One Scoop, Please

"ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn)
10/07/2020 at 12:35 • Filed to: wingspan, Planelopnik

From 1940 to 1945, the United States produced more !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! than any other bomber in the American arsenal. Though it could carry more bombs than the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , it was a demanding aircraft to fly, and not as rugged as the Flying Fortress. But the efficient, shoulder-mounted Davis wing meant that the Liberator could fly fast and far, and was one of the first aircraft to routinely fly across the Atlantic Ocean. With so many B-24s left over after the war, those attributes made it a perfect test bed for developing new aviation technologies.

In 1942, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA, the predecessor to NASA) created the Aircraft Engine Research Laboratory at Lewis Field in Ohio. By 1947, the facility became known as the Flight Propulsion Research Laboratory, where engineers carried out all manner of experiments, including significant research into the effects of icing on aircraft. Ice formation can be a dangerous situation for any airplane flying in cold and wet conditions. Ice can build up on the wings and affect the airflow, add extra drag, or coat the propellers. Enough ice, and the plane could fall from the sky. But ice can also affect a jet engine. Even though it is belching super hot air from the exhaust, the jet engine is taking in the cold wet air outside, and ice buildup at the front of the engine can cause chunks of ice to pass through and possibly damage the engine, disrupt airflow, or clog vital sensors or valves.

In the early days of jet aviation, it’s doubtful that any test pilot was keen about flying a relatively untested jet into icing conditions just to see what would happen. So NACA engineers took a surplus B-24M (s/n 44-41986) and mounted a General Electric I16 jet engine inside the bomb bay (the I-16 would go on to become the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , America’s first mass produced jet engine). Once the Liberator reached high altitude, the engine was started and cold outside air was fed through a scoop mounted on the top of the bomber, while inside, water was mixed with the cold air to make ice. The jet exhaust was vented out the back of the B-24. NACA also mounted a turbojet under the wing and sprayed water into it to see how the engine would react to icy conditions.

Ice buildup on the jet engine mounted under the starboard wing

But it wasn’t just jet engines. NACA operated the B-24M until 1949 to gather vital data on icing conditions and how it affected all manner of aircraft parts, from wings to engine cowls, to antennas to pitot tubes. Today, the research center is known as the NASA John H. Glenn Research Center at Lewis Field, and their work on aviation and space travel continues. But nowadays, the icing tests are carried out in a special icing tunnel.

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Connecting Flights

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If you enjoy these Aviation History posts, please let me know in the comments. You can find more posts about aviation history, aviators, and aviation oddities at !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .

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DISCUSSION (8)

CarsofFortLangley - Oppo Forever > ttyymmnn
10/07/2020 at 12:38

scoops make everything better.

user314 > ttyymmnn
10/07/2020 at 12:44

SBA Thanks You For All The Fish > CarsofFortLangley - Oppo Forever
10/07/2020 at 12:55

Agree to disagree...

Kinja'd!!!

CarsofFortLangley - Oppo Forever > SBA Thanks You For All The Fish
10/07/2020 at 12:58

I mean, proportionally I I think it would improve it. Gotta get a supercharger under there first.

Kinja'd!!!

Boxer_4 > ttyymmnn
10/07/2020 at 13:54

I had a great uncle that was a radio operator on B-24s during WWII. He was involved in two incidents during that time - the first requiring ditching the plane in the English Channel, the second one resulting in Swiss intern ment for a while.

I’m pretty sure he never set foot on an aircraft again after the war.

The B-24s he was on weren’t as interesting as these though.

ttyymmnn > Boxer_4
10/07/2020 at 13:58

The Liberator was really a tough plane to handle. The C-109 tanker version was used to fly planeloads of fuel over The Hump, and the Singing Cowboy Gene Autry, who served on the C-109, called flying the Hump “the thrill that lasts a lifetime. ” I can’t even imagine what it must have been like to serve in those bombers.

oldmxer > ttyymmnn
10/08/2020 at 07:50

thanks, love your aircraft content. this was one story I knew nothing about

ttyymmnn > oldmxer
10/08/2020 at 10:46

Thanks, I appreciate that. This was one that I had never seen before. I spend lots of time trolling through collections of airplane photos, the older the better. I came across this one and took a dive into it. That happens a lot....

Thanks for reading!