Ode to a Lost Nomad

This past week, it was announced that a long-lost Canadian Northrop A-17 Nomad was recovered from the bottom of a lake. The CNN story can be seen here.

In honor of that recovery, I offer this completely unrelated photo of an Army Air Corps A-17. Obviously, given all the people in the scene, something was going on, but the plane (tail number 26) seems otherwise unremarkable. I really like the hangar architecture, but have no idea where it is. Ideas anyone?

Fits Like a Glove

Greetings, fellow aviation historians, the Blog is finally returning to (somewhat) active duty! For now, my posts won't be quite as frequent as they once were, but we're back up and running. And as you might expect, the first post back is something of a mystery....

This photo is an original Douglas Aircraft print (stamp on the back says it's from the El Segundo plant), and there's a hand-written notation that reads "Laminar Flow Airfoil Glove". The plane shown, Northrop A-17A serial 35-122, at some point was turned over to NACA for a laminar flow reseearch program, which was operated out of Langley.

Unfortunately, I could find very little information about the test program (and no other photos of the plane in this configuration), and there are only a few snipets of information about it on the web, one of which mentions that the small added propellers were intended to add airflow over the wing. The primary source for information on NACA's history of laminar flow research is the paper A History of Suction-Type Laminar-Flow Control with Emphasis on Flight Research. Written by pioneering researcher Albert Braslow (who has since, sadly, passed away), this paper makes no mention of tests using the A-17A. The paper, on page 3, implies that the first laminar-flow flight tests took place in 1941 and utilized a surplus B-18 bomber. Either Braslow was unaware of the use of the A-17A (improbable, in my view), or this particular part of the larger research effort yielded little or no data of note. Joe Baugher's database indicates that 35-122 was returned to the Army in August of 1943.

If anyone has additional information on the modifications, when the test program took place, and any data that resulted from it, I would very much like to hear from you!

Black Widows

Two P-61As are depicted on this Northrop-issued postcard. Compare to the
same depiction on a press 8x10 further below. 

The MojaveWest Archive recently had the opportunity to obtain two small collections of Northrop- and Air Corps-issued publicity/press photos of the Northrop P-61 Black Widow. The first is a set of three real-photo postcards issued by Northrop, presumably as publicity giveaways, and the second collection is are press-release 8x10 photos that were collected by some unknown individual (they came from an estate via an intermediary, so the origin has been lost), although I suspect that this person was a retired Northrop graphic artist.

The lurid 1940s hype shines through in the description: "Big, venomous,
secretly equipped, the BLACK WIDOW has what it takes to lurk in the darkened skies."

The P-61 Black Widow was a fighter that, like so many other planes built by Jack Northrop, just didn't quite fit the image that people had about fighters. While most such aircraft were single-seaters, the P-61 had a three-man crew: pilot, gunner and radar operator. It had almost the same length and wingspan, as a B-25, and more powerful engines and had a heavier empty weight than the Mitchell. Yet the P-61 had no bomb bay (it did have under-wing hardpoints, though). Instead, the Widow's bite was its four 20mm cannon it its belly, as well as four .50 caliber Browning machine guns in a dorsal turret, which could be aimed and fired remotely by any one of the three-man crew - at least that's how it was designed. After the first 37 aircraft were delivered with turrets, delivery issues with the turret led to the next 363 aircraft to be delivered without them, as the turret shared critical components with those used in B-29s, which were considered a higher priority aircraft. The aircraft that came without the turret also had the gunner position eliminated.

The real secret of the Black Widow, however, was that it could see in the dark. In fact, it's sole intended mission was to serve as a night interceptor, finding and eliminating the enemy in the dark. To do that, it was equipped with the SCR-720 radar system, which was steerable by a radar operator, who initially sat in the aft section of the aircraft; on aircraft without a dorsal turret, the radar operator was moved up to the gunner's position. The radar system had a range of about five miles and when the operator identified a target, he would vector the pilot towards it. When the Widow got closer, the pilot could navigate using a small radar scope on the instrument panel.

The rest of the images, below are all accompanied by the text of the mimeographed cut lines pasted to the backs.

This appears to be a factory new plane; note lack of any markings other than the
insignia, and the lack of an upper turret.

(Left) "Closeup of the deadly Northrop Black Widow, world's largest pursuit plane, designed specifically for night fighting, now in increased production at Northrop Aircraft Inc., Hawthorne, California. The Black Widow P-61 is quick and easy to 'spot' in flight or on the ground. Distinguishing features are the long nose of the crew nacelle and twin 2,000 horsepower Pratt and Whitney engines. Twin tail booms supporting two rudders are connected by a stabilizer and elevator group. The plane is as large as a medium bomber; it carries a crew of three fighting specialists. Photo by Northrop Aircraft Inc."

This serial 41-18876, the third aircraft built and the first of 13 YP-61 service test
aircraft. Note that the aircraft paint crew seems to have been somewhat dyslexic,
having labeled the tail incorrectly as 11867. Also note the early experimental radar
antenna on the side of the fuselage.

(Left) "The Army Air Forces' deadly night fighter, the Northrop P-61 'Black Widow', is doing yeoman work in the Philippine Theater, where the Japs are attempting to destroy our B-29 and fighter airbases, supporting General MacArthur's re-conquest of the Islands. Jap attempts to night bomb our airfield have met disaster in the 'Black Widow's' sting with its four 20 millimeter cannon and four .50 calibre machine guns. Darkness moans nothing to the 'Black Widow', for with its special detection instruments it can spot planes from afar, sneak up on them in the dark and blast them to pieces. 14 Feb. 1945. Photo by Air Technical Service Command."

The press print version of the post card includes lots of clouds, but somehow,
the angles all seem wrong to me, as if a photo of the planes taken from the ground
was superimposed on a photo of clouds. Thoughts?

(Right) "Northrop Black Widows soar gracefully through the sky in test flights daily over Northrop Field, Hawthorne, California. These deadly night interceptors, now in increased production, are the world's largest and most powerful pursuit planes and were designed specifically for night fighting. The Black Widow P-61 is easily identified in flight. Look for the long nose of the crew nacelle extending far in front of the plane's two 2,000 horsepower Pratt and Whitney radial engines, and riding between twin booms. Capable of blasting apart anything that flies, the Black Widow packs 20 mm cannon and 50 cal. machine guns. Photo by Northrop Aircraft Inc."

Tail number 42-5501, the 16th A-model built. 

(Left) "First official photo of the top turret of the Northrop Black Widow P-61 night fighter. While much of the equipment of the Black Widow is still highly restricted by the War Department, permission was granted to show the lethal, revolving turret, on top of crew nacelle, housing four .50 caliber machine guns. In addition to this armament, the Widow carries 20 millimeter cannon, a combined fire-power greater than that of any other fighter in the world and capable of blasting out of the sky anything that can fly. It is this terrific fire-power PLUS the inherent maneuverability and safety of the Black Widow that has enabled it to shoot down the best the Japs and Nazis could throw against it, without a single Black Widow being compromised or shot down in combat. Official Army Air Force Photograph."

P-61A-1 42-5507

The photo on the right is clearly not the same photo, nor the same aircraft, as shown above, but carries the exact same caption on the back, with the exception of the photo credit being given to Northrop. Which was first? Were they released on the same day? Well, who's counting. What is intriguing to me is the motivation for releasing two photos of early-production A-models, which were built just before the turrets became unavailable - and unused - on the next 363 aircraft. Could it be a little bit of psych-warfare, wanting the enemy to fear a weapon that was not actually available?

Serial 42-39486 was a B-model, and had an 8-inch longer nose. Like many of the
A-models, the first 200 (out of 450) B-models built didn't have an upper turret,
the lack of which might have been one reason this plane was shot from the bottom.

(Right) "Newest photo of the Black Widow P-61 night fighter, Army's most powerful, and still highly secret pursuit plane. Picture was taken to show the exceptional rate of climb of the Black Widow which takes off steeply and swiftly, as well as landing at low speeds, permitting it to be used on small airfields. In [this] picture, the Black Widow has attained considerable altitude although its landing wheels have barely started to retract. The plane is made by Northrop Aircraft, Inc. Hawthorne Calif., creator of the Flying Wing. Photo by Northrop Aircraft Inc."

P-61B

The last photo is not part of the above collection, but is an 8x10 film positive that has been in the Archive for a while; the image itself is one of the more common P-61 photos out on the web. There is no caption accompanying it.

Black Bullet

Jack Northrop had a knack for thinking outside the box...and coming up with radical, unusual aircraft designs. And not all of them worked...the XP-56 Black Bullet is a shining example of that kind of glorious "failure" that comes from pushing the envelope of design.

Our two "photos" today are morphs, glossy 8x10 press photos that are based on actual photographs of the aircraft, but which are heavily retouched by an artist. Keep in mind, this was war time, and the rules on releasing actual photos of cutting edge, experimental aircraft, were quite restrictive on what could actually be shown.

Ever obsessed with developing the flying wing aircraft design - and taking advantage of the reduction in aerodynamic drag that the elimination of the tail surfaces provided - Northrop envisioned an extremely fast, maneuverable fighter.

Both photos carry the identical mimeographed cut line pasted on the back, which reads, "Northrop Aircraft's XP-56 -- an extremely advanced pusher type pursuit plane, and the first of its type ever designed and built.  The streamlined nacelle, vertical fins above and below, and the absence of a conventional tail give the XP-56 a startling and unusual appearance." The images are also stamped as approved for publication by the War Department.

The source photo which the artist of the publicly released version
worked from shows the second XP-56 on jacks in a hangar at
Muroc. This photo is from the National Museum of the Air Force,
via Tony Landis' excellent book Experimental and Prototype
Aircraft.

It didn't work out so good. The original design, which Northrop called the N2B, did not have the upper vertical stabilizer shown here, and directional stability on the first flights was severely lacking.

Jack's concept was actually designed around a proposed liquid-cooled 24-cylinder H-block engine, Pratt & Whitney's X-1800. When the engine builder gave up on that design, however, Northrop was forced to adapt the airframe's design to accommodate a very different engine shape, the air-cooled Pratt R-2800 radial engine, which was embedded in the fuselage right behind the cockpit. The engine drove two contra-rotating pusher props, and excessive flexing of the drive shafts caused additional problems.

The first of the two prototypes was destroyed while doing a high-speed taxi test on Muroc's lakebed, when the left tire disintegrated and the plane went out of control. The second prototype, 42-38353 and the aircraft shown here, took over testing. A number of design changes were made to try to improve the stability, including the addition of the upper vertical and the installation of an innovative flaperon system that was pneumatically actuated (by a system of bellows powered by air from the venturiis on the wingtips). First flight of 42-38353 was on March 23, 1944, but was very short, since the pilot experienced problems in pitch control, with the aircraft acting extremely nose-heavy. There were other problems, as well, including excessive fuel consumption and an inability to fly anywhere near the top speeds that the engineers expected.

To investigate the causes of these issues, NACA was asked to test the aircraft in their giant wind tunnel at Moffatt Field. However, higher priority projects pushed the XP-56's schedule to the right, so some additional tests were flown at Muroc. The handling qualities problems continued, and further testing was not deemed safe. The wind tunnel testing was delayed another year, and by this time the war was over and the age of jet aircraft was dawning. Ultimately, the Air Corps gave up and cancelled the program. The sole surviving XP-56 is stored awaiting restoration at the National Air and Space Museum.

Oh, and no, despite the name, the XP-56 was never painted black.

The mimeographed caption on the photo's back

America's First Rocketplane

Acme Telephoto wirephoto with an embedded caption. This is the only known
photo of the MX-324 during powered flight, although there are a number of images
extant that were taken during the initial glide testing. Back "in  the day", it was
fairly common for photos to be retouched (yes, even long before Photoshop became
a verb!), and this one is quite heavily retouched, so much so that the caption writer
had to note that "this is an actual photograph". The actual flight took place on July
5, 1944, so presumably this dateline is February 13, 1946.

In 1942, Jack Northrop began to pursue one of his most persistent dreams: to perfect the flying wing. This version, the XP-79, was to be a rocket-powered flying-wing fighter aircraft. To test some of the concepts, he first built three MX-324 test aircraft. One of these was later powered by a rocket motor built by Aerojet Corp. In order for the pilot of both the XP-79 and the MX-324 to withstand the anticipated high-G loads, he would fly lying prone.

The first flight of a MX-324 glider took place on October 2, 1943, at the remote Harper Dry Lake, not far from today's Edwards AFB and Mojave Air and Space Port, where modern rocket plane development is underway. The small aircraft were towed aloft behind a P-38 Lightning. There were several incidents that seriously jeopardized the program. During one of the glide test flights, the pilot pulled the wrong handle when it came time to jettison the tow rope...he had grabbed the escape hatch release by mistake! The aerodynamic changes that this caused led to severe buffeting, but he was able to land safely. On another test flight, one of the MX-324s was lost when the tiny glider got caught in the P-38's prop wash, and entered a spin. When the pilot recovered, he was inverted and lying on the ceiling, unable to reach the flight controls. Instead, he bailed out and parachuted to safety. The -324 continued its gliding descent inverted and was damaged beyond repair on hitting the lakebed.

The engine used on the MX-324 was a 200-pound-thrust Aerojet XCAL-200 liquid-fuel compound rotary rocket, which actually was comprised of several smaller rockets that rotated about an common axis. The fuel was monoethylaniline and red fuming nitric acid.

The first powered flight of the MX-324 took place on July 5, 1944 (some accounts state that it was on July 4, other say it was July 22; date confusion is not surprising, since even the photo of the then-top-secret aircraft wasn't release for two years!) with Northrop test pilot Harry Crosby at the controls. The plane was towed to 8,000 feet, and Crosby then release the tow rope and ignited the engine. The flight lasted only four minutes, 3:30 under rocket power, but was considered a success.

Just over a year later, on September 12, 1945, Harry Crosby was at the controls of the XP-79 prototype when it went out of control during its maiden flight. He was killed while trying to bail out.

Historian's note: there's a lot of confusion about this plane, as would be expected from a secret project conducted during this time period. Besides the variation of first flight dates, even the model designation is in dispute. Northrop historian Ira Chart states that the MX-324 was the unpowered glider and the MX-334 was the powered version. Author Andreas Parsch states the opposite. It is clear, though, that in the official news release accompanying our photo, two years after the flight the powered version was being referred to as the MX-324.

Update: After this posted this morning, I received the following note from one of my Mojave rocket plane friends: "Well... America's third rocketplane, but arguably America's first military rocket plane, as the caption claims. In 1931, William G. Swan flew a rocket glider at Bader Field in Atlantic City. In 1941, Lt. Homer Boushey took off in a JATO-equipped Army Air Corps Ercoupe from which the propeller had been removed. The MX-324 was probably the first airplane designed from the outset for rocket power." Thanks, Randall!

A Norwegian Northrop

A Northrop N-3PB, probably airframe 304, sits on the shore of Lake Elsinore
in Southern California, where the type was flight tested, in this official Northrop
photograph (the particular copy in our archive is a film positive). Even though the
design was quickly made obsolete by technological advances, its clean lines
and overpowered engine made it a favorite of crews and fans alike.

The Northrop N-3PB was a seaplane derivative of the Northrop A-17 Nomad (itself having roots in the Northrop Gamma line). With the threat of German expansionism on the horizon, Norway was scrambling in the late 1930s to moderize its military, and it was decided that a float-equipped coastal reconnaissance aircraft was one element that was needed.

Northrop built 24 of the aircraft for Norway, which carried internal airframe designations 301 to 324, but world events and Nazi troops overtook the delivery schedule, and there wasn't a Norway left. With the Norwegian government-in-exile established in England, a training base for Norwegian pilots who had escaped ahead of the Nazi invasion was set up in Canada, and became known as "Little Norway".

When the N-3PBs were ready for delivery, the aircraft were put under the control of the UK's Royal Air Force's Coastal Command and six were stationed at Little Norway in Canada, and 18 of the "Northrops", as they were called by the Norwegian crews, were shipped to Iceland, and based at Badueyri, Reykjarvik and Akueyri. The aircraft in Iceland were manned by Norwegian pilots as a part of RAF 330(N) squadron.

Ten of the aircraft were lost to accidents in Iceland, all but one while trying to land in rough seas. An additional four crashed in training accidents in Canada.

Only two aircraft, airframes 306 and 322, finally made it to Norway after the end of WWII, and one was scrapped in 1949 and the other in 1956, after being used as a training device for Norwegian aircraft mechanics.

The whereabouts of only two N-3PBs are known. One was a wreck that was salvaged from the Thjorsa River in Iceland. It crashed in 1943 and was recovered in 1979 and transported back "home" to Northrop's Hawthorne plant, where employee volunteers worked to meticulously restore the aircraft. After a rollout ceremony at Northrop on November 10, 1980, the aircraft was first displayed at the San Diego Air & Space Museum before being transported to Norway, where it is on permanent display at the Gardermoen Airport as a part of the Forsvarets Flysamlingen (Aircraft Collection of the Norwegian Armed Forces).

A second one, believed to be airframe 317, has been found in the water about a half mile off the end of one of Reykjavik's runways. Although it has not yet been salvaged, plans are being considered.

(An alternate view of the same aircraft in our featured photo, taken on the same day, can be seen here, as the 6th image down the list.)

The Bantam X-Plane

For the next few weeks, the Tuesday mid-week updates will feature old-style PR photos that were released to newspapers. In the years before the digital revolution, newspapers primarily received their black and white photos via wireservices. Wirephotos long pre-dated fax machines, but used the same concept, line-by-line scans transmitted over telephone lines (a fascinating 1937 article in Popular Mechanics on how wirephotos work can be found here). Newspapers typically then filed away 8x10 prints for possible future use. With the arrival of the digital age, some of these have been filtering out into the collector's world, and the MojaveWest archive has been able acquire some.

One of the "forgotten" X-planes from the late 1940s was the Northrop X-4 Bantam, of which two airframes were built. Our photo shows the second aircraft, 46-677, on its maiden flight at Edwards. The photo still has the "ditto" caption taped to the back (for the younger generations who read this, "dittos" were a pre-photo copy means of reproduction...and the smell of ditto fluid is one of those staples from when I attended elementary school). The caption read:

"First Flight of the Northrop X-4, star performer in one of the Air Force's secret projects at Edwards Air Force Base, shows the small Flying Wing-type research airplane streaking over the California desert on a test flight. Northrop pilot Charles Tucker has flown the X-4 repeatedly during the past several months in a test program intended to explore flight characteristics of the high sub-sonic zone. The fourth in a series of 'X' ships ordered by the Air Force, the X-4 will continue research pioneered by the Bell X-1, the first airplane to fly faster than the speed of sound. One of the smallest airplanes ever built for the Air Force, the X-4 measures approximately 25 feet from wing tip to wing tip. The X-4 is patterned after the big Northrop Flying Wing bombers. A single pod houses the pilot and elaborate instrumentation. The unusual tail consists only of a vertical stabilizer and rudder. There is no horizontal stabilizer or elevator assembly. 'Elevons', developed by Northrop for use on the Flying Wings, serve as both elevators and ailerons."

The first X-4, 46-676, took its maiden flight on December 15, 1948, but had a really troubled flight test program, being plagued by seemingly unending technical problems. The second aircraft, 46-677 took to the air in mid-1949 (the photo and caption are undated). When Northrop had completed the initial handling qualities testing and turned the aircraft over to the Air Force in February 1950, the first aircraft was permanently grounded, and was cannibalized for parts to support the second one.

The goal of the program was to evaluate the characteristics of a flying wing's reaction to transonic speeds, and above all else, the X-4 program proved that a flying wing with analog flight controls did not have ideal handling qualities. The Bantam experienced continual pitch oscillations (porpoising) as it approached the speed of sound, and there was nothing the pilot could do to dampen it. In fact, engineers would not be able to overcome these issues until the advent of digital fly-by-wire control, which would allow a computer to fly the plane, leading to the current rash of flying wing designs, including the B-2 Spirit and the X-47B N-UCAS.

Both X-4s survived their era, however. 677 resides at the Air Force museum in Dayton Ohio, and 676 is currently being restored at the Air Force Flight Test museum at Edwards AFB.