Aircraft General Discussion

[old martParticipant @oldmart]

I remember riding a motorcycle along the Hogs back between Farnham and Guildford (A31) and seeing a Hercules very slightly below me to the north.

[Graham TitmanParticipant @grahamtitman81812]

A question for the recognition experts.We was walking the dog down a very quiet gated road on tuesday evening at about quarter to six a car went past and made turn my head from the way we was walking and out of the corner of my eye saw a light in the sky about 1/4 of a mile away at about 150 feet and it was not until it got a lot closer about 200 yards could we actually hear it.It sounded like a muted tuned car engine, 2 prop engines as it was directly over head we could still hear each other talk it was so quite it was unbelievable flying roughly south east to north west and as it flew away a single orange flashing light at the rear and no lights visible on the wing tips.Flying slight south of Brixworh and heading towards Haslebech,As fae as i know we are a low flying area but only in day light.Graham

[martin perman 1Participant @martinperman1]

How big was it, high or low wing, what colour, was it boxy in shape and were the propellors to large for the fuselage.

Martin P

[Martin King 2Participant @martinking2]

Osprey?

Martin

[Graham TitmanParticipant @grahamtitman81812]

Hi it seemed long for a piston prop i/e small light aircraft the wings looked thin and i think the engines were on the wing not like the drones i found on google at the rear. It was pitch black and i was so surprised to see something so low and it was gone in a few seconds so was going reasonable fast. The thing i cannot get out of my mind is how quiet it was two hundred yards and you could not hear it at all.It was also on the same flight path we sometimes see the Red Arrows on.Sorry to be so vauge but it was in sight for less than 10 seconds.Graham

[Martin ConnellyParticipant @martinconnelly55370]

Spotted this flying caravan today, well it is boxy and as slow as a caravan (I was outside and had time to go in and get my camera). It seems to be a Ledcor/Summitair aircraft but they are based in Canada's Northwest so it seems out of place. Does anyone recognise what it is or know where it is based?

Martin C

[martin perman 1Participant @martinperman1]

Martin,

Its a Short SC7 Skyvan made by Shorts of Belfast, **LINK** they tend to be used these days as a bus for parachutists.

Martin P

[Martin ConnellyParticipant @martinconnelly55370]

Thanks, your link does mention Summit Air as operators of two of them. Stall speed of 69mph which is why it seemed to be travelling very slowly (flaps down in photo).

Martin C

[Anonymous]

Good grief, you need to be poised over the keyboard ready to post these days, or you get gazumped!

The Skyvan morphed into stretched versions, the Shorts 330 and 360. The wing always looked far too small, especially for an aircraft that could operate from relatively short runways.

Andrew

Edited By Andrew Johnston on 18/11/2019 16:49:03

[martin perman 1Participant @martinperman1]

Posted by Andrew Johnston on 18/11/2019 16:48:29:

Good grief, you need to be poised over the keyboard ready to post these days, or you get gazumped!

The Skyvan morphed into stretched versions, the Shorts 330 and 360. The wing always looked far too small, especially for an aircraft that could operate from relatively short runways.

Andrew

Edited By Andrew Johnston on 18/11/2019 16:49:03

Sorry Andrew I've been out doing my part time delivery job this afternoon and when I got home I made SWMBO and I a cup of tea and I sat down with it and saw an email and answered the thread, I may not know much but aircraft recognition is as you know an interest of mine.

Martin P

[Marischal EllisParticipant @marischalellis28661]

A bit of a come down from the mighty Sunderland. Best wishes to all.

[BufferParticipant @buffer]

Parachutist have the right idea. Jump out of that shed as soon as you can.

Edited By Richard brown 1 on 18/11/2019 18:02:06

[Anonymous]

Posted by martin perman on 18/11/2019 17:09:21:

………but aircraft recognition is as you know an interest of mine.

Quite so. I knew it was a Shorts, but I had to search to find it was a Skyvan, which is why you beat me to the reply.

Andrew

[Geoff TheasbyParticipant @geofftheasby]

My pilot friend says the Skyvan had a roof hatch in the cockpit, which always leaked..

[Cornish JackParticipant @cornishjack]

Sad news

No doubt Ian SC will be aware. **LINK**

rgds

Bill

[Mike PooleParticipant @mikepoole82104]

A sonic boom has made BBC headline news, when I was a boy they were so common you barely looked up to try and see the aircraft. Seems to cause consternation now but I suppose we do have a few more causes of loud bangs. I was mysteriously woken up at the moment the Buncefield depot exploded and I am about 35 miles away.

Mike

[martin perman 1Participant @martinperman1]

As an aviation enthusiast I've never heard a sonic boom and even though im only 35 miles from Buncefield I never heard that either but I dont have a problem with RAF sonic booms when allowed as its much better than a rogue aircraft any day.

Martin P

[Anonymous]

I didn't hear Buncefield as we were on our way back from gliding in Northumberland. Although it didn't affect us we wondered why there were lots of signs on the A1 announcing that the M1 was closed. My mum in Bedford claimed she heard/felt something at about the right time.

I heard my first sonic boom a few years ago, at the time of the London Olympics. I was in the workshop and there was a loud boom followed by a smaller boom. The garage door visibly shock. We don't have mains gas in the street so I wondered whose oil or propane tank had gone up. Half the street were outside looking to see which house was a smoking ruin. I told my neighbour it sounded like a sonic boom. She was very dismissive, said she'd heard one before and this boom wasn't right. Then the BBC news announced that two Typhoons had been scrambled to intercept a non-communicating aircraft, and had broken the sound barrier on the way down to London. My neighbour had to eat humble pie!

Andrew

[DrDaveParticipant @drdave]

I experienced a few sonic booms whilst I was working in Switzerland (I think that the Swiss airforce might be a little more relaxed about speed excursions than the RAF is). First time, we were working in a Portacabin which shook like the devil. Even the floor shook! I looked around to comment about the apparent explosion, but none of my Swiss colleagues had batted an eyelid. It then dawned that it had been a sonic boom.

[Mike PooleParticipant @mikepoole82104]

I suppose the period when I remember them as commonplace was living in Germany from 1963 to 1966, job to know whether it was the RAF or the Luftwaffe, skywriting was another regular event over the skies of Düsseldorf.

Mike

[Martin ConnellyParticipant @martinconnelly55370]

From experience I can state that sonic booms and ejection seats going off sound very similar.

Martin C

[JAParticipant @ja]

In Bristol we used to get the remnants of Concorde's sonic boom. Concorde, as it approached the mouth of the Bristol Channel, decelerated to subsonic speed but, I believe, the accompanying shock wave would continue travelling ahead of the aircraft weakening all the time. By the time it reached Bristol it was more of a distant rumble than a double bang. The sound of Concorde's engines followed. This was most noticeable on cold, quiet, winter evenings when it flew over at 10 o'clock.

JA

[martin perman 1Participant @martinperman1]

Posted by Martin Connelly on 01/12/2019 17:26:00:

From experience I can state that sonic booms and ejection seats going off sound very similar.

Martin C

Martin,

As a passenger I wouldn't be to chuffed if I heard a bang and saw a flash from the front of a passenger plane

Martin P

[SamsarandaParticipant @samsaranda]

Martin C, are you saying you recognise the bang of an ejection seat because you exited an aircraft using one?
Dave W

[Robert Atkinson 2Participant @robertatkinson2]

We used to hear the tail end of Concords supersonic runs up the bay of Biscay all the way in Christchurch on cool quiet evenings.
And I did of course hear the booms from Thrust SSC back in 1997. The car went supersonic 5 times. One of these was unintentional. The car was to run to a predetermined indicated airspeed which should hav been just below Mach 1, There was however a clear boom. The first suspect was the airspeed indicator calibration (which was my responsibility, I built the speedometer and Mach meter for the car) but it turned out that when calculating the target speed they forgot to allow for the affect of altitude on Mach number. The Black Rock desert is at about 3900ft above sea level.

Robert G8RPI.

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