Bad Plane Designs When planes are designed, they don’t always work out, that is to say they usually do not go into production, but there are exceptions. Not all planes are what we might call tightly designed because some obstacles could not be entirely eliminated due to the technology of the time. Take one of the most famous and best performing planes of all time, the SR-71 Blackbird. This plane was far ahead of its time and still holds many speed records. The technology of the time didn’t allow for it to be ideal. The plane leaked fuel. The reason for this was the material it was made from. It flew so fast the body would heat up and expand and then the metal would shrink as it cooled. There were no seals at the time capable of stopping this problem. The expansion was so severe the plane would get 4 inches longer when flying at speed. The Soviets loved the British Harrier jet and decided to try and copy it, so they commissioned the Yakovlev Design Bureau to build the Yak-38. Sometimes imitation is the best form of flattery, but in this case while that may have been true, the plane was a failure. One of the problems was the weather. This model was not a vertical takeoff model. If it was cold the plane could only fly for about 15 minutes. There were cases where the plane would take off and then fall into the sea or crash into the ground. The next step was to be a vertical takeoff plane which completely imitated the Harrier in every feature which would be named the Yak-39. One would think after the failures of the Yak-38 the Soviets would have second thoughts. Well, they did and cancelled the project. Bad plane designs were not limited to the Soviets however. We have been designing some very bad planes since the early days of flight. In 1919 the United States commissioned two planes to be built initially and tested. They were to be fighter planes. The planes were built by the Christmas Aeroplane Company and named the Christmas Bullet. The planes were single wing and strutless. When the first plane was tested it crashed killing the pilot. Some time later the second plane was tested and it also crashed killing the pilot. One of the worst passenger jets of all time was the De Havilland Comet. It was the first jetliner and made its first flight in 1949. When it came out commercially in 1952 it revolutionized air travel, but became known as a very dangerous way to fly. It was plagued by crashes due to things like air frame stress, cracks in windows and other problems. Within twelve months three planes had crashed. Later versions had been released and were much better than the original. The Vought F7U Cutlass was a strange looking plane. It was designed to be a U.S. Navy carrier plane. There had been a lot of controversy about the plane because many people thought at the time the design actually came from captured planes from Messerschmitt and Arado, which was denied by the company. About 320 were built. It killed the test pilot and over the course of its use 21 pilots died. It is considered a very bad plane. It gained the name the Gutless Cutlass because of its underpowered engine. The plane was so bad none of the planes built between 1950 to 1952 were approved for use. One pilot who became an astronaut named Walter Schirra wrote the plane was a widow maker. The Soviets wanted a plane to compete with the Concord, a jet liner capable of speed of 1,330 miles per hour for cruising and 1,557 miles per hour top speed. Their answer was the Tupolev-144. The Soviet plane was featured at a French air show where it blew up in front of a horrified audience. It only flew freight for a while then tried again to enter commercial service and this time it crashed again. It was said there were so many things wrong with the plane, there were too many to fix. The Poles had produced a bomber named the Zubr before the start of World War II. It was supposed to be a medium bomber and was produced by the LWS factory. It was probably the worst bomber ever made. It turned out it could only be used for training. The airframe was so stressed the plane could disintegrate without warning. Only twenty were ever produced. It was slow and had only a tiny bomb load capacity. It had only two 420 horse power engines which it struggled with. A prototype crashed after the wood delaminated on the wings. The Poles determined the bomber could not even carry an effective load of bombs. While in flight another one of the bombers had a structural failure and crashed killing everyone in the plane. The Hiller VZ-1 hovercraft was a bad idea from the start. One has to wonder what the company was thinking of? It was basically a large fan on its side with a small platform above and a railing. The idea was for an individual soldier to be able to fly around during a battle. One of the criticisms was if he fell, he would go into the fan and become chop meat. You flew this device by shifting your body weight. Only six were ever built. Years ago, a similar device was depicted in a comic strip called Dick Tracy in which the policeman flew around on a similar device. Could this be where the idea came from? Anyway, people have been coming up with bad designs forever and this was just another one of them which had no possibility of being effective.
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