Customer Reviews

Concept Aircraft: Prototypes, X-Planes, and Experimental Aircraft (Aviation Factfile)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The book just scratches the historical surface on a too-wide variety of experimental aircraft, leaving the reader wishing for more detail on fewer planes. Many of the illustrations are quite nice, and there is a fine sprinlking of fascinating factoids. The arrangement is alphabetical rather than chronological (why?), and the writing is marred by numerous typos and puzzling graphical performance comparisons. Still, it makes an interesting few evening's reading, and it looks great on the coffee table! It's just too cheap not to have one.

Remember when you were a kid and every plane seemed out of this world? This book presents a variety of the most interesting experimental planes. Sure, none of these got very far off the drawing board, but using your imagination they can all soar again. There are a lot of great pictures and illustrations and I like the quaint comparative graphics. The enthusiast will of course find more detailed volumes on many of the aircraft profiled, but for for a general tour the "out there" ones this volume can't be beat.

I'm a aerospace engineer with 30 years in the biz. I'm pretty familiar with a lot of unusual craft, and this book (sometimes very briefly) lists some I've never seen mentioned in decades. With good photos and illos.