In the late 1940's the sound
barrier was viewed as the absolute limit of speed for any machine and
there was a general belief that any aircraft exceeding Mach 1 would be
destroyed by compressibility of the air over the wings. There was plenty
of evidence for this of course with Mustangs and Spitfires breaking up or
pilots reporting severe vibration and turbulence as the sound barrier was
approached. A number of planes were built to break the sound barrier
including the DH 108, which fell victim to the forces around the sound
barrier (but did finally exceed it in a dive), and the M52 which might
well have succeeded before the X-1 had it not been canceled by the British
Government.
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Despite the many and various
efforts it was the USAF, Bell and Chuck Yeager who together actually
exceeded Mach 1 in 14th October 1947 with the Bell X-1. I
bought an excellent summary of the project to break the sound barrier from
the USAF Museum last year and when I found the kit in K Witoons model Shop
in Bangkok in March it went into the stash. I decided that the anniversary
was a good reason to do the build so I knocked it out in a week for the
Real Space GB. The model is totally stock other than having the plastic
probes replaced with brass.
The last few pictures show the X1
with the DH 108 and the Miles M52 which make interesting comparisons.
Colin
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