Vickers V-1000

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Vickers V-1000
f2
Type: Four - engined narrow-body aircraft
Design country:

United KingdomUnited Kingdom United Kingdom

Manufacturer:

Vickers-Armstrongs

First flight:

not flown

Commissioning:

not put into service

Production time:

not finished

Number of pieces:

1

The Vickers V-1000 was a planned cargo aircraft based on the Vickers Valiant bomber . The civilian version as a passenger jet was given the designation VC7 .

history

The Vickers-Armstrongs V-1000 was a scheduled jet-propelled cargo aircraft that met a requirement from the UK Department of Supply seeking strategic transport for the Royal Air Force (RAF) to specifically support their strategic bomber fleet, the V bombers. The V-1000 prevailed against the Avro 722 Atlantic based on the Avro Vulcan and the Handley Page HP.111 based on the Handley Page Victor . The design bears many similarities to the Vickers Valiant, one of the V-bombers , but also has significant changes. The V-1000 would have been powered by either Bristol Olympus or Rolls-Royce Conway engines. In addition to their military application, both the Ministry and Vickers intended to use the same basic design of the V-1000 as the Vickers VC7 . The VC7 was intended as a transatlantic jet airliner for the British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC). In fact, the British Ministry of Supply ordered BOAC as the first (civil) customer to procure the VC7. But BOAC itself was more interested in the Boeing 707 than in the VC7. Without the civilian version VC7, the price of the V-1000 was too high for the British Ministry of Supply.

This led to the following situation in 1955: At this point in time the prototype was largely complete, the Ministry of Supply decided to stop the V-1000 project in the middle of the development phase. By this point, the design had piqued the interest of airlines and led to re-designs being carried out by competing US manufacturers that impacted the design of the Boeing 707 and Douglas DC-8 . The V-1000 is one of the great what-ifs in British aviation and its cancellation has been the subject of much debate in the House of Commons.

The construction of the military transporter draft V-1000 and its civilian offshoot VC7 were used for the VC10 . The main innovation was the positioning of the engines. Experience had shown that the wing construction with the engines integrated in the wing was very prone to failure. Therefore it was decided to mount the four engines at the stern.

construction

The V-1000 differed from the Valiant in the following points in particular: The elevators were attached to the fuselage below the rudder, as is the case with many commercial aircraft today, and not as a "crosstail" in the middle of the vertical stabilizer. The wings were attached to the underside of the fuselage instead of a high-wing configuration, making the V-1000 a low-wing aircraft. This resulted in a shortening of the main landing gear strut and an extension of the nose landing gear strut. The entire fuselage was redesigned into a pressure fuselage. The bow of the bomber was replaced by a new design that corresponded to the conventional cockpit, bow design of jet passenger aircraft. In the course of the development, the wings were each provided with a flow body (also known as Küchemann carrots ) like the Convair CV-990 . In and of itself, the V-1000 / V7 looked like an enlarged de Havilland DH.106 Comet , but the engines were mounted further out in the wing compared to the Comet. The aim was to reduce noise emissions in the cabin and better protect the fuselage from the hot engine exhaust gases.

Technical specifications

Parameter Data
crew
Passengers 100
length 44.50 m
span 140 feet 0 inches (42.67 m)
height 38 feet 6 inches (11.73 m)
Wing area 303.1 m²
Wing extension 6th
Empty mass 49,487 kg
Max. Takeoff mass 104,780 kg
Cruising speed 830 km / h (450 kn)
Top speed
Service ceiling
Range 6,700 km (3,600 nm) (still air, 8,600 kg payload)
Engines 4 × Turbofan Rolls-Royce Conway with 15,000 lbf (67 kN) thrust each

Versions

  • VC7 civil passenger aircraft
  • V-1000 military troop transport, tanker and material transport aircraft for the support of the V bombers.

literature

Web links

Commons : Vickers aircraft  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ "Hansard December 8, 1955, Vickers V-1000 Aircraft, Motion made, and Question proposed" , Hansard , December 8, 1955, question tabled by Mr. Paul Williams
  2. ↑ Barry Jones, “Opportunity Lost,” Airplane , May 2008.
  3. ↑ Andrews and Morgan 1988, pp. 570-571.