Shooting Star with prone pilot - EF80

[John R]

Whilst looking for pictures of the Prone Pilot Meteor I came across this picture of a similar version of the F80.

Does anybody know anything about it?

John

[camper1]

From the Schiffer book on the F80.

Serial number44-85044 carried the buzz number PN044 and FT044 at different times.

Used to see if aircraft could withstand up to 7Gs plus.

Interestingly this aircraft was also used to test the US equivalent of the German' ShrageMusik' utilising two .50 calibre guns to see if it was a viable armament option.

Apparently this worked but lacked practicality.

Hope this helps

Ian

[Kes]

Other than this one and the prone meteor you may consider a 'Stratos 4' TSR2 with it's teeny tiny girlie crew and their 'something a bit disturbing' prone pose?!?!

. . . Kes (who has seen 'Stratos 4' anime purely for research!!)

[goon]

As an aside, can anyone see why either this or the Meteor got off the drawing board? It shouldn't have been hard to know it would be desperately uncomfortable. A fact I can attest to from my younger days of playing video games lying down in front of the telly. (I'm sure that's why I've got a dodgy back!)

Edited December 21, 2015 by goon

[John R]

Lifted from my post about the Prone pilot Meteor

"Quite why it needed an actual aircraft to find this out is not clear. One feels that the same information could have been derived from a mock-up. Even my wife, a renowned technophobe, commented 'How could he see behind?' when first told about it."

[Old Viper Tester]

A terrible photo, but you should be able to get some length and depth references from it.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v29/Phantomtoo/44-85044-EF-80_zpsb472vq5b.jpg

Clarence “Bud” Anderson gave a talk at Edwards AFB in 1983 on his flight test career. He mentioned the prone-position Shooting Star test at Wright-Patterson’s Flight Test Division, but had no illustrations. Ever the modeler, I asked him after his talk if he had any photos or drawings. This photo and the one in your original post arrived in the mail a week later. A great guy.

As camper1 also pointed out, the same airframe was used earlier to test a Schraege Musik arrangement. I believe this is from a Life magazine series:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v29/Phantomtoo/44-85044%20wright%20fld%20Schraege_Muzik%202_zpssp6t4xrf.jpg

Sven

Old Viper Tester

Edited December 25, 2015 by Old Viper Tester

[John R]

Thank you for those most interesting photos. Did Bud mention the results of the test?

Regarding the "Schraege Musik arrangement" I wonder what happened to the a/c attitude when those fired. I think that the original version had arranged so that the recoil went throught he CG.

[Old Viper Tester]

The only things I remember Bud mentioning about the prone position test, other than it being one of the weirder things done at the time, were very similar to the Meteor observations: very uncomfortable position for any length of time, freedom of movement being almost non-existent, almost impossible to "check-six", and difficulty moving the flight controls - having to rely almost entirely on ankle and wrist flexing (goes to the freedom of movement observation).

Sven

Old Viper Tester

[Pete in Lincs]

Interesting stuff, Thanks guys.

Those guns, muzzle flash could

have been a problem at night....