One detail for the animation: the 2 propellers should turn in opposite directions and opposite to the direction of the wing tip vortex, if I am not mistaken.
Normaly the lower the wing aspect ratio the greater the vortex loss and less efficient wings. This plane can get away with such chunky wings because the propellers position counteract this loss like you mentioned.
All I have to say, is that this channel reminds me of Mustard (2017-now)
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Looks like a perfect design to start for an all electric plane. 80HP is a piece of cake for electric motors, this could even work with current batteries.
Agreed. No transmission. The electric motors could be small enough to be pushed out to the edges. A small turbine Aux can power the electric motors. Contemporary batteries can do wonders to power a 30-minute flight. More ideas like contra-rotation of smaller rotors can be helpful.
@@jfangm Negative. That's a myth. NACA tunnel tests with the V-73 showed that it did not gain anything nor particularly change anything with those props. It got is super-STOL stall-proof performance solely from the planform, not the props. See the Arup S=-2 of the 1930s which the V-173 was based on. Sleek and quick on little power, super-STOIL and stall-spin proof. Zimmerman saw it fly while he worked for NACA and after that chose it as a starting point for his VTOL tail-sitter experiments. It was not necessary for the props to be there to fly. See the 1940s Boeing model 390 for alternative flapjack. Based on the Arup experience it would have flown well.
@@JFrazer4303 No, it isn't a myth, is a matter of scientific fact. The shape of the aircraft necessitated large propellers. I made no claims about the propellers relating to its performance. Try reading for comprehension next time.
It's simply not true that the shape necessitated the props situated as they were. See the "Flying Heel-Lift" videos about the Arup plane which this was based from. It did everything this did, on less power and faster if an Arup ever had 160 horsepower. Several other similar examples have flown well, and not paying any attention to any alleged huge vortices at cruise. It is a matter of scientific fact that the Arups did everything the Vought did, proving that it did not need the props as they were.
Thinking about this, an aircraft like this would probably make for an excellent COIN aircraft. Think about it. S/TOL means you don’t need a full size airfield to operate it. Ideal for operating in the middle of nowhere. With the lifting body and large wing surface area, payload is gonna be excellent. And you can pack a lot of fuel. Loitering time is gonna be wonderful.
Downside is that it would have a huge visual profile that would make it easy to spot and target using ground based heavy machine guns. It would also lose a lot of it's aerodynamic efficiency when you start hanging external bombs and missiles on it. Another consideration is maintenance. If an A-10's wing get's damaged you can actually fit a new one. If any part of a plane like this was damaged it might be a complete write off. Plus having enough hatches in the fuselage for mechanics to do routine maintenance on the internal systems could be an issue. So not necessarily a bad idea but you have to consider the downsides as well as the upsides when looking at this sort of thing.
@@thekraken1173 : Yeah, this sort of thing would probably be best suited to non-military roles. Would be interesting to see an attempt to adapt this design to full VTOL too, maybe with low-mounted rotors and thrust redirection flaps like on the Curtis Vertiplane or Fairchild VZ-5.
Replace the tail plains with a pair of swiveling fans and you've got an excellent starting point for a fast, long range drone with nearly full VTOL capabilities.
I used to work at the vought factory in Grand Prairie Texas where they restored the V-173 and got to see it on a daily basis. A truly remarkable aircraft
@@insertjjs So.....your one of the reasons first shift got 40 hours for 2 hours work and I got 1,5 for 9 hours work? I was there in 2009. $10.85 an hour working on flight critical components and training other people? I had to go.
You totally miss the underlying design philosophy. The high aspect ratio wing has been known by many as very efficient. I.E. lift to drag ratio. The problem is with very long wing tips it has great wing tip vortices-, where the high pressure air under the wing rushes to the low pressure area on top of the wing. These vortices (which Geese take advantage of in their V formations) are minimalized by having short wing tips like the mustang you put up, and also by modern airliner winglets. Zimmerman created a very direct solution by putting the props right on the wing tips rotating in the opposite direction as the vortices thereby cancelling that inherent drag and maximizing the inherent advantages of the high aspect wing. This design and it's inherent efficiency remains untapped except by the very expensive Osprey. Commercial aircraft could do well to perfect the design. Small frontal area turbo-props could be used right in the wingtips and avoid the drive train issues. Zimmerman has left his gift for some forward thinking designer to run with it!
Myth and urgan legend. The props in Zimmerman's plane did not cancel the vortices. NACA tests showed that it did not gain anything or particularly change anything with the situation of the props. The Arup S-2 which this was based on, had all the same flight qualities (super-STOL, stall-proof), but did not use Zimmerman's propeller situation. Did not suffer from lots of drag. The fact that the V-173 was able to fly super-slowly showed that the wing-tip driven "parachute lift" was in effect which means the props didn't counter them in any meaningful way. It got its flying qualities solely from the planform, not the awkward and over-complex situation of the props.
wingtip props don't cancel vortices, they move them further out as they increase the effective span. there's an advantage to tip props but it's not huge ... debated but less than 15%, and designers are not keen on the characteristics of losing an engine. in general short heavily loaded spans generate larger vortices than long lightly loaded spans. the tips of long spans do the same thing as they would if they were folded up as winglets, except they don't fit so well in airports
having engines at the edges would create quite a big bending moment and overall really stress the wings, so the extra mass needed to reinforce the wings would probably counteract any gains
@@DS-pk4eh I want to build one. I haven't done anything since control-line profile planes and balsa and tissue paper rubber-band power, decades ago. IDK what materials or tools...
I honestly love this plane. I remember a game back in the day called secret weappns over normandy that had this plane in it. Honestly its design is hard to forget
@@RandomTask678 you're probs right. was one of the weapons an energy snake that just shot out one beam that would get thicker with upgrades and just stick to one enemy until it got destroyed?
It had been my understanding that more powerful engines would have been installed in the production models giving it a much higher speed, so while it could fly slow, it could also fly very fast. It could also generate its own lift with its propellers, initiating a limited hover from very little forward movement.
correct, the designs goal was to have a very fast (in fact intended to be one of the the fastest prop fighters) yet still have docile low speed handling for carrier and short field operations. V173 was only a proof of concept for XF5U.
Negative. The Super-STOL stall-proof qualities came solely from the very-low aspect-ratio planform. NACA tunnel tests with the Vought V-173 showed that it did not gain anything or particularly change anything versus normal sized props spinning the other way. The Arup and very many other very-low aspect-ratio planes reproduced everything the Vought plane did, and were not slow and draggy but sleek and quick on little power.
The engineer/designer's concept was vindicated, this could have been a very successful design but it took too long to iron out the problems and by the time that was done the jet age had already arrived. Like the Bear Cat and many other post WWII "Super Props" we will never know just what this design might have been capable of. I love designs like this that dare to stray from the conventional and push design in a new direction, even if the design fails what is learned often advances aerodynamic understanding.
Yes, this looks like would be useful against u-boats operating from merchant carriers as in an WW 2 oil or grain ship with an flight deck. Not the jets who killed it I think but more escort carriers and fewer u-boats.
How do you figure the designers were vindicated? We can not really know what the performance would be like because it never flew. And the fact that no one else came up with anything similar, say a turboprop VSTOL tells me the concept was probably flawed.
@@ouroboris - The XF5U never went beyond high speed taxi test. A much lower powered proof of concept aircraft did fly. The XF5U was scheduled to be shipped to California, for flight testing but it was canceled and the aircraft broken up and scrapped. And the V-22 is completely different. It is not a fighter but is vertical takeoff and landing. The aircraft was a loser. And following it was the XF-6U Pirate and the F7U Cutlass. Three losers in a row. Were it not for the F-8 Crusader, LTV would probably folded as an aircraft manufacturer.
Arup planes did all of that in the '30s. Fast on little power, and super-STOL. Are any of these other super-STOL planes also stall-spin proof with amazing climb rate? Will not stall. Flow does _not_ separate from the top of the wing as ~
The first was Kenneth Arnold in '47. He reported 8 things somewhat like this, no fins or apparent canopies, all mirror silver. They were apparently escorting a larger paraboloid all-wing. And they were all going Mach 2+, so no, not something we were building. A jet powered plane like this wouldn't be silent, wouldn't hover silently, wouldn't zip off from a zero start to Mach 5 in a second.
This was actually a bit faster than any -frontline- _piston engined_ fighter at the time and so hardly slow except when considering it's low takeoff and stall speed.
Had the widest range of speed compared to anything developed at that time, but I suppose this video only focuses on the take-off and landing characteristics. The top speed mentioned here may have just been engine/driveshaft limitations of the prototype.
Its two different planes, the original prototype was slow, but the military fighter aircraft prototype had a high theoretical top speed. Which wouldnt be shocking, considering its a compact plane with two extremely powerful prop engines. However, theoreticals dont get you anything, if you cant even do a full flight test because of high vibrations. Vibrations are often a limiting factor towards an aircrafts top speed, and in this plane they were so bad you couldn t even take off.
@@Sherwoody it's funny because I see a ton of comments describing how this could be used in a ton of different applications that Helicopters already do. Low flying Search and Rescue, very short flights, and affordability. I was just thinking "You mean like a really cheap Helicopter?"
The XF5U didn't even fly, due to excessive vibration from the powertrain. It wasn't necessary: it didn't and you don't need to try to "counter" wing-tip vortices, very-low aspect-ratio planform planes are not inherently draggy, many have been sleek and quick on little power. The Navy, if they were serious about fast, STOL planes, should have built the Boeing 390/391.
Sack As-6 was to be a pancake, but it probably needed more nose-up angle on the landing gear to take off. See the modern Rowe "UFO" circular plane, and the '30s Arup planes from Indiana ("flying heel-lift" on youtube). the Arup was the origin of the Vought V-173 flapjack and the Sack plane, and otehrs. See also the '30s Nemeth "parachute plane" with circular wing. Faster than the plane which the fuselage came from, stall-spin proof, landing roll near zero with any wind.
Actually this plane was a requirement for a new fighter for the pacific, the plane could take off at, and don’t hold me to this 40MPH from a carrier deck and it’s top speed of, 500MPH. This would put it on par with the early jets of the day. This also would’ve allowed it to intercept kamikaze and other suicide aircraft.
This thing is really bad carrier fighter, It require 541 ft of runway when there is 25 knot headwind, F4U-4 only require 288ft on same condition. There is a reasons that USN never put this thing into service
@@tomshen320 The F-4 corsairs gull wing design. Gave that appearance that it was coming to Get ya. I surmise they went back to the 20mm. canons away from the 50's was for more capacity. I would like to think. All the modifications that came about with the B&C versions were made due to input from the pilots flying earlier versions. Vought later in the 1950's chose the 20 mm for that reason. On the F-8 Crusader. Another phenomenal contribution to our Navy's air wing.
ive heard that the design was meant to be stall-less, which worked so well that the plane accidentally inverted itself during a stall test and flew back the way it came, straight into a pine forest
@@tomshen320 Actually, we don't know how much runway it would take, as they never did a flight test, just taxiing. Given that the V-173 test craft did a 200ft run with no headwind, and *less than 50 foot run with a 30mph headwind,* I think getting the XF5U off an Essex's deck (despite it being 5x heavier) will be little problem. Jets are what killed this project, not any lack of performance to spec.
Animator/Author: The propeller blade tips go: top -> out, outboard -> down, counter-rotating, both sides critical. The idea was to keep a high pressure cushion under the aircraft. It worked fantastically well. You need to modify the animation.
The propellers were counter rotating. They washed the air downward over the wingtips to counter the effect of wingtip vortecis. The port side prop spun counter clockwise and the starboard prop spun clockwise. I love watching your animations, but please think about these things.
Counter rotating props are used in any multi prop plane. It also create balance between the left and right side of the plane. Counter-rotation is to balance propeller torque effects thus eliminating any problems
"Counter rotating" "the egg beaters are lobbing" was my take. I think the speed and short takeoff would really be fun in one of these if we slap an experimental sticker on it. A massive corn holio panel party to only want to do it once,, they had two engines. (2) 12 hour days later with 2 guys headphones on using idgaf comms yeah the vibrations could be fixed. Don't reuse screws you'll hate yourself. Save all the screws from your recent addition on your house after a teardown and put it back together, after doing that every 4 days for two years you'd expect something to be right. Vegas baby. Be an engineer not a mechanic or you'll just find in aviation new ways to reuse toilet paper the stunning effects of it across the spectrum.
@@Batalia122 In this case, the designer was working towards a tail-sitter VTOL, though neither of the planes had enough power or appropriate landing gear. He supposedly wanted to counter wing-tip vortices. As it happens, he didn't: its slow-flying ability and being stall-proof were due to the planform, not the props.
@@JFrazer4303 "He supposedly wanted to counter wing-tip vortices. As it happens, he didn't: its slow-flying ability and being stall-proof were due to the planform, not the props." How is the second part of that comment disproving the first? Any low-aspect ratio wing, no matter how you design it, will have a massive issue with wingtip vortices. There's high pressure below the wing, low pressure above, and on a short wing, the air has only a short way to travel to get around the wingtip. Creating a monster of a vortex, loosing lift and creating drag in the process. For this design to work, the wingtip props were just as essential as the shape of the fuselage. Otherwise it would drag penalty itself to death.
I worked at Vought in Grand Prairie TX. Our retiree group were restoring the VF-173 to be displayed at the Smithsonian. Charles Lindberg flew it. He never did anything wrong.....until he flipped the VF-173 on a beach.
hmm, the static pictures show the rotors should counter-rotate. The moving picture SEEMED to show rotors rotating the same direction. I guess this must be an illusion associated with the frame rate. Nevertheless this suggests the rotors speeds were not matched.
Well spotted. Actually, in the few seconds of REAL footage around 8:28 and 13:57, they can be seen clearly to be counter-rotating. It is only in the CGI scenes, that they are rotating in the same direction, even though they have counter-rotating propellers. It's most obvious around 13:30, where they slow down. The left propeller (right side on the screen) is turning the wrong way! It only shows that the people making these CGI have no understanding of aviation principles, or didn't care to do it properly.
This happens extremely often and seriously puts me off, very evident Since the way this plane works is actually that it took advantage of the upward rotating half of the vortex column produced by those giant propellers, to both create an increased upward force below the wing, and to completely eliminate the wingtip loss it would otherwise have. If the propellers were oriented to spin in their opposite directions, with the downward rotating half of the vortex column hitting the top of the wing, the plane likely wouldn't even get off the ground.
@@foolishwatcher the model looks fine apart from that? Its a UA-cam video mate, its such a simple mistake as an animation turning the wrong way. In all honesty, if this had millions of dollars worth of production behind it I'd agree with you in that it would be a shock to see a detail like that missed. Try to not pair a minor detail easy to miss with absolute intent to ruin the immersion of a floating digital model.
The props counter-rotate. Zimmerman's genius was that the props "unwound" the wing tip vortices, which had bedeviled earlier low-aspect designs. This, in turn, provided the flapjack's amazing 25:1 functional airspeed envelope (20-500 kts). Incidentally, the airfoil cross-section and the planform had the same shape, differing only by their "thickness".
The V-173 was a proof of concept machine, never intended to be a production machine. Identifying issues was it's goal, not speed as evidenced by the fixed landing gear.
This aircraft might have made a huge difference in the Atlantic as submarine defense. Liberty ships had a length of 441 feet so a partial upper deck conversion could have created a potent anti submarine platform.
@@SephirothRyu The Arup planes from Indiana proved the concept in the '30s "(see the "Flying Heel-Lift" youtube). A larger plane like a twin engine the size of the Avenger or S-2 would have taken off with 10 kts deck speed with any wind and headway, and did not require more advanced technology than the mid'30s. They just ignored it, and when they did look at it they did a parody with the outward turning wing-tip props.
Blew my mind when I saw this crazy thing at the Frontiers of Flight Museum in Dallas. Had no idea it existed. Been a favorite of mine ever since. Thanks for the great video!
I'm just going to put this out there so that it is actually said somewhere, but there are many planes that are both significantly slower than this plane and could take off in shorter distances. Many of these even predate it (look at the Po-2 or the Fi-156 for example). So it's scarcely revolutionary in that regard. This aircraft was created as an experimental proof of concept for a different wing arrangement than usual and flying as slow as possible was not one of the stated goals for it. It is still interesting nonetheless and definitely one of the most unusual aircraft of that period. A german engineer also attempted to create a circular wing aircraft at about this time, its called the Sack AS-6, and it has a pretty interesting history as well
The reason the plane was made was not only was it capable of short runway takeoffs, but could *land* on a short runway as well. Why? It was made to operate from the deck of a Liberty ship that had a desperate need of aircraft to defend themselves against the Luftwaffe. There was some freighters that could launch a fighter from a catapult, but they could not recover the fighter (which I believe for the British was a Hawker Hurricane). The catapult system also ate up a bunch of space that could have been used for war-time cargo. Float Plane Fighters required a crane to recover in addition to the catapult system, and by then the performance of float places was too far behind German long range fighters and bombers to make a difference. The Flying Flapjack only needed a fairly small amount of cargo space for its fuel and ammo. It could even perform as Anti-Submarine Warfare against a sub that was surfaced. PS: The Sack AS-6 failed because the Germans failed to take into account how much lift was lost over the edges of the plane. The Flying Flapjack had those two engines and propellers to counteract the loss of lift, and therefore could fly.
@@neorenamon Landing on a ship still requires an arrestor hook, it isn't really practical to make a plane that can stop very quickly on a ship without some external aid. And at that point you're better off using a conventional design with better performance at low speeds to make landing easier. A conventional STOL plane is perfectly capable of landing on short runways as well (often less than 100m) and you'd be hard pressed to beat that even with modern planes. But as I said, you'd equip a plane with an arresting hook and install arresting wires on the ship as well anyway, so that kinda gets rid of the whole point of using a specially designed STOL aircraft. The other issue is that STOL aircraft often are not very fast (this specific iteration of the flying pancake only had a top speed of around 220km/h if I'm not mistaken) which is really not ideal for dealing with fighters or potential attack aircraft anyway (this thing is slower than the stall speed of some aircraft, so imagine how outclassed it would be in a fight, not to mention it's a pretty easy target given it's basically a big circle) Honestly the eventual solution they chose of using an escort carrier or single use catapult launched Hurricanes was a far more practical and worthwhile solution than this thing would have ever been. It's an interesting exercise in unorthodox design nonetheless, but ultimately it falls short in some crucial areas. Probably the most notable one here is the fact it had very poor handling and difficult controls at lower speeds, which is absolutely the last thing you want when doing any sort of carrier operations, especially on a small flight deck.
Neither the PO-2, nor the FI-156 was a fighter aircraft, the whole point of this aircraft was to have a high performance aircraft that could land on a freighter or noncarrier warship. Quite a bit different then a spotter aircraft.
@@kdrapertrucker if the point was to have a high performance aircraft they wouldn't have bothered with a completely unorthodox STOL design. As mentioned in my previous comment this thing had awful low-speed handling and its top speed was laughable for the time, especially for a fighter. Carrier-based operations largely eliminate the reasons STOL exists in the first place, and there were already sufficient solutions to the problem. My comparison to the Po-2 and Fi-156 was to demonstrate that the flying pancake fell short as a STOL design, whether those aircraft were designed for the same role or not does not change the fact that it was a failed, dead-end design itself
@@karukurokami It had two engines of 80 HP. The XF5U never flew, so any talk about what it might have done is speculation. It also would have done remarkably well with jets. See the Boeing "flapjack" model 390. Single center prop just like the Arup S-2 which Zimmerman based this on. Sleek and quick on little power, stall-spin proof, great handling, fast climb rate> It would have been virtually identical to the Arup planes which adequately tested the planform and showed that it was better in just about every respect to "normal" planes.
@Bryce Kleinschmidt Because a fast plane is gone in a few seconds. The closer to the ground, the greater the problem. A super slow plane uses less fuel than a helicopter but can monitor the ground for extended periods. It can also drop cargo very accurately.
The C-21 Dragon Assault Ship comes to mind from the James Cameron Avatar flick. The helicopter of it's time with a higher payload. 450 mph. Now that is handy.
It would be a poor design in real life. Disk loading would be high compared to a single rotor helicopter (more power needed for the same amount of lift) and it relies on mechanically tilting the ducted fans instead of cyclic pitch which would make for slower attitude control and more power needed to move the whole assembly. With a helicopter the angle of attack of the blade changes as it rotates around the hub i.e. the blades will have a higher angle of attack on one side of the disk than the other which in turn increases lift on one side and decreases it on the other, this requires less mass to be moved and is faster than tilting the whole thing. And no matter how powerful your engines are or how efficient the rotor blades design, those same advances can be applied to a single rotor helicopter as well so single rotor helicopters would always be ahead.
@@atomicskull6405 yes, but top speed is limited in single rotor helicopter to around 200 mph due to procession of the blade lift... for 1945 this was a slick solution short take off and heavy lift body.
I think there is STILL a place for the design. How about bush planes? Or ground support attack aircraft? Do you realize how difficult it would be for ground troops to take aim at such a silhouette? Turboprops would be perfect for the design!
P-40 Warhawks on a carrier deck at 7:45. This was probably footage of the 325th Fighter Group aboard the USS Ranger. A year earlier, the 33rd FG participated in OP Torch aboard a CVE using P-40s.
Does anyone look at this and think A 10 back to the future vibes . It was incredibly tough, manouverable . Run turboprops or turbofans... 🤔😎 This and the Moonbat always make me want to play what if.. The other point is those self same jets were supplanted in combat by Skyraiders flying coin missions and skymasters doing FAC and rescue coordination ... This would have been able to withstand heavy small arms ground fire and stay in one piece.👽🤠
One thing about this, is that to fly slowly, it must have ~30+ degrees nose-up. Try fitting a big gun, with -30 degrees down angle. Either that or mount the guns inside normally, and it doesn't fly super-slowly for gunnery.
0:25 seeing those props revolve in the same direction hurts my brain. Having animators that have an idea of the function of the object they're modelling helps. Again at 0:47, here the stationary props are both clearly designed to rotate left. (at least THAT was right in the shot mentioned previously) The shot at 8:36 proves that the guys assembling the wind tunnel model didn't have an idea about the principles either; left and right propeller are swapped. The argumentation at 3:42 is way off. NACA certainly knew that a wing like that would have highly 3-dimensional flow characteristics, with the airflow being as much lateral as longitudinal. That was the reason to put the props at the wingtips and have them rotate so they "shovel" air under the wing. The high angle of attack is a necessity due to the very low increase of lift over angle of attack of extremely low aspect ratio wings. In short: you have no idea about the aerodynamics of this highly extraordinary craft. You may have found it (not that it needed finding, aviation enthusiasts are well aware of it.) But you certainly have not explained it.
I really thought the narrator was saying "Zinnerman" rather than Zimmerman and the subtitles kind of confirm this, though the robots think he's saying cinnamon. Oh dear.
It needs more throttle to stay aloft at such low speeds than it would for an efficient cruise. At very high nose-up A, the vortices create huge drag, while at cruise they're sleek. This is amply demonstrated on the Arup planes which this is based off, and other like the Facetmobile.
You seem to ignore the need/requirement that the propeller blades be large, counter-rotating, and must rotate in the direction that negates the wing tip vortex. Which is central to the whole point of the design. Also that you cannot fly with one of the propellers out.
A myth. The props did not counter the vortices, NACA tunnel tests showed that they didn't help or particularly change anything. See the Arup S-2 for where this concept came from (minus Zimmerman's work towards a VTOL tail-sitter). See the '90s Wainfan "Facetmobile". The very low aspect-ratio planform is not inherently draggy.
I know this is nit picking. The animation of the all metal pancake seems to have the rotors spinning in the same direction. Don't many dual rotor aircraft use contra rotating props?
Considering all images and even animation of it standing still as well as the historic footage shown show them as counter rotating, i fairly sure that was a genuine mistake on the animators part. Good to state it, but in no way reducing the quality
@@dominiklehn2866 to be fair, I'm not able to produce such nice animations. I'm not knocking the animator. That's why I preceded the statement with it being a nit pick. It's a miniscule detail. I was a bit curious if the animator was correct and I'm wrong. I was kinda hoping I would be proven wrong and the animation was correct. I thought maybe that was a reason for some of the vibration.
@@birdmun to be fair, after reading through some other comments you pointed it out in the most polite way. But yeah, I'm pretty sure it's a miniscule animation error. The animation is still fantastic
Not only are dual rotor aircraft usually counter-rotating, it was an essential feature in the case of the V-173. The reason most aircraft don't use a low-aspect ratio wing like this is that they cause massive wing vortices. The high pressure air below the wing is driven around the wingtip to the low pressure air above it. And the shorter the wing, the more air does so, loosing lift, creating a vortex and inducing drag. The Flying Pancakes rotors were both spinning down on the outward turn, creating counter-vortices that cancelled each wingtip vortex out. This was pretty much the only way to make a low-speed, low-aspect ratio wing workable, with a brilliantly simple solution.
The opening statement was actually..."to fly as humanely slow as possible"... 😄 (Not: as slow as humanly possible) -Now, what the * does that mean ?? Humanely slow ?? (Or even if he meant "humanly"). Anyhoo...funny ❗😁😜
Everybody who's talking about electric replacements, keep in mind that these are 80 horsepower constant motors, a Tesla only uses approximately 30 to 50 horsepower to maintain freeway speeds, and a small 80 horsepower electric motor isn't made to run for more than 30 minutes
As some of your other viewers have noted this was not a design for a slow playing it was designed for a slow takeoff plane eventually sponsored by the Navy as a fighter. Your emphasis in the first part of the video rather misses the point. Thanks for what you have done. This is a favorite plane on which I have read a bit...
There are tons of wierd 2WW canceled aviation project. Can I look forward to more of sorts? I absolutely love this kond of "alternatively real weapons" :)
I love the design, and except for one thing found the video excellent. That one thing? You paid great attention to detail, even modeling the props as a left hand and right hand rotation. But every darn time you show the props spinning, they are spinning in the SAME direction! Very aggravating. Otherwise excellent job.
It would have actually been among one of the fastest prop driven aircraft at the time if it weren't for it's over-budgeted development, vibration issues and of course, the arrival of the jet age!
Romulan Temporal Engineer: We need a new capital ship design Assistant: Shows this video Engineer: *GENIUS!* And thus the Valkis Dreadnought Warbird was born
As a 6+ ton combat plane... (P-47 or Avenger was 7+ tons. Hellcat was just less) And can those bush plane do 480+ knots? Carrying a couple of tons of payload? Being totally stall-spin proof?
When I was watching the History channel back when I was 9 years old, they legit no joke said this was made to fly underwater and come up for surprise bombing on ships. I am serious, no joke.
Build a large scale RC model ...see existing vids. It works really well and has done since early control line versions... but they aren't all that slow.😵
I think that comes down to the fact that the renders represent the production model, while when they wanted to show the actual prototype they gust got footage.
On the bright side, the finalized flying pancake has a home in the Arcade, a vertical shoot-em-up game, Strikers 1945 one and two, compete with powerful energy cannons and can call in two giant flying wings for reinforcements.
The pancake has always been one of my favorites ever since I was a little kid. It's extremely high on my list if I ever want to keep a classic airplane. If I could get a pancake airplane and a world war II biplane I would be very happy. 👌👍✌️❤️
@@clivestainlesssteelwomble7665 I really doubt that's the case. I've heard plenty of computer generated voices and some of them are very good, but none of them sounded this natural. Plus there are plenty of other pronunciation idiosyncrasies that don't sound like the product of a computer generated voice.
I knew about this plane back as a kid, through the Arcade vertical shooter, Strikers 1945 lol...
Same! It’s cool to finally learn something about the real plane lol
Good'ol strikers, good times.
Facts
How much to have an animation based on Strikers 1945 starring the flying pancake ;)
man, strikers 1945 II huh
One detail for the animation: the 2 propellers should turn in opposite directions and opposite to the direction of the wing tip vortex, if I am not mistaken.
Well they got half of them right
@@GoingtoHecq LOL good one
Not if you want to cause problems
Normaly the lower the wing aspect ratio the greater the vortex loss and less efficient wings. This plane can get away with such chunky wings because the propellers position counteract this loss like you mentioned.
All I have to say, is that this channel reminds me of Mustard (2017-now)
Looks like a perfect design to start for an all electric plane. 80HP is a piece of cake for electric motors, this could even work with current batteries.
Agreed. No transmission. The electric motors could be small enough to be pushed out to the edges. A small turbine Aux can power the electric motors. Contemporary batteries can do wonders to power a 30-minute flight. More ideas like contra-rotation of smaller rotors can be helpful.
@@lelandhetrick205 A 30 minute flight at these speeds doesn't seem very useful though
Hendershot generator
Look at the surface area of that thing. Cover the top in thin lightweight solar panels to supplement fuel cell/bettery usage.
smells like startup idea cooking
The Pancake actually had a decent top speed, comparable to a Hellcat or Wildcat. It's real advantage was its extremely low stall speed.
the XF5U never flew. The V-173 probably lost speed swinging those unnecessary props around.
@@JFrazer4303
Those props were necesary to fly . . .
@@jfangm Negative. That's a myth.
NACA tunnel tests with the V-73 showed that it did not gain anything nor particularly change anything with those props.
It got is super-STOL stall-proof performance solely from the planform, not the props.
See the Arup S=-2 of the 1930s which the V-173 was based on. Sleek and quick on little power, super-STOIL and stall-spin proof. Zimmerman saw it fly while he worked for NACA and after that chose it as a starting point for his VTOL tail-sitter experiments.
It was not necessary for the props to be there to fly. See the 1940s Boeing model 390 for alternative flapjack. Based on the Arup experience it would have flown well.
@@JFrazer4303
No, it isn't a myth, is a matter of scientific fact. The shape of the aircraft necessitated large propellers. I made no claims about the propellers relating to its performance. Try reading for comprehension next time.
It's simply not true that the shape necessitated the props situated as they were.
See the "Flying Heel-Lift" videos about the Arup plane which this was based from.
It did everything this did, on less power and faster if an Arup ever had 160 horsepower.
Several other similar examples have flown well, and not paying any attention to any alleged huge vortices at cruise.
It is a matter of scientific fact that the Arups did everything the Vought did, proving that it did not need the props as they were.
Honestly with more iterations, this would be one heck of a plane.
Thinking about this, an aircraft like this would probably make for an excellent COIN aircraft. Think about it. S/TOL means you don’t need a full size airfield to operate it. Ideal for operating in the middle of nowhere. With the lifting body and large wing surface area, payload is gonna be excellent. And you can pack a lot of fuel. Loitering time is gonna be wonderful.
Downside is that it would have a huge visual profile that would make it easy to spot and target using ground based heavy machine guns. It would also lose a lot of it's aerodynamic efficiency when you start hanging external bombs and missiles on it.
Another consideration is maintenance. If an A-10's wing get's damaged you can actually fit a new one. If any part of a plane like this was damaged it might be a complete write off. Plus having enough hatches in the fuselage for mechanics to do routine maintenance on the internal systems could be an issue.
So not necessarily a bad idea but you have to consider the downsides as well as the upsides when looking at this sort of thing.
@@silverjohn6037 It can be used for civilian humanitarian missions in Africa
@@thekraken1173 : Yeah, this sort of thing would probably be best suited to non-military roles. Would be interesting to see an attempt to adapt this design to full VTOL too, maybe with low-mounted rotors and thrust redirection flaps like on the Curtis Vertiplane or Fairchild VZ-5.
Replace the tail plains with a pair of swiveling fans and you've got an excellent starting point for a fast, long range drone with nearly full VTOL capabilities.
@UC6c3GU25MfPhWL6VukH48cg Because batteries and electric motors will be heavier than jet or turboprop engines and fuel for the foreseeable future.
I used to work at the vought factory in Grand Prairie Texas where they restored the V-173 and got to see it on a daily basis. A truly remarkable aircraft
I worked there as well. Blackhawk program. Better than a museum. You could actually touch them and look inside.
@@hidingposer3422 I started as an IE intern doing time studies on Blackhawk during the 2nd shift back in 2007
@@insertjjs So.....your one of the reasons first shift got 40 hours for 2 hours work and I got 1,5 for 9 hours work? I was there in 2009. $10.85 an hour working on flight critical components and training other people? I had to go.
You totally miss the underlying design philosophy. The high aspect ratio wing has been known by many as very efficient. I.E. lift to drag ratio. The problem is with very long wing tips it has great wing tip vortices-, where the high pressure air under the wing rushes to the low pressure area on top of the wing. These vortices (which Geese take advantage of in their V formations) are minimalized by having short wing tips like the mustang you put up, and also by modern airliner winglets. Zimmerman created a very direct solution by putting the props right on the wing tips rotating in the opposite direction as the vortices thereby cancelling that inherent drag and maximizing the inherent advantages of the high aspect wing. This design and it's inherent efficiency remains untapped except by the very expensive Osprey. Commercial aircraft could do well to perfect the design. Small frontal area turbo-props could be used right in the wingtips and avoid the drive train issues. Zimmerman has left his gift for some forward thinking designer to run with it!
Myth and urgan legend.
The props in Zimmerman's plane did not cancel the vortices.
NACA tests showed that it did not gain anything or particularly change anything with the situation of the props.
The Arup S-2 which this was based on, had all the same flight qualities (super-STOL, stall-proof), but did not use Zimmerman's propeller situation. Did not suffer from lots of drag.
The fact that the V-173 was able to fly super-slowly showed that the wing-tip driven "parachute lift" was in effect which means the props didn't counter them in any meaningful way.
It got its flying qualities solely from the planform, not the awkward and over-complex situation of the props.
@@JFrazer4303 That one would be great candidate for "electrification". What do you think?
wingtip props don't cancel vortices, they move them further out as they increase the effective span. there's an advantage to tip props but it's not huge ... debated but less than 15%, and designers are not keen on the characteristics of losing an engine. in general short heavily loaded spans generate larger vortices than long lightly loaded spans. the tips of long spans do the same thing as they would if they were folded up as winglets, except they don't fit so well in airports
having engines at the edges would create quite a big bending moment and overall really stress the wings, so the extra mass needed to reinforce the wings would probably counteract any gains
@@DS-pk4eh
I want to build one.
I haven't done anything since control-line profile planes and balsa and tissue paper rubber-band power, decades ago.
IDK what materials or tools...
I honestly love this plane. I remember a game back in the day called secret weappns over normandy that had this plane in it. Honestly its design is hard to forget
Same here, loved that game
Absolutely great game.
I thought we were thinking of the same game, but I remember this aircraft being playable in one of the Raiden games
@@beezzarro I think it was Strikers 1945 unless I'm misremembering. I remember playing the pancake all the time on arcade.
@@RandomTask678 you're probs right. was one of the weapons an energy snake that just shot out one beam that would get thicker with upgrades and just stick to one enemy until it got destroyed?
I remember playing Strikers 1945 on the PS1. That was the first time I’d ever seen the Pancake.
Found and Explain: The Flying Pancake is the slowest airplane ever made.
MacCready Gossamer Albatross: Are you sure about that?
The Polish PZL M-15 Belphegor is also slower than the pancake (at 200kph)... and it's a jet =)
The po 2 128km/h speed
Helium filled rc plane fly at walking speed (｢`･ω･)｢
For areo-bradia, how about another Polish plane, the Wilga? Saw one at Abbotsford I could probably outrun on foot (then).
Fiesler Storch?
It had been my understanding that more powerful engines would have been installed in the production models giving it a much higher speed, so while it could fly slow, it could also fly very fast. It could also generate its own lift with its propellers, initiating a limited hover from very little forward movement.
correct, the designs goal was to have a very fast (in fact intended to be one of the the fastest prop fighters) yet still have docile low speed handling for carrier and short field operations. V173 was only a proof of concept for XF5U.
Negative. The Super-STOL stall-proof qualities came solely from the very-low aspect-ratio planform.
NACA tunnel tests with the Vought V-173 showed that it did not gain anything or particularly change anything versus normal sized props spinning the other way.
The Arup and very many other very-low aspect-ratio planes reproduced everything the Vought plane did, and were not slow and draggy but sleek and quick on little power.
@@JFrazer4303 negative, i have the gun
The engineer/designer's concept was vindicated, this could have been a very successful design but it took too long to iron out the problems and by the time that was done the jet age had already arrived. Like the Bear Cat and many other post WWII "Super Props" we will never know just what this design might have been capable of. I love designs like this that dare to stray from the conventional and push design in a new direction, even if the design fails what is learned often advances aerodynamic understanding.
I'd hardly call this a superprop. More like a superflop.
Yes, this looks like would be useful against u-boats operating from merchant carriers as in an WW 2 oil or grain ship with an flight deck. Not the jets who killed it I think but more escort carriers and fewer u-boats.
How do you figure the designers were vindicated? We can not really know what the performance would be like because it never flew. And the fact that no one else came up with anything similar, say a turboprop VSTOL tells me the concept was probably flawed.
@@scootergeorge9576 It flew in testing, and was eventually reincarnated as the V-22 Osprey.
@@ouroboris - The XF5U never went beyond high speed taxi test. A much lower powered proof of concept aircraft did fly. The XF5U was scheduled to be shipped to California, for flight testing but it was canceled and the aircraft broken up and scrapped. And the V-22 is completely different. It is not a fighter but is vertical takeoff and landing. The aircraft was a loser. And following it was the XF-6U Pirate and the F7U Cutlass. Three losers in a row. Were it not for the F-8 Crusader, LTV would probably folded as an aircraft manufacturer.
Vought: "I can design a super slow aircraft!"
Sikorsky: "Hold my beer."
Focke-Wulf Fw 61 from 1936 want to have a word with you...
Fear Sikorsky
*laughs in polikarpov Po-2*
Arup planes did all of that in the '30s. Fast on little power, and super-STOL.
Are any of these other super-STOL planes also stall-spin proof with amazing climb rate?
Will not stall. Flow does _not_ separate from the top of the wing as ~
Well this explains the 50s and 60s sightings of flying saucers. Clearly the first few people to report them saw these things.
The first was Kenneth Arnold in '47. He reported 8 things somewhat like this, no fins or apparent canopies, all mirror silver. They were apparently escorting a larger paraboloid all-wing.
And they were all going Mach 2+, so no, not something we were building.
A jet powered plane like this wouldn't be silent, wouldn't hover silently, wouldn't zip off from a zero start to Mach 5 in a second.
This was actually a bit faster than any -frontline- _piston engined_ fighter at the time and so hardly slow except when considering it's low takeoff and stall speed.
The slow speed would enable them to operate from short deck escort ships. The helicopter would eventually fill most of the roles it was designed for.
Had the widest range of speed compared to anything developed at that time, but I suppose this video only focuses on the take-off and landing characteristics. The top speed mentioned here may have just been engine/driveshaft limitations of the prototype.
Its two different planes, the original prototype was slow, but the military fighter aircraft prototype had a high theoretical top speed. Which wouldnt be shocking, considering its a compact plane with two extremely powerful prop engines.
However, theoreticals dont get you anything, if you cant even do a full flight test because of high vibrations. Vibrations are often a limiting factor towards an aircrafts top speed, and in this plane they were so bad you couldn t even take off.
@@Sherwoody it's funny because I see a ton of comments describing how this could be used in a ton of different applications that Helicopters already do. Low flying Search and Rescue, very short flights, and affordability. I was just thinking "You mean like a really cheap Helicopter?"
The XF5U didn't even fly, due to excessive vibration from the powertrain.
It wasn't necessary: it didn't and you don't need to try to "counter" wing-tip vortices, very-low aspect-ratio planform planes are not inherently draggy, many have been sleek and quick on little power.
The Navy, if they were serious about fast, STOL planes, should have built the Boeing 390/391.
German: flying wing
American: flying pancake
Both live up to their name very well
Soviet: flying tank
Japan: flying bomb
@@taryhunter5584 true
Sack As-6 was to be a pancake, but it probably needed more nose-up angle on the landing gear to take off.
See the modern Rowe "UFO" circular plane, and the '30s Arup planes from Indiana ("flying heel-lift" on youtube). the Arup was the origin of the Vought V-173 flapjack and the Sack plane, and otehrs.
See also the '30s Nemeth "parachute plane" with circular wing. Faster than the plane which the fuselage came from, stall-spin proof, landing roll near zero with any wind.
Mmmmm hungry
Actually this plane was a requirement for a new fighter for the pacific, the plane could take off at, and don’t hold me to this 40MPH from a carrier deck and it’s top speed of, 500MPH. This would put it on par with the early jets of the day. This also would’ve allowed it to intercept kamikaze and other suicide aircraft.
This thing is really bad carrier fighter, It require 541 ft of runway when there is 25 knot headwind, F4U-4 only require 288ft on same condition. There is a reasons that USN never put this thing into service
@@tomshen320
The F-4 corsairs gull wing design. Gave that appearance that it was coming to Get ya.
I surmise they went back to the 20mm. canons away from the 50's was for more capacity. I would like to think. All the modifications that came about with the B&C versions were made due to input from the pilots flying earlier versions.
Vought later in the 1950's chose the 20 mm for that reason. On the F-8 Crusader.
Another phenomenal contribution to our Navy's air wing.
ive heard that the design was meant to be stall-less, which worked so well that the plane accidentally inverted itself during a stall test and flew back the way it came, straight into a pine forest
@@snapcutter9596 going to the 20s was largely due to the planes getting larger heavier and faster. :P
@@tomshen320 Actually, we don't know how much runway it would take, as they never did a flight test, just taxiing. Given that the V-173 test craft did a 200ft run with no headwind, and *less than 50 foot run with a 30mph headwind,* I think getting the XF5U off an Essex's deck (despite it being 5x heavier) will be little problem. Jets are what killed this project, not any lack of performance to spec.
Animator/Author: The propeller blade tips go: top -> out, outboard -> down, counter-rotating, both sides critical. The idea was to keep a high pressure cushion under the aircraft. It worked fantastically well. You need to modify the animation.
absolutely was not expecting the adam & eve sponsorship that hit me like a bus
I think they might be clueless about what Adam & Eve sells.
Suggestion: do the Lunex project
Legends say Found and Explained was eating Pancakes as it premiered
True
correct. they were delicious!
@@FoundAndExplained holy moly 🗿🤝
Flying pancakes with sausage balloons are a great way to start your day.
The propellers were counter rotating. They washed the air downward over the wingtips to counter the effect of wingtip vortecis. The port side prop spun counter clockwise and the starboard prop spun clockwise. I love watching your animations, but please think about these things.
Counter rotating props are used in any multi prop plane. It also create balance between the left and right side of the plane. Counter-rotation is to balance propeller torque effects thus eliminating any problems
"Counter rotating" "the egg beaters are lobbing" was my take.
I think the speed and short takeoff would really be fun in one of these if we slap an experimental sticker on it.
A massive corn holio panel party to only want to do it once,, they had two engines. (2) 12 hour days later with 2 guys headphones on using idgaf comms yeah the vibrations could be fixed.
Don't reuse screws you'll hate yourself. Save all the screws from your recent addition on your house after a teardown and put it back together, after doing that every 4 days for two years you'd expect something to be right. Vegas baby. Be an engineer not a mechanic or you'll just find in aviation new ways to reuse toilet paper the stunning effects of it across the spectrum.
Spot on mate.
@@Batalia122 In this case, the designer was working towards a tail-sitter VTOL, though neither of the planes had enough power or appropriate landing gear.
He supposedly wanted to counter wing-tip vortices.
As it happens, he didn't: its slow-flying ability and being stall-proof were due to the planform, not the props.
@@JFrazer4303 "He supposedly wanted to counter wing-tip vortices.
As it happens, he didn't: its slow-flying ability and being stall-proof were due to the planform, not the props."
How is the second part of that comment disproving the first?
Any low-aspect ratio wing, no matter how you design it, will have a massive issue with wingtip vortices.
There's high pressure below the wing, low pressure above, and on a short wing, the air has only a short way to travel to get around the wingtip. Creating a monster of a vortex, loosing lift and creating drag in the process.
For this design to work, the wingtip props were just as essential as the shape of the fuselage. Otherwise it would drag penalty itself to death.
But a later version, the UD-4L Cheyenne Dropship, would see plenty of action fighting xenomorphs.
"We're on an express elevator to hell. Going down!"
I worked at Vought in Grand Prairie TX. Our retiree group were restoring the VF-173 to be displayed at the Smithsonian. Charles Lindberg flew it. He never did anything wrong.....until he flipped the VF-173 on a beach.
Next time, the sunbathers won't get so lucky :D
Never did anything wrong except open collaboration with nazis
hmm, the static pictures show the rotors should counter-rotate. The moving picture SEEMED to show rotors rotating the same direction. I guess this must be an illusion associated with the frame rate. Nevertheless this suggests the rotors speeds were not matched.
Well spotted. Actually, in the few seconds of REAL footage around 8:28 and 13:57, they can be seen clearly to be counter-rotating. It is only in the CGI scenes, that they are rotating in the same direction, even though they have counter-rotating propellers. It's most obvious around 13:30, where they slow down. The left propeller (right side on the screen) is turning the wrong way! It only shows that the people making these CGI have no understanding of aviation principles, or didn't care to do it properly.
This happens extremely often and seriously puts me off, very evident
Since the way this plane works is actually that it took advantage of the upward rotating half of the vortex column produced by those giant propellers, to both create an increased upward force below the wing, and to completely eliminate the wingtip loss it would otherwise have.
If the propellers were oriented to spin in their opposite directions, with the downward rotating half of the vortex column hitting the top of the wing, the plane likely wouldn't even get off the ground.
@@foolishwatcher the model looks fine apart from that? Its a UA-cam video mate, its such a simple mistake as an animation turning the wrong way. In all honesty, if this had millions of dollars worth of production behind it I'd agree with you in that it would be a shock to see a detail like that missed.
Try to not pair a minor detail easy to miss with absolute intent to ruin the immersion of a floating digital model.
The props counter-rotate. Zimmerman's genius was that the props "unwound" the wing tip vortices, which had bedeviled earlier low-aspect designs. This, in turn, provided the flapjack's amazing 25:1 functional airspeed envelope (20-500 kts). Incidentally, the airfoil cross-section and the planform had the same shape, differing only by their "thickness".
This odd looking plane is also in Strikers 1945 II and in Secret Weapons Over Normandy
The V-173 was a proof of concept machine, never intended to be a production machine. Identifying issues was it's goal, not speed as evidenced by the fixed landing gear.
the version featured in the 3d was the production model.
Are we not going to talk about how nonchalant he was with the Adam and Eve promotion?
We played this in my AFJROTC class today. So imagine the surprise when the ad segment came on.
I just love the fact that Adam and Eve sponsored a airplane video 😂 but in all seriousness good video and keep up the good work!
No lie, I heard the sponsor and immediately said *out loud*: heywaitaminute, that's not pancakes!
Lmao I wasn't ready for it
Right. Like defuk? But whatever makes the money.
Love the sponsorship, makes the channel more “fun”.
I caught it when I was skipping forward. Don’t get why they keep sponsoring random people
This aircraft might have made a huge difference in the Atlantic as submarine defense.
Liberty ships had a length of 441 feet so a partial upper deck conversion could have created a potent anti submarine platform.
By the time this thing would have been getting made, they may as well have used the subsequent Victory class transport vessels.
@@SephirothRyu
The Arup planes from Indiana proved the concept in the '30s "(see the "Flying Heel-Lift" youtube).
A larger plane like a twin engine the size of the Avenger or S-2 would have taken off with 10 kts deck speed with any wind and headway, and did not require more advanced technology than the mid'30s.
They just ignored it, and when they did look at it they did a parody with the outward turning wing-tip props.
0:45
I just love how the Corsairs have French markings
This was my favorite plane in that arcade game: Striker 1945
Blew my mind when I saw this crazy thing at the Frontiers of Flight Museum in Dallas. Had no idea it existed. Been a favorite of mine ever since. Thanks for the great video!
Oh wow ,another great video and you certainly never disappoint us with your amazing videos.Keep up the great work and have a great week
Thank you so much 😀
I'm just going to put this out there so that it is actually said somewhere, but there are many planes that are both significantly slower than this plane and could take off in shorter distances. Many of these even predate it (look at the Po-2 or the Fi-156 for example). So it's scarcely revolutionary in that regard.
This aircraft was created as an experimental proof of concept for a different wing arrangement than usual and flying as slow as possible was not one of the stated goals for it. It is still interesting nonetheless and definitely one of the most unusual aircraft of that period.
A german engineer also attempted to create a circular wing aircraft at about this time, its called the Sack AS-6, and it has a pretty interesting history as well
The reason the plane was made was not only was it capable of short runway takeoffs, but could *land* on a short runway as well. Why? It was made to operate from the deck of a Liberty ship that had a desperate need of aircraft to defend themselves against the Luftwaffe.
There was some freighters that could launch a fighter from a catapult, but they could not recover the fighter (which I believe for the British was a Hawker Hurricane). The catapult system also ate up a bunch of space that could have been used for war-time cargo.
Float Plane Fighters required a crane to recover in addition to the catapult system, and by then the performance of float places was too far behind German long range fighters and bombers to make a difference.
The Flying Flapjack only needed a fairly small amount of cargo space for its fuel and ammo. It could even perform as Anti-Submarine Warfare against a sub that was surfaced.
PS: The Sack AS-6 failed because the Germans failed to take into account how much lift was lost over the edges of the plane. The Flying Flapjack had those two engines and propellers to counteract the loss of lift, and therefore could fly.
@@neorenamon Landing on a ship still requires an arrestor hook, it isn't really practical to make a plane that can stop very quickly on a ship without some external aid. And at that point you're better off using a conventional design with better performance at low speeds to make landing easier.
A conventional STOL plane is perfectly capable of landing on short runways as well (often less than 100m) and you'd be hard pressed to beat that even with modern planes. But as I said, you'd equip a plane with an arresting hook and install arresting wires on the ship as well anyway, so that kinda gets rid of the whole point of using a specially designed STOL aircraft. The other issue is that STOL aircraft often are not very fast (this specific iteration of the flying pancake only had a top speed of around 220km/h if I'm not mistaken) which is really not ideal for dealing with fighters or potential attack aircraft anyway (this thing is slower than the stall speed of some aircraft, so imagine how outclassed it would be in a fight, not to mention it's a pretty easy target given it's basically a big circle)
Honestly the eventual solution they chose of using an escort carrier or single use catapult launched Hurricanes was a far more practical and worthwhile solution than this thing would have ever been.
It's an interesting exercise in unorthodox design nonetheless, but ultimately it falls short in some crucial areas. Probably the most notable one here is the fact it had very poor handling and difficult controls at lower speeds, which is absolutely the last thing you want when doing any sort of carrier operations, especially on a small flight deck.
Neither the PO-2, nor the FI-156 was a fighter aircraft, the whole point of this aircraft was to have a high performance aircraft that could land on a freighter or noncarrier warship. Quite a bit different then a spotter aircraft.
@@kdrapertrucker if the point was to have a high performance aircraft they wouldn't have bothered with a completely unorthodox STOL design. As mentioned in my previous comment this thing had awful low-speed handling and its top speed was laughable for the time, especially for a fighter. Carrier-based operations largely eliminate the reasons STOL exists in the first place, and there were already sufficient solutions to the problem. My comparison to the Po-2 and Fi-156 was to demonstrate that the flying pancake fell short as a STOL design, whether those aircraft were designed for the same role or not does not change the fact that it was a failed, dead-end design itself
@@karukurokami It had two engines of 80 HP.
The XF5U never flew, so any talk about what it might have done is speculation.
It also would have done remarkably well with jets.
See the Boeing "flapjack" model 390.
Single center prop just like the Arup S-2 which Zimmerman based this on.
Sleek and quick on little power, stall-spin proof, great handling, fast climb rate>
It would have been virtually identical to the Arup planes which adequately tested the planform and showed that it was better in just about every respect to "normal" planes.
"Hot, vibrating, and blind as a bat."
Maybe they followed your AdamandEve sponsor link?
OK, but how SLOW could it fly? This would make a great design for spotting or aerial photography.
@Bryce Kleinschmidt Because a fast plane is gone in a few seconds. The closer to the ground, the greater the problem. A super slow plane uses less fuel than a helicopter but can monitor the ground for extended periods. It can also drop cargo very accurately.
The C-21 Dragon Assault Ship comes to mind from the James Cameron Avatar flick. The helicopter of it's time with a higher payload. 450 mph. Now that is handy.
The fictional C-21 is more like a well armed flying car concept.
It would be a poor design in real life. Disk loading would be high compared to a single rotor helicopter (more power needed for the same amount of lift) and it relies on mechanically tilting the ducted fans instead of cyclic pitch which would make for slower attitude control and more power needed to move the whole assembly. With a helicopter the angle of attack of the blade changes as it rotates around the hub i.e. the blades will have a higher angle of attack on one side of the disk than the other which in turn increases lift on one side and decreases it on the other, this requires less mass to be moved and is faster than tilting the whole thing.
And no matter how powerful your engines are or how efficient the rotor blades design, those same advances can be applied to a single rotor helicopter as well so single rotor helicopters would always be ahead.
@@atomicskull6405 yes, but top speed is limited in single rotor helicopter to around 200 mph due to procession of the blade lift... for 1945 this was a slick solution short take off and heavy lift body.
I think there is STILL a place for the design. How about bush planes? Or ground support attack aircraft? Do you realize how difficult it would be for ground troops to take aim at such a silhouette? Turboprops would be perfect for the design!
P-40 Warhawks on a carrier deck at 7:45. This was probably footage of the 325th Fighter Group aboard the USS Ranger. A year earlier, the 33rd FG participated in OP Torch aboard a CVE using P-40s.
11:02
Sounds like the aviation counterpart to the Cadillac Eldorado. "Make it heavier, people will love it!"
4:11
A-80 Radial,
Ha!
That's a good one.
When ever found and explain
Says pancake the more hungry I am
Does anyone look at this and think A 10 back to the future vibes .
It was incredibly tough, manouverable . Run turboprops or turbofans... 🤔😎
This and the Moonbat always make me want to play what if..
The other point is those self same jets were supplanted in combat by Skyraiders flying coin missions and skymasters doing FAC and rescue coordination ... This would have been able to withstand heavy small arms ground fire and stay in one piece.👽🤠
Build a plane on the same pattern with turboprops as a CAS platform.
Love the Moonbat! That thing always reminded me of some Pulp Hero's ride. "What if Doc Savage designed a warplane?"
@@dphalanx7465
Stealth before stealth...a bit like an E type jag is aerodynamic before wind tunnels ... 😉😎
V22 Osprey is the closet thing ,we have now. I would not be surprised if they didn’t look over the design.
One thing about this, is that to fly slowly, it must have ~30+ degrees nose-up. Try fitting a big gun, with -30 degrees down angle.
Either that or mount the guns inside normally, and it doesn't fly super-slowly for gunnery.
We have the flying wonderwaffle and the flying pancake, all we need is the flying toast, egg and bacon and we have the flying breakfast squadron
The Me 163 was known as the Power Egg, so now we just need toast and bacon
We have the egg, the Me 163 was nicknamed "Kraftei" (Power egg)
Sausage balloons.
Weapon loadouts
BB-82 500 lb Banana bomb
30mm sticky syrup squirt guns
HDM-9 Hotdog air-air missiles
Weapon loadouts
BB-82 500 lb Banana bomb
30mm sticky syrup squirt guns
HDM-9 Hotdog air-air missiles
0:25 seeing those props revolve in the same direction hurts my brain.
Having animators that have an idea of the function of the object they're modelling helps.
Again at 0:47, here the stationary props are both clearly designed to rotate left. (at least THAT was right in the shot mentioned previously)
The shot at 8:36 proves that the guys assembling the wind tunnel model didn't have an idea about the principles either; left and right propeller are swapped.
The argumentation at 3:42 is way off. NACA certainly knew that a wing like that would have highly 3-dimensional flow characteristics, with the airflow being as much lateral as longitudinal. That was the reason to put the props at the wingtips and have them rotate so they "shovel" air under the wing.
The high angle of attack is a necessity due to the very low increase of lift over angle of attack of extremely low aspect ratio wings.
In short: you have no idea about the aerodynamics of this highly extraordinary craft.
You may have found it (not that it needed finding, aviation enthusiasts are well aware of it.) But you certainly have not explained it.
I really thought the narrator was saying "Zinnerman" rather than Zimmerman and the subtitles kind of confirm this, though the robots think he's saying cinnamon. Oh dear.
The V-173 was a proof of concept design it wasn’t meant to go fast, the planned production XF5U would have had a top speed of 452mph
this looks like a great drone aircraft design, with the super small engines, you could make a electric version that just loiters, and chugs along.
It needs more throttle to stay aloft at such low speeds than it would for an efficient cruise.
At very high nose-up A, the vortices create huge drag, while at cruise they're sleek. This is amply demonstrated on the Arup planes which this is based off, and other like the Facetmobile.
You seem to ignore the need/requirement that the propeller blades be large, counter-rotating, and must rotate in the direction that negates the wing tip vortex. Which is central to the whole point of the design. Also that you cannot fly with one of the propellers out.
A myth. The props did not counter the vortices, NACA tunnel tests showed that they didn't help or particularly change anything.
See the Arup S-2 for where this concept came from (minus Zimmerman's work towards a VTOL tail-sitter).
See the '90s Wainfan "Facetmobile".
The very low aspect-ratio planform is not inherently draggy.
I took a shot of whiskey every time the host said pancake - I died.
That segue to the sponsor was so unexpected and well executed. Bravo sir.
Thank you kindly!
found and explained could you do a video on weird ww2 aircraft like a compilation of sorts?
yes I must!
@@FoundAndExplained if you do can you put my name in the video?
Suggestion: A video about the Dornier Do 335 Pfeil/Arrow?
needed!
Brilliant video, keep it up Nick!
Glad you enjoyed it!thanks wee!
This looks like a plane that I would design in Spore
That was one of the weirdest non sensical sponsors I've ever seen
I know this is nit picking. The animation of the all metal pancake seems to have the rotors spinning in the same direction. Don't many dual rotor aircraft use contra rotating props?
Considering all images and even animation of it standing still as well as the historic footage shown show them as counter rotating, i fairly sure that was a genuine mistake on the animators part. Good to state it, but in no way reducing the quality
@@dominiklehn2866 to be fair, I'm not able to produce such nice animations. I'm not knocking the animator. That's why I preceded the statement with it being a nit pick. It's a miniscule detail. I was a bit curious if the animator was correct and I'm wrong. I was kinda hoping I would be proven wrong and the animation was correct. I thought maybe that was a reason for some of the vibration.
@@birdmun to be fair, after reading through some other comments you pointed it out in the most polite way. But yeah, I'm pretty sure it's a miniscule animation error. The animation is still fantastic
Not only are dual rotor aircraft usually counter-rotating, it was an essential feature in the case of the V-173.
The reason most aircraft don't use a low-aspect ratio wing like this is that they cause massive wing vortices.
The high pressure air below the wing is driven around the wingtip to the low pressure air above it. And the shorter the wing, the more air does so, loosing lift, creating a vortex and inducing drag.
The Flying Pancakes rotors were both spinning down on the outward turn, creating counter-vortices that cancelled each wingtip vortex out.
This was pretty much the only way to make a low-speed, low-aspect ratio wing workable, with a brilliantly simple solution.
It may have failed to achieve their goals but it certainly wins the "goofiest museum display ever" award! :-D
It`s a very respectful airplane, it "flies as slow as humanely possible"
"become a patreon" lol
The opening statement was actually..."to fly as humanely slow as possible"... 😄
(Not: as slow as humanly possible)
-Now, what the * does that mean ??
Humanely slow ??
(Or even if he meant "humanly").
Anyhoo...funny ❗😁😜
I picked that up too. He obviously doesn’t get anyone to “proof read” his videos before uploading.
I remember fawning over this plane when I was in middle school seeing it in popular mechanics.
“I feel the need, I FEEL THE NEED FOR…oozing!” -it’s pilot high-fiving his crewmate prior to takeoff.
My favourite on Strikers 1945
I would like to see a video about the G10 Fugaku, the intercontinental bomber thought up by Imperial Japan
It's basically japanese b-52
More like the B-36 or the proposed British "Victory Bomber".
"Don't adjust your phone screen"
Are most ppl really watching that on phones?
Yeah
These days? Yes.
Everybody who's talking about electric replacements, keep in mind that these are 80 horsepower constant motors, a Tesla only uses approximately 30 to 50 horsepower to maintain freeway speeds, and a small 80 horsepower electric motor isn't made to run for more than 30 minutes
I volunteer at the museum that has it, Frontiers of Flight in Dallas. It's so weird just to have that thing around
The Japanese surrendered after hearing that they could have been attacked by thicc planes
As some of your other viewers have noted this was not a design for a slow playing it was designed for a slow takeoff plane eventually sponsored by the Navy as a fighter. Your emphasis in the first part of the video rather misses the point. Thanks for what you have done. This is a favorite plane on which I have read a bit...
I feel the need for….slow.
Those gigantic props on the same line as the pilots face.
It must have been scary to see those huge blades in line to the left and right.
the designer obviously loves Sunfish
it literally is the same shape besides the propellers
There are tons of wierd 2WW canceled aviation project. Can I look forward to more of sorts? I absolutely love this kond of "alternatively real weapons" :)
I love the design, and except for one thing found the video excellent. That one thing? You paid great attention to detail, even modeling the props as a left hand and right hand rotation. But every darn time you show the props spinning, they are spinning in the SAME direction! Very aggravating.
Otherwise excellent job.
I'd assume the modeller and animator were two different persons. Its too obvious from the model what way theyre supposed to spin.
It would have actually been among one of the fastest prop driven aircraft at the time if it weren't for it's over-budgeted development, vibration issues and of course, the arrival of the jet age!
You could use these in Secret Weapons Over Normandy.
Video Intro: "Don't adjust your phone screen"
Me: "Pfft, obviously" * begins adjusting monitor *
Now drop the pancake from the concorde
Romulan Temporal Engineer: We need a new capital ship design
Assistant: Shows this video
Engineer: *GENIUS!*
And thus the Valkis Dreadnought Warbird was born
"Takes off in 200 feet, a record short distance." Let me introduce you to Bush pilots.
As a 6+ ton combat plane... (P-47 or Avenger was 7+ tons. Hellcat was just less) And can those bush plane do 480+ knots? Carrying a couple of tons of payload? Being totally stall-spin proof?
It was so slow it got bird strikes from the rear.
When I was watching the History channel back when I was 9 years old, they legit no joke said this was made to fly underwater and come up for surprise bombing on ships.
I am serious, no joke.
Seriously, no joke?
No idea why -- but I love it . I want one .
Build a large scale RC model ...see existing vids. It works really well and has done since early control line versions... but they aren't all that slow.😵
Strikers 1945!
Why are there so many rendered shots with the left hand prop spinning the wrong way ?
I think that comes down to the fact that the renders represent the production model, while when they wanted to show the actual prototype they gust got footage.
@@t65bx25 then why were the props rendered to show they should spin in opposite directions?
I expect most viewers never noticed that detail.
On the bright side, the finalized flying pancake has a home in the Arcade, a vertical shoot-em-up game, Strikers 1945 one and two, compete with powerful energy cannons and can call in two giant flying wings for reinforcements.
The only reason I know about this plane is because of the Strikers 1945 cabinet at the movie theatre in the town I grew up in.
The pancake has always been one of my favorites ever since I was a little kid. It's extremely high on my list if I ever want to keep a classic airplane. If I could get a pancake airplane and a world war II biplane I would be very happy. 👌👍✌️❤️
Strikers 1945 be like :
I like this channel, but I really wish you'd get a handle on the pronunciation of names. I have no idea how Zimmerman became "Zinnamon" 😀
Computer...synthesised pronounciation.🤦🏻♂️🤷♂️
@@clivestainlesssteelwomble7665 I really doubt that's the case. I've heard plenty of computer generated voices and some of them are very good, but none of them sounded this natural. Plus there are plenty of other pronunciation idiosyncrasies that don't sound like the product of a computer generated voice.
that adam and eve sponser was not i expected
I wanted pancakes from the sponsor but instead i was traumatized :"(
Why do you keep repeating yourself no less than 3 times per phrase. If I could watch on 5x rather than just 2x I would.
He finally starts getting to the point at the 3:00 mark. Very poorly written.
3:50
A 3blade propeller...
5seconds later, in the sketch we see 4 blades
This is such a weird video for an Adam and Eve ad
A ton of P38 LIGHTNING vibes, that's for sure
I was too thinking about UFO lol