Saab 37 Viggen: The Forgotten Fighter Jet

hello there just before we get into today's video why not check out a new channel from me called wara graphics want to know all the details about some of history's most famous battles and wars come join me on war graphics from sherman's march to the sea to operation barbarossa if it's got people fighting each other we'll cover it there is a link below i hope to see you over there and now today's video imagine this 1986 somewhere over the baltic sea after making a 2000 plus mile per hour reconnaissance run over northern europe and around the edges of the soviet union an american sr-71 blackbird the world's fastest known aircraft was speeding homewood on the return legabids mission it goes without saying that the yanks love knowing what everybody else is up to but safe in their supposed vulnerability somewhere along the line someone slipped into casual sloppiness known as the ballistic express the black bird's roots and schedules had become laughably predictable as a result the revolutionary spy planes were particularly vulnerable while in a tiny slice of international airspace between various friendly and not-so-friendly countries one of which had spent much of the previous two decades developing one of the world's most capable and technologically advanced aircraft not unsurprisingly this unnamed country had a state-of-the-art air defense radar system too and it didn't like it when its turf was encroached upon privy to the blackbird's course and speed jets on the ground were scrambled barreling down short runways climbing into the air and hurtling skyward under power from their deafening turbo fan engines they accelerated toward a point well ahead of their intended target at speeds approaching mach 2. each was armed with air-to-air missiles capable of locking on high and fast flying aircraft like blackbirds even from head-on but despite heavy active jamming from the sr-71 at least one of the pilots was able to acquire missile lock then when the adversary was in range he reached for the red trigger on the stick well truth be told missiles probably aren't even fired by red triggers and though it would have made for a dramatic ending and possibly marked the beginning of world war three the pilot never launched any weapons by now you're probably thinking it must have been a mig-25 but well their debuter you'd be wrong in fact the warbird in question was a swedish saab vegan by some accounts the only aircraft to ever officially achieve radar lock on an sr-71 though some russian interceptor pilots might vehemently disagree with that assertion but perhaps most ironically of all in the early going the vegan wasn't even meant to be an interceptor [Music] the saab 37 vegan was a single-seat single-engine multi-role combat aircraft developed between the early 50s and the late 60s with the draken the swedes already had a capable fighter interceptor though their saab 32 lance and attack planes were rapidly becoming obsolete vegans would ultimately replace both featuring distinct double delta wings and large canards jutting from the engine inlets below the cockpit viggens featured tailless designs with no horizontal stabilizers known for a lengthy development period blistering performance high-tech avionics and the wide array of lethal weapons they could carry when the guns entered service in 1971 they were among the most lethal military aircraft in the world in english vegan has at least two different translations loosely the first is thunderbolt referring to the magical hammer wielded by the thunder god thaw the second is simply tufted duck it's probably safe to say that since no scandinavian waterfowl ever stood a chance of intercepting an sr-71 designers had the former translation in mind when they named their new warbird dozens of different concepts featuring single and twin engines as well as traditional and delta wing configurations were considered ultimately however double delta wings and a single engine would deem to be the best combination vtol vertical takeoff and landing capabilities were also considered but testing revealed that this would have required even more development time and the necessary lift engines would have increased weight cost and complexity while severely limiting range from the outset viggens were to be integral parts of sweden's national defense and due to the country's relatively small defense budget that need to be capable of performing a variety of missions part ground attack platform part fighter part interceptor to survive the riggers of aerial combat viggens would need to exceed mach 2 outmaneuver the world's best dog fighters and take off and land on short unfinished airstrips and highways in addition they'd need to be relatively inexpensive serviceable by minimally trained ground crews and have the ability to operate from dispersed air bases in remote areas far away from military installations and supply hubs factor in low stall speeds complex thrust traverses for post-landing deceleration and high thrust to weight ratios to get them airborne in less than 500 meters and it's not surprising that initial estimates pointed to a development period exceeding a decade though these projections proved accurate the program got a boost in 1960 when the soviet union pledged to intervene militarily in the event that sweden was attacked or invaded by the soviet union thanks to this agreement the u.s transferred advanced technology that allowed saab to develop the new airplane more quickly and inexpensively than would have been possible otherwise saab got the formal go-ahead to develop the new aircraft in the early 1960s it was such a massive undertaking but by the middle of the decade the program purportedly accounted for nearly 10 of the country's research and development expenditures both military and civilian during the first few years various teams weighed the pros and cons of each proposed configuration but by 1963 it had become clear that powerful but fuel efficient turbofan engines double delta wings canards and thrust reversers provided the best all-around performance especially when it came to s-toll short takeoff and landing capabilities saab originally intended on using a variant of rolls royce's medway engine but development issues necessitated that a license-built volvo manufactured version of the pratt whitney jt-8d engine be used instead called the rm8 the engine was optimized for high supersonic speeds and fitted with a swedish built afterburner and variable exhaust nozzle rm8s were the first engines to be equipped with both afterburners and thrust reversers the latter of which are more common on large commercial and military aircraft like airliners bombers and transports of the seven prototypes built the first flew in early february of 1967. the flight lasted less than an hour after which saab's chief test pilot eric dalstrom reported that the plane was a joy to fly though they'd briefly considered buying mcdonald douglas f4 phantom 2s instead of developing their own indigenous aircraft saab and the swedish government concluded that based on initial testing viggens would be less expensive and superior to f-4s in many respects the following year saab was awarded a contract to build 175 vegans in the spring of 1969 the first production unit made its public debut at the paris air show nearly 54 feet long and 34 feet 9 inches from wingtip to wingtip vegans had a maximum takeoff weight of about 40 000 pounds which put them squarely between heavier f4 phantoms and lighter mig-21s with approximately sixteen thousand pounds of dry thrust and 28 thousand pounds of thrust when the afterburner was lit the volvo turbo fans were capable of propelling viggens to 59 000 feet into top speeds approaching 1 400 miles per hour using only their 1 300 gallon internal fuel loads they were capable of flying more than a thousand miles and range could be extended significantly by adding a 400 gallon external fuel tank though twin crew configurations were considered as well the vegan central computer heads-up display and ergonomic controls allowed pilots to comfortably handle all mission tasks in addition to flying the plane the elimination of a second crew member made viggens lighter less complex and less expensive to build and operate but unlike other aircraft of the era cockpits also included old-school mechanical gauges and cathode ray tube displays because in addition to being cheaper and more reliable most experienced pilots were already familiar with them vegans were also equipped with a host of electronic countermeasures including radar receiver warning systems before and afters as well as jamming and chaff or flare pods that could be carried depending on the mission parameters a total aircraft weight nearly 1 300 pounds was electronics and counter measures equipment early biggins were equipped with saab made ejection seats that were optimized for low altitude high speed emergencies though manually initiated the subsequent ejection sequence including canopy discharge seat firing and parachute deployment was all automatic because vegans needed massive turbo fan engines to meet performance requirements their airframes were surprisingly bulky double delta wings those in which the outer portion of the leading edges swept more of an angle than the inner portion were chosen over traditional delta wings because they provided greater lift and better performance at various speeds and altitudes the large canards that took the place of the horizontal stabilizers were positioned behind the inlet openings and sat slightly higher than the main wings and they were used during takeoffs and landings to provide lift and drag respectively to minimize weight and increase strength sarb made extensive use of aluminium honeycomb structures in biggen airframes and much of the rear fuselage was built with titanium that acted as a giant shield which protected pilots and sensitive components from the immense heat generated by the engine to handle the punishment associated with operating from unfinished airstrips viggens had tall heavy-duty landing gears that lessened the likelihood of debris being sucked into the engines and allowing them to take off carrying anti-ship missiles or external fuel tanks slung onto their fuselages though tall vertical stabilizers can be folded downward to facilitate storage and small hardened hangers which were employed to limit damage from preemptive aircraft artillery and cruise missile strikes weapons loads up to 15 500 pounds could be carried on nine hardpoints located under the fuselage wings the center line hardpoint was typically used for an external fuel tank but it could also accommodate an anti-ship missile when additional fuel wasn't needed ground crews log munitions data into the big and central computer after which it automatically made calculations and adjustments pertaining to fuel consumption tracking fire control and avionics available weapons included various types of explosive and armor-piercing rockets smart and dumb bombs air-to-air air-to-ground nature ship missiles and 30 millimeter cannon pods each of which held 150 rounds of ammunition both nuclear and chemical weapons were also considered on later variants though in the end sweden produced neither the first production viggen was delivered to the swedish air force in the summer of 1971. before flying solo ever pilots had to accumulate at least 450 ply towers in saab 105s lansons and two-seat trainers with production ramping up by late 1973 a number of units had attained full operational status and the following year despite normal teething issues and the aircraft's complexity viggens across the country were operating safely and efficiently that said one commonly encountered and potentially fatal safety issue was that viggens were notoriously susceptible to ingesting birds into their engine inlets largely because they typically operated in remote and forested areas to ensure that no human lives or multi-million dollar warbirds were lost the swedish air force began keeping an eye on seasonal migration patterns and forwarding vital ornithological information to ground crews in the hinterlands for nearly a decade viggens were the backbone of the country's extensive air defense network compared to aircraft operated by other western powers they had lower operating costs quicker refueling repair and rearming times and were capable of operating to and from unfinished airfields by the mid-1980s biggins were routinely intercepting sr-71 some of which were returning to raf mildenhall in the united kingdom during the 60s and 70s wiggins also entered into the united states air force's ground-fired competition the aim of which was to find a suitable replacement for its aging and accident-prone f-104 starfighters in early 975 however the aircraft that would eventually go on to become the f-16 was declared the winner and as they say the rest is history [Music] though sweden originally intended to produce nearly 800 vegan variants less than 350 were actually ever produced thanks to inflation and the introduction of saab's jas gripen in the late 1980s by late 2005 nearly all remaining vegans had been officially retired a few were kept operational as electronic warfare trainers though these were phased out in mid-2007 all told vegans highlighted sweden's ability to develop and produce a remarkable aircraft on a relatively small budget compared to those of america britain and the soviet union in fact many nato aligned air forces wouldn't have equally capable and advanced multi-role aircraft until panavia tornadoes were introduced in the late 70s had the two countries gone to war vegans probably would have inflicted serious damage and losses on soviet ships tanks troops and aircraft however it was common knowledge that they'd sustain heavy casualties in the process and unfortunately for the swedes the soviets would have been in a much better position to absorb the losses with a clear winner on its hands saab sales executives engaged in various worldwide marketing campaigns targeting both european nations and developing nations in asia africa and south america however despite its efforts india was the only country to show any real interest in acquiring viggens sadly the cell was blocked by the united states at least officially because under the proposed agreement volvo rm8 engine variants would have been produced under license in india and if you're wondering how that works if you recall rm8 engines themselves were license-produced variants of american pratt and whitney engines though it's anybody's guess why the american government blocked the sale it probably had something to do with the fact that if india bought the swedish vegans it'd be one less potential customer in the market for one of their expensive american ones despite producing a true world beater saab never sold a single viggen overseas though now dozens are living out their final days in museums in france poland estonia and of course sweden [Music]

Channel: Sideprojects

Views: 259,231

Keywords: megaprojects, construction, engineering, projects

Id: gvW2wEVs-rI

Length: 14min 28sec (868 seconds)

Published: Thu May 12 2022