# Aesthetically pleasing aircraft that flew poorly and vice versa **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 18, 2018, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aesthetically-pleasing-aircraft-that-flew-poorly-and-vice-versa/810777 "2018-03-18T15:15:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2018, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aesthetically-pleasing-aircraft-that-flew-poorly-and-vice-versa/810777/81 "2018-03-23T23:21:26Z")
> [@Jacquernagy](#): > > There’s something about WWII air combat that just blows my mind…it’s like, planes had barely existed for a few decades, and suddenly the whole country re-aligned its economy and industry and military towards cranking out giant numbers of these machines and training guys to fly them,… There was a lot of development between the World Wars that went into air racing. Read up on the [Schneider Trophy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schneider_Trophy) races someday. There was a lot of national pride involved, and the planes that competed were the fastest machines of their era. It was won for the last time in 1931 by a Supermarine S.6B at a speed of 340 mph. The designer of that plane went on to create the Supermarine Spitfire that became famous during the Battle of Britain. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2018, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aesthetically-pleasing-aircraft-that-flew-poorly-and-vice-versa/810777/82 "2018-03-23T23:59:29Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > There was a lot of development between the World Wars that went into air racing. Read up on the [Schneider Trophy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schneider_Trophy) races someday. There was a lot of national pride involved, and the planes that competed were the fastest machines of their era. It was won for the last time in 1931 by a Supermarine S.6B at a speed of 340 mph. The designer of that plane went on to create the Supermarine Spitfire that became famous during the Battle of Britain. Be sure to watch [_The First Of The Few_](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0034734/) (US title: _Spitfire_). Good bit about the Schneider Trophy races there. Unfortunately, I have not found a copy with good audio. And the video is pretty poor to anyone who didn’t grow up with TVs that had rotary tuners. But it’s still a must-see. ---
**Author:** ![MikeF](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@MikeF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MikeF)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2018, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aesthetically-pleasing-aircraft-that-flew-poorly-and-vice-versa/810777/83 "2018-03-24T15:22:19Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > Somewhere online I once read the account of one of the pilots who flew it. He said something like “For an hour I flew it and for an hour it tried to kill me”. For a slightly different take: The R-1 won the 1932 Thompson Trophy race, piloted by Jimmy Doolittle. He also set a new world landplane speed record of 476 km/h (296 mph) in the Shell Speed Dash. The distinction of a landplane record was noteworthy because, at that time, specialized speed seaplanes outran landplanes, e.g. the Macchi M.C.72 with over 700 km/h. The Springfield Union of September 6, 1932 quoted Doolittle as saying, **"She is the sweetest ship I’ve ever flown. She is perfect in every respect** and the motor is just as good as it was a week ago. It never missed a beat and has lots of stuff in it yet. I think this proves that the Granville brothers up in Springfield build the very best speed ships in America today." Bolding mine. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2018, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aesthetically-pleasing-aircraft-that-flew-poorly-and-vice-versa/810777/84 "2018-03-24T22:06:32Z")
> [@MikeF](#): > > The distinction of a landplane record was noteworthy because, at that time, specialized speed seaplanes outran landplanes, e.g. the Macchi M.C.72 with over 700 km/h. I always thought it was odd that the fastest planes back then were seaplanes. The floats and struts have a drag penalty compared to wheeled gear. Then I read the explanation somewhere. Those racing seaplanes had small wings, and high wing loading; low drag, but you have to be going very fast just to take off. Add a fixed-pitch propeller optimized for high speed and it took them miles to get up to takeoff speed. I guess there weren’t any runways long enough to build a comparable land plane, so the speed records belonged to seaplanes. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aesthetically-pleasing-aircraft-that-flew-poorly-and-vice-versa/810777.md?page=4)