston Churchill and sex scandal peer Duncan Sandys 1957 white paper correctly signaled the end of UK military aircraft development that also effected the Avro Arrow. Although the creation of BAC enabled the UK to concentrate resources and continue with cutting edge technologies such as the TSR 2 for a short time. There were many in the military and government that also worked closely with our American allies.The F111 eventually made it's way to the Royal (Australian) Air Force and it was therefore available to the RAF. RAF pilots undertook CIA operated flights in Canberra's U2's and allegedly SR 71's. The RAF were eventually equipped with the fantastic Blackburn Buccaneer. Most of the Avro Arrow engineers found their way into NASA. Whilst the TSR2 may have been cutting edge, it was far from being a good operational aircraft and the RAF has always been suitably and well equipped. There is speculation that the Concorde was capable of being equipped to carry nuclear weapons within 24 hour notice and whilst the pilots of the SR71 had to use pressure suits and pee in a bottle, they were wearing short sleeves and eating canopies in Concorde. After 1957 the UK concentrated on missile and radar technologies such as Black arrow, Chevaline and ROTOR. "All modern aircraft have four dimensions - Span, Length, Height and Politics. The TSR-2 got the first three right.” Sir Sydney Camm (1893-1966),. Chief Designer, Hawker Aircraft Ltd. In August 1960 - but I'm sure you know all this.
I disagree, as the Germans called the USAFs Starfighter "Earth Anchor" [tent peg].
The US can afford large defense projects, and Britain can't.
What Britain does well is making components, like jet engines, tooling, etc.
But it can't afford to make all its own hardware, but then the US can't either, and imports components. The death of the British Commercial Aviation Industry was self inflicted, as it focused on the wealthy, unlike the US & CCCP, which focused on maximum passengers & lowest passenger mile costs...
Curious Droid
The armed forces always want more of something. If it is cheaper to buy elsewhere they will push for that. Politicians have to take all into account, the employment to make an armament, having a leading edge in some technology, etc.
So that's where us Australians got it from
The same happened with the Arrow from Canada. The enginers went to US. Al Jigs, parts and tooling was destroyed.
I was recently at Cosford and the TSR2 is huge and imposing. It stil looks futuristic in its design.
lol... Avro arrow for canada tsr-2 for UK.
Jérémy Drouin it was bound to happen it was too expensive for its own good
Yes. Both of their stories are very similar. Americans are good at wrestling foreign military tech companies to the ground.
Certainly a similar story to the Avro
The Arrow was obsolete before they even built it. It was a single mission aircraft that didn't have a mission. The Soviet supersonic bomber threat never materialized and with the advent of ICBM's and later SLBM's, interceptors were obsolete.
As to the TSR-2 the Americans already had a aircraft just as good. The A-5 and it flew LONG before the TSR-2. So stop with the conspiracy theory bullshit.
David Smith How can you say the threat from Russian bombers never materialized when the RCAF has been intercepting them in our airspace for decades?
I didn't know any survived! I'll be looking for the TSR.2 when I cross the pond. (There are no remaining XB-35/XB-39/YB-49s so at least you kept something to admire).
The US has lots of rare and interesting aircraft in its various museums. Pop into the USAF Museum at Dayton or the National Air And Space Museum in Washington DC - and you'll find plenty to admire.
Two TSR2s survive, at Cosford and at Duxford. Some fuselage sections are on display at Duxford.
Cosford is not too far from Birmingham Airport.
Pete Kuhns Get yourself along to the Imperial War Museum at Duxford mate,you'll love!
Cosford is really well worth a visit.
Cosford is an excellent air museum. There are some real gems in the American Museum at Duxford too and they're less than 200 miles apart :)
"The 4th dimension" also scuttled the Avro Canada CF-105 in the late 1950s, with similar unemployment and emigration of design and manufacturing talent. I admire Sweden's approach, relying on their own excellent SAAB aircraft.
I lived in Salisbury during the flight testing period, every Friday morning it would take off from Boscombe Down and fly around between Salisbury and Andover, we were supposed to be doing cross country running from our school but once we were away from the school we just stood and stared at this wonderful aircraft flying in front of us. Brilliant time watching it and so sad to see it scrapped.
this is eriely similar to the Avero Arrow In the 1950's in Canada. Everything was destroyed from the project. Could you do a video of the Arrow?
I just made the same comment 3 years later...sorry to zombie your thread. But I'd love to hear him narrate the Arrow story too!
This is a great video and I love, but the video does skip and miss several points, including the fact that it was so overweight it couldn't meet its own requirements for range, the engine had a tendancy to explode and the design process was a shambles, largely thanks to Vickers and the sheer load of subcontractors. The book 'Britain's Lost Bomber' explains the project in incredible detail. Despite all this, this is my favourite aircraft, and it would've been a world beater had it met all its objectives. Most of which were incredibly lofty and unrelated to what it would actually have done. Get the book, it's a bloody good read.
The TSR2 would have met its specification, eventually - but only if a lot more money was spent on it. The Government just couldn't see how they could afford it.
Charles clvr Ah but that's what they do to get as much money out of government as they can. They under estimate and over promise. Be it a military firm or government departments they want as much funding as possible. NASA estimated Space X would spend 4 billion developing the Falcon 9. However it was 390 million, less than 1/10th. They rarely come under budget and nearly always underspend. Its not just NASA, it's the Perfect which can lose trillions apparently, FBI and CIA who bet billions and over pay their employees. They don't make their money via voluntary exchange but have their hands in peoples pockets. They're legal gangsters. Or aristocracy. Whatever you want to call them. That's why all these things go on. It's one rule for them, one rule for everyone else.
Taxation is theft
Charles clvr
didn't get the memo? in all cases at all times all failures are the fault of the US
It was a new and undeveloped engine (that went on to great things, eventually). Pairing a new engine with a new airframe is a known risk multiplier.
Weight growth is inevitable in any aircraft development. This has been known since the Wright Brothers.
I have Derek Wood's Project Cancelled, which is also instructive about the long slow trainwreck of the TSR-2 project. Successive governments fiddled with the requirement, employed vast bureaucratic committees to oversee every small aspect, and smothered the development in paperwork. The planemakers (remember them?) continued to rely on amateurish management, mostly promoted by the old boy network. Neither side made any attempt to do proper project management, and as the project became the only military aviation program that the Government was promoting, every body and his dog tried to get on board. Cue even more cost escalation.
I would mention that while the airframe flew, and very successfully, none of the systems integration had happened, or even been planned. Hindsight tells us that it would have been a long hard slog to get all the systems working satisfactorily. The aircraft was still a long way from entry into service.
I have read that Jenkins and Healey (who are the guilty parties, though they always denied it) wanted to cancel Concorde, until they saw the contracts and what the cancellation fees would have been. Sucking their teeth, they turned to the next biggest victim, TSR-2. Despite their pre-election promises to the aircraft industry workers that "their jobs were safe with Labour". There's nothing new about politicians turning out to be lying bastards.
It would have worked, given proper attention, less Government interference, and a revolution in BAC management. What can be said, again with 100% hindsight, is that the F-111 was never going to be the answer to a maiden's prayer that it was expected to be. Thin-wing Buccaneer would have been a winner, and it is the biggest missed opportunity of all.
Alan Dicey I am aware of weight growth and engine teething problems which are to be expected. But the Olympus 22R wasn't the first choice, the RR Medway was... due to reliability. The 22R suffered catastrophic LP compressor shaft failures on multiple occasions, a problem which still wasn't addressed come flight testing, the test pilots were given limits and were forbidden from selecting high thrust levels. By many it was considered (and still is) to be un flight worthy and potentially deadly. Weight issues... can't remember all the details of the top of my head but they did lead to the TSR2 falling around 200nm short of the prescribed range. Admittedly that range was too high and with all the requested specifications it would be a heavy plane, but even for overweight planes it was bloated. No comment on aerodynamics and looks. They were perfect. This project was killed when Duncan Sandys produced his famous white paper forcing companies to collaborate and chase one wild goose. The sad reality is this, had it continued, it would've bankrupted the RAF. It was Britain's defence or Britain's airplane industry on thr chopping block. I would've made the same unthinkable decision too. What a plane though.
Looks like our British cousins made the same mistake we made in Canada with the Avro Arrow.
I've seen the remaining TSR2 at RAF Cosford
What a really interesting and thought provoking comment, thank you.
In the first supersonic test the prototype broke... the sound barrier.
Pólvora Del Rey 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣......you almost got me
With only ONE afterburner active
The Australian Government got a knock down price on the F-111, but we had to send a second battalion to Vietnam to keep the American's happy on that one! Because the Australian government was thinking of pulling out of Vietnam but we needed the jets and we couldn't afford the jets after the price blown out due to wing problems and the aircraft was grounded! Funny sounds just like the F-35 program.
I guess if the Americans are going to give it to us in the arse, we should ask for flowers and chocolates too! cheers mate
TheWheels1965
there you go blaming the US for being such a cheap date. wiggle your tail for the chinese and see how that works out for you
Except that while the Yanks called their F-111 "Aardvark", the Australians called theirs "Pig", because they could sniff the ground very effectively, but also head off at incredible speed. So Pig was a much more evocative name. While the F-111c Pigs were very effective for Australia, when they were effectively commissioned into the RAAF almost a decade late, I think the TSR.2 would have been even better for Australian needs.
I remember watching a documentary on this many years ago. One of the union shop stewards said that management would ask the workers to complete a piece of work on the plane in say 30 days. The guy said that 30 days was very generous to get it done but they would complain that it wasn't achievable, so would then be given 60 days to do it. This just added to the continual delay. The irony is the shop steward guy seemed quite pleased and proud of himself. That was the 60's and 70's!
socialism at it's best.
@@FlyingWildAZ Nah just the arrogance and corruption that comes with any group that gains too much power and influence.
Sounds a lot like what happened with the A V Roe Arrow jet fighter in Canada
The test pilot was named Roland Beamont (pronounced BEEmont, not Beaumont). He had also test flown the Canberra and the Lightning.
The Canberra might be better known as the Martin B-57 to 'mercuns. Yes you do like British planes and then build them under licence. "The B-57 Canberra holds the distinction of being the first jet bomber in U.S. service to drop bombs during combat." The Harrier is another memorable example of British technology adopted by the USA. Then there's the Resonant Cavity Magnetron that transformed radar. It was a gift from us. Want me to go on ?
The Americans are not fussy. If someone comes up with a better idea than one of theirs, they will accept it instead of - although they will try to adapt and use the idea so they obtain both a military and/or commercial advantage from it.
The Harrier is a very good example - and it is doubtful it would have seen the light of day as a viable weapons system without the support of the Americans, particularly the Marines. Neither the RAF nor the Royal Navy were interested in the concept[t originally. It's potential was recognised by the US Marine Corps, who pushed for American aid to be given to the British to push the design along.
Actually it was the British Army Air Corps that were first interested in it as a an attack and fighter plane that needed no runway. It could also be hidden under a few trees and camouflage net in the fields of Germany, should the Warsaw Pact attack ! I've never heard of any American aid. Hawker-Siddeley did it alone after their experiments with the Kestrel AFAIK.
Yes, I was correct "Throughout much of the early development work, there was no financial support for the project from HM Treasury (never mind the USA), however, support for the engine development portion of the effort was sourced via NATO's Mutual Weapon Development Program".
One thing that the article curiously doesn't mention is the engine water injection to increase thrust. 90 seconds worth is carried IIRC.
"It was exported to the United States as the AV-8A, for use by the US Marine Corps (USMC), in the 1970s." NOT copied !
It has an advantage over the F-35B in that it can engage in 'VIFFing' which the F-35B is inherently incapable of because of its cover over the lift fan for 'stealth' that also acts as an airbrake. It can't be engaged at speed and takes some time to operate.
"Starting with just 20 Sea Harriers, a further eight joined the (Falklands) Task Force by mid-May. A total of six were lost by accident or ground fire, and not one in air-to-air combat"
Money may have been sourced (obviously) for the development of the improved Harrier II / AV8-B which was a joint BAe / McDonnell Douglas project. ... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harrier_Jump_Jet ... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawker_Siddeley_Harrier ... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Harrier_variants
The NATO fund which was primarily funded by the US. That is why the Tripartite squadron was set up.
The US Marines loved the Harrier and were instrumental in making sure it got built - both generations. As far as I am aware, the British Army never flew Harriers. The RAF hated the thing (initially) because they thought it was too slow and couldn't carry a useful payload. The Royal Navy also hated it because they thought adopting the Harrier concept would mean they would lose their plans to operate big carriers.
In the end, circumstances and economics meant that both the RAF and the Royal Navy ended up using the Harrier and, in the end, grew to like it, a lot.
It did have payload and range shortcomings, which is why the second generation Harrier was proceeded with, again, mainly at the behest of the US Marines. And this time the Americans more or less took over the project to ensure it got built - many of them in the US by McDonnel Douglas.
And the original concept was French. So, the Harrier although championed by Hawkers was quite an international project.
When I was doing my Apprenticeship a lot of my tutors worked on the project. I don't think people relies how ground breaking this project was and how in my opinion the TSR2 would still be in service today (in some form) if it had proceeded. It was that advanced. But again like the Avro Arrow a..... Certain country through there toys out there pram and didn't like a little competition and there still doing it today Bombardier comes to mind.
Simon Walton quite likely given the length of service of the Canberra - my understanding is that the US still flies their variant.
Very unlikely to be still flying considering both Australia and the USA wound down their F111's a fair few years ago...
the usa are still flying there canberra's double the sensors of the u2 just flys a little lower
Great video! I don’t hear much on British aviation after WW 2, so thank you for the little history lesson! Keep up the good work, love your posts.
Why have i only just discovered you. You are flipping interesting and your delivery is superb.
_"the country was spending far more than it could afford"_
*Spot on.*
YF-23 suffered a similar fate. I've always said that Northrop's critical mistake in designing the YF23 was that they gave the USAF precisely what it asked for, not it "wanted". What the USAF wanted was an evolutionary aircraft, draped in revolutionary ad copy buzzwords. Northrop created a revolutionary aircraft. Whoops.
thedungeondelver Northrop with the YF-23 and Boeing with their JSF concept both lost out to Lockheed and its hard not to suspect favoritism in both cases
i thought the f22 was better. I read somewhere of the shhortcomings of the yf 23 compared to the yf 22. but i dont recall it at the moment.
thedungeondelver
_Wants_ and _Needs_ are different.
The reason the YF-23 was not selected instead of the Raptor was because the DOD still upset from cost over runs on the expensive B-2 Northrop built .
+thedungeondelver Errrr, yes.
Loved the video, thanks for posting.
Currently my most favourite documentary-oriented channel. Love the host, the music, the excerpts, everything. It reminds me of the golden days of Discovery Channel during the 90's. Thanks for making all of these! Amazing jet, truly a shame that it was cancelled by politicians lacking faith in their own nation and resources. So fast, such a small takeoff distance required for it... All for it being burned and wasted. Little did I know as well, that much of the research and production of the TSR.2 influenced and continued into the Concorde. The Panavia Tornado also bears huge resemblance to the TSR.2 as stated - one cannot help but think of the original.
Hypothesis one: The decision to totally destroy the TSR2 and other projects came directly from Americas military industrial complex because they didn't want competition.
Hypothesis two: It took corrupt businessmen and politicians on both sides of the pond to make hypothesis one work.
Hypothesis three: That same military industrial complex and the international culture of corruption that goes along with it is still with us as strong as ever today.
Drogo Baggins Quite right another case in point is the Miles M.52,once again shaffed by the yanks.
That damn military industrial complex. I guess Britain isn’t a democracy after all.
+Mr Obvious Any British MIC that MAY have existed is now defunct thanks to those mentioned by Drogo Baggins.
+Paul and Sue Roberts Indeed, the gift of the all flying tail allowed the Bell X-1 to go supersonic, AFTER the M.52 was inexplicably cancelled.
pasoundman I was referring to the US and how they were supposedly able to force Britain to dump this project without them having a say. Seems just as reasonable it was cancelled due to costs. I was being a bit fictitious since OP had 3 hypothesis’s that were basically the same and all blamed the US. Hypothesis 4: it was unnecessary and too expensive.
Paul, my 87 year old father is very much enjoying your channel. He sent me an article this morning on his old friend, who he worked with at North American Aviation before it was Rockwell. Dad claims that George Welch flew an F-86 supersonic in a dive at Paradise Ranch a month before Yeager did it in the X-1. Do you know that story?
It could be possible that the Pitot Tube spedometer read too high (they tend to do that coming up on Mach 1, and this needs to be corrected for by computers). For example, there are many stories of Spitfires diving at full throttle and thinking they had broken the sound barrier.
@@Jupiter__001_ no they didn't think they had broken the sound barrier all that was noted is that they had hit the point just before the sound barrier.
@@micksharp1169 I disagree. I am 90% certain I read of one or two claims of breaking the sound barrier, not just coming up on it, though I may be wrong, as memory can be false.
The F86 could do it in a dive, Yeager mentioned it in his book. At that time were they only up to the F80?
Io it is physically impossible for a spitfire to break the sound barrier - either in a dive, or any other way.
This is due to the propeller itself, not necessarily the airframe. The supersonic stresses on the propeller tips would have broken the propellers off at the point just before Mach 1. The stresses on the airframe itself, probably wouldn't have handled it either.
The shockwaves themselves would have sat right on top of the Wings, which weren't designed to have supersonic shock waves sitting on top of them. Not only that, but the moment of supersonic shockwave sits on flight surfaces, the pilot would be doomed.
Thanks for Uploading.
A really nice and very informative video about British Aeronautical history..Thanks alot
Not COMPARING WITH TSR.2,but in INDIA also US is lobbying to destroy our indigenous fighter jet project TEJAS so that we will buy F-16 BLOCK 70, YES TEJAS might not be as great as f-16 but it helps in understanding fighter jets as everyone knows NECESSARY IS THE MOTHER OF INVENTION.Tejas may not be great but helps a lot in future fighter jet programs because "because best teacher is your last mistake"
I totally understand what you're saying and I do not like the idea of my government stifling what may be an ally and her projects but think of it this way- billions of dollars or the equivalent in rupees would need to be spent to develop something that would not quite be as good as a 40 year old aircraft. That doesn't sound like a winner to me. Add on the proven upgrades program and the willingness of Lockheed to build them in India, well that's a hard proposition to beat. There will be a wealth of engineering training brought to the Indian aerospace sector right there.
Is putting a jet engine on "reheat" the British way of saying "afterburner"? Great video by the way, keep up the fantastic work! :)
Yes, same thing.
oh. so that is what reheat supposed to mean.
Annoyingly the 'reheat' process when applied to a turbine also describes adding more heat to the gases (I guess by another combustion process) between the two turbines to gain extra efficiency, as opposed to afterburner, which burns fuel after the turbines and before the nozzle to gain a huge amount more power. I guess that's the one situation where the American terminology is better than the British
The other combustion process is with air that's still in the exhaust gases.
As far as I am aware they are an identical process, they both use rings at the aft portion of the engine to inject more fuel resulting in more power, although it is much less efficient as it burns a lot more fuel than it makes up for in power, so yeah afterburner does make sense, the exra fuel BURNs in the AFT portion of the engine
My mum's grandfather worked on the landing gear on the TSR-2 and we have kept the passion for the aircraft in the family alive since then. I always make a trip to RAF Cosford to see XR220 whenever I'm in the area. God bless British engineering ❤🤍💙
Brilliant mini doco and love the shirts
Had the RAF and Navy had any common-sense they'd have bought a stack of TSR2's + Buccaneers then had them under joint-command.
Add to that Lightning's and the Harrier . . . .what a combo.
Bad idea.
You guys should do one on the Avro Arrow. I know there's other people mentioning it but I don't think anybody so far has suggested doing a video on one.
Excellent, thank you for this video. As a former Handley Page flight test observer, on Victors from 1957 to 1960, this really made me grind my teeth! *****
Excellent and informative video CD - really interesting thanks!
Curious Droid: The simultaneously most depressing and enjoyable channel on youtube!
In those days the British not only designed and built the best but also the most beautiful. Just look at the Sea Vixen!
Hmm, the Sea Vixen that had a 38% accident rate over its whole fleet...
Dylan Milne ok point taken. Still beautiful though.
Agreed, I first saw the Sea Vixen a few years ago when it unexpectedly punched through clouds and rolled - it stole my heart. They were displaying over the town I was in the next day which I unfortunately couldn't watch but just seeing it got me into classic jets there and then.
Nice to see my favorite F4-Phantom II in here, albeit briefly.
I hope you will do a full video on it some time.
An article I read in the 80s about the way this aircraft was cancelled summed up the whole thing "once again a country's armed force has found it's most dangerous enemy is so often it's own politicians"
You guys should definitely make a video about the Avro Arrow CF-105!
I’ve seen the one at Duxford, and she is a beauty. Shame to see should a potential aircraft scrapped.
i really like the details you give.
FYI, Royal Australian Air Force also considered the RA-5C (A-5 with slightly greater wing area) Vigilante as a replacement for its English Electric Canberra.
As soon as i saw the title i had a fair idea what country it was
I've heard of the TSR2 but never heard its story. Those rear landing gears look similar to the ones on the Russian MiG-31 Foxhound.
I think its like a big naughty Jaguar..
Thank you for such great information of history.
My father was a sergeant in the RAF at the time. He was seconded to the TSR2 as a hydraulic specialist, he has always spat feathers about what happened to this “amazing aircraft” His words.
When I think of the loss of the TSR2 I always get very angry, go and see one in a museum and realise how phoney the 'special relationship' is.
Roger Hudson
thank allah you have the US to blame for all your troubles. otherwise what would you do?
really the Suez crisis did not show you that your special relationship is not one of equals
And now we've bought the F35 from them :(
Chance Belcher
Arrogant Johnson, who got to power in a coup, did interfere with the UK domestically. Wilson remembered and never backed the US in Viet Nam.
Red Ice
There is a huge UK input to the F35.
Rumor was that Tony Benn received a very large brown envelope to scrap TSR2 and buy the F111's....
johnyfartpants I doubt it was Tony Benn, but I'm sure Lord Mountbatten and the Duke of Edinburgh were involved in a very large way in terms of brown envelopes.
The Aardvark Was a Hot Ship.....Killed far too many Good Pilots in '68-71.
Which were cancelled as the F111 did not meet the performance requirements. The UK ended up with Phantoms.
The former Viscount Stansgate(Antony Wedgwood Benn), his father bought the title from Lloyd George, would not make a decision which nuclear reactor design the UK should use in nuclear power stations. The Industry kept asking for a decision, lack of which damaged UK nuclear industry. A good reason why politicians should be kept well away from technical decisions as they only screw them up. The Bennite wing of the Labour party was even more vicious than the Corbynite wing of the current Labour party. Tony Benn was described in the Crossland diaries as a nice guy shame he is cracked. I think the same is probably true of his son who is an EU remainer
Given what we know about tony benn I doubt he would favour an American manufacturer over a british one.
I have never voted Labour but I have always had enormous respect for Tony Benn and I am certain he was anything but a brown envelope man.
Thank you, enjoying your videos.
Very interesting and informative video. Thanks for all the work you must have done to put it together. It's a very puzzling end to this story of such a magnificent, world class plane. Somebody, somewhere must know why they went to such great lengths to destroy its existence.
Read the biography about John Boyd by Robert Coram. When presented with the preliminary specs for the F-111, as soon as he heard it had a swing wing, he quickly predicted the additional weight, complexity, the loss of performance, design, testing and production delays.... As an alternative to the F-15 he promoted the F-16 which was less expensive, more versatile... One plane that was being presented through the Pentagon and Congressional oversight/selection committees had ginned up performance characteristics. Boyd projected the lift numbers for the wings back to zero velocity to expose the fraud. At zero forward velocity the wing still would have significant lift-- not yet possible in this Universe.
So basically the UK by infighting, and with the help of Montbatten (who provides an excellent argument for getting rid of the monarchy and titles) sank its significant lead in aerospace. We've seen that more than a few times in history.
The F-111 while complex, was superior to the TSR2 in range speed and payload. (Read Damien Burke's excellent book on TSR2) In Gulf War 1 F-111s dropped the lion's share of precision munitions and the RAAF operated them very successfully for 37 years. At the time of their retirement they were still the best medium range land/maritime strike aircraft in the world.
"Lords" like Mountbatten, haven't a clou of technology. They should keep their mouth's shot.
@@Completeaerogeek But not sexiness though. And thats the main thing. I also thought the hydraulics leaked like a sieve but I may be confusing it with the B1b
Another fine example of British ingenuity combined with British self-destruction
Nicely done
Thanks for doing a great job on this, you covered a lot of detail outside the commonly ( oversimplified ) telling of this story. I wasn’t around at the time but everything I’ve heard & read during this time in Britain was how much it was struggling economically , aircraft enthusiasts have to be realistic that it just didn’t have even a fraction of the money the USA could put into military/ aerospace development at that time. BTW it’s usually read as “R, double A, F”
Just what every project needs... more management. ;-(
Mach 1.1 at sea level + V/STOL? That is indeed ambitious!
edit: WAS ambitious for the 60s
Ive been told by someone involved in this project that there are 3 of these planes buried at the end of the runway at Warton near Blackpool where they were part assembled ......
Thank you for the information. Complemented my own.