After reading a post for everyones opinion on the best looking aircraft, I’m interested to see what you all think is the three ugliest aircraft ever. Here (in no particular order) is what I think are some of the worst. The Fairy Barracuda was a bit of a bad one for a company the produced some great looking aircraft. The Feissler Storch was just plain ordinary looking. And I’m not to fond of the Grumman J2F Duck.
So, cast your votes for the award that no-one wants, The ugliest plane ever. I’m sure you can come up with some worse ones than those above.
Number 1 would have to go to the Soviet Ekranoplan series.
Number 2 I would say the Boeing XF 32 (what were they thinking??)
Number 3 Boulton-Paul Defiant
dgarrington, I can’t believe you wrote that! The KM is a beauty…! (well, to me anyway!)
Speaking of Soviet aircraft, I don’t like the looks of the MiG-29… And the Sukhoi T-4 had a front fuselage that looked like a locomotive…
From the US, the XF-32 is way ahead in terms of ugliness, but the F-22 is not really that far behind…
From the UK, I don’t care much for the looks of the Blenheim, nor of the Hampden but that’s nothing compared to some of their inter-war biplanes…
The French created some winners too: the Amiot 143, and the Les Mureaux 117 comes to my mind but still have some charm compared to others of the same time-frame…
Well, in any list of this type, you couldn’t leave out the little Goblin parasite fighter. It even looked like some kind of blood sucking tick. And the B-36 it was attached to was no beauty itself. Together, that would have to qualify as “double ugly.”
Tom
How in the world did the F-4 Phantom and the A-10 Warthog make it onto this list? Did some car modelers sneak onto this site? [:(!] Just put me out of my suffering [xx(] and include my other favorite BEAUTY the Ju-87 Stuka!
Dunno about that Stuka – I agree with the FSM writer who said the Stuka’s ugliness was perfectly in keeping with the uglyness of its Nazi patrons and their hideously ugly philosophy.
As for the Phantom, you are dead on right. It’s a beauty, and I waxed lyrical (um, rather poorly, I might add) about it on why it’s beautiful on the other thread.
Tom
dan cooper has it right with “wrong looking” - its gotta be the lightning, but id say the ugliest bird ever made would be the new UAVs and the JSF-32. they both look like cardboard. and with the saw-tooth edges it looks the the guy couldnet even cut the templates out properly. oh well
I also agree with DanCooper on the English Electric Lighting. It amazes me that it even flew. I also second the motion on the X-32 that Boeing put up against Lockheed’s X-35. Talk about UGLY. I’m glad that Lockheed won.
Who put the B-36 on this list? Where is he? I resent that. The B-36 is one of the greatest airplanes out there!
Then again, I kind of live by the creed, “ugly” is beautiful, so this is a little hard. If I had to pick, though, these are my choices-
I agree with the Italian WWII fighters. They look ugly with radial and in-line engines.
Second, I have to say any stealth bomber (or large aircraft) nowadays. B-1, B-2, etc. The lines are, well… generic. Uninteresing. Not dictated by function anymore, but it seems like some government program to cut costs or whatnot. I know that’s not right, but my point is I don’t like them.
And three… have to go with… I don’t know. Skips my mind at the moment.
(And for the record- I think the Goblin looks cute. It’s a nice little airplane. The whole “blood sucking tick” is just taking the parasite fighter concept to a new low.)
