Horten IAe 38

[robert arndt]

Ran across some interesting pics of this strange aircraft:

http://www.geocities.com/unicraftmodels/germ/ho38/ho38.htm

Rob

[Vicente Vazquez]

(robert arndt) wrote in message >...
> Ran across some interesting pics of this strange aircraft:
> http://www.geocities.com/unicraftmodels/germ/ho38/ho38.htm

Some more information can be found here:
http://www.laahs.com/art09.htm

I can't understand why Argentina's government invested time and money
on such weird ideas, when IMHO they should have invested FIRST on
developing their "conventional" (so to speak) aircraft industry and
THEN on "revolutionary" projects.

[robert arndt]

(Vicente Vazquez) wrote in message >...
> (robert arndt) wrote in message >...
> > Ran across some interesting pics of this strange aircraft:
> > http://www.geocities.com/unicraftmodels/germ/ho38/ho38.htm
>
> Some more information can be found here:
> http://www.laahs.com/art09.htm
>
> I can't understand why Argentina's government invested time and money
> on such weird ideas, when IMHO they should have invested FIRST on
> developing their "conventional" (so to speak) aircraft industry and
> THEN on "revolutionary" projects.

Some further information:


http://www.insigniamag.com/hort17.html

Rob

[Cub Driver]

>I can't understand why Argentina's government invested time and money
>on such weird ideas, when IMHO they should have invested FIRST on
>developing their "conventional" (so to speak) aircraft industry and
>THEN on "revolutionary" projects.

Well, they had Reimar. He was certainly their best shot at a
breakthrough, and a breakthrough probably seemed their best shot at
developing significant aircraft.

There are always those who believe that the conventional wisdom is
wrong--that there is a carburetor that gives 80 mph to a gallon, only
the oil companies bought it up and suppressed it. The notion that hard
work and heavy investment is the way to progress is hard to swallow
for these people.

Argentina was in a tough spot in the 1950s. Twenty years earlier it
had been one of the important countries of the world, and now it was
sliding into irrelevance. No doubt Reimar looked good to the Peron
government, as a short-cut to the riches that should have been
Argentina's.


all the best -- Dan Ford
email: (put CUB in subject line)

see the Warbird's Forum at www.warbirdforum.com
and the Piper Cub Forum at www.pipercubforum.com

[Jason Strong]

(robert arndt) wrote in message >...
> Ran across some interesting pics of this strange aircraft:
>
> http://www.geocities.com/unicraftmodels/germ/ho38/ho38.htm
>
> Rob


dude, that is one UGLY aircraft. looks like a grossly pregnant glider!

but then what do you expect from a transport derived from a WW2 bomber
that would have only dropped oranges in anger!

i think the Argentine government appreciation of the Nazi regime
severely affected their reasoning. decades later this thinking led to
the failed Falklands invasion.

Jason

[The Enlightenment]

Cub Driver > wrote in message >...
> >I can't understand why Argentina's government invested time and money
> >on such weird ideas, when IMHO they should have invested FIRST on
> >developing their "conventional" (so to speak) aircraft industry and
> >THEN on "revolutionary" projects.
>
> Well, they had Reimar. He was certainly their best shot at a
> breakthrough, and a breakthrough probably seemed their best shot at
> developing significant aircraft.
>
> There are always those who believe that the conventional wisdom is
> wrong--that there is a carburetor that gives 80 mph to a gallon, only
> the oil companies bought it up and suppressed it. The notion that hard
> work and heavy investment is the way to progress is hard to swallow
> for these people.
>
> Argentina was in a tough spot in the 1950s. Twenty years earlier it
> had been one of the important countries of the world, and now it was
> sliding into irrelevance. No doubt Reimar looked good to the Peron
> government, as a short-cut to the riches that should have been
> Argentina's.
>


I wouldn't be so hard on them. Flying wings provide impressive
performance as several Boeing stidies have shown and the US certainly
experimented with several Northrop designes.

The WW2 Horten HXVIIIA flying wing Jet bomber
<http://www.luft46.com/horten/ho18a.html> was on the basis of
conservative calculations capable of a round trip bombing mission to
the USA at 600mph using the same fuel gussling Jumo 004B engines on
the Me262. This I am sure would have been technically impossible in a
conventional layout. (Presumably the more reliable Jumo 004D then in
production would have been needed for reliabillity)

Flying wings have a few problems:
1 unique stability problems (more easily controlled with modern
fly-by-wire controls but still solvable without)
2 Finding cargo space. (B2 has woefull low altitude performance
because the bulged center section was increased to improve bombload at
the expense of low altitude drag)
3 Burried engines must be small diameter or multiples someting that
Northrop got wrong in the YB49: they thickened the wing rather than
thining the engines.

As a business strategy it problably wasn't to bad either. Rather than
take on the US and UK industry head on you jump past it using radical
technology.

It turns out that in anycase that the UK industry, the Asutralian
Industry, the Canadain Industry all failed to varying degrees so the
Argentinain industry is by non means unique. The US industry was
helped by a huge domestic market and rather generous funding for
achieving technical supremacy over the Soviets.

I suspct the legendariy designers like Kurt Tank, The Hortens and to a
lessor extent Messerschmit many have been given too much freedom and
not enough surpervision or they may simply have been trying to do to
much with too little.

Argentina was excluded from a lot of trade agreements because of its
neutrality during WW2.


>
> all the best -- Dan Ford
> email: (put CUB in subject line)
>
> see the Warbird's Forum at www.warbirdforum.com
> and the Piper Cub Forum at www.pipercubforum.com

[killfile]

"Cub Driver" > wrote in message
...
>
> >I can't understand why Argentina's government invested time and money
> >on such weird ideas, when IMHO they should have invested FIRST on
> >developing their "conventional" (so to speak) aircraft industry and
> >THEN on "revolutionary" projects.
>
> Well, they had Reimar. He was certainly their best shot at a
> breakthrough, and a breakthrough probably seemed their best shot at
> developing significant aircraft.
>
> There are always those who believe that the conventional wisdom is
> wrong--that there is a carburetor that gives 80 mph to a gallon, only
> the oil companies bought it up and suppressed it. The notion that hard
> work and heavy investment is the way to progress is hard to swallow
> for these people.
>
> Argentina was in a tough spot in the 1950s. Twenty years earlier it
> had been one of the important countries of the world, and now it was
> sliding into irrelevance. No doubt Reimar looked good to the Peron
> government, as a short-cut to the riches that should have been
> Argentina's.
>
>
> all the best -- Dan Ford
> email: (put CUB in subject line)
>
> see the Warbird's Forum at www.warbirdforum.com
> and the Piper Cub Forum at www.pipercubforum.com

A Mercedes SMART car can do 100MPG+ ... it can also do 80MPH ;¬)

Matt