English electric Lightning WHM 1:48

[Mike1158]

Bloomin' marvelous.

[hyair]

What is special about this trio - well they all started the service around 1960 , they are mach 2.0 fighters and were design and built
in Western Europe by British Airways , Dassault and Saab Aviation.
Some images of the trio.

Yair

[CMDRTED]

excellent saab drakken, and great job on the lightning.

[Vinalssergio155]

Magnificent work Yair! As for the design of these aircraft, my taste is Mirage, Draken and Lightning, in that order.

[hyair]

Dear Sergio - you are right in your choise but I will present some more facts regarding the trio :
Production- Mirage III - 1500 Draken -600 Lightning - 350
Mirage was exported to Israel Swiss Australia Libia Lebanon Pakistan Belgum Egypt....
Draken was exported to Finland Austria and royal Danish Airforce.
Air to Air victories - Mirage 394 in IAF alone. Draken and Lightning none.
The Mirage is the most beautiful of the trio at least to my eyes.
So a clear win for the Mirage III.

Yair

[hyair]

The Lightning and the Mirage started to enter service around 1960-61. The Lightning was design to protect GB from Russian bombers and was very good at that with the best climb rate of 50 k feet per minute and could become supersonic in a climb !!!
The drawback was fuel capacity which was very small and a very short range !!! therfore a belly tank was added with capacity that was gruing between each version until a capacity of 2700 liter in the F6 - the last version. It was not cleared for any air to ground mission until the F-53 version that was supplied to Saudi Arabia from 1969 and on.
The Mirage is a very diffrent plane. It was not only interceptor but was cleared to carry two 500 kg bombs under belly and had a much better operational range.
Another issue was complexcity- the Lighning required heavy maintainance and the Mirage was much simpler in that regard.
The Mirage had 394 kills of Arab planes mostly Mig -21's in the period between 1964 -1973 !!!
So the Mirage is the much better plane among the two.

Yair

[hyair]

Both types entered service around 1960 but there are many differences between. The Lightning is heavier and has two engines and therefore a much more complex aircraft to maintain
. Also the Lighning production was a small one with only 350 built while the Mig almost 11000!
The Lighning had a small advantage in rate of climb ability
50 k feet per min but the Mig 21 BIS did 40 - so it was close.
Both Fighters suffered from short range and both found sinillar ways to handle this issue - the Lightning had a belly big blister under body and the Mig carried more fuel in enlarged dorsal spine - however the Lightning suffered more from the range problen and air refueling prob was added under the starboard wing.
As both types never had a clash it is very hard to determine who will have the upper hand but both are
very fast and capable fighters !!!

Yair

[hyair]

The Crusader went to service in early 1957 some 3 years before the Lightning .
In terms of pure performance the Lightning is faster with mach 2.05 vs mach 1.86 and rate of climb of 50k feet per min vs 25k feet per min. However the Crusader had a much longer range and could carry bombs if needed.
The Lightning was a much more heavier and complex plane and required a lot of hours of maintenance per 1 our of flight while the Crusader needed less.
More than 1250 Crusaders were built vs only 350 Lightnings.
Both were phased out in 1987-1988 time guideline.
The CRUSADER killed 16 Mig 17 plus 3 Mig 21 and had the best kill ratio in VIETNAM OF 1:6 against Migs and was dubbed "Mig Master" while the Lightning had none.
In practical terms despite the brilliant Lightning performance the Crusader is the better plane of the two.

Yair

[hyair]

The Lightning is from IAF magazine based on WHM model 1:48 scale. The Crusader is from hobby model reduced to 1:48 so put the two side by side is realistic in terms of size comparition.

Yair

[hyair]

The two entered service in 1960 as a top performance fighters capable of doing mach 2.0 . Each design had it's special wing - the Draken had the double delta and the lightning had the big 60 degrees swept wing. Both were designed to protect the sky of Sweden and GB from Russian bombers intrusions and were designed to have the best climb rate and speed available at the time.
The Lightning had a pair of Firestrike air to air missiles plus 2 x30 mm guns.
The Draken had a mix of sidewinders and falcon missiles plus 1 30 mm gun.
Both were mach 2.0 capable and the Lightning was slightly faster in climb but by a small margin. Both used Avon engines but the Draken only one.
Again the Draken was the less complex plane here and required less maintenance for each our of flight. Some 600 Draken were built vs only 350 Lightnings. The Draken lasted more in service up to late 90's some 10 years more. The Draken had a much better range then the Lightning and as with other fighter comparisons here the Lightning loses due to it's limited range and only air to air capability .

Yair