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Cobra! is a comprehensive, meticulously researched and fully documented history of Bell Aircraft Corporation and their piston engine fighters built during the Great Depression and through World War II. While the story centers on techincal aspects of the various fighters, significant attention is also devoted to those key individuals who conceived, built and flew these innovative designs. In addition to aircraft development, Cobra! surveys the combat use of the P-39 and P-63 fighters in the hands of American, French, Italian, and Soviet pilots. The story continues after World War II when a number of Bell surplus fighters were successfully modified for air racing. Birch Matthews is also the author of Wet Wings & Drop Tanks: Recollection of American Transcontinental Air Racing 1928-1970, and Mustang: The Racing Thoroughbred(with Dustin W. Carter). Both books are available from Schiffer Publishing Ltd.).
Even before the spectacular success of its X-1 rocket-powered aircraft in breaking the 'sound barrier', the adventurous Bell Aircraft Corporation was already pushing ahead with a parallel project to build a second aircraft capable of far higher speeds. The X-2 (or Model 52) explored the equally uncertain technology of swept-back wings. Now common in modern conventional fighter aircraft, the Bell X-2 was revolutionary in using this type of airframe to probe Mach 3 and research the effects of extreme aerodynamic friction heat on airframes. Although both X-2s were destroyed in crashes after only 20 flights, killing two test pilots, the knowledge gained from the programme was invaluable in developing aircraft that could safely fly at such speeds. Using stunning artwork and historical photographs, this is the story of the plane that ultimately made the Lockheed Blackbird and Concorde possible.
The main thrust of this book is to acknowledge the technologies that the Bell-aerospace-company developed or refined. If certain programs incorporated technologies that were basically the same as other programs, then these same technology programs were not included in detail.
Photographs and text chronicle World War II ace Charles "Chuck" Yeager's quest to fly supersonically and profile the people and aircraft that made it possible for him to break the sound barrier.
In the 1930s, as nations braced for war, the German military build up caught Britain and the United States off-guard, particularly in aviation technology. The unending quest for speed resulted in the need for radical alternatives to piston engines. In Germany, Dr. Hans von Ohain was the first to complete a flight-worthy turbojet engine for aircraft. It was installed in a Heinkel-designed aircraft, and the Germans began the jet age on August 27, 1939. The Germans led the jet race throughout the war and were the first to produce jet aircraft for combat operations. In England, the doggedly determined Frank Whittle also developed a turbojet engine, but without the support enjoyed by his German c...
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The Bell P-39 Airacobra was a low-wing single-engine fighter produced by the US Bell Aircraft Corporation. It was the most controversial fighter aircraft used by the US during World War II. It was the first fighter in the world to have a tricycle gear and always the first to have the engine installed in the center of the fuselage, behind the driver. But his engine proved totally inadequate at high altitude, and, both in Europe and in the Pacific, the P-39, as an interceptor, found himself outclassed and was gradually relegated to secondary roles. The Bell P-63 fighter plane Kingcobra was a single-engine low-wing developed by the US Air Force Bell Aircraft Corporation in the early forties and...
Reviews DOD procurement program.