Martin-Baker M.B.5
#1

[Image: martin_baker_mb_5_r2496_p_greensted.jpg]
What about it?
p-51D+spitfire?
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#2

Combine the mustang with the spitfire?
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#3

Not much Spitfire in that one...
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#4

About as useful as a 109Z.

[Image: sig2.gif]
TEAM PACIFIC
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#5

Metatron Wrote:Not much Spitfire in that one...

The nose is nearer to a Spitfire than anything else IMHO.
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#6

It does look pretty badass, if ugly.
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#7

Would be nice - but we dont have anything really to use parts of in her build - particuarly seeing how we dont have any contra-rotating props - and never mind the FM.... Sad

The MB5 would have been great if she ever saw production/deployment.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin-Baker_MB_5

[quote]Design and development
The MB 5 was actually begun as the second Martin-Baker MB 3 prototype, designed to Air Ministry Specification F.18/39 for an agile, sturdy Royal Air Force fighter, able to fly faster than 400 mph. After the first MB 3 crashed in 1942, killing Val Baker, the second prototype was delayed. A modified MB 3 with a Rolls-Royce Griffon was planned as the MB 4, but a full redesign was chosen instead.[1]

The re-designed aircraft, designated MB 5, used wings similar to the MB 3, but had an entirely new steel-tube fuselage. Power came from a Rolls-Royce Griffon 83 liquid-cooled V-12 engine, producing 2,340 hp (1,745 kW) and driving two three-bladed contra-rotating propellers.[2] Armament was four 20 mm Hispano cannon, mounted in the wings outboard of the widely-spaced retractable undercarriage.


Flight testing
The first flight of the MB 5 prototype, serial R2496, took place on 23 May 1944.[3] Performance was considered outstanding by test pilots, and the cockpit layout was praised by the Armament and Aircraft Experimental Establishment. The accessibility of the fuselage for maintenance was excellent, thanks to a system of detachable panels.

Acknowledged as one of the best aerobatic pilots in the UK, S/L Janusz Żurakowski from the Aeroplane and Armament Experimental Establishment (A&AEE) at RAF Boscombe Down gave a spectacular display at the Farnborough Air Show in June 1946, with the Martin-Baker MB 5, a design he considered as a superlative piston-engined fighter, better in many ways than the Spitfire.


An MB 5 replica, nearing completion as of 2006.Serial production, had it been authorized, would have begun in time for squadron service over Germany. Instead, the RAF directed their attention towards jet fighters, and the MB 5 remained unordered. Perhaps one of the reasons that the MB 5 did not go into production was because the Rolls Royce Griffon engine failed when the MB 5 was being demonstrated to Sir Winston Churchill.[citation needed] Another reason, stated by Michael Bowyer might be that Martin-Baker lacked both facilities and sufficient government support.[4] The original MB 5 was reputedly destroyed on a gunnery range. Martin-Baker went on to become one of the world's leading builders of ejection seats.

General characteristics
Crew: one
Length: 37 ft 9 in (11.5 m)
Wingspan: 35 ft 0 in (10.7 m)
Height: 15 ft 0 in (4.5 m)
Wing area: 262 ft
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#8

Production/deployment status hasn't harmed the LW Wink
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