BAC TSR-2
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| TSR-2 | ||
|---|---|---|
 TSR-2 XR219 in flight | ||
| Description | ||
| Role | Tactical Strike/Reconnaissance | |
| Crew | 2 | |
| First flight | 27 September 1964 | |
| Entered service | Never | |
| Manufacturer | BAC | |
| Dimensions | ||
| Length | 89 ft ½ in | 27.12 m |
| Wingspan | 37 ft 1¾ in | 11.27 m |
| Height | 23 ft 9 in | 7.24 m |
| Wing area | 702.9 ft² | 65.3 m² |
| Weights | ||
| Empty | 54,750 lb | 24,834 kg |
| Loaded | 79,573 lb lb | 36,169 kg |
| Maximum takeoff | 102,200 lb | 46,357 kg |
| Powerplant | ||
| Engines | 2× Bristol-Siddeley Olympus B.O1.22R | |
| Thrust | 2× 30,610 lbf | 2× 136.7 kN |
| Performance | ||
| Maximum speed | Mach 2.15 | |
| kt | km/h | |
| Combat range | 1150 miles | 1850 km |
| Ferry range | 4256 miles | 6850 km |
| Service ceiling | 54,000 ft | 16,459 m |
| Rate of climb | 50,000 ft/min | 16,000 m/min |
| Wing loading | lb/ft² | kg/m² |
| Thrust/weight | 0.77 lbf/lb | 7.5 N/kg |
| Avionics | ||
| Avionics | Autonetics Verdan autopilot modified by Elliot Automation, Ferranti (terrain following radar and navigation/attack systems), EMI (sideways looking radar) and Marconi (general avionics) | |
| Armament | ||
| Payload | Internal weapons bay, 20 ft (6 m) with 1 nuclear or 6 x 1000 lb (450 kg) HE, or 4 x 37 rocket packs or nuclears on inner pylons only. | |
The British Aircraft Corporation's TSR-2 was an ill-fated Cold War project in the early 1960s to create what would at the time have been one of the most advanced aircraft in the world. "All modern aircraft have four dimensions: span, length, height and politics. TSR-2 simply got the first three right." - Sir Sidney Camm
Contents |
[edit] History
[edit] GOR 339
In the 1950s, the British Royal Air Force was aware that the Canberra bomber would need to be replaced, and in 1956 a specification for its replacement with additional strike and reconnaissance roles was drafted in the form of GOR (General Operational Requirement) 339. This specification was exceptionally ambitious for the technology of the day, requiring a supersonic all-weather aircraft that could deliver nuclear weapons over a long range, operate at high level at Mach 2+ or low level at Mach 1.2, with a short takeoff ability from rough and ready airstrips. As this specification was being studied by various manufacturers, the first of the political storms that were to dog the project reared its head, the then defence minister Duncan Sandys stating in the 1957 Defence White Paper that the era of manned combat was at an end and that guided missiles were all that would be needed in future. Within a decade this philosophy became thoroughly discredited, but at the time and in the climate of the cold war and "mutual deterrence" it doubtless appeared to make some sense, especially as it seemed that guided missiles would offer significant cost savings over manned aircraft.
Another political matter that did not help was the mutual distrust between the various services - the Air Force was looking at GOR 339, but it was alleged that the development of a supersonic version of the subsonic Blackburn Buccaneer for the Royal Navy was competitive with this project. The RAF claims that it did not ignore or deride the project (as politicians such as Denis Healey claimed) but in fact invited Blackburn to submit a pre-tender brochure for consideration and discussion. However, the requirement was for a Mach 2 aircraft, not a subsonic one, and the STOL requirement was intended to allow the aircraft to operate from roads and bush runways in a similar manner to the Saab Draken; the Blackburn Buccaneer required a shipborne steam catapult to achieve short take off. Although various proposals, now under the designation OR (Operational Requirement) 343, were submitted, in 1959 the go-ahead was given for the BAC entry, named the TSR-2, for Tactical Strike and Reconnaissance 2. The origin of the '2' is unclear; it has been suggested that the Canberra, which at the time fulfilled that particular role, was considered in official circles to be the TSR-1, or alternatively that the '2' signified a Mach 2 performance.
[edit] The mission
The envisioned "standard mission" for the TSR-2 was to carry a 2,000 lb (900 kg) weapon internally for a combat radius of 1,000 nautical miles (nm) (1,852 km). Of that mission 100 nm (185 km) was to be flown at higher altitudes at Mach 1.7 and the 200 nm (370 km) into and out of the target area was to be flown as low as 200 feet (60 m) at Mach 0.95. The rest of the mission was to be flown at Mach 0.92. If the entire mission were to be flown at the low 200-foot altitude, the mission radius was reduced to 700 nm (1300 km). Heavier weapons loads could be carried with further reductions in range.
Extensions to the TSR-2's range were planned to be made by fitment of external tanks — one 450-Imperial gallon (2,000 L) tank under each wing or one 1,000 Imperial gallon (4,500 L) tank carried centrally below the fuselage. If no internal weapons were carried, a further 570 Imperial gallons (2600 L) could be carried in a tank in the weapons bay.
It was also planned to be able to equip the TSR-2 with a reconnaissance pack in the weapons bay which, coupled to the aircraft's capable sideways looking radar (SLAR), would have turned the aircraft into a formidable "recon" asset not unlike the contemporary North American RA-5C of the US Navy.
[edit] Design
English Electric, manufacturer of the Canberra, and Vickers had combined their ideas for the specification and put forward their design with a view to a flying aircraft by 1963. No order was forthcoming and by the time the Ministry had made a decision the various companies had been collected together as the British Aircraft Corporation in 1960.
The design was a large aircraft with a large shoulder-mounted slab-wing with down-turned tips, an all-moving swept tailplane and a large all-moving fin, to be powered by two Bristol-Siddeley Olympus afterburning turbojets. The latter were a variant of those used in the Avro Vulcan and Concorde. It is often stated, incorrectly, that the leading designer of the TSR-2 was Vickers' Barnes Wallis, the legendary aeronautical engineer famous for his Wellington bomber design and contribution to the Dambusters raids. Wallis was not involved in the TSR-2, but his son, who also worked for Vickers, was involved with it to a small extent. In fact Wallis was quite critical of the TSR-2, and stated that a "swing-wing" design (a concept which he championed, having done much work on it) would be more appropriate.
The design featured blown flaps to achieve the short take off and landing requirement, something which later designs would achieve with the technically more complex swing-wing approach. The aircraft featured some extremely sophisticated avionics for navigation and mission delivery — far ahead of anything else available at the time — which would also prove to be one of the reasons for the spiralling costs of the project. Some features, such as ground-following terrain radar, FLIR cameras, side-looking airborne radar and the sophisticated autopilot only become commonplace on military aircraft later. The wing loading was high for its time, and this gave the aircraft the ability to fly at very high speed and low level with great stability without being constantly upset by thermals and other ground-related weather phenomena. This in turn made the innovative ground-following radar and autopilot system feasible.
There were considerable problems with realising the design, some contributing manufacturers were employed directly by the Ministry rather than through BAC, and the Ministry itself would take on design tasks with the usual long deliberations and meetings expected of civil servants.
[edit] Testing
Despite the rocketing costs (which were inevitable, given the low original estimates), two prototype aircraft were completed. Roland Beamont made the first flight on 27 September 1964. In the course of testing, the TSR-2 was found to meet easily the demanding GOR 339 performance specification. Aerodynamically the aircraft was trouble-free, but there were continual problems with the engines and the undercarriage. Indeed, the engines delivered for the first aircraft did not fit, leading to delays for the first flight which meant that the TSR-2 missed the opportunity to be displayed to the public at that year's Farnborough Air Show. Initial flight tests were all performed with the undercarriage down and engine power strictly limited. Only on the tenth test flight was the landing gear successfully retracted, but vibration problems on landing persisted. The second prototype incorporated additional dampers in the main gear legs to overcome this. The first supersonic test flight, the fourteenth overall, had to be performed with only one afterburner because of problems with one of the engines. A speed of Mach 1.2 was reached on that occasion (and contrary to myth, the TSR-2 did not outrun the Lightning chase plane).
Over a period of six months many test flights were conducted. None of the complex electronics were yet ready, so these flights were all concerned with the basic flying qualities of the aircraft, which were by all accounts excellent.
[edit] Project cancellation
The American team behind the General Dynamics F-111 project had been pressing their case and newspaper reports had suggested that the RAF were considering it. In response to suggestions of cancellation BAC employees held a protest march, and the new Labour (and supposedly pro-worker) government, which came to power in 1964, issued strong denials. But in the its budget speech of 6 April 1965, the cancellation in favour of the F-111 was announced. A week later the Chancellor defended the decision in a debate in the House of Commons, saying that the F-111 would prove cheaper.
The TSR-2 tooling and partially completed aircraft were scrapped. Two finished aircraft survived, though with substantial internal damage inflicted, and can be seen in the RAF Museum, Cosford near Wolverhampton, and the Imperial War Museum at Duxford. A number of unfinished airframes were hastily scrapped, with very few parts retained intact. The only airframe ever to fly, XR219, was taken to Shoeburyness and used for as a target to test the vulnerability of a modern airframe and systems to gunfire. The haste with which the project was scrapped has been the source of much argument and bitterness since: some feel it was done with vindictiveness to score political points, though others have suggested that it was simply to prevent the very high technology secrets falling into the wrong hands, as the cancellation came at a period of particular paranoia during the cold war. Instead of the TSR-2, the RAF orderded the swing-wing American General Dynamics F-111. However, the F-111 itself suffered such enormous cost escalation (exceeding that of the TSR-2 projection ) that the RAF eventually cancelled their order, procuring instead the F-4 Phantom II and the Blackburn Buccaneer, some of which were transferred from the Royal Navy. Ironically, this was the very same aircraft that the RAF had apparently derided in order to get the TSR-2 the go-ahead. Fortunately the Buccaneer proved very capable and indeed was still in service into the early 1990s. The TSR-2 nonetheless remains a lingering "what if?" of British aviation, like the Avro Arrow in Canada.
A government study into the feasibility of resurrecting the TSR-2 project was carried out during the early 1980s when Margaret Thatcher had come to power. There was, briefly, some speculation that TSR-2 might yet see the light of day in an updated form, but after the study concluded that it would be far too expensive (the previous destruction requiring a complete start-over from scratch) and that the technology was no longer cutting edge, the TSR-2 was buried forever.
[edit] Planned improvements
It was planned to extend the payload by a further 25,000 lb (11,000 kg) in further developments of the aircraft.
[edit] In miniature
The TSR-2 has long been an aircraft that has inspired modellers, but owing to its relative obscurity it has never been the subject of a mainstream kit; Airfix cancelled plans to produce one in the 60s after the real thing was itself cancelled. Over the years a number of "difficult" kits have been released, usually in the form of a vac-form semi-kit. Such kits require a great deal of skill and experience to assemble into a convincing model, though many have been successfully completed. After petitioning by keen modellers in recent years, organising via the Internet, Airfix agreed to release a mainstream 1/72 scale injection moulded kit with all-new tooling and the original box artwork intended for the planned 1960s kit. The kit was released on 27 February 2006 [1] in a limited edition of only 10,000 units, despite the rumour that Airfix had received orders for 16,000 units nine months before launch. The kit's scarcity has made it one of the fastest selling model kits of all time.
[edit] In fiction
In the Japanese anime series Stratos 4, the fictional "TSR-2MS" aircraft used to intercept meteor debris is based on the TSR-2.
[edit] External links
- Thunder and Lightnings (TSR-2)
- RAF Museum Cosford (TSR-2)
- Imperial War Museum, Duxford (TSR-2)
- Photo gallery of surviving TSR.2
[edit] Related content
<h3>Comparable aircraft<h3>
<h3>See also<h3>
- List of bomber aircraft
- Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MRCA, became the Panavia Tornado)
- SEPECAT Jaguar - An Anglo-French deep penetration strike aircraft; incorporates some design elements of TSR-2.
- Miles M.52 - Another promising supersonic British aircraft which didn't get the required support from the then government.
- Avro CF-105 Arrow - A promising Canadian interceptor airplane which ran into rough political weather.
- North American YF-107 - A promising but ill-fated American prototype fighter
