Whilst digging through my database, I stumbled across this photo I took a while back. It’s a photo of a large “blueprint,” Convair drawing SD-54-09001, “VTOL General Arrangment Rotating Pilot Seat.” Shown is a 3-view of a tailsitter jet fighter, similar to the Ryan X-13 although optimised for operational duty. It packs a Vulcan in its belly, which is a nice courtesy detail, and canards. The pilots seat would presumably tilt forward while in vertical orinetation so the pilot isn’t on his back. However, there are no indication of windows on the underside of the cockpit.
At the time the photo was taken, the diagram was far too large for scanning or photocopying.
The cockpit and underslung inlet do in some small way presage the General Dynamics F-16 from 20 years later.
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