Pinned Post: Elf The Asymmetrical
A sentient fully-functional model plane replica of a Blohm & Voss BV 141 'Vogel Unsymmetrich'.
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The BV 141
Before the war - Shunned by the Luftwaffe
The BV 141 had the manoeuvrability of a plane half its size.
It was built like bomber, really really big, the size of a bus.
Its purpose was reconnaissance with future plans as a bomber.
On seeing it flying around, they asked the pilot to perform the kind of sudden sharp turns, that a much smaller plane would be capable of.
Needless to say, they broke the damn control stick off.
The designer was then told it would never be a good fighter plane, and for that reason they decided to use it as target practice.
Shake My Head. It's not built to be a fighter plane.
The fact it manoeuvres like one at the size it is, is a damn miracle.
During the war - Sabotage by Focke-Wolfe
They gave the reconnaissance job to a much less manoeuvrable aircraft, because when they saw it flying around, they didn't confuse it for a fighter plane, BECAUSE IT WAS LESS MANOEUVERABLE!
The BV 141 did however take part in a couple of air battles, despite most public sources today claiming it never did.
It outperformed the enemy fighter planes, leading to a victory in all cases where it was used.
Despite this, it was pulled and funding was instead spent on the triebflugel.
This turned out to be a costly mistake, as the triebflugal project was an absolute disaster, not producing a single working prototype, after literal years of development.
The designer of the triebflugal themselves even admitted, that they created the outlandish design just to get funding, and they knew from the start that it would never actually work.
Immediately after the war - betrayal by America
After the war, the Americans gave a lot of the aircraft designers sanctuary.
However the designer of the BV 141 was rejected this offer, because according to the other aircraft designers, the plane would never be even able to leave the ground, they already knew the plane had performed well in test flights.
The Americans looked at the designs and couldn't understand it, so they called it a "flightless bird" and instead funded the triebflugal.
The American triebflugal project was met with disaster as well, and after a few dozen deaths they eventually scrapped it, in favour of a different VTOL design from a different designer.
Since the BV 141's designer had emigrated to the USA, but was not given the pardon by the authorities, he was classified as an illegal immigrant, despite the fact that the very people accusing him of the crime, were the same people that imported him to the USA to begin with.
Due to his criminal status, he couldn't leave without being arrested, so he just lived in hiding until dying of old age, his papers on the scientific discovery that enabled the BV 141's flight, were found after his death and stored in a museum warehouse.
This is not the same as the literal plane's blueprints, which Lockhead Martin kept for a while before making them public.
The arrest of an enthusiast on live television
In the 70's, a full-scale replica was built by an enthusiast, as part of a British documentary on 1940's aircraft.
Part of it involved a live segment showing the plane in flight.
After the broadcast, the enthusiast was arrested without charge and spent the next few decades in prison with no explanation why.
But since then there have been televised demonstrations of models, and public broadcasts of air shows involving the plane in question, even while the enthusiast from before was still in prison.
It's possible he was arrested for some other reason, but no explanation has ever been given, even after his eventual release from prison.
The years that follow - The mystery of a lost science
Replicas of the BV 141 have been made in miniature and full scale, and they fly exactly like the ones from WW2.
However, any attempt to change the design, for some reason makes the plane fly considerably worse.
Nobody's sure why this is and for decades scientists have been trying to figure it out.
Simulations involving the BV 141 aren't accurate, since they're built on our current understanding of physics, and for that reason we can't use AI to figure it out.
Only whatever formulas the plane designer used are accurate to how it responds in real life.
Without knowing what those formulas are, we would need to build literally millions of miniatures each with a different combination of alterations and then test each in real life to find the golden ratio.
All we know is the name the designer gave it "The encapsulated vortex effect".
Many have assumed what it means, but have all been proven wrong in practice.
It stands as a scientific discovery lost to time, via the ignorance of trend-following sceptics.
G-force suppression - A case for asymmetry
The design of the BV 141 appears to break the rules of G-force, at least considering the strain on the pilot.
In reality it's more like an optical illusion.
pulling up with a clockwise roll, pushing down with an anti-clockwise roll, rolling clockwise with elevation, and rolling anticlockwise with declination, all place the driver's cabin as the pivot point, changing the G-forces from being translations to rotations.
this severely reduces the G-forces on the pilot when taking manoeuvres, while moving vital functions of the plane, such as the engine and tail, rapidly out of the way.
it does put the crew at more risk, but it's better to sacrifice a crew member than the whole plane, especially since at the altitude the plane was commonly used, losing the plane would have meant death for all occupants.
