RE: Harrier GR3: You Know You Want To

[hidetheelephants]

Eric Mc said:

garypotter said:

A stunning peice of british engineering (with help from the EU usa etc) my favourite war plane of all time and sadly missing from airshows.

British engine (the Bristol Siddeley Pegasus, a development of the Orpheus, another fine jet engine, both masterminded by the great Sir Stanley Hooker)

Concept by a Frenchman (Michel Wibault)

Idea put into metal by Sir Sidney Camm

Potential spotted by US Marine Corps (not the RAF or the Royal Navy)

Testing part funded by the US (through the MDAP programme following representations by the US Marines)

EVENTUALLY, the British military decided that such an aeroplane had its uses and the Harrier proper came into being.

Edited for

[IanMorewood]

0836whimper said:

Ahem....these sex shops....where are they and what do they sell ?

Just south of the a57 junction if I recall and you should be able to find yourself a new butt plug.

[mybrainhurts]

My neighbours don't like my cars.

I could seriously piss them off with this bit of kit....

[dandarez]

I thought I seemed to remember some guy buying a Harrier for his garden...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2441319/Th...

[fatboy69]

mybrainhurts said:

My neighbours don't like my cars.

I could seriously piss them off with this bit of kit....

I dont like/get on with my neighbour's so this on the drive would seriously piss them off.......

Its mine!!!!

[mybrainhurts]

fatboy69 said:

mybrainhurts said:

My neighbours don't like my cars.

I could seriously piss them off with this bit of kit....

I dont like/get on with my neighbour's so this on the drive would seriously piss them off.......

Its mine!!!!

You'll have to fight me for it....

[Rotary Madness]

yellowjack said:

robj4 said:

Amazing that people think anyone can learn to fly an early Harrier

I too am amazed that anyone thinks it's a skill that can be learned without it being your day job. Plenty of professionals have come unstuck at the controls of a Harrier, including top display pilots.

I recall a 'near miss' that took place over Hawley Woods near Farnborough, back in the early 90's. Back then there was something called the "Staff College Demonstration" put on for the benefit of the courses at the Staff College in Camberley, and Gibraltar Barracks hosted it, at least the year I was there. We had representatives from every branch and trade in the Royal Engineers, including armoured engineers, and the 'tin kickers' from Waterbeach, whose role was to support RAF off-base deployment of the Harrier force. As part of the demo, a Harrier would be camouflaged in the woods, and then brought out, launched and recovered. During one rehearsal the pilot was coming to the end of his display, and "taking a bow" to the crowd, when somehow the aircraft accelerated, in a nose-down attitude, and very nearly slammed into the ground before our eyes. How he held it together and regained full control I'll never know. Some eye-witnesses swore that he snapped the tops of a few pine trees on his way through. Disaster was narrowly averted that day, and there was no drama on the actual 'live' demonstration before the assembled officers.

Would most of these incidents be the result of cocking about to show off at air shows?

[fatboy69]

No chance.

Its mine because i dis-like my neighbour's intensely.

[ArnieVXR]

yellowjack said:

robj4 said:

Amazing that people think anyone can learn to fly an early Harrier

I too am amazed that anyone thinks it's a skill that can be learned without it being your day job. Plenty of professionals have come unstuck at the controls of a Harrier, including top display pilots.

While I agree that it probably takes a fair bit of effort to achieve a level of competency, I'd suggest that most people could learn to fly an early Harrier given the right training. That few have learned and they were the best of the best is a function of the limited number of places for Harrier pilot and the high cost of the training, not that only supermen could ever do it.

[Bluebottle911]

Presumably they come with an owner's manual, like with a car.

[oliverjthomas]

leedsutd1 said:

someone where I live ,place called Queensbury near Halifax used to build old planes out of wrecks , he built a harrier ,very similar to this a few years ago and sold it on Ebay ,cant remember price around £80k ,don't know if this it ?

I was wondering the same. I remember it disappeared sometime early last year, but then I saw another one on a low-loader a few weeks later heading out of Halifax towards Queensbury.

Anyway, rules? What rules? Someone needs to buy this, get it flying again, arm it and learn to pilot it. When the Zombie Apocalypse comes, nobody will be bothering about type approved bolts or thrust to weight ratios

[Jimbo.]

TIGERSIX said:

http://www.aaib.gov.uk/publications/bulletins/octo...
Sorry Jimbo
Oh yes you can mate of mine had a decommissioned Hawker Hunter in civi sadly he suffered a misdemeanor and planted it ,Wally Cubit was a top crop duster pilot in the 70's a carpenter by trade and a self taught aero engineer . His down fall was not wanting to disapoint the crowds at an airshow one day .

There is a world of difference between a Hunter and a Harrier! And that's before you get to the pilot skills required to fly them.

[Mark Wibble]

Rotary Madness said:

Would most of these incidents be the result of cocking about to show off at air shows?

No- the Harrier is extremely difficult to hover with very little power margin if something starts to go wrong. Sure you could not display the VTOL capability to anyone and buzz around in conventional flight but that tends not to impress anyone. Even experienced pilots make mistakes now and again- and unfortunately the Harrier could be somewhat unforgiving.

[Eric Mc]

hidetheelephants said:

Edited for

Top ing there.

Hooker is one of my heroes.

[will261058]

HoHoHo said:

llamafarmer said:

Oh, and they lied about it seeing missions in Falklands:

BAe Harrier GR.3 XZ132

29.03.82 - A of 233 OCU Wittering, transferred to 1(F) Sqn during April.

Allocated fin code - Red 36. Outrigger codes - Yellow 36. ALE-40 chaff dispensers fitted.

04.05.82 - flown from Wittering to St Mawgan, from there on 05.05.82 to Banjul and on to Wideawake, Ascension on 06.05.82. Suffered from incurable fuel leaks; returned to Wittering, date unknown.

Source: http://archive.is/vEKoS#selection-1717.0-1769.72

How on earth can a jet suffer from 'incurable fuel leaks'?

Presumably there's a finite number of pipes and bolts that are either loose or need a tighten up?[/quote

The fuel leaks would not have been "incurable", but would have required more time and resources than were available at Wideawake during the conflict. I was there with the Nimrod fleet and on more than one occasion we rotated aircraft from Kinloss for technical reasons.

I remember that Lightning on the A1. I too used to look out for it and was a shame to see it deteriorate.

[SKiwi]

Somewhere there is video of a Harrier taking off from Central London - I remember seeing a clip of the London to New York air race & the Harrier took off from the yard of 1 of the main railway stations which was being worked on at the time....... There may have been a Concorde used as well

[Ginetta G15 Girl]

It was St Pancras: Flt Lt Tom Lecky-Thompson of 1(F)Sqn flying Harrier XV741 in the Daily Mail Trans-Atlantic Air Race in May 1969.

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=st+pancras+harri...

Edited by Ginetta G15 Girl on Thursday 27th March 10:59

Edited by Ginetta G15 Girl on Thursday 27th March 11:00

[Dr Jekyll]

ArnieVXR said:

While I agree that it probably takes a fair bit of effort to achieve a level of competency, I'd suggest that most people could learn to fly an early Harrier given the right training. That few have learned and they were the best of the best is a function of the limited number of places for Harrier pilot and the high cost of the training, not that only supermen could ever do it.

There is also the point that the RAF ETC look for people who can not only fly it but have enough spare capacity to fight with it as well.

[virgilio]

not sure if it's legal to fly fighters in the UK, but across the pond it it.

And you can buy this: http://www.raptoraviation.com/aircraft%20spec%20pa... !!!!

Actually this may be the ultimate purchase imaginable for any petrolhead (I assume you cannot buy an F22 or a Eurofighter for private civil use), and at $4.5m it's a bargain as you'll literally look down on any 250GTO owners...

[SKiwi]

Ginetta G15 Girl said:

It was St Pancras: Flt Lt Tom Lecky-Thompson of 1(F)Sqn flying Harrier XV741 in the Daily Mail Trans-Atlantic Air Race in May 1969.

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=st+pancras+harri...

Edited by Ginetta G15 Girl on Thursday 27th March 10:59

Edited by Ginetta G15 Girl on Thursday 27th March 11:00

Many thanks ! - I'll do a bit more googling.......