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F-86 Sabre in Action aircraft No 126 by Larry Davis Soft Cover
F-86 Sabre in Action aircraft No 126 by Larry Davis
Soft Cover
58 pages
Copyright 1992
CONTENTS
F-86A
F-86B
F-86C/YF-93A
F-86D
F-86L
Specifications North American Aviation F-86D-45 Sabre
F-86L SAGE Antenna
F-86E
F-86F
TF-86F
RF-86F
CL-13A Sabre Mk 5 and CL-13B Sabre Mk 6
Specifications North American Aviation F-86F-25 Sabre
Project GUNVAL
RF-86F
Fuselage Development
Commonwealth CA-26/27 Sabre
Fuselage Development
F-86H
Specifications north American Aviation F-86H-5 Sabre
F-86K
Korea
INTRODUCTION
SABREJET! - That word instantly brings to mind thoughts of silver swept wing jets locked in mortal combat in the skies over Korea. But the North American Aviation (NAA) F-86 Sabre was much more than that. Not only was it the best clear-air fighter in the world at that time, the basic design would evolve into the only production single seat all-weather jet interceptor, an atomic capable fighter-bomber and a carrier-based fleet interceptor and fighter-bomber for the Navy. The F-86 series was built by many different manufacturers throughout the Free World and served to counter the Soviet threat during the 1950s.
The F-86 Sabre was just one of the superb designs to come from North American Aviation. During the 1940s and 1950s North American literally "owned" the military aircraft sales market, not just in America, but throughout the Free World. This aviation giant began life as a holding company in the early 1930s with no designs of its own. Originally founded in 1928, the company was reorganized in 1933 with James H. "Dutch" Kindelberger as President. Under Kindelberger, NAA entered the military aviation business.
The first NAA design was the 0-47 observation aircraft. This was followed by a single engine, monoplane basic trainer, the BT-9 which evolved into the greatest trainer aircraft of the Second World War - the T-6 Texan. The BT-9/T-6 contract made it possible for NAA to move to a new North American Aviation plant in Inglewood, California in January of 1936. The 159,000 square foot factory was located at the south edge of Mines Field (Los Angeles International Airport).
During the Second World War, NAA produced two of the war's finest combat aircraft. The first was the famed B-25 Mitchell and the second aircraft was the "most perfect pursuit plane in existence" - the P-51 Mustang. At the peak of wartime operations, NAA employed over 91,000 people. The factory had grown into two huge complexes with over
8,573,835 square feet of floor space. Between 1 January 1939 and 30 September 1945, NAA built 42,683 military aircraft including 15,603 P-51s, over 15,400 T-6s and 9,817 B-25s (some 14 percent of all U.S. aircraft production).
An incident midway through the war made the Mustang obsolete, along with every other combat aircraft in existence. That incident was the operational debut of the German jet-powered Messerschmitt Me-262. With two Jumo jet engines, the Me-262 had a speed of over 550 mph, some 125 mph faster than the best Allied fighters. By early Fall 1944, Me-262s were defending the Reich, taking the Allies by surprise.
The rush to catchup saw jet aircraft design proposals come in from every U.S. company. Bell Aircraft was the first to have a jet fighter aircraft flying. The P-59 Airacomet, however, was not a successful combat aircraft: it was not as fast as the Mustang or Thunderbolt and could not hope to match the Me-262. Lockheed and Gloster fielded jet fighters and both the Lockheed P-80 and the Gloster Meteor did see some combat in the Second World War, but neither was a counter to the Me-262. Three other companies submitted design proposals to the War Department: Republic (XP-84), Grumman (XF9F) and North American (XP-86).
NAA had been interested in jet powered aircraft for some time, with the Confidential Design Group making an initial proposal for a jet fighter in early 1943. Ed Schmued had one design based on a piston/turbojet powered P-51 with a radical forward swept wing. One of the design studies from North American was selected by the Navy as its first jet fighter aircraft, the XFJ-1 Fury. The XFJ-1 used a circular fuselage that enclosed a GE J35 jet engine. The intake was in the nose with a straight through duct to the engine, rather than using side inlets such as those found on the P-80 and XF9F. The wing and tail were similar to the P-5I Mustang and armament was six .50 caliber machine guns. The contract for the first XFJ-1 Fury was let on 1 January 1945.
The original XP-86 design was quite similar to the XFJ-1 Fury. The XP-86 fuselage was more slender and longer than the Fury, but it retained the wing and tail surfaces of the XFJ-1. Both the XP-86 and the XFJ-1 were powered by a 4,000 lbst General Electric J35 axial flow turbojet. The straight wing and the low thrust of the J35 restricted the XP-86 to a top speed of some 575 mph - far below what the USAAF requirement called for.
The end of the Second World War brought an immediate (and controversial) influx of jet technology from Germany. As rapidly as advances were made in engine technology, however, the speed potential seemed to stabilize at about 600 mph. Something was needed to bring airframe technology in line with the power plants. Captured German documents, translated by Larry Green, NAA's Head of Design Aerodynamics, including transonic wind tunnel data, clearly showed the speed benefit of swept wing surfaces.
In September of 1945, NAA engineer Harrison Storms studied the results of Green's research and thought it might be incorporated into the XP-86 proposal. The German wind tunnel tests revealed compressibility drag was delayed through the use of swept wings. Storms' swept wing XP-86 was estimated to be about 75 mph faster than the straight wing XP-86. There were problems with the use of a swept wing including a loss in low speed handling characteristics, but a further study of German research revealed that movable leading edge devices, called slats, that extended into the airstream improved low speed handling.
Storms' new wing with its 35 degree sweep and full span leading edge slats was fitted to the redesigned XP-86 model and tested in NAAs low speed wind tunnel. The swept wing exhibited satisfactory stall characteristics when fitted with the leading edge slats and gave the XP-86 an estimated top speed of over 650 mph. As a result, the USAAF authorized three prototypes in November of 1945.
The first XP-86 prototype (45-59597) took slightly over eighteen months to complete and rolled out at NAA's Inglewood plant on 8 August 1947. The prototype emerged as a sleek low wing aircraft with swept back wings and tail surfaces, with little resemblance to its contemporaries, such as the P-80, P-84 and F9F. Not only was the airframe a radical departure from any other aircraft then in production, the XP-86 also incorporated two major structural innovations. First was the use of tapered skinning and the second was the use of a double skin structure rather than a conventional rib and stringer construction. This provided added strength and allowed enough open area in the wing for fuel tanks.
The XP-86 looked fast - and it lived up to its looks. After extensive ground testing, NAA test pilot George "Wheaties" Welch lifted the XP-86 off the dry lake bed at Muroc on I October 1947. Flight tests revealed that the XP-86 was all that the Air Force had hoped for. The greatest advantage of the swept wing was its low drag at high Mach numbers.
This meant that thrust that was needed to reach these speeds with a straight wing aircraft could now he used for combat maneuvering. It was found that the swept wing actually had a higher lift factor than a larger straight wing design at high Mach numbers. This meant that a Sabre pilot could keep the Mach number high in a diving turn where lift is usually a limiting factor with a straight wing. The XP-86 was designed with a set of speed brakes in the rear fuselage, two on the fuselage sides and one, large brake under the fuselage. These brakes could be opened in any attitude and speed, including at or above Mach One. No other fighter had such a braking system.
Tests showed that the XP-86 was 75 mph faster than anything else in service. The XP-86 wasn't just a fast aircraft. The leading edge slats could be used to lessen turn rate and gain an advantage over an enemy. It was a "pilots airplane." If the XP-86 went out of control, the pilot need only to release the stick and the XP-86 would stabilize, if you had the altitude. One of the things pilots liked about the airplane was the great vision through the 360 degree bubble canopy.
Low speed handling, especially during takeoff and landing was still an area of concern, even with full extension of the leading edge slats. If the wing lost lift, no amount of power could keep the XP-86 airborne. The aircraft would perform what was known as the "Sabre dance," during which the aircraft would flounder in the air, waving back and forth on its exhaust plume, usually with fatal results. The answer was more power and North American re-engined one of the three XP-86 prototypes with the new 5,200 lbst J47-GE-3 power plant (which was intended for production aircraft) and it was this XP-86 that "Wheaties" Welch put through the sound barrier on 25 April 1948. With the successful completion of the test program, the Air Force ordered the aircraft into production under the designation F-86A Sabre.
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