Lost from the Pretty Planes files

[VNugget]

The Campini Caproni CC.2

Brief background: The second successfull flight of a thermojet , first flown in 1940 (the first being the Coanda 1910, flown in -- you guessed it -- 1910). More details here.

Just thought I'd share in my late night boredom.

I think it bears a strange semblance to the MiG-21, with the beautiful elliptical wings from the Spitfire. There's also something else that its front section reminds me of, but I can't quite put my finger on it.

 

[bart]

Didn't the CC have a piston engine driving the compressor?

 

[Big Duke Six]

Backerds'

The front end of the Caproni looks a lot like the backend of a JT-8D or an engine of similar vintage, without the hardware for the buckets of course. Then again, I could be way off.

Now, can someone shed some light on the technology of the thermojet engine? Pretty innovative airplane for it's day - COOL!

 

[VNugget]

Thermojet -- a jet without a turbine, and the compressor being driven by a piston engine. Very inefficient, but still way ahead of its time in 1910.

Aside from the 2 examples mentioned earlier, there was also a Japanese kamikaze craft powered by it. None of them were very successful. The Coanda 1910 crashed on its maiden flight because its pilot.. well, wasn't a pilot. Mr. Coanda was testing the engine, but it was so powerful that it took off! The CC2 had a very poor T/W ratio and was just a testbed anyway. There were plans for a signle-seat fighter version, but were scrapped. The Okha Type 22 was never flown operationally.

The 4th known example, which breaks this mold, was the MiG-13, which had a piston engine turning both a prop and a thermojet compressor. (A NASA engineer was exploring the same idea, which never got the support to bring it to life.) It could top 500 mph, and somewhere between 20 and 50 planes served operationally in the Baltic theater from 1940 to 1945. Also the first usage of a variable exhaust nozzle.

 

[VNugget]

Bingo! I just figured out what the CC2 reminds me of -- a very sleeg, elegant retrofuturistic Hughes H1(although you can also use those to describe the H1 itself).