TangoGolf has released a brilliant freeware recreation of the Bristol Type 188 “Flaming Pencil.” Available at Flightsim.to.
The Bristol 188 was an experimental aircraft that flew from 1960-1964. It was a stainless steel plane designed to test the effects of heating at high speeds, but it wasn’t fully successful because it didn’t carry enough fuel to maintain those speeds for long.
This looks brilliant! I haven’t had a chance to fly it yet, but full credit for doing something very different and doing it so well. This gives me lots of hope for other aircraft that would never make it commercially. Really well done
P.s. I love the speed indicator straight out of the EE lightning
Long before the blackbird. It was at a time when the RAE (Royal Aircraft Establishment) conducted lots of research using aircraft such as the Fairy Delta 2 and later BAC221, Short SC1 and numerous others from Thurleigh in Bedfordshire and Farnborough.
Thanks for the awesome plane! Love this period of aviation history, such cool test planes, century series fighters, just crazy British designs… Never thought I’d see the 188 in the sim, and it’s certainly exciting to fly! Beautiful modeling.
It was a time of experimentation with a fairly new technology, nuclear weapons and the uncertainty of what warfare in the Cold War could actually be like if it turned hot. From what I gather about the Bristol 188 and the Fairy Delta 2, they were only ever meant to be an experimental planes to explore flight at speeds beyond Mach 1 (or beyond Mach 2 in case of the Bristol). Both aircraft delivered valuable insights which were later incorporated into the Concorde.
The US also built dozens of specialised prototypes for various applications, experiments and roles that never went beyond that stage. In the end it turned out that regular fighter jets could take on many of the roles that those projects had been destined for.
Although the difference between the US and UK approach is that the UK government essentially cancelled an entire generation of military aircraft development after cancelling these experimental prototypes and the US actually built up on this experience to develop quite a number of projects.
The Fairey Delta 2 is actually quite a good example as when the British government lost interest in it the French invited Fairey to further test and develop it in France and work with Dassault. Dassault ended up making their own Delta winged prototype which bore quite a striking resemblance to the Fairey plane. This prototype ended up becoming the Mirage III which was one of the most successful cold war jets outside of the US and USSR.
“If it were not for the clumsy way in which you tackle things in Britain, you could have made the Mirage yourself.”
Marcel Dassault
Anyway, time to finally fly the Bristol from Bristol! Well from Filton but it’s a lot closer than the actual Bristol airport, although Bristol Airport has the advantage of still being open. Kinda weird how Filton is still open in the sim despite being closed IRL for over a decade now. Asobo closed down some airfields in the UK update that had shut down but left Filton as is. Not complaining though, it was a scandal they let Filton be sold off and developed for housing
It seems to no longer be available on flightsim.to, and now there’s a version selling on SimMarket for 7 euros? I had it downloaded before but then had to delete it to save room, and now that I have a second SSD I wanted to download it again and can’t.
Personally I think it is well worth buying, and if it does well, maybe the author will be encouraged to develop other unusual and interesting aircraft.
) Will be giving this a go tomorrow for sure.
