The TSR2

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Discussion

Eric Mc

121,788 posts

264 months

Monday 24th November 2014
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Klippie said:
The video on YouTube mentions it outrun a Lightning with only one engine on re-heat...awsome plane a real shame it was never given a chance.

Britains aero industry was world leading as with everything else no funding and a lack of vision killed it dead.
You really need to read the other threads on here to find out the "truth" behind these stories.

The TSR2 has become a thing of mythology. Don't believe everything you read or hear about it.

V8 Fettler

7,019 posts

131 months

Monday 24th November 2014
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Ginetta G15 Girl

3,220 posts

183 months

Monday 24th November 2014
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Max_Torque said:
Considering the size of the thing, it always looks a bit "underwinged" to me..... (guess they were fixated on high speed at high altitude, rather than scudding around doing NOTE Flying etc?)
TSR2 was primarily designed to be a low level, high speed, Interdictor/Strike a/c.

It gets very turbulent at low level and pretty uncomfortable flying at speed through such turbulence.
Until the design of modern, fully FBW (Fly By Wire), 'electric jets' (such as F15E Strike Eagle), the only way to get any sort of reasonable low level ride (and hence crew comfort/reduced crew fatigue) was to lower the gust response of the a/c. Other benefits of doing this were reduced airframe fatigue but, most importantly, reduced weapon aiming degredation. Remember, TSR2 was being designed in the days long before PGMs (precision guided munitions); indeed the RAF only began to receive limited stocks of PAVEWAY 1 LGBs (Laser Guided Bombs) at the tail end of the 1970s and even as late as Gulf War 1 the PAVEWAY II capability was pretty limited.

Simplistically, the way to reduce the gust response was to increase the wing loading ie to 'underwing' the a/c as you put it.

Additionally, if you want to go fast in an a/c (especially at low level) then, aside from reducing the Coefficient of Drag of the airframe, you reduce the surface area of the wing. Hence the wing loading goes up futher. Indeed fast jets comparable in size/weight to non- fast jets always have significantly higher wing loadings.

Of course, doing this tends to give you limitations in manoeuvrbility and increased take off and landing runs (owing to the higher stall speed of the wing) - hence the concentration with boundary layer control on TSR2.


IanMorewood

4,309 posts

247 months

Monday 24th November 2014
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Yep fast and low so small wings to minimise ground effects.

Yertis

18,017 posts

265 months

Monday 24th November 2014
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The F104 must have been super-smooth at low altitude, provided you kept everything in shape.

IanMorewood

4,309 posts

247 months

Monday 24th November 2014
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The Starfighter got a lot of use as a low level strike aircraft in the European theater despite being designed for the opposite. It was fairly effective until it crashed into the ground hence the name widow maker.

H100S

1,436 posts

172 months

Monday 24th November 2014
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DamienB said:
I feel like Candyman sometimes. Say TSR2, TSR2, TSR2 and up I pop...

Lovely looking jet. Too expensive, too limited, too troubled... the end. No need for conspiracy theories or political flag-waving. A government of any colour would have cancelled it. My book covers the problems pretty well - nothing insurmountable if you didn't mind throwing yet more money at the project, but doing so simply didn't make sense.

I think the RAF ending up with the Buccaneer and Jaguar - and later Tornado - actually made a great deal more sense.

'Eagle' was a name made up on a modelling forum. I found no evidence of any serious discussions about naming the aircraft.

The "documentary" linked to is a puff-piece, with various factual inaccuracies. If "everything was destroyed", for instance, why are there shelves full of documentation at Warton, Weybridge and Kew, two complete airframes and various other bits still around?
Where is the other airframe, ive only seen the Cosford plane.

T5GRF

1,972 posts

263 months

Monday 24th November 2014
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The other is at Duxford I think.

Eric Mc

121,788 posts

264 months

Tuesday 25th November 2014
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Duxford and Cosford.

There are also TSR2 related parts and equipment at Brooklands.

slybynight

391 posts

120 months

Tuesday 25th November 2014
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ive read that the germans used to call the 104 "erdnagel"
translates as ground nail!
apparently if you really wanted one, all you had to do was buy a small plot of land.

and wait!

IanMorewood

4,309 posts

247 months

Tuesday 25th November 2014
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Flying low and fast certainly isn't/wasn't a safe occupation, however as a strategic bomber option it's one of the few ways you could avoid most enemy air defences to lay a tactical nuke in your opponent's back yard.

Downside is that whilst training your pilots you will loose quite a few.

si-h

123 posts

202 months

Wednesday 26th November 2014
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What technology was actually taken from the TSR2 program, and used in other projects ?
That is, was the technology ground breaking and can it be considered a very expensive research project ?

Simpo Two

85,159 posts

264 months

Wednesday 26th November 2014
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slybynight said:
ive read that the germans used to call the 104 "erdnagel" translates as ground nail!
apparently if you really wanted one, all you had to do was buy a small plot of land.

and wait!
Like the Thunderchief 'Thud' perhaps!

Ginetta G15 Girl

3,220 posts

183 months

Wednesday 26th November 2014
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si-h said:
What technology was actually taken from the TSR2 program, and used in other projects ?
That is, was the technology ground breaking and can it be considered a very expensive research project ?
The INAS (Inertial Navigation and Attack System) went directly into F4M.

The Inertial Platform was developed into that fitted in Nimrod MR1.

Edited by Ginetta G15 Girl on Wednesday 26th November 23:36

Eric Mc

121,788 posts

264 months

Wednesday 26th November 2014
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Anything from TSR2 end up in the Tornado?

Ginetta G15 Girl

3,220 posts

183 months

Wednesday 26th November 2014
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Not as far as I am aware although one could say that the Inertial Platform fitted to the GR1 was about 3 generations descended from that in TSR2.

Ayahuasca

27,427 posts

278 months

Thursday 27th November 2014
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Oh god, not another TSR2 thread.

Sorry OP, it has been done to death.

DamienB

1,189 posts

218 months

Thursday 27th November 2014
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News to me than the F-4M INAS was TSR2 kit - perhaps some small bits of it were related (as per Harrier) but it wasn't the same system. Good discussion here about the complex relationships between various IN[A]S kit of the time:

http://www.secretprojects.co.uk/forum/index.php?to...

HF transmitter ended up on Phantom and Nimrod. IFF transmitter/receiver was being developed for numerous types anyway and went forward. Doppler continued development and I think ended up in the Nimrod. Missile warning receiver work continued and was - I think - an ancestor of the RWR fitted to the Phantom and Jaguar. The Phantom's big recce pod was a cut-down version of the one destined for TSR2 (American IR linescan rather than British visual spectrum linescan, a side looking radar developed from the TSR2 one and similar camera fit). It was an expensive flop I understand...

Tornado flight control system is a very distant ancestor of TSR2s - basically based on the same principles, no hardware commonality.

Ginetta G15 Girl

3,220 posts

183 months

Thursday 27th November 2014
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DamienB said:
News to me than the F-4M INAS was TSR2 kit - perhaps some small bits of it were related (as per Harrier) but it wasn't the same system.
My other half is an ex- F4 engineer and he tells me that the INAS in the F4M (FGR2) was basically that from TSR2 with all it's attendent niggles (at least in the early days). I guess he ought to know given that he worked on it!

I'd also be surprised if TSR2's Doppler found its way straight into Nimrod without much modification, given the nature of sea returns (especially in a low Sea-State) to the Janus array.

Edited by Ginetta G15 Girl on Thursday 27th November 18:31

Eric Mc

121,788 posts

264 months

Thursday 27th November 2014
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Just because someone works on a piece of equipment doesn't mean they know a lot about the history of its development.

I would be looking for something a bit more authoritative.