Monday 25 April 2016

Airspeed AS.47/48/49

We are covering three unbuilt British airplanes in this post, even if two of them are left undrawn because there aren't blueprints of them, or at least we couldn't find them.

The Airspeed AS.47 was designed in 1939 and was going to be a twin-boom bomber project with two engines in the tractor-pusher configuration, with each engine having a four-bladed propeller. The fuselage was cylindrical with the cockpit placed a little bit to the left of the axis of the fuselage. It was expected that it could carry an internal bomb load of 454kg. plus some unespecified amount under the wings.
It was going to be powered by two Napier Sabre and were expected to deliver 2200hp of power, each of them. Apparently, the rear engine could be detached in order to create an emergency exit.
Considering also that the speed of this airplane was expected to be high, it was believed that it wasn't going to need any defensive armament.

The Airspeed AS.48 and AS.49 were also designed in 1939. The AS.48 was going to be a single-seat night fighter project and the AS.49 was going to be the trainer version of the AS.48. As we could only find text referenced to those projects and not any blueprint or drawing whatsoever, they aren't drawn.










Sources:
1. http://raigap.livejournal.com/401554.html (translated)
2. Putnam's British Aircraft - Airspeed Aircraft Since 1931

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