As touched upon in the previous post concerning the He 162, there was a boom in jet designs in the beginning of the jet age. This expansion saw a diversity of airplanes in all niches, naval and air force fighters, transports and bombers. The 1950s arguably saw the most diversity in aviation history amongst naval fighters, which makes it a fascinating time for aviation enthusiasts. While currently, the US Navy has conformed to utilizing one exceptional, yet relatively uniform airframe, the McDonnell Douglas F/A-18 Hornet, 1950s naval aviation saw a plethora of jet fighters. To name a few of the fighters (not even attack planes) seen in the 50s: North American’s FJ Fury; McDonnell’s F3H Demon and F2H Banshee; Grumman’s Panther F9F, Cougar F-9, and Tiger F-11; Vought’s F7U Cutlass, F8U Crusader; and Douglas’ F4D Skyray. While all these fighters interest me mostly because of their short service lives and forgotten legacies, I will focus on the Skyray in this post. I will revisit some of the fighters in future posts; especially the F-11, F3H, and F7U.
The Douglas F4D (F4D creating the nickname “Ford”) Skyray is a classic example of a US Navy Cold War interceptor. It was designed to shriek off into the sky at a phenomenal rate of climb (18,000 ft/min) to 50,000ft and attain supersonic speeds of (+700 mph) to engage aggressing aircraft. While the airplane is probably overlooked today due to its large entourage of naval fighters and service life as short as grade school, with a closer look the plane is quiet an individual. For one, the Skyray is one of the few American delta wings fighters in history and the only US naval delta wing fighter (A-4 is an attack jet). The Skyray is also the first US Navy/ Marine airplane to break the speed of sound in level flight. It surprisingly joined service just a little over 2 years after the North American F-100 Super Sabre (first plane to break Mach 1 in level flight) joined the USAF. This attests to Douglas’ ingenuity. They were able to make a fighter that appeased Naval and Marine requirements, had the avionics, maneuverability, and supersonic swiftness to be a premier interceptor, and most notably fly slow enough to land on a boat (Vso 103kts). This contrasts to the 10,000 ft runways the F-100 (Vso 137 kts) could go soak up.
Some of the design features of the Skyray are rounded tips on the delta wings, leading edge slats (which were revolutionary at the time), elevon controls (standard for delta wings), afterburner for its J57 engine, and a peculiarly large pitch trim tabs on either side of the engine nozzle. These trim controls were essential to the F4D’s maritime success, because it aided in decreasing the attitude of the aircraft at slow speeds (high attitudes and sink rates at slow speeds are the greatest side effect of delta wings). The delta wing design of the plane, resembling a sting ray or manta ray inspired its name Skyray. The plane looks like it was built for speed to any onlooker. This specified design that brought its success, ultimately caused its downfall. With the development of the Cold War, the Navy wanted fighters to be more versatile than the narrow specifications of simply a light interceptor. Thus, the Skyray was retired as quickly as it was developed.
The F4D Skyray’s specified mission and quick service life spoke to the immediate post war years of great aerial defense spending. This spending resulted in a diversity of jet fighters, which proved to be a headache to the armed branches servicing the planes, the pilots constantly transitioning between planes, and tax payers funding so many particular jets. While it is positive financially that the military has become more economical with their aviation implementation, the 50s brought about an abundance of fighters that kept pushing the envelope and making milestones with every coming year. It was an exciting time, with groundbreaking aircraft that have become forgotten today.
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