willedoo

Phil, I'd guess the two were quite an even match, as you say. By the time we had the Meteors in the Korean War, they were outclassed, but 77 Squadron did a mighty job with what they had. The Meteor can claim the world's first combat ejection using an ejection seat when W.O. Ron Guthrie ejected from his Meteor after being shot down by a Russian MiG-15 pilot. He bailed out with the Martin Baker MK.1E seat, which was the first generation, pre automation MB seat. The only automatic feature was the static line activated drogue gun which deployed the drogue chute. After that, it was all manual - undo the seat restraint belts, push yourself away from the seat then head on down. Options were to ride the seat to a more oxygen friendly altitude of around 10,000 feet before seat separation, or to separate early and freefall if you had the skill. Ron Guthrie chose the third option and separated from the seat at high altitude, pulled the D ring and got a canopy happening at an altitude in the high thirties. His theory was to try and drift out into the bay and get picked up by friendly forces, but the wind didn't go his way and he was captured. The MK.2 modification didn't come along until the end of the war, but it provided barometric controlled seat belt release, seat separation, and personal recovery chute deployment. This was a big step, as a pilot could be injured or unconscious after ejection and still survive.

This one should be relatively easy - not a production aircraft.

No. 4 would have to be Rockwell.

Kaz, the way I see it, the Russian willingness to sustain huge losses was decreed at the very top and backed up by party commisars attached to every unit as enforcers of the common goal. Stalin has his critics because of his harshness to his own people in the war, but if he wasn't that way, the Soviets would have been defeated. That may have lead to our defeat, maybe not, as Hitler would still have had to tie up lots of resources as an occupying power. Stalin's hard line also had a high degree of public support as the Russians were fighting for the Motherland on their own soil and everything was at stake. Same as the British with their backs to the wall. The undisciplined gaggles of Russian aircraft is an interesting one. Sheer numbers helped, and compared to the Germans, I guess you would have to say the discipline and structure were not comparable. But what won the day in my opinion, was firstly the Russian fighting spirit. Defenders have a lot more incentive to do well than the invaders. Secondly, I think the undisciplined nature of their air war worked in their favour. The German mindset is well and truly contained in the box, whereas the Russian mindset doesn't even comprehend the concept of a box. You never know what they'll do next, and that's a good asset to them. It would have been a lot harder for us if Hitler had deferred to the professionals in the Luftwaffe and let them get on with the job. But always a hard task when you are continually losing infrastructure and manufacturing ability to bombing raids.

One thing I like about the 262 is the pull start pilot motors; single cylinder motorcycle engines. The post war Russian copy of the engine had the same setup which suited their remote airfield operations.

Kaz, I figure your'e talking German air power only there. The reason I say that is that overall, in the war, the Russians accounted for 80% of Hitler's losses (with allied material support). We mopped up the other 20%. If Hitler and Stalin had remained semi - allies, the amount of manpower, material and finances used up at the Eastern Front would have been available for use in the West, and we wouldn't have won the war. The Russians couldn't have done it without American and British logistic support, but they are the ones that paid the price in human terms to defeat Hitler. Average losses of 19,000 per day for the duration of their part of the war. Our WW2 wall of remembrance at the war memorial in Canberra is fifty metres long. The same dimensions height wise, translates to 10 kilometers in length to represent the Russian losses. Not taking anything away from the Americans, but it needs to be put into context.

Thanks for posting, IBob. I've found this discussion very interesting as one of the things I collect is logbooks. Some of them are real gems, and it's a nice exercise to immerse yourself in the story that you can piece together from a close examination of the logs. Sometimes we read these things quickly, brush over them and take them for granted, but if we go down the rabbit hole a bit, there are incredible stories there that should be preserved for the future.

Totally agree, IBob; it's mind boggling when you look at the thousands of designs developed over the years. The amount of work that goes into it is certainly hard to get the head around. I remember reading a book on the development of the F-4 Phantom, where McDonnell had something like 4,000 engineers working on the project. Another example is Titanium Valley in Russia, where 1,000 Russian engineers and 600 Russian scientists are working for Boeing. The worldwide number of people working in design, development and manufacturing for Boeing alone must be enormous.

Doug, I think that's just grime.

Almost correct, it's a Tu-134UBL. It's the standard Tu-134 airliner fuselage with a Tu-160 front end. Used for crew training for the Tu-160 supersonic bomber. The only photoshopping was removal of the flag on the tail and the lettering along the side of the fuselage.

Not sure if this will work - I've tried some some devious tricks to get around Google image search.

Just as an edit to the above post, the zoom lens and aperture setting probably make it look at least 20 or 30 metres closer than it really would be. Reminds me of real estate ads when they're trying to embellish the views; just add a bit of zoom.

I hope I'm not detecting a bit of condescending credentialism there. But you're 100% correct; I haven't done any formation flying. Fact is, threads have to have some sort of a name and unfortunately the software won't allow thread title edits post posting, to something more suitable like ' A really long way, away'. In hindsight I could have just called it ' Sukhoi flying behind an Il-76'. That would have been more accurate.

Su-30 in Syria showing off:

It's a Soviet lend lease Hurricane. I can't remember if they fitted them with 20mm or 23mm cannon; it was one of the two.

This should be an easy one.

Svetlana Kapanina gives it a good work out in this one:

The PAK FA T-50 finally has a permanent name - Su-57. Su-57: Russian Air Force chief confirms 5th-gen fighter jet name

Sukhoi T-50's performing aerobatics at last weeks MAKS airshow.

Propaganda or just delusional journalism - hard to tell. Possibly I'm missing something. It did some loops, turns and climbs. Maybe I just need to watch it again.....and again....and again. At the very least it would have been a convenient time for the crowd to duck off for a hamburger.

I think you're right there, FT. Looking at other news reports, there's not too much detail other than the groundings. It sounds like the OBOGS has had a problem and the seat emergency cylinder has had to be used. It must be a definite problem going on if multiple pilots have had the same issue.

Thanks, FT. Always interesting reading about the ins and outs of the F-35. From a technical point of view, it would be nice to read sometime in the future what the problem was and how it was fixed. Unfortunately, anytime after now, it's yesterday's news and always hard to find a follow up to it later on. I've never been a fan of the F-35, but it's sad to see the standard of journalism these days. Take this article for instance. It should be wholly about the hypoxia problem they are having. Any aircraft development is a process of combining parts into a system. Those systems are then combined to create the aircraft as close to design as possible. Often a problem like this can be tracked down to a contractor supplied component, either faulty design or just a bad batch. It usually has nothing to do with the overall design of the aircraft. But sadly the media will report on something like this and add references to other problems with the aircraft ( the bad view) and comments from people who think the whole deal is wonderful ( the good view). Low standard journalists often try to dramatize what most likely is just a bad batch of reducer valves or something similar. I realize they have very little information at this stage and need to make their articles attention grabbing, but if it's a problem with the oxygen system, why can't they just stick to the script and talk about that. Oxygen systems aren't rocket science; they're just a bunch of combined parts and all they need to do is track down the Gremlin involved. It's got nothing to do with any major design issues with the aircraft. Well, that's my two bob's worth. Cheers. Willie.

Maybe the Doomsday Preppers aren't crazy after all.

I've been looking at that video again and freeze framing. Apart from design flaws, in all the taxiing footage, the pilots head doesn't move - not a flinch. In that situation, the pilot is normally looking at a lot of different things quite rapidly, usually some head movement. Maybe it's Bernie from 'Weekend at Bernie's'.

Doug, I'd guess a lot of things as discussed above. A few things don't add up like the extremely small intakes - hard to imagine enough airflow there for a twin engine job. Also, there doesn't appear to be any nozzles, just a straight jetpipe by the look of it. And that wing configuration is too weird, it doesn't seem to fit any current aerodynamic development. I'm no expert at aerodynamics, but I couldn't see it having any useful maneuverability. My best guess is that it's always been a propaganda mock up. No doubt it's something they aspire to. They are smart people and are starting to manufacture a lot of native military equipment in recent years. They still have a long way to go.