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The Aircraft Thread!

PracticalMac

PracticalMac

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Jan 22, 2009
2,857
5,243
Houston, TX
Saw the cars thread, know there are a few aircraft lovers here, so see how far this goes.
Some great topics for discussion:
  • Heavy Iron (airliners and airlines)
  • Golden Era (airlines from the 30's to 70's, before cattle service was introduced)
  • Puddle Jumpers (piston powered smalls birds, Cessna's, Pipers, Beechcraft, Grumman, Light-Sport, etc)
  • Jet Setters (biz jets)
  • Active military (if it has an F, A, C, T, or some other letter in name...)
  • Whirly birds (beat the air into submission to fly)
  • Barnstormers (biplanes and equally old cloth covered small planes)
  • War birds (piston powered warriors with engines that make Ferrari's envious!)
  • Speed Freaks (old jet war birds, like F-86, MiG-15/17, T-33, Meteor, Vampire, L-29, L-39, etc)
  • DIY (home builds and things that cannot be described)
  • Bleeding Edge (latest tech of glass cockpits, iPads, electric or diesel power)
  • UFO (that was built on earth? nahhhhh. Really??)
  • Fly the Virtual skies (flight sims and flight games (WoWP not counted)).
  • Great Museums of the world
  • I LOVE the smell of AvGas/Jet Fuel in the morning! (for those who live an breath anything aviation)
And of course
  • Maintenance (help, tips, Q&A)
  • How to do legal upgrades.
  • Care (clean/wax/polish)
  • Air Shows
  • Racing events (Reno Air Races, Red Bull)
  • Media (photos, video, audio clips)

Start off, here is a 2012 thread I made of using an iPhone as a aircraft instrument (to add to the aircraft instruments, not replace)
 
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Was always a big fan of the warbirds. P-51, Spitfire, Messerchmit, and also the lesser known like Yaks. Was a big fan of the Il-2 Sturmovik flight sim back in the 2000s and MSFS.
 
Great idea for a thread.

To actually see some of these (older or stranger) planes in the flesh, if at all possible, try to visit parts of the old Soviet Union, or central Asia, or parts of Africa.

Some of these places are host to extremely interesting, if small, aviation museums.

There, craft are still flying that wouldn't have been out of place in the 50s, 60s & 70s.
 
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The Soviet planes in NATO forces normally got updated avionics.
 
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decafjava said:
Was always a big fan of the warbirds. P-51, Spitfire, Messerchmit, and also the lesser known like Yaks. Was a big fan of the Il-2 Sturmovik flight sim back in the 2000s and MSFS.
Click to expand...

Scepticalscribe said:
Great idea for a thread.

To actually see some of these (older or stranger) planes in the flesh, if at all possible, try to visit parts of the old Soviet Union, or central Asia, or parts of Africa.

Some of these places are host to extremely interesting, if small, aviation museums.

There, craft are still flying that wouldn't have been out of place in the 50s, 60s & 70s.
Click to expand...

Great points of topics! added a few more bullets.
 
Add 'weird and strange airports, the sort that wouldn't have been out of place in Indiana Jones movies', too.

In my travels, I've seen a few of these, in the former Soviet Union, central Asia, parts of Africa.

Actually, I remember flying into Gdansk in the mid 1990s, and, prior to our descent, asking what the airport was like.

"A shed and a windsock," grunted the man beside me. I thought that this was an example of that classic, typically phlegmatic British understatement, but subsequently discovered, on landing, that Gdansk airport was indeed "a shed and a windsock", as was Kaliningrad, when I flew into it around a decade later.

And, as I seem to recall, I saw biplanes parked there. A row of them.
 
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quagmire said:
Nice idea.

As a new captain, the tiller is awesome. :)
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Grats! :)
[doublepost=1532123776][/doublepost]One of my favorite historical aircraft from the Cold War is the B-58 Hustler, mostly because of it's astetics, but also because it was the tip of the airborne nuclear spear. Trivia: This was the aircraft used by the US in the movie, Fail Safe, if I recall correctly.:oops:

More entries to come! :D

B9D4EADE-6AAF-4F37-BC56-6B01BC1FB854.jpeg

FD8107A9-87CB-473B-8222-94CAD0A58669.jpeg

E6BFA8CB-5BD8-49C8-9249-3063663F9CAD.jpeg
The landing gear- What a mess​
 
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My preference tends to be more military aircraft, but generally more non-standard types.

A few favs, active duty or not…

• A7 Corsair II. Most military referred to it as the SLUFF but to me it's always been beautiful.
• A10 Thunderbolt II (Warthog). How many pilots and groundpounders have been saved because of this airframe and gun?
• B52 Stratofortress. Still flying. BUFF.
• OV10 Bronco. FAC over Vietnam
• A1 Skyraider. Sandy missions with the Jolly Greens. These were the A10's of their day, equipped with the same engine you would find in the B29. Incredibly tough.
• MH-53 Jolly Green Giant. The helicopter you wanted to see if you'd been shot down in Vietnam
• HH-53 Super Jolly Green Giant. The more powerful version of the MH-53
• AH-1 Super Cobra. One of the deadliest attack helicopters out there. Marine Corps is still using a variant
• UH-1 Huey Gunship. When the Army started arming the Hueys.
• AC-47 Spooky. An armed version of the C-47, the military version of the DC-3
• AC-130 Spectre. An armed version of the C-130. USAF SOC is still using a variant
• C-130J Super Hercules. Still flying. Glass cockpit with HUD!
• P-61 Black Widow. WWII Nightfighter.

And a couple of civvies.

DH-6 Twin Otter
Bell 222
 
WWII Favorites:

0CB78484-4781-48C7-8565-B730681B4FEE.jpeg
P-51: Most macho

4F6AFEF8-647F-49AF-9D64-C0960835ECC6.jpeg
Supermarine Spitfire: Most astetic

0152CEC5-D3DF-4FF8-914F-838B54309827.jpeg
F4U Corsars: Nice gull wings.
​
[doublepost=1532127574][/doublepost]
eyoungren said:
My preference tends to be more military aircraft, but generally more non-standard types.

A few favs, active duty or not…

• A7 Corsair II. Most military referred to it as the SLUFF but to me it's always been beautiful.
• A10 Thunderbolt II (Warthog). How many pilots and groundpounders have been saved because of this airframe and gun?
• B52 Stratofortress. Still flying. BUFF.
• OV10 Bronco. FAC over Vietnam
• A1 Skyraider. Sandy missions with the Jolly Greens. These were the A10's of their day, equipped with the same engine you would find in the B29. Incredibly tough.
• MH-53 Jolly Green Giant. The helicopter you wanted to see if you'd been shot down in Vietnam
• HH-53 Super Jolly Green Giant. The more powerful version of the MH-53
• AH-1 Super Cobra. One of the deadliest attack helicopters out there. Marine Corps is still using a variant
• UH-1 Huey Gunship. When the Army started arming the Hueys.
• AC-47 Spooky. An armed version of the C-47, the military version of the DC-3
• AC-130 Spectre. An armed version of the C-130. USAF SOC is still using a variant
• C-130J Super Hercules. Still flying. Glass cockpit with HUD!
• P-61 Black Widow. WWII Nightfighter.

And a couple of civvies.

DH-6 Twin Otter
Bell 222
Click to expand...

A-10 Warthog- UG-ley, but functionally beautiful. :)

554D7A94-A4F4-486F-9FA8-C3211CD6A02C.jpeg​
 
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What about sound?

I know there are prop guys out there for whom the full roar of a radial engine is magnificent, but for me the full range of a jet engine is the best music in the world - particularly at startup.
 
quagmire said:
Nothing beats a radial. Got to ride in Fifi 2 years ago.





B-17 as well....

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That's the way it is for my dad. :)

He grew up when these aircraft were the hot ticket and never really cared when jets came along.
 
Agree that the Spitfire is aesthetically stunning, but the Hawker Hurricane was at least as effective in 1940.

My own taste runs more to civilian aircraft, and I have worked in some places where a rugged and reliable craft - something that can take off and land anywhere - particular on dirt tracks, or short enough run-ways, or challenging - perhaps high-altitude run-ways - and is the opposite of high maintenance - is valued.

Anyone here share my passion for the DC-3?

Agree with @LizKat about the X-1 and Chuck Yeager; and loved "The Right Stuff".
 
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Scepticalscribe said:
Agree that the Spitfire is aesthetically stunning, but the Hawker Hurricane was at least as effective in 1940.

My own taste runs more to civilian aircraft, and I have worked in some places where a rugged and reliable craft - something that can take off and land anywhere - particular on dirt tracks, or short enough run-ways, or challenging - perhaps high-altitude run-ways - and is the opposite of high maintenance - is valued.

Anyone here share my passion for the DC-3?

Agree with @LizKat about the X-1 and Chuck Yeager; and loved "The Right Stuff".
Click to expand...

Ah yes the DC-3 was an absolute legend. Not hyperbole for once. Still in use all over the world.
 
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decafjava said:
Ah yes the DC-3 was an absolute legend. Not hyperbole for once. Still in use all over the world.
Click to expand...

Leaving aside rugged reliability, and judging on aesthetic grounds, I have long loved the De Havilland Comet, the worlds first commercial jetliner (which also, through a series of tragic crashes, taught some very valuable lessons about the appropriate and desirable shape of windows for long distance air travel at high altitude and air speed.)
 
cube said:
It sucked that the A-Team always used this old plane. In the eighties!
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But - despite what the calendar says - it isn't (and wasn't) the eighties everywhere in the world; even now, - and I've been to a few such places - there are places - described as "airports" - with dirt tracks, where the landing strips are marked by two lines of white pebbles in the red earth; in such places, using a DC-3 - which was an astonishingly well made, advanced for its time, and is still a reliable and rugged plane, still makes total sense.
 
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Scepticalscribe said:
But - despite what the calendar says - it isn't (and wasn't) the eighties everywhere in the world; even now, - and I've been to a few such places - there are places with dirt tracks, where the landing strips are marked by two lines of white pebbles in the red earth; in such places, using a DC-3 - which was an astonishingly well made, advanced for its time, and is still a reliable and rugged, plane, still makes total sense.
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I am just complaining about US TV & film typically using old aircraft before CGI.
 
cube said:
I am just complaining about US TV & film typically using old aircraft before CGI.
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Well, with a few exceptions US TV and film is not something that I use as a benchmark.

But, on a US TV series which featured planes - well, a biplane, actually two different biplanes - (and was set in a historical era, the period immediately preceding WW1), that I did love, was Bearcats!
 
Even more annoying was using American gear to portray enemy equipment. One of the most blatant examples was the M3 half track.
 
cube said:
It sucked that the A-Team always used this old plane. In the eighties!
Click to expand...
That was so they could be incognito. :)
cube said:
Even more annoying was using American gear to portray enemy equipment. One of the most blatant examples was the M3 half track.
Click to expand...
I think it’s was the Guns of Navarone where they used US made tanks instead of German Tanks. And in Kelly’s Heroes, they built exteriors for some other tank (I forget exactly) to turn them into Tigers. I’d have to research it, but my guess is in Patton, in the big N.Africa tank battle they used substitute tanks there too. Off hand, I can’t think of a movie where they used substitute aircraft, except in Casino Royal, they hung a bunch of stuff on a 747 to create a new airplane. :) Such is movie making, there is authentic, and then there is practical and cost effective.
 
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