Warbird tail-sitters

[Tophe]

On this great invention road, were designed the Deltastang DP-51D and 51B, discarding tailplanes like willing to discover the secret of our Flying Saucers!:

[Tophe]

Look: Earth-humanoids, for curing the stability problem of the Deltastangs, could have invented this!:

Like Flying Saucers! of their own!
(and their witch-doctors were willing to apply mental force instead of piston/fuel/rotors, coming to our level of technology! so these awful two-feet animals could have comen here and invaded all! Fortunately, starvation killed all men. Saving Civilization, saving our red planet. Thanks Göd!)

[Tophe]

On this great invention road, were designed the Deltastang DP-51D and 51B

Like North American made the Deltastang tailsitters from simple P-51s, the Soviet made the Yuriev Kit-1 delta tailsitter from P-39 Aerokobra
(see the 1/72 great model at http://www.unicraft.biz/on/kit1/kit1.htm )
But the capitalistic Bell engineers made a cheaper tailsitter from the standard P-39 Airacobra: V-39 Tailsacobra:

[Tophe]

the Soviet made the Yuriev Kit-1 delta tailsitter from P-39 Aerokobra
(see the 1/72 great model at http://www.unicraft.biz/on/kit1/kit1.htm )

As well, the Spitfire tailsitter is famous ("Real-World" project, they say, I don't know what that means), but the 2-seat Twin-Spitfire tailsitter is a consequence of the tail-sit fever I described in the Stories topic http://beyondthesprues.com/Forum/index.php?topic=5501.0 ...

[Tophe]

The XV-38A, X and C were other Lightning tail-sitters (the C was the reason why the French SNECMA paid copyright to Lockheed for the well-known project Coléoptère):

[taiidantomcat]

Love these latest iterations 

[Tophe]

Thanks! I plan to draw next the "real" Spitfire tailsitter (that I scanned recently to send to a SecretProjects friend). This is almost "too much true" for being here, but it could be the basis for twin-fuselage derivative or other dreams...

[Tophe]

Here are they:
- The Supermarine Spitfire 4040 is a VTOL (unbuilt) true project, found as 3-view in the book "Spitfire, the History" by Morgan+Shacklady, Key publishing
see also http://www.secretprojects.co.uk/forum/index.php/topic,3602.0.html
- The Supermarine Twin-Spitfire 4042 is a VTOL dream that occured in the 1944 tail-sit fever "glue141" explained at http://beyondthesprues.com/Forum/index.php?topic=5501.0

[Tophe]

Of course, before the Supermarine 4040, rather far from a standard Spitfire, were the Ultramarine Spitfire Mk.14T and Mk.22T tailsitters:

[Tophe]

In the Twin-Spitfire family, of course there were many other different projects of tailsitters: half-bubble, double-bubble, single-bubble, bubble-less-single-seater, no-seat-UAV:

[Tophe]

Of course, engineers of the 1940s were clever and wise: they understood perfectly that tailsitting was not the only VTOL-way. But the tilting-fan test (take off position on the left, theoretical cruise in the center) failed to take off actually, and the final P-38 fan-VTOL became another tailsitter (on the right below)...

[Tophe]

The HA-38 "Harrier" was also a famous failure, having tail-sit derivatives: