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Aviation History
1955
1955 - 0523.PDF
22 April 1955 "Flight" photograph The B-45A-NA-5—belonging to the 86th Squadron of the 47th Wing—the handling of which is described below. AT THE CONTROLS OF THE B-45 Second-pilot Time on a Four-jet Bomber By C. M. LAMBERT WE make no apologies for describing here the flightcharacteristics of an aircraft which dates as far backas 1947 in design. For one thing, this is only the second time that permission has been officially granted for anyone to fly and describe an operational American jet bom- ber; for another, the B-45 is still, despite its age, a most interesting aircraft and the first of its type which we have been permitted to describe in England. Generous facilities, also, were granted by U.S.A.F. headquarters in Washington to take air-to-air photographs, and those published here and on March 25th were secured from a Lockheed T-33 put at our disposal by the 86th squadron of the 47th Bombardment Wing (Light), which also supplied the B-45. Permission having been granted from Washington, we wendedour way to Sculthorpe, the base of the 47th Wing. The light being just right for photography, it was decided to get airborneas soon as possible, and McLaren (with camera) and I were swiftly equipped and briefed for flight. Our clothes consisted ofsuits, Mae Wests, back-type parachutes and Lombard crash helmets with A13A pressure-demand oxygen masks. Of theseand the related cockpit equipment, more later. We were then introduced to our crews, Lt. I. L. Prado (86thSquadron) pilot of the T-33, and Maj. H. J. McGee and Maj. A. C. Wilhelm, respectively pilot and bombardier/navigator of theB-45. Maj. Wilhelm is a member of the 86th Squadron, but Maj. McGee was inspector of the Wing. He had, in fact, beendetailed to fly me, since he was due for "rotation" to the U.S.A. and required only an hour and forty minutes' B-45 time to makeup the round thousand on type. In terms of time served he was one of the two oldest members of the Wing, having been with itsince its early war years in North Africa. We drove out to the aircraft, a B-45A-5, and I had a few moments in which to lookit over from the outside. The first face-to-face meeting with an aircraft one has notpreviously inspected at close quarters is always interesting. The impressions "in the flesh" are always refreshing, if only becauseof the number of new aspects one can appreciate while just walking up to it. Crews of the B-45 and the photographic T-33 (left to right): Maj. H. J. McGee, pilot, and Maj. A. C. Wilhelm, navigator/bombardier; Lt. I. L. Prado, T-33 pilot. The B-45 is a puzzling aircraft, and my impressions are allcoloured by the feeling that it ought to be more difficult than it is. A number of its features I did not and do not like, thoughnone so much as to change my overall opinion that this must be one of the most tractable and "ordinary" large aircraft built. Andyet, on the face of it, it has no right to be so. The answer is that considerable internal complication of equipment has not beenallowed to detract from simplicity of operation. So many factors could militate against this simplicity—highall-up weight, comparatively high performance, four turbojets and complexity of systems and equipment. Yet the B-45 isdelightful to fly, steady, light and responsive and completely straightforward. It can be driven on the ground almost like acar, and flown like a much lighter aircraft: it woffles over the hedge at only 130 m.p.h. and is quite happy on a 2,000-yd run-way. As for its top-speed performance, it is not remarkable by modern standards. The top speed low down is marked on theA.S.I. as 550 m.pii., and the maximum permissible Mach value as 0.76. The ceiling is "above 40,000," immediately after full-weight take-off. Entry is via a door beside the bombardier's station on the portside, whence a deep corridor leads aft to the bomb-bay. As one crawls along this corridor, the floor of the cockpits proper is atshoulder level, and one reaches the seats- by worming one's way up between the floor and the cockpit coaming. For the inexperi-enced, wearing the back-type parachute, this can be a two-man job. The left arms of the ejector seats are lowered to give moreroom and also to prevent the entrant from accidentally pulling the pre-ejection lever and prematurely arming the seat. Once in "the office" there is ample room and, though one cansee little enough forwards from the back seat, the view from the front is excellent. All-round view corresponds to that from afighter, both forwards and backwards. The co-pilot in the rear has only such gear as will allow him to handle the aircraft in theair. He cannot see very much in front and for purely flying equipment he has, in addition to the control column and rudderpedals, only the six basic blind-flying instruments, four throttles, "press to transmit" button and elevator trim switch. I would have the following criticisms to make at first sight ofthe seat and its equipment. It is not automatic and does not seem to fit so closely to the body as the R.A.F. type. The back-type parachute harness has three hook fastenings which are not too easy to undo and would be most difficult to get rid of in ahurry. The harness is completely quick-adjusting, but this brings with it the inevitable penalty of long lengths of strap hangingloose about one. To fire the B-45's seat one first raises the pre-ejection leveron the end of the right arm-rest, thus exposing the firing trigger beneath it. Then the seat-arming lever, in the correspondingposition on the left arm-rest, has to be pulled in order to make the seat "live". After that the hood is jettisoned from the frontcockpit or by one of two large manual jettison controls (one at each pilot's position) and the pilots are free to go. Once clearof the aircraft they release themselves from the seat manually and either use the direct rip-cord on the left side of the harnessor pull a red transparent knob below it to arm the barostatic device. This then causes the parachute to develop at about10,000ft. An emergency oxygen supply is stowed in the pack and connected normally to the main oxygen lead on the mask. Theseat-harness itself is of the standard American pattern with the two shoulder-straps terminating in leather loops which arethreaded over the main clasp of the lap strap. The clasp itself
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