What's the best sounding aircraft you ever heard?

I gotta go with the P-51 with the Merlin, and a close second is the sound of
a radial.

Wayne


"DeltaDeltaDelta" wrote in message
...
This came to mind when I heard a RAF VC-10K overflying my house at some
1000
feet AGL at full steam. What a sound! The VC-10 both looks and sounds
powerful. Also, the piston Yak-52 I heard a few days ago...unbelievable,
such a powerful and awe inspiring sound. The only thing I regret is never
hearing a DC-6 at full throttle; watching a documentary on ConAir
firefighting services today (on Discovery Science) I heard one pilot
remark
that those 76 cylinders at full power sound 'like a Hell's Angels
funeral'.

Triple Delta

Ditto!!!

Wayne wrote:

I gotta go with the P-51 with the Merlin, and a close second is the sound of
a radial.

Wayne

"DeltaDeltaDelta" wrote in message
...
This came to mind when I heard a RAF VC-10K overflying my house at some
1000
feet AGL at full steam. What a sound! The VC-10 both looks and sounds
powerful. Also, the piston Yak-52 I heard a few days ago...unbelievable,
such a powerful and awe inspiring sound. The only thing I regret is never
hearing a DC-6 at full throttle; watching a documentary on ConAir
firefighting services today (on Discovery Science) I heard one pilot
remark
that those 76 cylinders at full power sound 'like a Hell's Angels
funeral'.

Triple Delta

B-25 or B-17, or virtually any multi-engine aircraft outfitted with
Wright Cyclones.

all the best -- Dan Ford
email:

see the Warbird's Forum at www.warbirdforum.com
and the Piper Cub Forum at www.pipercubforum.com

The setting: Duxford for Flying Legends airshow, 1995-ish, around 1800 or
so. I was a volunteer for The Fighter Collection at the time, assigned for
that day to look after the Corsair which was the last aircraft parked on the
display line, at the departure end of the parallel taxiway. Gorgeous sunny
summer day with big, fluffy clouds way up high. It had been a great day of
flying, everything from Mustangs, Spits, the B-17 "Sally B", B-25, Corsairs,
all the 'Cats, Spads, and probably some other stuff I can't remember. We
had a total of 19 Merlin powered fighters on the flightline that day.

Being at the departure end of the taxiway, everything had to taxi past me to
get to the runup area and then the runway.

At the end of each Flying Legends airshow, the last formation is a Balboa, a
massed formation of everything on the flightline up in the sky at once. The
Corsair I was minding was already gone, so the distinction of the end of the
parking line was lost. The Mustangs and Spits were due to go off together
and started to taxi past me one-by-one to do their runups. But there were
too many of them for the small runup area to hold all at once. So they
turned into wind wherever they could.

I suddenly found myself surrounded on 3 sides by all the Spits and Mustangs
doing their runups at the same time - 19 Merlins revving up, churning the
air with their props, making the ground shake, creating a deafening sweet
racket which I couldn't bring myself to block from my ears. They rang for 8
hours afterward but it was worth every minute.

And I remember thinking, while standing on the WW2 Spit and Mustang base,
that this must have been what the base sounded like in 1944. It was one of
the few times in my life I actually felt like I'd been allowed to step back
in time.

All of that because of the noise...

Shawn

"DeltaDeltaDelta" wrote in message
...
This came to mind when I heard a RAF VC-10K overflying my house at some
1000
feet AGL at full steam. What a sound! The VC-10 both looks and sounds
powerful. Also, the piston Yak-52 I heard a few days ago...unbelievable,
such a powerful and awe inspiring sound. The only thing I regret is never
hearing a DC-6 at full throttle; watching a documentary on ConAir
firefighting services today (on Discovery Science) I heard one pilot
remark
that those 76 cylinders at full power sound 'like a Hell's Angels
funeral'.

Triple Delta

I suddenly found myself surrounded on 3 sides by all the Spits and
Mustangs
doing their runups at the same time - 19 Merlins revving up, churning the
air with their props, making the ground shake, creating a deafening sweet
racket which I couldn't bring myself to block from my ears. They rang for
8
hours afterward but it was worth every minute.

Thanks for sharing that, Shawn. I've been at OSH numerous times when a
dozen (or more) Mustangs were doing their run-ups, and I still get shivers
just thinking about it!
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

You bet, Jay. There are other airplane engines that sound pretty cool but
that one experience always stands out in my mind.
Others include:

Sitting near the departure end of Incirlik Airbase when the F-111s and the
Turkish F-104s were departing was pretty thrilling, too. The -104s, when
fully spun up, howled like a hangar door with a stuck wheel being dragged
across it's track. That's the only way I've ever been able to describe that
sound.

The crackle of the B-1s four engines in afterburner as it does a reversing
turn, pointing it's tail straight at you, in an airshow.

Last Wednesday hearing the sound of the last ever Concorde departure as our
final one was flown to the museum at Filton.

The 5 cylinder radial on a Baby Lakes that I just got to hand swing - pure
vintage fun!

The corncob radial on the Corsair starting and warming up - sounds even
better than being at full throttle!

Someone else mentioned the MATS Connie. I got to see and hear her come in
to Duxford a few years ago. Lovely in the extreme!

There are more but I'm not entirely coherent, being home with the flu, so
they're escaping my mind. I think it's the sounds of aviation that are most
thrilling. You can see nearly any airplane on static display in a museum
somewhere, but it's cold and lifeless. To hear it with it's engines running
is to hear it breath and thrive. That's thrilling!

Shawn

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:A0dzb.406785$Fm2.414824@attbi_s04...
I suddenly found myself surrounded on 3 sides by all the Spits and
Mustangs
doing their runups at the same time - 19 Merlins revving up, churning
the
air with their props, making the ground shake, creating a deafening
sweet
racket which I couldn't bring myself to block from my ears. They rang
for
8
hours afterward but it was worth every minute.

Thanks for sharing that, Shawn. I've been at OSH numerous times when a
dozen (or more) Mustangs were doing their run-ups, and I still get shivers

just thinking about it!
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

"ShawnD2112" wrote in message
news
The crackle of the B-1s four engines in afterburner as it does a reversing
turn, pointing it's tail straight at you, in an airshow.

Yeah. Nice. Like the sound of Concorde on take-off! Except you can
(could) get closer to Concorde as it flies directly over your head at when
standing near the end of the runway.

Last Wednesday hearing the sound of the last ever Concorde departure as
our
final one was flown to the museum at Filton.

It was high though. I guess a lot less fuel on board than on a transatlantic
flight. Where were you standing? Was your car parked there? What car
were you in? What do you look like? (I'll look out for you on my video)

Someone else mentioned the MATS Connie. I got to see and hear her come in
to Duxford a few years ago. Lovely in the extreme!

Yes, I was there. But you weren't allowed near it. It was at the
PFA rally the previous day, and there I had a good close up look
and spoke to the people involved.

I think it's the sounds of aviation that are most
thrilling. You can see nearly any airplane on static display in a museum
somewhere, but it's cold and lifeless. To hear it with it's engines
running
is to hear it breath and thrive. That's thrilling!

Our Hurricane at Brooklands should be returning to taxi-able condition.

Don't know if we get engines too when we get Concorde 202 from
Filton...don't suppose they'll allow us to taxi that! :-)

Paul

I probably didn't see you at LHR when Concorde took off. I was standing on
the 8th floor of the carpark in Tech Block C on BA's Engineering East Base.
My car was parked three floors below me. She did do one hell of a climbout,
though, didn't she? No bags, min fuel, just 100 pax or so of weight - she
never climbed like that for the 001 to JFK! I think Capt Mike Bannister
really enjoyed that one.

I didn't go the the PFA rally this year and I haven't been to Duxford in a
couple of years. I was a volunteer for The Fighter Collection for a couple
of years back in the mid 90s, and was there nearly every Sunday for
volunteer day. But then got back into flying in 97. I found myself in a
Cub group. So, fly my own Cub on a Sunday or drive an hour and a half to
watch someone else fly airplanes all day? I'll let you do the math on that
one! :-) It would have been good to see and hear the Connie again. One
good thing about being a volunteer at Duxford is that you normally get onto
the flightline for a lot of this stuff. When the Dutch DC-4 came in a few
years ago, they let us all up into the cockpit to just have a nose around.
I spoke to the owner/pilot. He was a great guy and it's a heck of an
operation they'd got going.

Shawn
"Paul Sengupta" wrote in message
...
"ShawnD2112" wrote in message
news
The crackle of the B-1s four engines in afterburner as it does a
reversing
turn, pointing it's tail straight at you, in an airshow.

Yeah. Nice. Like the sound of Concorde on take-off! Except you can
(could) get closer to Concorde as it flies directly over your head at
when
standing near the end of the runway.

Last Wednesday hearing the sound of the last ever Concorde departure as
our
final one was flown to the museum at Filton.

It was high though. I guess a lot less fuel on board than on a
transatlantic
flight. Where were you standing? Was your car parked there? What car
were you in? What do you look like? (I'll look out for you on my video)

Someone else mentioned the MATS Connie. I got to see and hear her come
in
to Duxford a few years ago. Lovely in the extreme!

Yes, I was there. But you weren't allowed near it. It was at the
PFA rally the previous day, and there I had a good close up look
and spoke to the people involved.

I think it's the sounds of aviation that are most
thrilling. You can see nearly any airplane on static display in a
museum
somewhere, but it's cold and lifeless. To hear it with it's engines
running
is to hear it breath and thrive. That's thrilling!

Our Hurricane at Brooklands should be returning to taxi-able condition.

Don't know if we get engines too when we get Concorde 202 from
Filton...don't suppose they'll allow us to taxi that! :-)

Paul

I kind of like the sound of a glider with spoilers out on short final - the
"whooshing"/whistling is pretty neat.

"DeltaDeltaDelta" wrote in message
...
This came to mind when I heard a RAF VC-10K overflying my house at some
1000
feet AGL at full steam. What a sound! The VC-10 both looks and sounds
powerful. Also, the piston Yak-52 I heard a few days ago...unbelievable,
such a powerful and awe inspiring sound. The only thing I regret is never
hearing a DC-6 at full throttle; watching a documentary on ConAir
firefighting services today (on Discovery Science) I heard one pilot
remark
that those 76 cylinders at full power sound 'like a Hell's Angels
funeral'.

Triple Delta

Anything radial, multiple, and large in climb. From the cockpit or the
ground. Once the props are pulled back and really biting the air, it
deepens the tone. Marvelous! Closely rivaled by any large radial starting.


JG