The Hawker Sea Fury Carrier borne fighter-bomber was the British Fleet Air Arm's last piston-engined fighter, developed during WWII it did not see service with the Fleet Air Arm until after the war. It was arguably the fastest piston powered aircraft ever manufactured.
It was a development from the Hawker Tempest, itself a development of the Hawker Typhoon. Originally, the Hawker Fury was designed by Sidney Camm in 1942 under F.2/43 specification, to provide the RAF with a lightweight replacement for the Tempest II.
On 23 June, 1942, Luftwaffe Pilot Oberleutnant Arnim Faber erroneously landed his Focke-Wulf Fw 190A-3 fighter at RAF Pembrey, apparently having mistaken this airfield for a Luftwaffe channel coast airfield. The British were thereby presented with a working example of the Fw 190 fighter, which had been giving the RAF an extremely difficult time. The Hawker Fury design was a direct result of the examination of Faber's Fw 190A-3. Examination of Faber's aircraft was largely responsible for the preparation of Specification F.6/42, which called for a new, high-performance fighter.
The design was modified in 1943 to meet a Royal Navy specification (N.7/43) for a carrier-based interceptor and named the Hawker Sea Fury. Hawker was designated to work on the land-based version, and responsibility for the naval conversion was assigned to Boulton-Paul Aircraft Ltd. of Wolverhampton.
Early in 1944, a revised naval specification, N.22/43, supplanted N.7/43. and in April 1944 contracts were placed for 200 F.2/43 planes for the RAF and 200 N.22/43 planes for the Fleet Air Arm. The first Sea Fury prototype, SR661, flew on 21 February, 1945. It was powered by a Centaurus XII engine driving a four-bladed propeller. This airplane had a deck arrester hook under the rudder, but retained fixed wings. The second Sea Fury prototype, SR666, was powered by a Centaurus XV driving a five-bladed propeller and was a fully navalized aircraft with folding wings. The prototype Sea Fury SR661 was subsequently tested for its suitability as a naval fighter, and in deck landing trials, at the A&AEE Boscombe Down in May 1945. Tests were still underway as the Japanese surrendered in August 1945.
With the end of the Second World War, the RAF cancelled all production contracts for the Fury, deciding to concentrate all of its future efforts on jet fighters. The Royal Navy reduced its order for Sea Furies to 100 aircraft, and canceled the Boulton-Paul contract in its entirety.
The first production aircraft - a Mark 10 which was a carrier-based version, with folding wings- did not make its initial flight until September 1946. Although originally intended to serve with both the RAF and FAA, the RAF order was cancelled at the end of the war. The first deck trials with Sea Fury TF898 began aboard HMS Victorious during the winter of 1946-47. The Mark 10 was approved for carrier operations in Spring 1947, and five Fleet Air Arm squadrons were then equipped with the Sea Fury. The Mark 10 was followed by the Mark 11 fighter-bomber - 615 of these were eventually delivered to the Navy. It became the Fleet Air Arm's principal single-seat fighter and remained so until the introduction of the Sea Hawk jet fighter in 1953.
The Sea Fury served throughout the Korean War, replacing the Seafire, which was not really built for carrier operations, being too fragile.
The Sea Fury was used by the FAA, Canada, Holland, Australia, and other countries including the Iraq Air Force. A total of 75 Sea Furies served with the Royal Canadian Navy(R.C.N.) between 1948 and 1956. All flew from the Aircraft Carrier HMCS Magnificent in 871 squadron.
Aircraft Type: Hawker Sea Fury
Mark: Prototype 1939-1945, postwar Mk X
Primary Role: Carrier borne fighter-bomber
First Flight: Prototypes - September 1944/February 1945
First production aircraft - a Mark 10 - did not make its initial flight until September 1946
Date operating with FAA squadrons: Entered Service: October 1945 for fully navalized version- 1950s
Manufacturer: Hawker was designated to work on the land-based
version, and responsibility for the naval conversion was assigned to Boulton-Paul Aircraft Ltd. of Wolverhampton.
Engine: One 2,480hp Bristol Centaurus 18 air-cooled radial engine
Wing Span: Length: Height: Wing Area: Wingspan 11.7m
Wing Area 26.01 sq m
Length 10.57m
Empty Weight: Max.Weight: Empty Weight: 4,191kg
Maximum Take Off Weight 5,670kg
Speed:
Ceiling:
Range: Speed:740kmh at 4,586m
Radius 1,127km without external fuel tanks
Service Ceiling 10,912m
Armament: Four 20mm cannon
2,000lb of bombs or twelve 3-inch rocket projectiles
Crew: 1
Squadrons: Prototype to A&AEE
Battle honours: None in 1939-1945, postwar involvement in Korea
So far as fastest propeller aircraft overall, the Russian TU-95 and TU-142 varients win. Amazing when you consider each engine is rated at 15,000 Shaft HP driving contrarotating props - just shy of 575 kts at altitude.
Some notes on the 95 -
The Tu-95 is the world's only swept-wing turboprop ever to enter service. Its distinct engines, each with two counter-rotating propellers, also make the Bear the fastest propeller-driven airplane ever built. The original Tu-95 was designed to carry two nuclear bombs to targets in the continental US. Later versions carried cruise missiles for long-ange stand-off missions. The Bear has also been used for reconnaissance, especially by the Soviet/Russian Navy which used the aircraft to locate US aircraft carrier task forces. A specialized variant of the Bear is the Tu-142 dedicated to maritime surveillance and anti-submarine warfare. Over 300 Bears were built.
PERFORMANCE:
Max Level Speed at altitude: 575 mph (925 km/h) at 40,010 ft (12,205 m), Mach 0.87
at sea level: 405 mph (650 km/h), Mach 0.53
Initial Climb Rate unknown
Service Ceiling 39,370 ft (12,000 m)
29,850 ft (9,100 m) with max payload
Range 8,110 nm (15,000 km) with max fuel
The Tu-95 propellers reach transonic speeds (in the order of M1.05) when it flies at its maximum speed (M0.83) and when it flies at max. cruising speed above 11 000 metres (36 000 ft). The rest of the time they are subsonic despite their large diameter (5.6m , 18ft 4in). This is due to their very low constant rotational speed, which is around 800 rpm( "plus/minus one mile") 8:}D This can be observed in all Tu-95 in-flight pictures. In most of them even the de-icing boots can be clearly seen. In static conditions the tips reach about M0.74.
Those tips are in fact supersonic airfoils (1952/3 vintage. Remember this aircraft was shown in public for the first time in 1955), very thin and with a sharply diminishing chord that reduces to zero at the apex.
One interesting feature of these coaxial props is that they are mechanically independent. One can rotate them together in any direction or counter-rotate them in any direction too. All of this with the small fingers. Each propeller is driven by its own free-turbine (four stages each, if my memory does not betray me.) The counter-rotation is achieved gasodynamicaly by the flux turning the rotors in opposite directions.
They must be noisy at M1.0, but these a/c normally cruise at slow speeds (740 kmh for 12 000 km range) or a bit less for their 16 patrol flights. Under these circumstances intercepting pilots will not hear anything but their own engines I think. If the Tu-95 pilot had enough fuel to play around flying at high speeds to annoy the intercepting pilots, I cannot imagine his crew consenting easily to that. A noise loud enough to keep away helmet wearing intercepting pilots, flying in noisy cockpits, should be so intense that the poor people inside the bomber, wearing their flimsy leather helmets and sitting in their not too-well sound-proofed cubicles would simply go crazy.
I have spoken with several F-15, F-16 and F-106 pilots who have intercepted Bears. They all said that they could clearly hear the noise of the Tu's props over the sound of their own engine(s), even with their helmets on. the propeller blade itself need not be travelling at supersonic speed in order to generate shock waves. When the tip velocity approaches high subsonic Mach numbers, the local velocity over the blades becomes supersonic, and shockwaves are generated. Even supersonic airfoils have this characteristic behavior. The exact Mach number at which shockwaves will appear is dependent on airfoil and angle-of-attack.
The accounts of Bears out-accelerating western jet fighters are true, but only in the case of Tornado F.3 intercepts. This is more a measure of the Tornado's weaknesses at high altitude than the Bear's exceptional capabilities. The Tornado's high wing-loading and engines optimized for low altitude make it a slug in the high altitude, subsonic regime. This performance failing is well known throughout NATO, but Gulf War experiences and recent accounts of Bear intercepts have brought the deficiency to public light. The Bear is powerful, fast and efficient for a subsonic bomber, but most fighters will leave it in the dust without the mere flicker of an AB plume.
My 2 cents
Wolf
