Convair XFY-1 Pogo

Amazingly, Aerofly took an experimental aircraft (that was scrapped) and made it for the Aerofly Pro Deluxe RC simulator, so we could find out how hard the plane was to fly in real life!
That's commendable.

The plane program was scrapped because no one could land it reliably.

On April 29, 1954, James F. "Skeets" Coleman, a Lieutenant Colonel in the Marine Reserve and a Convair engineering test pilot, made the first tethered flight in the Pogo.

Mr. Coleman was one of the few real pilots.

Some irate viewer scolded and insulted me by saying there was another pilot, Chuck Meyers, and told me I was out of line with my video, cause I left his name out!!

I meant not to dis-credit anybody, but merely point out Coleman's technique for landing this plane for the video.

My info came from the following website.
It is the Smithsonian Institute's Museum's Website!
http://www.nasm.si.edu/research/aero/aircraft/convair_pogo.htm

This is a credible site, and they also have a Pogo there.

Another is in San Diego Aerospace Museum, which I have many pictures of.

I never saw Meyer's name on the site, so how would I know who else flew it?

Why would I even care because the names of other pilots mean nothing for this video anyway.

Here is how Lt. Col.Coleman he did it.

He approached the field low with the engine set at flight-idle.

At mid-field, he popped the control stick back into his stomach and pitched the airplane's nose straight up. The speed fell sharply but just as he reached the peak of his climb,

The pilots applied power and stopped the Pogo in mid-air.

With practice, they could stop the climb in a hover, reduce power and "back" down to a nice landing, but sustained hover was marginal.

Nose heavy, Counter-Rotating propellers (with NO CYCLIC pitch), and a "slow to respond" Turbo Jet engine, made landings too difficult for pilots, so the project was scrapped by the Navy.

Many new technological advances were made while proving flight to hover, but
the machine was simply too difficult.

Today, we have MODEL airplanes that can hover easily.

Of course they don't land on their rudders, but the motors respond instantly and the CG is moved way aft for 3 dimensional stunt flying.

This is the most difficult airplane I have ever tried to land.

I would enjoy seeing some of your videos of Aerofly's XFY-1 flying too.

The point of the video is to show that no matter how unusual the airplanes, Aerofly (Ikarus Germany, USA) has them and must be commended for the time it took to accurately present these kinds of unusual machines.

Thanks for watching.

Category:

Autos & Vehicles

Tags:

• Pogo
• Convair
• XFY-1
• Pogos
• hover
• Navy
• crash
• airplane
• jet
• Dave
• Herbert
• NightFlyyer
• Horizon
• hobbies
• rc

[pencon61]

Finally someone puts on some decent background tunes!

[NightFlyyer]

Haha. Thanks very kindly.

[thecrikster]

man that looks absolutely terrifying to fly. once you start losing altitude you have to accelerate to regain it! nice choice of music by the way! :D

[NightFlyyer]

Thanks. It sure was.

[dontask2015]

its almost like your VTOL storm launche that you made.

[NightFlyyer]

Haha. Yep and just as hard to fly. LOL

[magicmike1122]

Did they ever land one successfully?

[imjustpassinthru]

Now you tell me it's just a model! I thought I was looking at the real thing I saw in the news when I was a kid.

[180literkanon]

Awesome.....

[Greenhornet270]

Rare airplane GREAT post!!!!

[newnerfguns]

the pogo was not destroyed i know that for sure

[ElectronTeacher]

Hi Dave:

Wow that Pogo was really a hand full & hard to fly!! Well, hopefully the foamey GreatPlanes VFO will be a tamer and more enjoyable plane to fly!

(Tower says delivery is mid-January, so I've ordered two of them, and if you don't mind, one will be dog-sleded to you at your test grounds in Artic Sibley) ET

[whizbang47]

Was it this one or the other tailsitter that they wanted to fly from the decks of escort vessels? Imagine trying to land in a typhoon! Of course one of them was built to fit inside a nuke survivable teepee also, so as to engage 2nd strike bombers after all the civilians are dead. I'm glad I was only a little kid in that era.

[cajunhornet60]

Great Post you are one hell of a pilot!!

[0TOM007]

They've also got this in Realflight, and your right, its so hard to fly and nose heavy!

its easy to torque roll thoug?:P but anyway good vid!