Hi Graeme

Not a Bell, but you've nailed the nationality in one shot.

All the best

Rowan

I'd like to say just as Graeme. The tail looks familiar, but in another way though. It looks a bit Curtiss Commando, so this might be from them. An early study for the Blackhawk perhaps?

Tony

Hi Tony

No, not a Curtiss either.

All the best

Rowan

Hi again

OK - I'm officially stunned that no-one has got what I thought was an easy one - well... compared with my usual totally obscure inter-wars biplanes! LOL!.

Time for the give-away clue (I hope!): this was the first of an almost spooky run of fighter designs...

All the best

Rowan

I told you Mr. Mac was interested in the occult (reading about it anyway), therefore the naming convention used

Hi Chuck

After a clue as big as that not being picked up on, I reckon you need to put everyone out of their misery and just name the beast!

All the best

Rowan

Hi again

Chuck hasn't got a follow-up question ready, so I'll try another clue: this is the forerunner of something a caped crusader might have flown...

All the best

Rowan

It's not some early test shape for the XP-67, is it? The engines are facing the wrong way, the tailplane is level and nose is too short, but if it is from Mr Mac, that's the only thing that springs to mind...

Hi Sean

You've basically nailed it without naming it! It's the wind-tunnel model for the McDonnell Model 1, which would have featured a fuselage-mounted engine with drive shafts out to the pusher propellers. (The XP-67 was the Model 2 with conventional wing-mounted engines, but maintaining the advanced streamlining.)

Over to you for the next question.

All the best

Rowan

Oh heck, not again.

Right, then, fairly straightforward ones this time, so three questions in one. No Googling and no Wikipedia!

1 The B-36 in its later versions was blessed with ten engines. What other type had ten engines? (Brings to mind the old interview - reporter: "why do you only fly aircraft with four engines?" test pilot: "because they don't make any with five engines")

2 What was the world's only four-engined three-engined aircraft?

3 The Vulcan and Concorde were two types that used four Bristol Olympus engines. What was the third?

Ok. All guess and no google.

1: Logically it would be the Dornier Do X. At least if the Dornier people spoke roman.
2: Didn't the Lockheed Connie often land with one screw feathered.
3: I think I saw a reference to the Olumpus in a TSR build at Hyperscale. Let's go with the BAC TSR.

(This will probably hurt) Tony

Tony

It might smart a bit ...

1 Not the Dornier, but closer than you might at first at think.
2 Nope - common though that was, that would make it a three-engined four-engined aircraft, if you see what I mean.
3 Only room for two Olympus in the TSR.2. If she'd had four, they'd never have seen her again once the pilot opened the throttles ...

Small clue for 1 and 2: they're both post-war. So I'm not thinking of some bonkers Russian thing with propellers sticking out everywhere and locomotive parts for undercarriage, in case you were wondering.

1. How many engines did the Messerschmitt Gigante have, 8 or 10? Failing that, one of the B&V monsters. Or Hughes' Hercules? (Three guesses in one!)

2. Hmmm ... how many post-war triples were there? DH Drover, BN Trislander, Trident, 727, Tristar, MD 1011, how many modified to take a fourth engine? (I assume not including an APU.)

3. Is Victor or Valiant too obvious?

He shoots ... and hits the crossbar, I'm afraid.

1 6, 6 (assuming the BV 222 or 238) and 8, if memory serves.
2 It's not an APU (I'm not that cruel).
3 You'd think, wouldn't you, but that would be much too logical for UK procurement.

Ah well, none out of three.

a) Would the ten engine be a helicopter? I remember seeing a mad contraption in a book with lots of engines.

b) A JU-52 jet engine test bed

c) Is it an aircraft with the Olympus engines? a ship might use four.

It's tempting at this point to play by Mastermind rules (the board game, not the quiz show) - "you have one right, but I'm not saying which position it's in". But like I say, I'm not that cruel. So:

1 Nope (where would you put ten engines? The most I can recall of the top of my head is four, and that was mad as a box of frogs)
2 I'm after a standard design rather than a testbed (otherwise we'd be into the seven-engined six-engined aircraft - anyone care to hazard a guess at that one?)
3 Very, very warm - it wasn't an aircraft. I know this is an aircraft trivia quiz but since we've had obscure Irish bands creep in, I reckon anything goes (within reason) . As a further help, it moves about as well, so we're not talking static power generation here either.

So now we are down to finding a ten engined flying ship with 4/3 of the powerplants being Bristol Olympusesess-es!

That shouldn't be too hard....

Giving up. Tony

You'd be amazed at how close that is. But we're definitely looking for three different answers, honest!

Did the SRN4 use Olympusses? That would have needed about 4.

10 engines, I am now thinking of one of those immense Soviet Ekranoplan things: The Sea Monster.


That big Russian helo with the two pods of engines on outriggers, biggest one ever flown, that had four engines.
I think it was 2 MI-8s glued to an MI-26.

Ooh ...

1 I was actually thinking of the Saunders-Roe Princess but as the KM had ten engines too, I'll let you have that one! The Princess was indeed a ten-engined flying ship, although it was ten Proteus rather than ten Olympus, so Longknife wasn't all that far off. The KM, eh - like one of Gerry Anderson's madder ideas, the sort his missus would tell him "nah, they'll never swallow that..."
2 Still waiting ... !
3 'Fraid not - the SRN.4 used the Proteus too (and bang goes my next question ...). The one I'm looking for would get wet as well, though, and would spend a lot of time around Portsmouth, like a few hovercraft still do.

The four-engined helicopter was the Mi-12 Homer - two complete Mi-6 powertrains on outriggers, with an airliner fuselage slung between them. You could be forgiven for thinking that every Russian designer should have taken more water with it...

Ekranoplanes! nice one Graeme

Ten engine
I'm sure the sea monster had ten engines.
Bensen b-12 is a chopper with 10 engines too. 10hp each!

4/3
is the layout two engine in the middle and two outboard (say like a tristar but with two engines in the tail)?
Is that an ekranoplane too?

Four Olympuses.
Was thinking hovercraft too. HMS Invincible runs 4 Olympus gas turbines. or are we talking ekranoplanes again?

Or was 3/4 engined bird some freaky testbed for the Double Mamba, maybe a DC-3 / Wellington / Manchester / Pembroke / Catalina (Now I'm just being silly) with the dually in the nose?

Bensen B-12 ... I'd never heard of it but it sounds even more barking than everything else.

OK, jaypee has number 3 - the Invincible-class carriers it is. I've wandered around the engine room of Illustrious and the engines are as impressive as you'd expect - big tubes about three feet across and fifteen feet long. But they're nothing next to the gearbox, which is the size of a house. Literally.

That's one and three knocked off. Jaypee and grubbyfingers have one each so whoever gets number 2 right gets to set the next question. And let me tell you, jaypee is very close now. But it's not another ekranoplan.

A google for bensen b-12 reveals these





ten two strokes all buzzing away. Think you could knock us up one of this Tony?

Or a B-10


Ouch!

Barking Bensen.