Open cockpits

[colmbo]

How can it possibly hit the pilot when departing the airplane? It can't go down.

Bubble types can move sideways.  Part of the brief I got when flying the Mustang was if we had to get out he would give me a warning and I was to bend over so the canopy would clear me.

[Butcher]

I certainly wouldn't mind the idea of having the cockpits opened, only key is if you fly to fast you rip it off like landing gears which would degrade performance. In theory you "can" fly without landing gears (aces high of course).

I would be opening a 109s cockpit every flight 

[W7LPNRICK]

No. Open can of worms, IMO 

[Guppy35]

It could only be done at slow speeds with steady orientation. In AH it would be so badly abused and left open all the time (especially in dogfights).


In reality, it was opened on final approaches so that if you crashed, or you missed the deck and splashed down, you could ESCAPE that much more quickly.

It's going to appear I'm stalking your statements a bit Krusty but I think you are making a statement that isn't true.

Spitfire pilot Bill Olmsted  "Four our July 17th sortie I decided to remove my hood or coupe top to see if I could squeeze a little more speed out of my "E" job. (his Spitfire Vc) None of our recent flights had been over 10,000 feet and I reasoned a few extra miles per hour coaxed from my Spit would be worth the cold and cockpit turbulence I expected from this untried action.....I suddenly appeared at zero feet over Cantania there were guns blasting at me from every side.  Without my coupe top to deaden some of the noise, I felt that the guns were only inches away.  The racket was overwhelming and terrifying.
...I resolved never to fly with the coupe top again, and the sound of all those guns remained with me a long time."  

There will be more examples as I dig them out

MTO P40E


ETO Jug


PTO Iwo based 51D


Early PTO Wildcat

[Guppy35]

The Spitfire VI had a canopy that had to be bolted on to make the pressurization system work.  Johnnie Johnson in his book "Wing Leader" references this when his 616 squadron got some of them.  As they didn't always fly at alt, it was like a steam bath stuck under the hood.

Quoting him on a scramble in a Spitfire VI  "I shouted to Smithson and we jumped in the two nearest Spitfires.  No time to place the hood on and lock it, and a good thing too as I didn't want to ruin my best suit!"

Geoffry Page, in his book "Tale of a Guniea Pig" talks about locking his canopy open going into combat.  This being a result of seeing a fellow Hurri pilot burned up in a crash landing and unable to get out due to a jammed canopy.

And of course the SBDs always seem to be chugging along with thier canopies open    In the end I don't think it's a performance issue, but a noise, cold and personal preference.  I think it was more likely to happen at low alts in warmer climates too.  I'm still looking for the photo of the Aussie Spit VIII flying with the open cockpit to post.

[Guppy35]

MTO Spit Vcs out on a combat patrol  lead bird with the canopy back

[Squire]

The Fiat G.50 had an open cockpit as did the I-16 (flying in Russia no less), A5M, ect. I hear that many Gloster Gladiator and CR42 pilots in the MED prefered their canopies open as well. Some of that was the tradition of open cockpits of the interwar fighters. Obviously a clamshell design could not do that without problems but opening a sliding cockpit was not prohibitive if it was a sliding design. Some pilots liked to fly open cockpit. That being said as the war progressed and speeds increased generally it was not done as much but it wasn't something that you couldn't do. As stated above it was a pilot comfort issue. Over the North Sea in November (brrr) would not be the same as being over Libya in mid summer.

Didn't the P-38, P-39 and P-51A/Bs all have the side panels that could be slid down like a car window?

[colmbo]

The Fiat G.50 had an open cockpit as did the I-16 (flying in Russia no less), A5M, ect. I hear that many Gloster Gladiator and CR42 pilots in the MED prefered their canopies open as well. Some of that was the tradition of open cockpits of the interwar fighters. Obviously a clamshell design could not do that without problems but opening a sliding cockpit was not prohibitive if it was a sliding design. Some pilots liked to fly open cockpit. That being said as the war progressed and speeds increased generally it was not done as much but it wasn't something that you couldn't do. As stated above it was a pilot comfort issue. Over the North Sea in November (brrr) would not be the same as being over Libya in mid summer.

Didn't the P-38, P-39 and P-51A/Bs all have the side panels that could be slid down like a car window?

In the P-38 having the window down caused buffeting.

[AWwrgwy]

I certainly wouldn't mind the idea of having the cockpits opened, only key is if you fly to fast you rip it off like landing gears which would degrade performance. In theory you "can" fly without landing gears (aces high of course).

I would be opening a 109s cockpit every flight 

It folds to the side. No breeze for you.



wrongway

[MachFly]

Bubble types can move sideways.  Part of the brief I got when flying the Mustang was if we had to get out he would give me a warning and I was to bend over so the canopy would clear me.

Right, I was thinking of it departing the aircraft directly backwards.

[Squire]

In the P-38 having the window down caused buffeting.

Righto...but at least you could get a quick snack at the drive through. 

[Baumer]

Well I can tell you that at cruise speed in a T-6 the canopy open is nice (for the front seat).  But once the speed gets up around 180 mph, it's very uncomfortable with the canopy open.

I'm sure plenty of canopy's were open for cruise and formation (especially formation) but if you're in a high performance plane, once you went for speed you'd close it quick. 

[W7LPNRICK]

It's going to appear I'm stalking your statements a bit Krusty but I think you are making a statement that isn't true.

Spitfire pilot Bill Olmsted  "Four our July 17th sortie I decided to remove my hood or coupe top to see if I could squeeze a little more speed out of my "E" job. .  The racket was overwhelming and terrifying.
...I resolved never to fly with the coupe top again, and the sound of all those guns remained with me a long time."  

There will be more examples as I dig them out

MTO P40E

Photo Op?

[Babalonian]

No. Open can of worms, IMO 

I agree, it'll be a huge investment to impliment at even limited degrees....  But.... Still, in a few years, might be some cool beans to see cracks grow from a hole in your canopy, you hear the crackling, and then suddenly in a flash, BAM the canopy dissapears, maybe you black out instantly for a few seconds or not, but in the meantime the sudden and violent increase in cockpit wind noise leaves you with no doubt what just happened. 

@ Guppy: many canopies (not all, and certainly many could of been a modification) I've seen have a crank so that pilots could open them or close them and leave them set there at a variety of positions in between, depending on what the pilot desired.  It's interesting to note all those pictured in your photos are fully open it apears, perhaps for the photo shoot, or perhaps because maximum ventalation was desired.

[Krupinski]

If canopy is to be blown off at high speeds, the edges of your screen should be greyed as if you're beginning to black out in a hard turn, and your screen should begin to shake as if in a compression.