Talk:De Havilland Vampire/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Assessment comment

The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:De Havilland Vampire/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.

Reference ` flyable ' vampires; Saw one at the Grand Canyon airfield / museum in 2005 which the attendant assured me was flown at air shows; worth checking out ? 74.115.77.7 03:47, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Last edited at 03:47, 16 February 2007 (UTC). Substituted at 13:03, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

Mosquito

The article mentions the use of the Mosquito-based Cockpit in the Vampire design but I dont think this was introduced until the two-seat Night Fighter Vampire Vampire Trainers. MilborneOne (talk) 19:22, 15 October 2016 (UTC)

IIRC, the fuselage of the two-seat Vampire Night Fighter (NF) version was designed to be the same diameter at the front as the Mosquito and the basic cockpit arrangement was also carried over, as it had been proved to work well in the Mosquito and crews used to the Mosquito would be able to transfer to the Vampire NF (and later Venom NF) without having to get used to a new cockpit arrangement. The same diameter fuselage would also simplify the installation of the radar gear and the radome, as some tooling designed to produce Mosquito components could be used, and the radar equipment itself could be installed in the same manner as the Mosquito with few changes. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.144.50.200 (talk) 15:37, 5 June 2017 (UTC)

First Flight

A J Jackson's DH Aircraft gives the first flight of LZ548 as 29 September rather than the 20th. MilborneOne (talk) 19:34, 15 October 2016 (UTC)

Hyphens

What is this anti-hyphen fixation? It actually alters the sense in some cases.Lexysexy (talk) 00:59, 22 October 2016 (UTC)

I have reverted the grammar improvements as you say the de-hyphenation broke some of the sense, perhaps a failure of a script based editing tool. MilborneOne (talk) 12:58, 22 October 2016 (UTC)

CE

Tidied bibliography, added isbns etc. Since most were in cite book did the rest like it. Are the citations supposed to be sfns? thanksKeith-264 (talk) 10:00, 5 February 2017 (UTC)

What do the last four words mean?

"...this would be typically embarrassing rather than dangerous due to the relative ease of recovery, which was principally achieved via course elevator application. Moriori (talk) 21:45, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

It's a spelling mistake, it should read 'coarse'. Stall recovery in some aircraft requires positive (coarse) use of elevator to pitch the nose down to regain airspeed. 'Positive' might be a better word as coarse relating to aircraft handling usually means rough or excessive control movements by an unskilled pilot. Nimbus (Cumulus nimbus floats by) 22:21, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

Thanks Nimbus. Have amended it to "positive" which I think the 'average reader' would better understand. Moriori (talk) 23:12, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

'Coarse' in this context is used in contrast to 'fine', i.e., 'coarse' meaning a large movement of the elevator. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.144.50.200 (talk) 15:25, 5 June 2017 (UTC)

Swedish Mk I's used hispano mk.II guns

So as the title says swedish vampire mk I's used Hispano mk.II guns. Did the british mk I's also use Hispano mk.II guns? And if so shouldnt it be mentioned somewhere in the article?--Blockhaj (talk) 10:18, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

That sounds very unlikely, the Hispano MK II had considerably longer barrels than the later Mk V, which had been standardised upon for UK fighter designs by the time the Vampire was designed as it had a higher rate-of-fire than the Mk II. The earlier Meteor used the Hispano Mk II however, IIRC. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.149.53.180 (talk) 10:37, 5 March 2018 (UTC)

Trainer Version

There are a number of differences between the single seat and the trainer Vampires, apart from the ejection seats. Some that come to mind immediately are hydraulic brakes, the fitment of Dunlop anti-skid, the retractable gunsights (I think), and the provision for in-flight relight. I refer in particular to the Mk35, 35A and 35W models, as I'm not familiar with any others, but I'd be surprised if they are much different. Is there scope for a new sub-section, or should these things be remarked upon in the existing body of text?Lexysexy (talk) 02:27, 21 February 2018 (UTC)

Various

• The Nene does not require auxiliary intakes "to provide airflow to the back of the impellor" (something that would be nice to have explained), it requires auxiliary air intakes because it has a higher mass flow and they couldn't just cut the intakes larger. It has a twin-sided impeller to move twice the air than a single sided impeller of the same diameter, but it does not require special, separate intakes for each side of the impeller, which is what this appears to be claiming. All the air that goes into the engine is intaken through the cone-shaped FOD guard on the front, and is divided internally afterwards to go to the different faces of the impeller. A standard Vampire intake would work just fine if the diameter of the intakes was increased and a small anifold chamber was installed around the intake cone, instead of going directly into the separate L and R intake vents of the Goblin. (My bad, it says "to reduce the installed-engine intake losses causd by having to feed air to the rear face of the impellor". All these need to say is "to accomodate the greater mass flow of the Nene engine, aux intake doors had to be provided". Or "since the greater mass-flow of the Nene would cause significant thrust losses due to the constriction of the regular Goblin intake pipes". If you really must discuss the twin-faced impeller, say something like "the Nene required aux intake doors to provide for the greater mass flow allowed by its unique twin-faced compressor, which doubled the amount of air which could be moved for the same diameter compressor...". Something besides what is written, anyway.)
• How can a jet "lack the means to restart in air"? Unless the jet lacks an ignitor and is lit by hand on the ground, using a blowtorch, I don't see what "means" it could be lacking. A jet doesn't restart in the air using a starter motor or compressed air, it is restarted by employing the pressuried "ram air" inside the intake manifold to "windmill" the compressor. Once a certain RPM is reached, the ignitor is fired and the jet is restarted. WIthout an ignitor, the thing would have to be manually lit on the ground eavery startup, and I doubt that this is the case. I suppose a jet could lack the ABILITY to restart in the air, if for some reason the design wasn't capable of windmill starting, but that's not "the means" to restart.

The Vampire's Goblin was started by an electric starter and providing enough battery power remained the engine could be restarted simply by going through the re-light procedure. The later Venom had a cartridge starter.

• A DH Venom is not a "swept wing" aircraft. I is an aircraft with a strongly tapered leading edge, resulting in on overall positive sweepback along the average centerline of the wing. But a wing is not "swept" until it reaches a certain threshold, which I think is 30deg. Anything less than that it behaves just like a straight wing, only it happens to sweep slightly back. An Me 262 is the same way; sometimes people describe it as "swept wing", but it's not, not even close. It's a straight winged plane with a slight sweepback angle on the wings. A F-18 Hornet doesn't even have "swept wings". Even the page on the Venom doesn't claim that it's a swept wing aircraft. The improvements that were made were in the wing thickness, and in engine power. Perhaps they hoped the angled leading edges would help give better high speed performance, but it's doubtful. Does anyone claim the C-47 has "sept wings" because it has tapered leading edges? I certainly hope not.

The Venom was given a thinner wing with swept leading edges in order to raise the Critical Mach number (Mcr) over that of the IIRC M=0.76 of the straight-wing Vampire. This was important if combat was at higher altitudes where the speed of sound is lower than it is at sea level. IIRC, the Venom wing's Mcr was raised to M=0.88, making the Venom able to fight - as opposed to just fly - at higher altitudes than the Vampire could.

• I don't know if this is the sort of thing that is worth mentioning in the article page - the Vampire was the aircraft used in the film "The Shepherd"... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.124.38.160 (talk) 05:01, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Idumea47b (talk) 04:34, 26 July 2019 (UTC)

Vampire Manufacture in Australia

A recent amendment uses an erroneous reference to claim the Australian Vampire to be a CAC product. De Havilland Australia made them all. CAC has never claimed the Vampire, see the list of product on their page. After Hawker Siddeley absorbed de Havilland, the Australian company became Hawker de Havilland. In 1985, long after Vampire production ended, HdH purchased CAC, which might have caused confusion in somebody's mind! I think NiD.29 needs to review his/her amendments.Lexysexy (talk) 01:06, 12 December 2020 (UTC)

:Having now read the reference, I see the author states: "Somewhat confusingly, some sources claim that a number of, even all, of the Aussie Vampires were actually built directly by de Havilland in Australia, not CAC." At the same time, he gives no reference whatever for his claim that CAC built the Aussie Vampires, yet consistently uses the claim throughout his pages. I have no idea what his provenance as an author is, but i feel that I can equally use a website as a source, see: https://aviationmuseum.com.au/dh-115-vampire-t35/

What this source states is that the aircraft were built by de Havilland, and the Nene engines were built by CAC. However, the Australian Goblins were built by de Havilland. Neither Wikipedia nor CAC itself claim the Vampire or give it a CAC type number. If the editor (NiD.29) who made this change is unwilling to revert to the historic truth, I will shortly make the revision myself.Lexysexy (talk) 00:29, 13 March 2021 (UTC)

Available information changes over time, especially when the sources are perfunctory or confused. If you have a source that clarifies the situation better, please feel free to change it. A book source is usually better than a website. The editor who entered something is not responsible for reverting a change from years ago - if it is in error, correct it, but make sure there is a source. As for the book above, perhaps it isn't the best source either? From more recent reading from Australian sources: (a magazine though -

Bennett, John (Spring 2017). "The Vampire". ADF Serials Telegraph News. RAAF Aircraft Markings Since 1950 Squadron Markings part 4. Vol. 7, no. 4., which I found online as a pdf) - perhaps someone has the refs for a book to add to that?

It says that de Havilland in Australia (DHA) built Vampires at Bankstown while CAC built the engines.

F.30 fighter (57 built), FB.31 fighter-bombers (23 built) and 24 F.30s were upgraded to FB.31.

T.33 trainers (36 built), T.35s trainers (68 built), while the last T.33 and remaining T.33s were upgraded as T-35As.

The DH Putnam book doesn't offer much detail but says that the F.30 was originally to have been the F.4, which was never built.

Cheers, - NiD.29 (talk) 09:59, 13 March 2021 (UTC)

Thank you for revising your amendment. Best,Lexysexy (talk) 00:44, 14 March 2021 (UTC)

When the Vampire retired

Air Force of Zimbabwe (Rhodesian Air Force) was still flying them in 1981/2 as I worked on them 2Sqn Maddog-Martin61 (talk) 21:43, 2 July 2022 (UTC)