ALTERNATIVE TO WINDOWS BLINDS

Blackburn Buccaneer

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedi

Buccaneer S.2B, RAF Mildenhall, 1988
Role Strike aircraft
Manufacturer Blackburn Aircraft Limited
Hawker Siddeley
First flight 30 April 1958
Introduced 17 July 1962
Retired 1994
Primary users Royal Navy
Royal Air Force
South African Air Force

The Blackburn Buccaneer was a British low-level strike aircraft with nuclear weapon capability serving with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force between 1962 and 1994, including service in the 1991 Gulf War.

Designed and initially produced by Blackburn Aircraft it was later known as the Hawker Siddeley Buccaneer when Blackburn became a part of the Hawker Siddeley group.

Design and development

In the early 1950s the Russian Navy introduced the Sverdlov class cruiser into service. Light cruisers by Second World War measure, they were fast, effectively armed, and numerous.

They presented a serious threat to the merchant fleets in the Atlantic, similar to the German "pocket battleships" of the war, but in far greater numbers and over 25% faster.

To counter this threat the Royal Navy decided to counter the Sverdlovs not with a new ship class of their own, but a new specialised strike aircraft employing conventional or nuclear weapons. Operating from their fleet carriers and attacking at high-speed and low-level, they would offer a solution to the Sverdlov problem.

A detailed specification was issued in June 1952 as Naval Staff Requirement NA.39, calling for a two-seat aircraft with folding wings, capable of flying at Mach 0.85 at 200 ft (61 m), having a combat range of over 400 nmi (460 mi; 740 km), and carrying a nuclear weapon internally.

Based on the requirement, in August 1952 the Ministry of Supply issued specification M.148T, and the first responses were returned in February 1953.[1]

Blackburn's design by B. P. Laight, Project B-103, won the tender. Due to secrecy, the aircraft was called BNA (Blackburn Naval Aircraft) or BANA (Blackburn Advanced Naval Aircraft) in documents leading to the obvious nickname of "Banana Jet". (Other sources have described the initial project title as 'ARNA,' 'A Royal Navy Aircraft,' with Blackburn ARNA quickly becoming 'Banana'.)


An RAF Buccaneer S.2B in 1981.

The wrap-around camouflage was applied as observers would often be looking at the undersides of the aircraft as it manoeuvered at extremely low level.

The Buccaneer was a mid-wing, twin-engine monoplane with a crew of two seated in tandem under a sliding canopy.

To meet the demands of the specification, the Buccaneer featured a number of advanced design features. The fuselage was area ruled; meaning it was designed to reduce drag at transonic speeds.

This gives rise to the characteristic curvy "Coke bottle" shape. It featured a variable incidence tailplane that could be trimmed to suit the particular requirements of low-speed handling or high-speed flight.

At the low-levels and high speeds traditional bomb bay doors could not be opened safely into the air stream, therefore doors were developed that rotated into the fuselage to expose the payload. This was also useful in assisting ground-level access.


RAF Buccaneer S.2 with wings foldedThe small wing of the Buccaneer was suited to high-speed flight at low level.

Such a wing, however, did not generate the lift that was essential for low-speed carrier operations. Therefore, the wing and horizontal stabiliser were "blown" by bleeding compressor gas from the engine through surface vents.

A consequence of the blown wing was that the engines were required to run at high power for low-speed flight in order to generate sufficient compressor gas for blowing.

Blackburn's solution to this situation was to provide a large air brake. The tail cone was formed from two leaves that could be hydraulically opened into the airstream to decelerate the aircraft.

The nose cone and radar antenna could also be swung around by 180° to reduce the length of the aircraft in the carrier hangar. This feature was particularly important as contemporary British aircraft carriers were small.

The first Buccaneer model, the S.1, was powered by a pair of de Havilland Gyron Junior turbojets producing 7,100 lbf (32 kN) of thrust. [2]

This mark was somewhat underpowered, and as a consequence could not take off fully laden with both fuel and armament.

A temporary solution to this problem was the "buddy" system; aircraft took off with a full load of weaponry and minimal fuel and would sortie with a Supermarine Scimitar that would deliver the full load of fuel by aerial refuelling.

This was not an ideal solution, however, as the loss of an engine during take-off could have been catastrophic, and the Gyron Junior gave a poor range due to high fuel consumption.

The long term solution was the S.2, fitted with the Rolls-Royce Spey turbofan, providing 40% more thrust with a greatly reduced fuel consumption.

The engine

Look up, look waaaaaaaaaaaaay up! For Our Daily Challenge - Abstract. Laying in the hammock with small aperture and slow shutter speed I was able to blur the view looking up into the canopy. Then, in photoshop duplicated the image, flipped the duplicate horizontally, moved it on to the original, changed the blending mode to lighten and then moved the top layer to reveal the patterns. Swinging in the hammock for 1/5 of a second @ f40.

Don't use this image on websites, blogs or other media without explicit permission.
© Barbara Dickie All rights reserved.