#xf-85

There are so many good choices, but this little guy is probably my favorite thing in the Air Force Museum.

It's a McDonnell XF-85 Goblin.  Its job would be to sit in the bomb bay of a B-36, and if/when the bomber was attacked en route to go bomb something, it would open the bomb bay doors and out would come the Goblin to fight off the attacking aircraft.  Once the attacking aircraft were taken care of, the Goblin would hook back onto its trapeze in the B-36's bomb bay and the bomber would continue on.

That was the plan, anyway.  In reality, it turned out that the air underneath the B-29, which is what they tested the Goblin with, was too turbulent for pilots to reliably be able to hook back onto the bomber, and the program was scrapped when aerial refueling solved the problem by allowing conventional fighter planes to accompany bombers for greater distances.

"In the immediate afterwar years, the U.S. Army Air Force and the U.S. Navy started a series of joint evaluation programs which for the most part proved unsuccessful. The Martin Model 233 Mighty Mite was the Navy's own parasite fighter, evaluated in parallel with the Air Force's McDonnell XF-85 Goblin under the designation XF3M-1. Slightly bigger and heavier than the Goblin, the Mighty Mite first flew in August 1948 and handled much better, but fell a victim of changing requirements. When the Navy's involvement in the program ceased abruptly early in 1949, some of the XF3M-1's successful features were incorporated in the Goblin, but this itself was canceled a few months later."

McDonnell XF-85 Goblin vs Martin XF3M-1 Mighty Mite

"Don't believe everything you read or see!!"

"The Smallest Fighter" by Mark Karvon, link.

"From the time the bomber was used in warfare, there was a need to protect the aircraft from enemy fighters. Fighters generally lack the long range of a strategic bomber which meant bombers had no fighter protection when their escorts had to turn back. After WWII, one idea was for the bombers to carry their own escorts. From this concept the XF-85 Goblin was born.

The XF-85 Goblin was a prototype jet fighter designed to be carried within the bomb bay of a B-36 Peacemaker bomber. In operation, the diminutive fighter would be released when enemy fighters were encountered. After protecting the formation, the Goblin would rendezvous with the bomber for retrieval.

In testing the XF-85 flew quite well. It had an estimated top speed of 648 MPH, it was maneuverable, stable, easy to fly and recoverable from spins. problems arose when trying to retrieve the fighter. It was meant to hook up to a trapeze extended beneath the bomber. Turbulence beneath the bomber created difficulties. At one point the fighter collided with the trapeze shattering the canopy and requiring an emergency landing. There were seven flight tests in all with only three of them resulting in successful hook-ups.

McDonnell XF-85 Goblin on a dolly, it was powered by a Westinghouse XJ-34 turbojet with 3,000 lb thrust.

Agreed

It was chibi before chibi was a thing.

Components of the McDonnell XF-85 Goblin.