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Anyone Know the Background to These WWII Bombers?
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Scotty



Joined: 23 Nov 2007
Posts: 883
PostPosted: Sun Mar 24, 2013 4:58 pm    Post subject: Anyone Know the Background to These WWII Bombers? Reply with quote
I was wandering through a thread on period images on the American H.A.M.B website and these 'test-bed' Lancastrian and 'Lanc' bombers fitted with jet engines appeared. I've never seen anything like them and there's no explanation to their background other than the tiny little bit of info I could glean from their 'properties' info.

Can anyone shed some light on them for me please? Wink

The first image has the following ID - RCAFJET-LancSM


And the second - lancjet_zpsc6ddedde


EDIT - I've removed my reference to 'Lancaster' and adjusted it to 'Lancastrian' with the info Penman has kindly sourced - many thanks Penman. Wink

Last edited by Scotty on Sun Mar 24, 2013 7:10 pm; edited 6 times in total
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Penman



Joined: 23 Nov 2007
Posts: 4755
Location: Swindon, Wilts.
PostPosted: Sun Mar 24, 2013 5:20 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Hi
I think they are both Avro Lincolns.

Wiki gives
Quote:
Lincolns were frequently employed as testbeds in new jet engine development. RF403, RE339/G and SX972 flew with a pair of Armstrong Siddeley Python turboprops outboard in place of the Merlins, and was used for the ballistic casing drop-test programme for the Blue Danube atomic weapon.[16] SX972 was further modified to fly with a pair of Bristol Proteus turboprops. RA716/G had a similarly placed pair of Bristol Theseus turboprops and later also flew with Rolls-Royce Avon turbojets replacing the pair of turboprops. Lincoln Test Bed RF533 kept its Merlins but had a Napier Naiad turboprop in the nose. It later flew, bearing the civilian "Class B" test registration G-37-1, with a similarly placed Rolls-Royce Tyne which it displayed at the 1956 Society of British Aircraft Constructors (SBAC) show, making a low level flypast on just the nose Tyne, the four Merlins being shut down and propellers feathered.[17]SX973 had a Napier Nomad diesel turbo-compound installed in a similar nose-mounted installation.[18] RA643 flew with a Bristol Phoebus turbojet in the bomb bay, and SX971 had an afterburning Rolls-Royce Derwent mounted ventrally.[19]


I can actually remember seeing the one with a nose mounted turbo-prop, though I can't tell you for sure which engine it was, but the date makes me think it was the Tyne, I would have been 14 then so was definitely roaming around the Ash Vale to North Camp area on my bike.
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Bristols should always come in pairs.

Any 2 from:-
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Penman



Joined: 23 Nov 2007
Posts: 4755
Location: Swindon, Wilts.
PostPosted: Sun Mar 24, 2013 5:40 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Hi
Found another picture saying Lancastrian for one of them.
http://1000aircraftphotos.com/Contributions/Visschedijk/7318.htm
and
http://1000aircraftphotos.com/Contributions/GrattonAubry/7902.htm
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Bristols should always come in pairs.

Any 2 from:-
Straight 6
V8 V10
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Roger-hatchy



Joined: 07 Dec 2007
Posts: 2135
Location: Tiptree, Essex
PostPosted: Sun Mar 24, 2013 11:15 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Type in

post war aircraft engine test beds Into your search engine, over 2,000,000 sites and plenty of images if you click on image key.

I have seen those photos in books when I was at school in the 1950's,, had a wardrobe full of them, they got thrown away when I joined the forces,
We had an small aero club in the school, well the dozen or so of us liked to refer to ourselves as a club.
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P3steve



Joined: 24 Nov 2007
Posts: 542
Location: Great Yarmouth, Norfolk
PostPosted: Fri Mar 29, 2013 10:39 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
They are just what the caption says test beds for the Nene jet engines. dont forget back in 1946 the jet engine was still an unknown commodity and this was a "cheap" way of testing them with out building a complete new test plane. If they failed then the plane could still fly on the piston engines, They were never intended to be used operationally the first of the V bombers the Valiant was just round the corner.
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Scotty



Joined: 23 Nov 2007
Posts: 883
PostPosted: Fri Mar 29, 2013 5:49 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Many thanks guys for all the info - I'm much better informed now. Wink
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nibortaweh



Joined: 19 Nov 2009
Posts: 14
PostPosted: Fri Apr 19, 2013 8:34 pm    Post subject: RCAF Lancaster Reply with quote
The first photograph is of an RCAF Lancaster being used as a test-bed for, I think, the Orenda jet engine that was used to power the Avro (Canada) CF-100 Canuck all weather fighter. The Lancaster was manufactured in Canada during WW2 and post war served as maritime recce aircraft.
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