Simviation Forum - 1st airliner to go supersonic was ...

Oct 23^rd, 2004 at 8:49pm

Felix/FFDS Offline
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the DC-8 ...

Okay, so it was in a controlled test dive, but it did go over Mach 1 at altitude (and later delivered to Canadian Pacific)

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Reply #1 - Oct 24^th, 2004 at 9:26am

Mr. Bones Offline
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you can also say the XP-86 was the first aicraft to reach mach 1 and not the X-1. it was flown through mach 1 in a dive before Yeager did it with his orange bird. Wink

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Reply #2 - Oct 24^th, 2004 at 10:07am

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you can also say the XP-86 was the first aicraft to reach mach 1 and not the X-1. it was flown through mach 1 in a dive before Yeager did it with his orange bird. Wink

It's debatable as to which was the first jet aircraft ever to exceed Mach 1.0 in a dive. Geoffrey de Havilland Jr. got close to it in the ill-fated DH.108 Swallow. It's been suggested that he might have succeeded on his fatal last flight on 27th September 1946 but there's no way of proving it. http://www.bowbrickhill.com/dehavillandcrash.html

I think even piston engined fighters were reported as "breaking the sound barrier" in a dive during WWII. Again, this is very difficult to confirm as they weren't fitted with mach meters.

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Reply #3 - Oct 24^th, 2004 at 10:31am

Craig. Offline
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The Yeagar flight was never billed as the flight flight to break the sound barrier. It was the first aircraft to go mach 1 in "level flight". Or in its case, climbing flight. I have also read that various aircraft in WW2 were reported to have gone faster than the speed of sound, and they reported, something like the reversing of controls???

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Reply #4 - Oct 24^th, 2004 at 11:20am

Mr. Bones Offline
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The Yeagar flight was never billed as the flight flight to break the sound barrier. It was the first aircraft to go mach 1 in "level flight". Or in its case, climbing flight. I have also read that various aircraft in WW2 were reported to have gone faster than the speed of sound, and they reported, something like the reversing of controls???

I know that Craig. Before Yeager's flight, they weren't sure if the wings would generate positive lift supersonic speeds. When air starts being compressed at fast speeds, streamtubes that get narrower (like over wings) actually slow down and increase in pressure, the opposite of what happens to incompressible air. So it was thought that it was possible that an airplane's wings might generate lift the wrong way (i.e. down) at supersonic speeds. Wink

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Reply #5 - Oct 24^th, 2004 at 11:45am

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I don't think that WW2 aircraft could resist the drag over mach 1. They'd have been blown to pieces near the barrier...

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Reply #6 - Oct 24^th, 2004 at 12:18pm

Hagar Offline
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I don't think that WW2 aircraft could resist the drag over mach 1. They'd have been blown to pieces near the barrier...

You might be correct. I'm wondering if any Luftwaffe pilots experienced it with the Me 163 or Me 262.

It's worth remembering that the DH.108 was inspired by the Me 163. It was basically a Vampire fuselage with a new swept-wing attached. The Vampire fuselage is all-wood construction like the Mosquito.

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Reply #7 - Oct 24^th, 2004 at 4:32pm

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You might be correct. I'm wondering if any Luftwaffe pilots experienced it with the Me 163 or Me 262.

It's worth remembering that the DH.108 was inspired by the Me 163. It was basically a Vampire fuselage with a new swept-wing attached. The Vampire fuselage is all-wood construction like the Mosquito.

There were rumors that the Me 163 Komets did actually go over mach 1. It was never scientifically recorded that they actually did. They were not designed to break records.

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Reply #8 - Oct 25^th, 2004 at 10:11am

Heretic Ex Member

The normal operational speed of a Komet was around 950kph. So it wouldn't be a astonishing that some might have broken the barrier.

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