The Surprising Story Of Aerial Refueling

This episode was presented by Brilliant In November 1911, a trivial but historically significant event would occur over the city of Anzer during the Italo-Turkish War in Libya. Italian lieutenant and pilot Julio Gavot would drop four grapefruit-sized grenades from an altitude of 600 feet. towards Ottoman military positions from their ETR to the monoplane, as long as no casualties were inflicted, this event is widely accepted as the first

aerial

bombardment from a heavier than air aircraft in 2 years, the bomber would become a stable of air warfare as specially built aircraft entered service. However, even under ideal conditions, these early bombers were limited to only 3 to 4 hours of flight time, limiting their range and flexibility.

The ability to transport large loads of ammunition to targets at much greater distances proved to be a challenge for early military aviation at the time. In both the civilian and military worlds, a practical method of traversing great distances, including large bodies of water, without the need for service. The landings were also highly sought after immediately after the First World War. Aviation development stalled because the range and payload capacity of the aircraft of the time were limited. It offered little appeal to the public as airframe and engine designs constantly evolved. Air

refueling

was considered the only immediate solution to the range extension problem, particularly for military applications;

However, it would take almost three decades of experimentation with the concept for the first system to become operationally practical. The first attempts at air

refueling

were carried out as dangerous stunts performed by civilian pilots known as Barnstormers in flying circuses in In these demonstrations, a crew member of the refueling aircraft would climb from his wing to the wing of the receiving aircraft with a can of fuel in hand, there he would manually refuel the receiving aircraft and subsequently climb back into his own aircraft after refueling. The first true systematic attempt at in-flight refueling was carried out on October 3, 1920 in Washington DC by Lieutenant Godfrey L Cabat of the United States.

The United States Naval Reserve jack test employed a trill rope with an attached grappling hook installed on their Huff Donal aircraft. The hook was used to retrieve a can of 5G gasoline that was floating in the pathomic river despite the relatively smaller amount of fuel consumed in the cat experiment. It marked the first time an aircraft's range was extended without landing to refuel. The CID would report the results of its tests to the Army Air Core Command recommending the use of its grappling hook method of recovering fuel to facilitate transatlantic aircraft delivery; However, his findings were not met with enthusiasm and his idea was quickly discarded despite his rejection.

The experiment sparked the interest of fellow aviators of the time, inspiring others to make their own, often dangerous, attempts at light flight refueling. Despite efforts, none of these attempts would ultimately produce any practical results in 1923. Veteran World War I pilots Captain LEL Smith and Lieutenant John RoR would devise a method of dealing with the flight duration limits that affect them during combat under the approval of their base commander, Major H.H. Arnold at Rockwell Field in San Diego, California, and employing pre-war engineering experience, the duo created a pair of test tankers by installing two airod dh4b biplanes with 50 foot hoses that could be lowered to a similar receiving aircraft.

Smith and RoR had made their first test flight on April 20 by successfully connecting the tanker hose to the receiving aircraft was in flight and maintained the connection for more than 40 minutes, although fuel was never transferred a few months later, it was They performed numerous test flights on a circular circuit and the team achieved their first flight endurance record on June 27 at 6 hours and 37 minutes. of flight time 2 months later, a flight duration of 37 hours was achieved using nine refuelings and over 686 gallons of fuel transferred mid-air on 25 October. Smith and RoR had conducted their first real-world tests flying nonstop from Sumus Washington to Tiana Mexico.

Using the equipment and techniques they had developed, taking more than 12 hours to complete and refueling over Eugene Oregon and Sacramento California, the flight served as a test of the feasibility of air-to-air refueling for military use at Despite the success of these tests, the dangers of air-to-air refueling would become apparent less than a month later, during an accident at an air show at Kelly Field Texas caused by a refueling host entangled in the propeller of the receiving plane. This event became the first death caused by air refueling. As the 1920s progressed, aviation enthusiasts around the world experimented with the technique in pursuit of new long-distance

aerial

records;

However, for the most part, the aviation community considered in-flight refueling to be a gimmick, the next big milestone in flight. -In-flight refueling would be performed in 1929 by Captain IRA eer and Major Carl Spatz with a flight endurance record of nearly 151 hours covering over 11,000 miles, more than double the previous record. Under the reluctant support of the United States War Department. Army aircrew group led by the two would fly two Douglas C1 aircraft configured as tankers and a three-engine monoplane called the Question Mark as a receiver aircraft. The air tankers were equipped with an additional 150 g gasoline tank and a 40 g oil tank using the refueling technique developed by Smith and RoR.

The tankers carried a 50-foot hose that would be lowered to the receiving aircraft, which in turn was modified with a large fuel funnel leading to its fuse. The Lodge tank on January 1 the question mark took off from Vanis California. and began their attempt at resistance, the main fighters stood on a platform above the question mark to pick up the hose lowered from the tanker and place it in the funnel. During the entire flight, 42 contacts were made with the tankers with almost 5,000 gallons of gasoline and 245 gallons of oil transferred eventually a failure of one of the fuel engines led to the termination of the flight between the test targets and disputes had shown that it was possible to transfer bombers and fighter aircraft abroad by refueling in flight without The report to the War Department remained largely ignored for many years, primarily due to the unreliability of aircraft engines for long-endurance operations, while some commercial interest persisted, particularly for transatlantic flights.

It paid very little attention to aerial refueling in the United States until after World War II. In the early 1930s in England, long-distance aviation pioneer and member of the First World War Royal Flying Corps, Sir Allan Kobam, would carry out his own studies on in-flight refueling with the use of a specially adapted AirSpeed ​​receiver plane and a W10 page type handle. As the tanker aircraft circa 19, 1935 would demonstrate a technique known as grab line, loop hose, air-to-air refueling, in this procedure the receiving aircraft would drag a steel cable which was then grabbed by a shot of line from the tanker, then the line was drawn. the tanker where the receiver's cable was connected to the refueling hose, the receiver would then remove its cable bringing with it the tanker's fuel hose.

Once the hose was connected, the tanker would climb slightly above the receiving aircraft where the fuel would flow under gravity using this technique. cin was able to make a non-stop flight from London to India using onboard refueling to extend flight duration in the late 1930s. The kum refueling company limited or F frl would become the first producer of a commercially viable aerial refueling system. Its loopt design. It began to be used experimentally to refuel various large transatlantic crossing aircraft known as seaplanes following the outbreak of World War II. Commercial testing of the system had ceased and attention was diverted to military applications by the Royal Air Force in the final year of the Second World War.

The fr loop hose refueling system would be fitted to Lancaster and Lincoln bombers in preparation for an offensive against Japan; However, the war had concluded before the system could be used in combat. After World War II, the progression into the Cold War led to the United States Air Force. for the first time prioritizing the development of equipment and techniques for air refueling due to concerns about the ability to conduct long-range operations. In March 1948, the U.S. Air Force Air Materiel Command initiated the Gem program in hopes of developing long-range systems. strategic capabilities through the study of aircraft winterization, air-to-air refueling and advanced electronics within the program.

The Strategic Air Command was tasked with conducting operational suitability testing of all developments. Air to a particular refueling program received top priority within Gem at the time when the only operable and proven refueling mechanism available worldwide was the fr grab line. The circular hose system. This led to initial testing beginning with Air Materiel Command acquiring enough FRL equipment to convert 100 B29s into receivers and 60 B29s into tankers; However, the US Air Force had modified the FR system by adding automatic docking to the refueling nozzle eliminates the need to fly at a lower altitude and depression drives the aircraft for the crew to dock manually. the fuel hose after a year of training and testing with the modified FRL air-to-air refueling system. be used by the B50 Super Fortress lucky lady 2 of the 43rd bomb wi to make the first non-stop flight around the world taking off on 26 February 1949 lucky lady 2 flew non-stop around the world in 94 hours and 1 minute with four refueling aerial from four pairs of B 29 tankers, the flight began and ended at Carwell Air Force Base in Fort Worth, Texas, with refueling occurring near the Azores, Saudi Arabia, the Philippines and Hawaii, while the famous flight turned out to be successful and was relatively uneventful. one of the tanker aircraft was lost in a landing accident, killing the crew of nine, while the round-the-world flight effectively demonstrated unlimited range for aircraft in aerial refueling.

The system was found to be impractical for widespread use, was unwieldy and difficult to use, and had the added disadvantage of using foreign-made components, leading the Air Force to search for a better solution. After experiencing operational limitations during testing with the FRLS Grapeline Loop host system, General Curtis Lame, commander of the US Air Force Strategic Air Command, requested that Boeing develop a refueling system that could transfer fuel at a higher rate than was currently possible. The solution to the problem came in the form of a flying arm refueling concept first conceptualized in 1948 by German scientist Ba Holman while working for the Air Command's material system.

Going from idea to operational testing in less than 2 years, the Flying Boom Aerial Refueling System is based on a telescoping rigid fuel tube that attaches to the rear of a tanker aircraft. The entire mechanism is mounted on a gimbal that allows it to move with the receiving aircraft. The nozzle at the end of the pipe is connected via a flexible ball joint. This nozzle is designed to mate with a corresponding fuel receiving receptacle and within it a poppet valve prevents fuel flow until properly engaged once the nozzle is attached to the receptacle. The locking mechanism is activatedduring fuel transfer.

What makes the flying arm design so effective is its ability to be steered by an operator. This is achieved by a pair of small hydraulically controlled moving air blades which, when combined with the telescoping action of the arm. can be used to fly the nozzle into the receiver receptacle in a typical flying arm aerial refueling scenario. The receiving aircraft meets the tanker aircraft and maintains formation. The receiving aircraft then moves to a position within range behind the tanker under signal lights or radio guidance from the boom. The operator, once in position, extends the arm to make contact with the receiving aircraft, where fuel is then pumped through the arm.

The first flight test of the flying arm system was carried out on 16 September 1948 using a reconfigured B29 and proved to be very effective as it was much more stable and allowed refueling at higher speeds. It was also more resistant to weather interference and lightning. It could also pass up to 500 gallons of fuel per minute, while the FRL system maxed out at around 100 gallons per minute. It worked so well that shortly after the flight of Lucky Lady it was decided that it was no longer necessary to acquire any further frl systems and the flying arm became the strategic gear command standard and receptacles were fitted to all future bombers between 1950 and 1951.

Boeing converted 116 B-29s into KB 29 flying tankers simultaneously Boeing would develop the world's first production tanker, the KC 97 Strat Freer, while the KC 97 was effective, its piston engines required gasoline, while the planes Jet engines operated on a kerosene-based fuel system; in addition, the tanker's slower cruising speed forced some jet-powered aircraft to slow dangerously close to their stall speeds in order to dock with the boom. of the tanker plane in the coming years. These issues would be addressed with Boeing's development of the first high-speed, high-altitude jet-powered flying arm tanker, the KC 135 Strat. tanker aircraft based on the Boeing 367-80 airframe, more than 730 of these aircraft would be built and deployed over the next decade.

The CC 135 revolutionized aerial refueling with its ability to carry up to 30,000 gallons of fuel that could be consumed and offloaded to receiving aircraft. It could refuel at speeds as low as 180 knots and as fast as 350 knots, meeting the needs of all aircraft within the Air Force inventory. It was also flexible, being able to carry up to 880,000 pounds of cargo and up to 250 passengers if necessary since On its first flight on July 15, 1954, the KC 135 has been one of six fixed-wing military aircraft, with more than 50 years continuous service and quickly became the US Air Force's primary refueling system with contemporary versions of its flying arm system capable of passing fuel at up to 1,000 gallons per minute while the United States Air Force United was developing the flying arm system, simultaneously requested that Sir Alan CBUM improve the FR RL grab line circular hose refueling system specifically to suit fighter aircraft use in 1949 he had devised the first aerial refueling system of prob and drogue Prob and drogue refilling employs a flexible hose that trails behind the tanker, a powerr called a basket is connected at its narrow end to a valve which in turn fits to the flexible hose via a coupling. ball joint which in modern variants allows misalignment of up to 22° during aerial refueling.

The droke stabilizes the hose in flight and provides a funnel to guide the insertion of a corresponding refueling probe extending from the receiving aircraft. The probe is usually installed in the nose or Lodge fuse and contains a valve that opens when mated with the forward internal receptacle of the droge allowing fuel flow on most high speed aircraft the fueling probe is designed to retract When not in use to preserve the funnel and protect the receiving aircraft from structural damage caused by large and sudden aerodynamic loads while in contact, the valve end of the probe is designed to break at a specifically designed structural weak point to form a mechanical fuse in the connection when refueling.

The operations are complete, then the hose is fully wound into an assembly known as a hose drum unit. Operational testing of the first problem and drug refueling system began in 1950 under the supervision of World War II fighter Colonel Dave Schilling, due to the specific nature of the fighter. From the design intent of it, Shilling would continue to improve the design and test its use with multiple aircraft simultaneously. This multi-drill configuration offered a clear advantage over the flying boom system. In 1952, the US Air Force decided to give probe and drog refueling a full-scale operational test in combat conditions in Korea, the F84 E of the 116th Fighter-Bomber Wing were equipped with probes and the KB 29 tankers They were equipped with drogs on the tips of their wings and tails using the probe and drog system, a new endurance record for a single-engine fighter would be set. would be established over Korea at 14 hours in 15 minutes in five non-landing combat missions in the 1960s, aerial refueling had become a routine operation and the trouble and drug system had become the most popular option worldwide due to its modular nature.

Hose drum units known as Buddy Pods would be developed, which allowed a variety of aircraft, including other fighters, to function as tankers. Additionally, adapter units were developed that converted the ends of the fuel lines of flying Boomers to droges for compatibility between tanker systems. The progan drug system proved to be so versatile that it was standardized by NATO, the US Navy and Marines, and several Army aircraft. Standardization allowed drug-equipped tanker planes to refuel other nations' probe-equipped planes. The Soviet Union would even reverse engineer and adopt NATO's drug and hos system, making them compatible with NATO tankers for the next 50 years.

AAL refueling would become common in military use and form a key element in mission planning. From a technical point of view, the reliability and effectiveness of these systems had led to very little change since their development in the 1950s. However, in recent years, the emergence of research into unmanned aerial vehicles would lead the in-flight refueling beyond what was thought possible during the early days of aviation. On June 4, 2021, the US Navy conducted its first in-flight refueling between a manned aircraft and an unmanned tanker aircraft using a Boeing. mq 25 Stingray and a Navy F-18 Super Hornet conducted over Mascota Illinois, the 4 and a half hour test flight performed a series of both wet and dry contacts with the UAV totaling 10 minutes of total contact time and transferring about 50 gallons of fuel the mq-25 program represents a larger venture toward a future in which carrier-based fleets are complemented by unmanned systems on the program's current trajectory the navy expects initial operational capabilities to occur around By 2025 with an estimated 1-third of Super Hornet flight hours being dedicated to refueling missions, the paradigm of how refueling is implemented in mission planning may ultimately change dramatically as the Large manned tankers slowly becoming obsolete seems like a simple idea to connect a fuel line between two aircraft to transfer fuel, but like most simple ideas in practice the complexity of the true extent of all the variables involved begin to reveal themselves to be capable.

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