# Hawker Hurricane Mk. IIB vs. Grumman F4F-4 Wildcat



## DAVIDICUS (Jun 14, 2005)

I don't know how accurate the data is that I have presented for each aircraft. (Consider the source and whatever knowledge you can bring to bear)

So how would these two allies fare in a head to head dogfight?








From: http://www.warbirdalley.com/hurry.htm

Engine: 1,280hp Rolls-Royce Merlin XX 12-cylinder V piston engine
Weight: Empty 5,500 lbs., Max Takeoff 7,300 lbs.
Wing Span: 40ft. 0in.
Length: 32ft. 2.5in.
Height: 13ft. 1in.
Performance:
Maximum Speed at 22,000 ft: 342 mph
Cruising Speed at 20,000 ft: 296 mph
Ceiling: 36,500 ft
Range: 480 miles
Armament:
Twelve 7.7mm (0.303in.) wing-mounted machine guns
Two 250 or 500-lb bombs

For further details see: http://www3.mistral.co.uk/k5083/TECHDATA.HTM

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From: http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/ac-usn22/f-types/f4f.htm

# Dimensions: Wing Span, 38 feet; Length, 28 feet 9 inches; Wing Area, 260 square feet.
# Weights: Empty, 5785 pounds; Gross, 7975 pounds 
# Powerplant: One 1,200 horsepower Pratt Whitney R-1830-86 double-row radial engine.
# Armament: Six .50 caliber Browning machine guns; Two 100-pound bombs.
# Performance: Maximum Speed, 320 m.p.h. (@ 19,800 feet weight of 7975 pounds).


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## plan_D (Jun 15, 2005)

The Hurricane Mk.IIB was a better performer in a dogfight but the armament leaves a lot to be desired when facing off against Grumman brick houses.


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## evangilder (Jun 15, 2005)

It would be very close, I think. They were both pretty rugged. The armament does give the edge to the Wildcat, but I am not sure with manueverability. There were stories of Wildcats shot full of holes still making it home. I don't know if that is the case with the Hurricane, but it wouldn't surprise me.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jun 15, 2005)

Close one, I's go withthe Wildcat because of the Radial engine


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## DAVIDICUS (Jun 15, 2005)

I know that the Wildcat was outclassed in manueverability by the Zero but suspect that the Hurricane would have been outclassed in manueverability as well. I don't think the Wildcat was an unmanueverable plane per se, it's just that having the Zero as your opponent does everything to develop and nothing to combat that impression.

The Wildcat, I have read, did have a superior dive rate and roll rate against the Zero.

Does anyone have climb data on both these aircraft?

*Perhaps to further even the contest, we could compare the Hurricane IIB to the fixed wing F4F-3 model which had four .50 cal's and was a little lighter, faster and more manueverable.

Perhaps we could substitute the IIC for the IIB which would afford the Hurricane four 20mm cannons. The FM-2 Wildcat is a consideration as well with its better performance vis a vis the F4F series.*.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jun 15, 2005)

Good Point!


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## R Leonard (Jun 15, 2005)

Chronologically, an F4F-3 s a fairer comparison to a Hurricane IIB, rather than the F4F-4.

Answer to the F4F v A6M2 question is tactics, tactics, tactics.

Rich


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## DAVIDICUS (Jun 15, 2005)

Ok, based on that representation, why don't we go with the F4F-3 and Hurricane Mk. IIB.

The only difference I think is that the F4F-3 had four .50 cal.'s and was a little lighter, faster and a manueverable than the F4F-4.

From: http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/ac-usn22/f-types/f4f.htm

"_The heavier F4F-4 was not as nimble nor as fast as the F4F-3 ..._"

From: http://www.microworks.net/pacific/aviation/f4f_wildcat.htm

Grumman F4F-3 Wildcat
Length: 8.77 meters / 28.8 ft. 
Wingspan: 11.58 meters / 38 ft. 
Crew: 1 
Weight Empty: 2423 Kilograms / 5342 lbs. 
Weight Loaded: 3176 Kilograms / 7002 lbs. 
Weight Maximum: ? 
Armament: 4 x 12.7mm / 50-caliber machine-guns, two in each wing, two 45 Kilograms /100 lbs. bombs 
Top Speed: 532 km/h / 331 mph 
Range: 1383 km / 860 miles 
Ceiling: 8839 meters / 29.000 feet 
Climb Rate: 701 meters per minute / 2300 feet per minute


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## the lancaster kicks ass (Jun 15, 2005)

well if you're gonna perposefully pick a better version of the wildcat surely we can go for a hurry Mk.IIC??


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## DAVIDICUS (Jun 15, 2005)

Actually I first picked the F4F-4 Wildcat which had poorer performance than the F4F-3 Wildcat. I only said why don't we go with the F4F-3 because of R Leonard's statement that the F4F-3 vs. Mk.IIB would be a fairer comparison as they were contemporaries which I thought made some sense. 

If I wanted to pick a superior Wildcat, I would have just gone straight for the FM-2.

At any rate, what do you think of a match up between a Mk. IIC and whatever Wildcat you wish to pick?


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## FLYBOYJ (Jun 15, 2005)

the -3 of course!


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## Glider (Jun 15, 2005)

This is really close. If its the Hurrie 2B against a Wildcat F4F3 I would go with the Wildcat because the 303 lacked penetration and the Wildcat was rugged. In performance there is little between the two.

If its the Hurrie 2C vs FM2, frankly I really don't know.

After having chewed this one over for some time I would go for the Wildcat FM2 over the Hurrie 2C
The reason is a little odd but the logic is as follows. 
The FM2 was an improved aircraft with a number of changes over and above the change in weapons. Overall its performance was improved.
The Hurrie 2C was a 2B with heavier guns and a small decrease in performance.

That said this is one that goes dwon to the pilot behind the controls.


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## R Leonard (Jun 15, 2005)

F4F-3 was straight wing, F4F-4 had folding wings

Most importantly, because the -4 had both folding wings AND three guns per wing it carried only 240 rounds per gun. The -3, with only two guns per wing carried 450 rounds per gun

F4F drivers at the time were as critical of this change as those brought about by increases in weight without increases in power. BuAir tried to sell the gun change as an ability to put more rounds into a target per burst, but the pilots recognized that first you had to hit the target.

Lieut Comdr JS Thach, CO VF-3, from transcript of a BuAir interview, 28 August 1942, after return from Pacific duty including the Battle of Midway and earlier actions:

“Air battles are won by hitting enemy planes with bullets. “

“The pilot who will miss with four .50 caliber guns won’t be able to hit with eight. Increased firepower is not a substitute for marksmanship.”

“In a fighter I would like to have 500 rounds per gun, but would be satisfied with 400.”

“We would rather have six guns, but there is no use carrying around six or eight guns if you can’t bring those guns to bear on the enemy.”

Lieut NAM Gayler, VF-3, VF-2, from transcript of a BuAir interview, 17 June 1942, after return from Pacific duty including the Battle of the Coral Sea and earlier actions:

“If you hit with four guns it’ll bring down whatever you’re hitting. I don’t say that I don’t think six guns are desirable, if you don’t have to cut down too much on your ammunition.”

“I should say that, in general, the four .50 calibers are a swell armament for a fighter plane. Personally I wouldn’t trade them for anything I’ve seen so far or heard of. They bring down anything they shoot; they’re rugged and apparently fool–proof and comparatively few stoppages and very little maintenance trouble or anything else to do with them. They’re very effective.”

“As far as I personally am concerned, I think the four caliber .50’s is excellent armament and that a couple of more would be nice if you can carry the ammunition. If you can’t, I think the four .50’s is adequate.” 

Having flown both in combat, my resident F4F pilot preferred the -3 to the -4.

Rich

Rich

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## FLYBOYJ (Jun 15, 2005)

Great stuff - I like the quote from Thach “The pilot who will miss with four .50 caliber guns won’t be able to hit with eight. Increased firepower is not a substitute for marksmanship.”


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## alejandro_ (Jul 14, 2005)

Does anyone konw the victory/loss ratio of the Wildcat against the Zero? Overall the victory ratio for the F4F is ~5:1. Apparently it is close to 1:1.

Regards.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 15, 2005)

alejandro_ said:


> Does anyone konw the victory/loss ratio of the Wildcat against the Zero? Overall the victory ratio for the F4F is ~5:1. Apparently it is close to 1:1.
> 
> Regards.



I think you'll find its way higher than that, more like 7 to 1. Against the Zero it would be about 5 to 1.


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## plan_D (Jul 15, 2005)

I would like to add to this that although I agree that .303 cal do lack hitting power - during Operation Torch Hawk-75s of the Vichy French managed to shoot down a fair few Wildcats of the USN and they only had six .303 cal MG.


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## alejandro_ (Jul 15, 2005)

> I think you'll find its way higher than that, more like 7 to 1. Against the Zero it would be about 5 to 1.



Are you sure you are not mixing the Wildcat with the Hellcat? IIRC the victory ratio for the Wildcat is 5.2:1, you can check it in this forum, in the request section, where there is a topic on kill ratios.

I would be especially interested in the F4F kill/loss ratio against the Zero, especially during the first months of the Pacific War. Most people argue the Zero was a superb fighter but it never achieved full supremacy against the Wildcat, which is considered to be totally obsolete. I just dont agree with this.

Regards.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 15, 2005)

alejandro_ said:


> > I think you'll find its way higher than that, more like 7 to 1. Against the Zero it would be about 5 to 1.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



No - Depending who you want to believe the Hellcat Kill ratio was between 10 to 19 to 1! Hellcats claimed 6000 air-to-air kills.

A kill ratio of 6.9 to 1 was claimed for the Wildcat in the pacific: 178 lost, for 905 'confirmed' kills. The most successful Wildcat pilot was Joe Foss, with 26 kills, all on the Wildcat.


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## R Leonard (Jul 18, 2005)

Claims to losses is a sticky subject. If you’re looking for an analysis of actual, verifiable victories to actual verifiable losses, that’s real hard to do. That being said, when talking about F4F’s vs A6M2’s in the first year of the war in the Pacific, the best place to go is two books written by John Lundstrom, “The First Team – Naval Air Combat from Pearl Harbor to Midway” and “The First Team and the Guadalcanal Campaign”. Both are pretty thick books with real small print. John was probably the last researcher to get to most of the USN and USMC pilots while they were still with us. As an example, from VF-42 he was able to speak to ten of the squadron’s pilots who flew at the Battle of the Coral Sea. There’s only two left today. John went to the Japanese records to reconcile claims to actual victories. I have not personally gone through the books page by page and made a stick count, but I can think of a few of guys who have and all agree that the ratio of F4Fs to A6Ms is damn close to about 1 F4F lost for every 1 A6M in the first year.

Personally, I like to work with the official reports. If you look at the roll up reported by the USN in 1946, you quickly find that it divides aerial victories into enemy bombers and enemy fighters, which, of course leaves out quite a few other players (float planes and the like) and leaves us wondering which fighters are they talking about. The only way to determine who is who is to look at the actual reports from the squadrons. I can do that with the Navy squadrons, I don’t have the information from the reports of the Marine squadrons.

Overall it looks like this (and just for F4F’s; FM-2’s are another story all together, with one of the highest kill claim to loss ratios of the war):

Carrier based F4Fs flew 1,104 combat sorties. Within these combat sorties, 17 F4Fs were lost to AA fire and 47 to enemy aircraft. There were 32 combat related operational losses (that is losses that occurred during a combat sortie but were not caused by combat damage; these are usually due to fuel exhaustion or flight deck accidents), 49 losses on non-combat related flights, and 22 were lost in the sinkings of Lexington, Yorktown, Wasp, or Hornet. On the claims side, there were a total of 302 enemy planes reported destroyed in combat, 190 bombers and 112 fighters.

USMC land based F4Fs flew 1,074 combat sorties. Within these combat sorties, 4 F4Fs were lost to AA fire and 75 to enemy aircraft. There were 11 combat related operational losses (these are usually due to fuel exhaustion or airfield accidents), 34 losses on non-combat related flights, and 26 were lost on the ground, at Wake or Guadalcanal. On the claims side, there were a total of 356 enemy planes reported destroyed in combat, 175 bombers and 281 fighters.

USN land based F4Fs flew 450 combat sorties. Within these combat sorties, 3 F4Fs were lost to AA fire and 56 to enemy aircraft. There were 7 combat related operational losses, 29 losses on non-combat related flights, and 20 were lost on the ground, at Wake or Guadalcanal. On the claims side, there were a total of 147 enemy planes reported destroyed in combat, 53 bombers and 94 fighters.

So, from the USN statistics, there were a total of 178 F4Fs lost in aerial combat versus about 905 claims, of which 487 were fighters. As much as I am an F4F booster, those numbers are a little hard to swallow, although I was interested to read in Herbert Bix’s “Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan” on page 461 reports 892 airplanes and 1882 pilots (and, one presumes, crewmen) lost between August 1942 and February 1943 in the struggle for Guadalcanal. General Yamada Otozo who was on Hirohito’s staff noted that this was “ . . . two and a half times the number of planes and fifteen times the number of pilots lost at Midway.” Certainly the F4F pilots did not shoot down all the Japanese planes lost during that period, but they did shoot down a goodly number, if not a majority. Gives one some pause to think, anyway.

Navy statistical records indicate that F4F’s were out of combat by October 1943, but the last two squadrons in action were VF-11 and VF-21 operating out of Fighter I on Guadalcanal. They left combat in July 1943. There may have been some F4F-4s mixed into with FM-1 squadrons operating from CVE’s between July and October, but they scored no victories of which I am aware.

So much for the gross numbers. If you look at the results culled for reports you can get a better feel for actual types shot down. Since I only have the information on Navy squadrons, you can draw your own conclusions on the Marines. The results I have tabulated for the Navy F4F squadrons looks like:\

Navy F4F-3 pilots were credited with 68.5 victories/10 Probables/7 damaged. Navy F4F-4 pilots were credited with 453/74/34, for a total of 521.5/84/41. Also of interest is that only 494 of these credits were for Japanese planes. Two of them were for German types and 25 for Vichy French (all from the F4F-4 total). If you compare the USN victory credits from the 1946 statistical report you can see that the statistical report has 449 credits for USN F4Fs for just enemy fighters and bombers in the Pacific. That would mean that some 45.5 of the Japanese aircraft shot down were NOT included in the statistical study as they were neither fighters (VF) nor bombers (VB). Counting up the non VF and non VB types listed gives a total of 33 victory credits or 12.5 less than the calculated value. On the other hand, the by squadron count shows 226 Japanese VB types credited and 233 Japanese VF types compared to the 1946 statistical report’s 243 and 206, repectively. My list of enemy types shot down by Navy F4Fs, based upon what was actually reported by squadrons, looks like this:

Japanese: 
219/33/19 - A6M Mitsubishi A6M series Type 00 Models 21, 22, 52 VF (Zeke)
6/0/0 - A6M2-N Nakajima Type 2 Float VF (Rufe)
1/0/0 - A6M3 Mitsubishi A6M series Type 00 Model 32 22A VF (Hamp)
58/14/6 - B5N Nakajima Type 97 VTB (Kate)
115/22/14 - D3A Aichi Type 99 VB (Val)
4/0/0 - E13A Aichi Type 00 2/Float VSO (Jake)
4/1/0 - E7K Kawanishi Type 94 VSO (Alf)
1/0/1 - E8N Nakajima Type 95 Float VSO (Dave)
7/1/0 - F1M Mitsubishi Type 0 Float VSO (Pete)
60.5/5/1 - G4M Mitsubishi G4M series Type 01 2/E VB/VR (Betty)
14/0/0 - H6K Kawanishi Type 97 4/E VP FB (Mavis)
2/0/0 - H8K Kawanishi Type 2 4/E VP FB (Emily)
1/0/0 - U/I 4/E VP Unidentified Japanese Patrol Aircraft
0/1/0 - U/I aircraft Unidentified Japanese Aircraft
2/2/0 - Me-109 Pacific Action Mis-ID, Probably A6M Mitsubishi Type 00 VF (Zeke, Zero)
494.5/79/41 – Japanese Total
German:
1/0/0 - He-115 Heinkel S/E Twin Float VSO
1/0/0 - Ju-88 Junkers Ju-88 Series 2/E VB
2/0/0 – German Total
Vichy French:
1/0/0 - B.174 or P.63/11 Bloch Type or Potez Type 2/E Lt VB 
4/1/0 - D.520 Dewointine Type VF 
8/0/0 - D.520 or H.75 Dewointine Type VF or Curtis P-36 type VF 
8/4/0 - H.75 Curtis P-36 type VF 
1/0/0 - LeO.45 Loire et Olivier Type 2/E Med VB 
3/0/0 - Martin 167 or LeO.45 Martin 'Baltimore' or Loire et Olivier 2/E Med VB 
25/5/0 – Vichy Total
521.5/84.0/41.0 – Grand Total

For what it’s worth.

Rich


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## plan_D (Jul 18, 2005)

I think your Vichy French kills are a little out there - RL. I say that because I've read in many places that in one combat sortie 15 Hawk-75s were brought down by Wildcats - with a loss of seven Wildcats and Dauntless. 

I think the Vichy French kills would be higher than 25, to be honest.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 18, 2005)

And it looks like we're still looking at 4 to 1 with the Wildcat vs the Zero.


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## alejandro_ (Jul 18, 2005)

R Leonard

Thank you for your message, very interesting. I was somewhat surprised that the USN did not fully compare their kill claims to the actual japanese losses, I guess some of the files were losted or destroyed at the end of the war.



> And it looks like we're still looking at 4 to 1 with the Wildcat vs the Zero.



If that is to the Wildcat it is too high in my opinion. During the first 6 months the USN losted quite a few airplanes at the hands of the Zero. The fact that no information was available and the wrong tactics were being applied didn't help the USN crews.

Regards.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 18, 2005)

alejandro_ said:


> If that is to the Wildcat it is too high in my opinion. During the first 6 months the USN losted quite a few airplanes at the hands of the Zero. The fact that no information was available and the wrong tactics were being applied didn't help the USN crews.
> 
> Regards.



What's your defination of "quite a few." As R. Leonard stated "from the USN statistics, there were a total of 178 F4Fs lost in aerial combat ." Face it Alejandro, the US Navy Claimed almost 7 to 1 in favor of the F4F against the Zero, numbers actuallu show more like 4 to 1. At even 3 to 1 the F4F, for being outclassed stomped on the Zero!


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## alejandro_ (Jul 18, 2005)

FlyboyJ



> At even 3 to 1 the F4F, for being outclassed stomped on the Zero!



But is this for the first 6 month of for a whole year? i am extremely surprised to find such a high ratio, and it has been compared with actual japanese losses...

Regards.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 18, 2005)

alejandro_ said:


> FlyboyJ
> 
> 
> 
> ...



This is for the whole 4 1/2 years of combat! At Coral Sea, the Zero had about a 2 to 1 kill ratio over the F4f. At Midway the F4F had a 1.5 to 1 kill ratio over the Zero. At Guadalcanal it went to 2.5 to 1. See the links;

http://centurytel.net/midway/appendix/appendixfourteen_usvftac.html

http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USMC/USMC-C-Aces/

Bottom line, only 178 F4Fs were lost in combat!


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## alejandro_ (Jul 18, 2005)

Thank you very much for the info, FLYBOYJ, that was *exactly* what I was looking for. I just don't understand how the Zero can be considered one of the greatest fighter in the PTO when it only achieved a 2:1 kill ratio when all the factors were against the Wildcat, and withing one year it had become totally obsolete.

Regards.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 18, 2005)

alejandro_ said:


> Thank you very much for the info, FLYBOYJ, that was *exactly* what I was looking for. I just don't understand how the Zero can be considered one of the greatest fighter in the PTO when it only achieved a 2:1 kill ratio when all the factors were against the Wildcat, and withing one year it had become totally obsolete.
> 
> Regards.



You're quite welcome Alejandro!


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## R Leonard (Jul 20, 2005)

I’ve revisited the Operation Torch results. There were a total of 26 victories claimed by USN pilots, 25 by F4F pilots and 1 from an SBD pilot. 

Looking at just the 25 F4F claims, two of these (a D.520 and either a Martin 167 or LeO.45) were reported in the USS Sangamon (CVE-26) report, but did not specifically identify pilots involved. By the time of the action reported, these victories would have stemmed from Mission A-02, which involved one 6-plane division and one 4-plane division, all catapulted off between 0610 and 0720 in conjunction with Missions A-01 (8 TBFs in two 4-plane divisions) and A-03 (8 SBDs in two 4-plane divisions). The only F4F pilot I show as identified was Lieut. Fitzhugh Lee Palmer, Jr., the F4F mission leader, who submitted a claim for a Martin 167 in action over the Port Lyautey airdrome at approximately 0800. As noted, the other victories claimed, which reportedly occurred in the same action as Palmer’s, were not credited to any other particular pilot. The information on the activities of VGF-26 typically does not mention actual pilots, in fact, Palmer is the only F4F driver mentioned by name; in the listings I have only 9 pilots are actually named out of 92 sorties. Anyway, we have Palmer with a M.167 and then the two mystery pilots with the D.520 and the M.167/LeO.45. And just to keep things confusing, VGF-26 had one other unidentified Vichy VF and two other unidentified 2E Vichy VB were reported as probables. Again the VGF-26 pilots are not identified.

There also appears to be a problem over in Ranger’s VF-41 on the morning of 8 November in identifying H75As versus D.520s. Across the intervening 63 years we might ask ourselves “how could they not be able to tell the difference?” but I’d suggest that with pilots in their first action, such confusion would be inevitable.

The credited results for aerial combat in F4Fs were:
Lieut.(jg) CV August of VF-41 (USS Ranger) on Nov 8 with 2 H75A
Lieut. MM Furney of VF-41 on Nov 8 with 2 H75A or D520
Lieut.(jg) BN Mayhew of VF-41 on Nov 8 with 2 H75A or D520
Ens. AD Conner, Jr. of VF-41 on Nov 8 with 1 H75A
Ens. W Taylor of VF-41 on Nov 8 with 1 H75A or D520
Lieut. Comdr. CT Booth of VF-41 on Nov 8 with 1 H75A or D520
Lieut. EW Wood, Jr. of VF-41 on Nov 8 with 1 D520
Lieut.(jg) CA Shields of VF-41 on Nov 8 with 1 H75A
Lieut.(jg) CA Shields of VF-41 on Nov 8 with 1 D520
Lieut.(jg) GM Harris of VF-41 on Nov 8 with 1 D520
Lieut. EW Wood, Jr. of VF-41 on Nov 9 with 1 D520 or Me109*
Lieut. Comdr. JA Raby of VF-9 (USS Ranger) on Nov 8 with 1 P63
Ens. LA Menard of VF-9 on Nov 9 with 1 H75A
Ens. MJ Franger of VF-9 on Nov 9 with 1 H75A
Lieut. Comdr. J Raby of VF-9 on Nov 9 with 1 H75A
Lieut. KC Childers, Jr. of VF-9 on Nov 9 with 1 H75A
Lieut.(jg) HE Vita of VF-9 on Nov 9 with 1 H75A
Lieut. LF Palmer, Jr. of VGF-26 (USS Sangamon) on Nov 8 with 1 M167
<Unidentified> of VGF-26 (USS Sangamon) on Nov 8 with 1 M167 or LeO45
<Unidentified> of VGF-26 (USS Sangamon) on Nov 8 with 1 D.520
Ens. BD Jacques of VGF-29 (USS Santee) on Nov 10 with 1 Potez 63
* This may have been a photo-recon Spitfire that failed to return from a mission. There was one Vichy D.520 in the area but the pilot reported no enemy contact. There were no German fighters involved in any of the Torch actions.

The lone SBD victory was a DB-7 scored by Ens. DA Pattie of VGS-29 (USS Santee) on Nov 10.

Probables claimed were:

Lieut. TA Grell of VF-41 - 1 D.520 on Nov 8
Lieut. Comdr JA Raby of VF-9 - 1 H75A on Nov 9
Lieut. KC Childers, Jr. of VF-9 - 1 H75A on Nov 9
Ens LA Menard of VF-9 - 1 H75A on Nov 9
Ens MJ Franger of VF-9 - 1 H75A on Nov 9
<Unidentified> of VGF-26 - Unidentified S/E VF on Nov 8
<Unidentified> of VGF-26 - Unidentified 2/E VB on Nov 8
<Unidentified> of VGF-26 - Unidentified 2/E VB on Nov 8

Combat losses were 
- In aerial combat:
OS2U (from USS Massachusetts) - Ens C Dougherty ARM RC Ethridge to H75A, both POW
F4F (VF-41) Ens CE Mikronis to H75A, WIA, POW
F4F (VF-41) Lieut.(jg) CA Shields to H75A, POW
F4F (VF-41) Lieut GH Carter, ditched due to damage from H75A, rescued
F4F (VF-41) Lieut. MT Wordell to H75A, POW

- to AA fire
F4F (VF-9) Lieut.(jg) E Micka, KIA
F4F (VF-9) Ens TM Wilhoite, KIA
F4F (VF-9) Lieut.(jg) SM Amesbury, KIA
F4F (VF-41) Lieut. TA Grell, ditched, AA damage, fuel exhausted, rescued
SBD (VS-41) Ens CE Duffy ARM3c GE Briggs, both KIA
F4F (VF-41) Lieut.(jg) CV August, POW
F4F (VGF-29) Ens WP Naylor, forced landing, POW
TBF (VGS-29) Lieut(jg) DC Rodeen, ARM DE Balkey, AMM3c EP Tarsilla, forced landing, all POW
F4F (VGF-29) Ens RW Peterson, forced landing, POW
F4F (VGF-29) Ens E Van Vranken, forced landing, POW
F4F (VGF-29) Ens UL Fretwell, forced landing, POW
TBF (VGS-27) Lieut(jg) RE O’Neill, AOM3c WS Gorka, AOM3c J Carter, all KIA

- Missing in Action
F4F (VGF-29) Lieut.(jg) GF Trumpeter, Aborted mission with oil leak, MIA

There were also numerous operational losses, takeoff crashes, landing accidents, ditching from fuel exhaustion, or engine failure. I've got all that, but they're not really relevant to the topic.

Some folks involved in this operation. CO of VGF-29 was Tommy Blackburn, later CO of VF-17. TA (“Tag”) Grell was one of my father’s USNA classmates, we used to go to his annual Army-Navy Game parties. MT (“Mac”) Wordell was XO of VF-41; he went on to command VF-44 in the Pacific. CV (“Chuck”) August went on with Mac Wordell to VF-44, was shot down in January 1945 over Formosa and taken prisoner, thus becoming one of the very few to be held as a POW by two different belligerents. Wordell also co-wrote “Wildcats over Casablanca” about his squadron, generally, and his adventures, specifically, in this operation. CT (“Tommy”) Booth went on to become an Admiral, lived a couple of quarters down the street from us at Norfolk NAS in the early 1960s. MJ (“Marv”) Franger was at TacTest with my father in the 1946-1948 period and then later was in VX-3 when my father was XO. Lieut TH (“Hugh”) Winters flew with VF-9 and was slightly wounded, went on to command VF-19 in the Pacific; Winters wrote "Skipper - Confessions of a Fighter Squadron Commander, 1943-1944," a fairly straight foreward account of VF-19. Ens. LA (“Lou”) Menard later flew in VBF-12 and has the distinction of being the first USN fighter pilot to bring down an enemy plane with a rocket, a deed done in February 1945. Lieut.(jg) DS (“Diz”) Laird (VF-41) did not score over North Africa, but later scored 1.5 victories over Luftwaffe snoopers off Norway in Operation Leader; added to his later victories over the Japanese made him the only USN ace with victories over both German and Japanese aircraft. Laird was in VF-171 when my father was CO in the 1948 and the squadron was the Navy’s first operational, carrier qualified, jet squadron. Hamilton McWhorter was in VF-9; went to the Pacific to become the first F6F ace. Lieut. John R Sweeny, another of my father’s classmates and long time family friend flew for VF-41; he passed along to me pieces of the Zero that crashed into USS Natoma Bay. Another classmates was Lieut. HB (“Brink”) Bass, XO of VGF-29, later KIA as CO of VF-74 in Operation Dragoon; Other classmates and long time family friends were Lieut HJ (“Hank”) Weiler (VF-41); Lieut. KG (“Cagey”) Hammond (VF-41); and Lieut. CV Johnson (VS-41). 

Rich


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 21, 2005)

Interestiong stuff RL! It seems the F4f did well based on this information and all F4F kills were from H75As'. Interesting!


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## R Leonard (Jul 21, 2005)

To answer at least one of the questions that has floated through this thread, I’ve pulled together some data on 
F4F and A6M losses from 1 May 1942 through the Battle of Midway. I have not included USN vs IJN encounters 
prior to 7 May 1942 as the USN F4F pilots did not encounter the A6M until the Battle of the Coral Sea where VF-42’s 
Walt Haas was the first USN fighter pilot to shoot down an A6M.

F4F Combat Losses 7 May 1942 through 4 June 1942:
(Format is Ship -- Squadron -- Date -- Number -- Cause)
CV-2 -- VF-2 -- 5/7/1942 -- 1 -- MIA Coral Sea Night Action/Operations
CV-5 -- VF-42 -- 5/7/1942 -- 2 -- MIA Coral Sea Night Action/Operations
CV-2 -- VF-2 -- 5/8/1942 -- 3 -- MIA Coral Sea probably shot down by A6M2s
CV-2 -- VF-2 -- 5/8/1942 -- 2 -- shot down by A6M2 US strike CAP
CV-5 -- VF-42 -- 5/8/1942 -- 1 -- forced down, battle damage by A6M2, US force CAP
CV-5 -- VF-3 -- 6/4/1942 -- 3 -- shot down by A6M2 US force CAP
CV-5 -- VF-3 -- 6/4/1942 -- 1 -- shot down by A6M2 US strike CAP
CV-5 -- VF-3 -- 6/4/1942 -- 1 -- forced down, battle damage by A6M2, US force CAP
CV-8 -- VF-8 -- 6/4/1942 -- 1 -- shot down by A6M2 (possible assist from friendly AA fire), US force CAP

So, we can see that there were a total of 15 F4Fs lost in combat. Of the first three, MIA in Coral Sea night action/
operations, we know that the one VF-2 loss, Lieut(jg) Paul Baker, and one of the VF-42 losses, Ens John Baker, 
(these gents were not related, but their identical last names may have contributed to their loss, a short but sad 
story of communications problems) were tragically just pilots who were lost in the dark and could not find their 
ways back to their ships. The other VF-42 loss, Ens Leslie Knox, simply was never heard from again and no 
specific cause can be pinned to his loss, although one of the last survivors of VF-42 still with us tells me that they 
all suspected that the cause of his loss was vertigo, not enemy action. Thus, we are left with 12 F4Fs actually 
shot down or forced down from damage by A6Ms. In the same period, there were 24 F4Fs lost operationally. 
10 of these were the VF-8 strike CAP at Midway, all of which ditched from fuel exhaustion; seven pilots, I believe, 
were recovered.

Japanese A6M losses in the same period were;
(Format is Ship -- Date -- Number -- Cause)

Shoho -- 5/7/1942 -- 1 -- shot down F4F strike CAP (VF-42) 
Shokaku -- 5/8/1942 -- 2 -- shot down F4F force CAP (VF-42) 
Akagi -- 6/4/1942 -- 3 -- shot down, various strike aircraft (non VF)
Akagi -- 6/4/1942 -- 1 -- AA fire Midway Island
Hiryu -- 6/4/1942 -- 3 -- shot down F4F force CAP (VF-3)
Hiryu -- 6/4/1942 -- 3 -- shot down SBD strike force
Hiryu -- 6/4/1942 -- 2 -- shot down, various strike aircraft (non VF)
Hiryu -- 6/4/1942 -- 1 -- forced down, battle damage SBD
Hiryu -- 6/4/1942 -- 1 -- forced down, battle damage SBD
Hiryu -- 6/4/1942 -- 1 -- shot down F4F force CAP (VF-3)
Hiryu -- 6/4/1942 -- 1 -- shot down F4F force CAP (VF-6)
Kaga -- 6/4/1942 -- 5 -- shot down F4F strike CAP (VF-3)
Kaga -- 6/4/1942 -- 1 -- shot down F4F (VMF 221 - land-based)
Soryu -- 6/4/1942 -- 3 -- shot down, various strike aircraft (non VF)

So, we see 28 A6Ms lost in combat. Fourteen, half, were shot down by F4Fs; one by AA fire; five either shot down 
out-right by SBDs or lost due to battle damage from same; and eight were lost to defensive fires from various 
other strike aircraft at Midway (TBD, SB2U, TBF, B-26). In the same time period there were 21 operational losses, 
all from fuel exhaustion; seven were at Coral Sea, the balance at Midway.

Bottom line here is that between 7 May 1942 and 4 June 1942, and, thus, just on the basis of exposure, in the first 
six months of the Pacific War, there were 12 F4Fs shot down by A6Ms and 14 A6Ms shot down by F4Fs, or an F4F 
victory to loss ratio of 1.167 to 1.

I think, though, we need to be careful with some of the numbers ascribed to the F4F. There is a big, big boost to the 
ratio of Wildcat claims to losses that stems from the F4Fs direct follow-on, the FM-2. The performance of the FM-2 
was such that the USN considered its combat results separately from those of the F4F. There is, however, a 
tendency to lump the two together as “Wildcat Results”. This tends to skew the statistics and can lead to, 
perhaps, some erroneous conclusions. Further, I would point out that, as with the BuAer bean counters, amongst 
the practitioners, those who flew both the F4F and the FM-2, the two were also considered to be different breeds of 
cat (pun intended) that simply had a similar appearance. 

In it’s brief time in combat, the FM-2 posted some pretty serious numbers. Perusing the US Naval Aviation 
Combat Statistics – World War II (1946), if you look at the period 1 January 1944 through 15 August 1945, 
operating FM-2 squadrons in aerial combat against the Japanese resulted in 422 credits of all aircraft types to 13 
losses. During these 20 months FM-2 squadrons flew some 751 aerial combat sorties (combat sorties defined 
as flights where aircraft of a given element - division or section - engaged in combat with enemy forces). This 
works out to 3.29 sorties for every Japanese VF shot down and 3.87 sorties for every Japanese VT/VB or 
overall 1.78 sorties for every Japanese aircraft credited. The FM-2 aerial combat losses work out to 57.8 aerial 
combat sorties for every FM-2 lost. Losses to AA fire for FM-2s in the same period were 62 for some 5533 
sorties with Japanese AA present, or 89 sorties encountering Japanese AA for every AA loss. 

Comparatively in the same period, F6F squadrons flew 6397 aerial combat sorties with 1.3 aerial combat 
sorties per credit and 27 aerial combat sorties per loss. F6F losses to AA fire were 527 in the course of some 
38,427 combat sorties in the same period where Japanese AA was present, or 73 sorties for every AA loss. 
For F4U squadrons there were 1.7 aerial combat sorties per credit and 26 aerial combat sorties per loss for around 
2495 combat sorties. AA losses for F4Us were 331 for 24,058 combat sorties facing AA fire, as with the F6F, 
some 79 sorties encountering Japanese AA for every AA loss. 

From 1 January 1945 to the Japanese surrender, operating FM-2 squadrons were credited with 187 victories 
(94 VF and 93 VT/VB) to 1, (yes, he said "one") aerial combat loss. Remember, of course, that a high number 
of these credits were scored against some rather single minded adversaries who really weren't paying 
much attention to the niceties of aerial combat, focusing primarily on just getting through the CAP defenses to work 
their mischief on whatever ship to which they could get the closest. Combat sorties per credit were 1.9 and 
combat sorties per losses were 362. 

And finally, if you look at just the last year of the Pacific war, from 1 September 1944 to 15 August 1945, FM-2s 
in action in aerial combat against Japanese VF only, the results were, credits to losses: 

FM-2 vs A6M series - 87 to 2
FM-2 vs Ki-43 - 38 to 3
FM-2 vs Ki-61 - 29 to none
FM-2 vs Ki-44 - 17 to 2
FM-2 vs J2M 1 to none
FM-2 vs Ki-27 - 1 to none
FM-2 vs unidentified S/E VF types - 10 to none 
This totals out to 183 Japanese VF types credited for 7 losses (26.1 to 1). 

Interestingly enough, another quick calculation from these results tell us that since FM-2 pilots were credited with 
94 Japanese VF victories from 1 Jan 1945 to the end of the war and 183 Japanese VF victories from 1 Sept 1944 
to the end of the war, the period of 1 Sept 1944 through 31 Dec 1944 was prolific indeed with 89 VF credits over a 
four month period, though theses were not without a cost. With 6 FM-2 losses, the credit to loss ratio in the same 
four months drops to a paltry 14.8 to 1. 

Other results for the 1 September 1944 though 15 August 1945 period were:

FM-2 vs D3A - 88 to none
FM-2 vs D4Y - 5 to none
FM-2 vs B5N - 4 to none
FM-2 vs B6N - 7 to none
FM-2 vs Ki-51 - 1 to none
FM-2 vs Total VB-VT - 105 to none

FM-2 vs E13 - 7 to none
FM-2 vs Total F/P - 7 to none

FM-2 vs G4M - 2 to none
FM-2 vs Ki-46 - 1 to none
FM-2 vs P1Y - 18 to none
FM-2 vs J1N - 9 to none
FM-2 vs Ki-45 - 4 to none
FM-2 vs Ki-21 - 16 to none
FM-2 vs Ki-48 - 21 to 1
FM-2 vs G3M - 1 to none
FM-2 vs U/I 2/E Combat Types - 9 to none
FM-2 vs Total 2/E Combat Types - 81 to 1

FM-2 vs Transports - 1 to none
FM-2 vs unidentified 2/E - none to 1
Total FM-2 vs Non-S/E VF Types - 194 to 1

Total for all FM victories, 1 September 1944 through 15 August 1945 is 377 to 9 or a ratio of 41.9 to 1.

And a review of the squadron ACA reports gives us the following claims posted for the FM-2 for their entire wartime 
combat service. By squadrons (format is Squadron -- Ship -- Credits -- Probable -- Damaged)

VC-27 -- CVE-78 -- 59.5 -- 1.0 -- 6.0
VF-26 -- CVE-29 -- 31.0 -- 2.0 -- 0.0
VOC-1 -- CVE-65 -- 20.0 -- 1.0 -- 0.0
VC-81 -- CVE-62 -- 19.0 -- 0.0 -- 2.0
VC-84 -- CVE-93 -- 19.0 -- 0.0 -- 2.0
VC-20 -- CVE-76 -- 18.0 -- 2.0 -- 2.0
VC-75 -- CVE-79 -- 18.0 -- 4.0 -- 0.0
VC-10 -- CVE-73 -- 17.0 -- 3.0 -- 3.0
VC-21 -- CVE-77 -- 17.0 -- 1.0 -- 0.0
VC-3 -- CVE-68 -- 17.0 -- 2.0 -- 1.0
VC-93 -- CVE-84 -- 17.0 -- 1.0 -- 0.0
VC-5 -- CVE-71 -- 16.0 -- 3.0 -- 6.0
VC-80 -- CVE-61 -- 14.0 -- 2.0 -- 0.0
VC-88 -- CVE-82 -- 14.0 -- 0.0 -- 3.0
VC-4 -- CVE-66 -- 12.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
VC-33 -- CVE-57 -- 11.0 -- 7.0 -- 1.0
VC-68 -- CVE-70 -- 10.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
VC-41 -- CVE-58 -- 9.0 -- 3.0 -- 1.0
VC-85 -- CVE-94 -- 9.0 -- 1.0 -- 0.0
VC-13 -- CVE-57 -- 8.0 -- 2.0 -- 1.0
VC-92 -- CVE-72 -- 8.0 -- 0.0 -- 3.0
VC-90 -- CVE-87 -- 7.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
VC-94 -- CVE-84 -- 7.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
VC-97 -- CVE-91 -- 7.0 -- 0.0 -- 1.0
VC-91 -- CVE-93 -- 6.0 -- 0.0 -- 1.0
VC-96 -- CVE-81 -- 6.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
VC-87 -- CVE-96 -- 6.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
VC-65 -- CVE-63 -- 5.0 -- 2.0 -- 0.5
VOC-2 -- CVE-70 -- 5.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
VC-76 -- CVE-80 -- 4.0 -- 1.0 -- 0.0
VC-78 -- CVE-82 -- 4.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
VC-83 -- CVE-83 -- 2.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
VC-11 -- CVE-74 -- 1.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
VC-63 -- CVE-62 -- 1.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
VC-66 -- CVE-70 -- 1.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
VC-86 -- CVE-95 -- 1.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
*VC-?? -- unknown -- 1.5 -- 0.0 -- 0.0*
Total -- - -- - -- - - 428.0 -- 38.0 -- 33.5
*These come from reported assists by unidentified FM-2s resulting in partial credits

And by Japanese types: (Type -- Credit -- Probable -- Damaged)

A6M -- 102.0 -- 5.0 -- 8.0
D3A -- 93.5 -- 5.0 -- 1.0
Ki-43 -- 43.5 -- 7.0 -- 6.0
Ki-61 -- 36.0 -- 2.0 -- 3.0
Ki-21 -- 21.0 -- 2.0 -- 2.0
P1Y1 -- 21.0 -- 0.0 -- 6.0
Ki-48 -- 21.0 -- 4.0 -- 1.0
Ki-44 -- 20.0 -- 3.0 -- 1.0
B6N1-2 -- 14.0 -- 0.0 -- 1.0
J1N -- 10.0 -- 5.0 -- 1.0
E13A -- 9.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
B5N -- 8.0 -- 1.0 -- 1.5
D4Y1 -- 8.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
G4M -- 7.0 -- 0.0 -- 1.0
Ki-45 -- 5.0 -- 3.0 -- 1.0
Ki-46 -- 2.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
U/I 2/E VT -- 2.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
G3M -- 1.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
J2M -- 1.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
Ki-57 -- 1.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
Ki-51 -- 1.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
Ki-27 -- 1.0 -- 0.0 -- 0.0
Total -- 428.0 -- 37.0 -- 33.5

Overall, the F4F was credited with a 5.1 to 1 credit to loss ratio (905 to 178). The FM-2 posted a 32.9 to 1 ratio (428 
to 13). Together, which some sometimes present, but which is technically incorrect, they form the “Wildcat Ratio” of 
7.0 to 1 (1333 to 191).

Regards,

Rich


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## plan_D (Jul 21, 2005)

This is what I have on Operation _Torch_ just to see if it's correct -

USN provided 164 aircraft alongside "some" P-40Es from the USAAF. Opposing them were 205 aircraft of the Vichy French of which 78 were fighters. Vichy French formations were GC I/5, GC II/5 and _Aéronavale Flotille_ 3F. The fighters fielded were 38 D.520 and 40 H-75s (all in the same colours). 

On 8th November six Hawks from GC II/5 _Lafayette_ scrambled from Camp Cazes to meet Wildcats (F4F-3?) from VF-41 (?). They caught a OS2U Kingfisher and shot it down. 

VF-41 caught one flight of Hawks taking off and seven Hawk pilots were killed (two lost in a collision during take-off) and four more wounded. The French shot down two Wildcats but had lost 13 Hawks. 

During 8th November GC II/5 claimed seven F4Fs destroyed - ID failure could mean some were SBD-3s. 

On the 9th GC II/5 took off with five Hawks which strafed the landing craft on the beaches. GC I/5 escorted a force of bombers attacking the beaches, they were caught by Wildcats of VF-9 who shot down four Hawks on the first pass! One of those lost was French ace Adj Chef Georges. 

GC I/5 claimed one victory on the 9th - a Wildcat from VF-9 piloted by Ens Gerhardt - the pilot of the Hawk was Sgt Chef Jeremie Bressieux.

This last one is odd because your records don't even mention an Ensign Gerhardt.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 21, 2005)

R Leonard said:


> The lone SBD victory was a DB-7 scored by Ens. DA Pattie of VGS-29 (USS Santee) on Nov 10.



Now that would of been a site to see!


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## R Leonard (Jul 22, 2005)

I Show:
CV-4 USS Ranger:
CRAG: 1 TBF-1
VF-9: 27 F4F-4
VF-41: 27 F4F-4
VS-41: 18 SBD-3
and 3 USAAF L-4

ACV-26 USS Sangamon:
VGF-26: 12 F4F-4 
VGS-26: 9 SBD-3, 9 TBF-1 

ACV-27 USS Suwannee:
VGF-27: 11 F4F-4 
VGS-27: 9 TBF-1
VGF-28: 12 F4F-4
VGS-30: 6 F4F-4

ACV-29 USS Santee:
VGF-29: 14 F4F-4
VGS-29: 9 SBD-3, 8 TBF-1

Total USN by Type:
F4F-4: 109
SBD: 36
TBF-1: 27
Total: 172

also

ACV-28 USS Chenango
P40-F: 76 (in transport)

Vichy Air Units
GC II/5 at Casablanca: 20 H75 and 13 D.520
GB I/32 at Cazes: 13 DB-7
GT II/15 at Cazes: 15 Various a/c
GC I/5 at Rabat-Sale: 26 H75
GR I/22 at Rabat-Sale: 13 LeO451
GT I/15 at Rabat-Sale: 16 Various a/c
Flo 1F at Port Lyautey: 27 D.520
Flo 3F at Port Lyautey: 11 M.167
GB II/23 at Meknes: 13 LeO 451
GR I/52 at Marrakech: 13 P.63 
GB I/23 at Marrakech: 13 LeO 451
Flo 3F at Agadir: 2 M.167 
GB Il/32 at Agadir: 13 DB-7

Totals by Type	
H75: 46
D.520: 40
DB-7: 26
M.167: 13
LeO 451: 39
P.63 : 13
Misc: 31
Total: 208	


I show Ensign Charles W. Gerhardt, A-V(N), USNR (O-114669) on mission B-02, 9 November, in F4F-4 
b/n 11707, side # 9-F-8, ditching at sea due to an oil leak and being rescued by USS Mayrant 
(DD-402). My sources do not show that the leak resulted from combat damage, however, if your 
information so indicates I am happy to accept that and so note. 

Mission B-02 was a launched at 0730 as a fighter sweep in the Fedala area and consisted of two 
4-plane divisions led by Lieut Comdr Jack Raby. First division was Raby, Ens. MJ Franger, Lieut.(jg) 
H. Feasley, and Ens. AE Martin. Second division was Lt. KC Childers, Jr, Ens. LA Menard, Jr., Lt.(jg) 
HE Vita, and Gerhardt. They engaged an estimated 16 H75As at approximately 0815. Reported 
results were: Raby – 1/1/0, Franger – 1/1/0, Feasley – 0/0/0, Martin – 0/0/0, Childers – 1/1/0, Menard
– 1/1/0, Vita – 1/0/0, and Gerhardt – 0/0/0; total 5/4/0. I believe the actual results were 4/4/0. Upon 
return to the ship, Menard crashed on landing into the barrier and then hit the island, but the plane was 
repairable. All except Gearhardt were back aboard by 0900.

Regards,

Rich


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## alejandro_ (Jul 22, 2005)

R Leonard

Those were excellent posts, let me ask a couple of things if you don't mind.

F4F losses at Coral should be these:



> CV-2 -- VF-2 -- 5/7/1942 -- 1 -- MIA Coral Sea Night Action/Operations
> CV-5 -- VF-42 -- 5/7/1942 -- 2 -- MIA Coral Sea Night Action/Operations
> CV-2 -- VF-2 -- 5/8/1942 -- 3 -- MIA Coral Sea probably shot down by A6M2s
> CV-2 -- VF-2 -- 5/8/1942 -- 2 -- shot down by A6M2 US strike CAP
> CV-5 -- VF-42 -- 5/8/1942 -- 1 -- forced down, battle damage by A6M2, US force CAP



F4F losses at Midway should be:



> CV-5 -- VF-3 -- 6/4/1942 -- 3 -- shot down by A6M2 US force CAP
> CV-5 -- VF-3 -- 6/4/1942 -- 1 -- shot down by A6M2 US strike CAP
> CV-5 -- VF-3 -- 6/4/1942 -- 1 -- forced down, battle damage by A6M2, US force CAP
> CV-8 -- VF-8 -- 6/4/1942 -- 1 -- shot down by A6M2 (possible assist from friendly AA fire), US force CAP



Zero losses in Coral:



> Shoho -- 5/7/1942 -- 1 -- shot down F4F strike CAP (VF-42)
> Shokaku -- 5/8/1942 -- 2 -- shot down F4F force CAP (VF-42)



Zero losses in Midway:



> Akagi -- 6/4/1942 -- 3 -- shot down, various strike aircraft (non VF)
> Akagi -- 6/4/1942 -- 1 -- AA fire Midway Island
> Hiryu -- 6/4/1942 -- 3 -- shot down F4F force CAP (VF-3)
> Hiryu -- 6/4/1942 -- 3 -- shot down SBD strike force
> ...



By the way, in the dates the first digit correspons to the month,and the second to the day right?

So, Zero vs Wildcat kill to loss ratios :

Coral: 9 vs 3  3:1 in favour of Zero (if all Wildcat losses attributed to the Zero).
Midway: 6 vs 11  1.83:1 in favour of the Wildcat.

Regards.


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## R Leonard (Jul 23, 2005)

> By the way, in the dates the first digit correspons to the month,and the second to the day right?
> 
> So, Zero vs Wildcat kill to loss ratios :
> 
> ...




Looks like three questions, so three answers: Yes, No, and Yes

Yes, date format is month/day/year

No, F4F losses to A6Ms at Coral Sea were 6 to 3 or 2:1. The three MIA on the night of 7 May did not result from VF vs VF action as noted in my post. Further, the three MIA F4Fs on 8 May are presumed to have been lost to A6Ms. Japanese VF vs VF claims for the action on 8 May were 36 F4Fs. They must have been shooting at somebody, so it is probably a safe bet that they did, indeed, get the 3 missing F4Fs on the 8th.

Yes, at Midway, 6 F4Fs were lost in exchange for 11 A6Ms.

Rich


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## plan_D (Jul 24, 2005)

Excellent information on _Torch_, RL. I'll have to update my notes on that then! Brilliant, thanks! 8)

There is one hiccup though, RL, I think - you've noted 26 kills during Torch, yet you've only listed 25.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 24, 2005)

After reading all this on the F4F it has certainly changed my mind about this little airplane. It seems she did a lot better than many giver her credit for and she certainly was not blasted out of the skies in early WW2 as another member suggested in another post.

The later models serving into the end of the war just proves the versatility of this great plane!


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## the lancaster kicks ass (Jul 24, 2005)

i wouldn't really call the F4F that versatile..........


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 24, 2005)

the lancaster kicks ass said:


> i wouldn't really call the F4F that versatile..........



Fleet fighter, night fighter, ground attack, land-based fighter bomber (used by the Marines) - used through-out the war even though considered obsolete - if that's not versatile, I dont know what is


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## Nonskimmer (Jul 24, 2005)

Yep, it was all that and tough as nails.


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## KraziKanuK (Jul 24, 2005)

FLYBOYJ said:


> the lancaster kicks ass said:
> 
> 
> > i wouldn't really call the F4F that versatile..........
> ...



It could not carry a Tall Boy or a Grand Slam.


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## the lancaster kicks ass (Jul 24, 2005)

that is true, and tell me, exactly how much modification did she need for those roles??


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 24, 2005)

Very little - as a matter of fact the only major differences between the early models was the wing fold mechanisms, the armament which went from 4 to 6 .50s, and better self-sealing tanks and armor were incorporated in the F4F-4. The Later model FM-2 had a larger Vertical stabilizer.


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## plan_D (Jul 25, 2005)

She wasn't versatile, she was just a remarkable and under-rated fighter.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 25, 2005)

plan_D said:


> She wasn't versatile, she was just a remarkable and under-rated fighter.



versatile/ remarkable/ under-rated - whatever?!? She kicked ass!


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## plan_D (Jul 25, 2005)

Versatile means capable of various different roles! The Ju-88, Mosquito, P-38 and Fw-190 were versatile, the F4F/FM-2 was just good!

Christ, Flyboy, I hate you.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 25, 2005)

plan_D said:


> Christ, Flyboy, I hate you.



I know


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## the lancaster kicks ass (Jul 25, 2005)

yeah i cirtainly wouldn't say she was versatile........


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 25, 2005)

Fighter, Fighter-bomber, Reconnaissance, ASW, - does 4 different roles count as versatile


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## cheddar cheese (Jul 25, 2005)

In my opinon, it counts as quite versatile 8)


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## Nonskimmer (Jul 25, 2005)

FLYBOYJ said:


> Fighter, Fighter-bomber, Reconnaissance, ASW, - does 4 different roles count as versatile


I'd say so, yeah.


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## plan_D (Jul 25, 2005)

No it doesn't because they're the jobs of any fighter.


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## Nonskimmer (Jul 25, 2005)

Which would make any such fighters just as versatile, if they were capable of ASW and fighter-bombing. The fact is, it could perform all of those rolls which makes it versatile. It could be used in any number of rolls.
That's like saying the Chinook isn't versatile because it does transport, heavy lifting, and in the odd case SAR. Those are the jobs of any helicopter, but it doesn't make them any less versatile.


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## plan_D (Jul 26, 2005)

Then every single aircraft and helicopter is versatile. Which would just waste the word "versatile".  

The F4F could be used in the roles of a fighter, which every fighter could do. The Chinook being able to do transport and heavy lifting doesn't make it versatile because it involves the exact same actions.


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## Nonskimmer (Jul 26, 2005)

All depends on how you choose to use that wonderful word "versatile" then I guess. 
It means basically _to have many uses_ or _ switching readily from one subject to another_, so I think it's use here is proper enough.

But what the hell do I know, I'm no English major.


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## evangilder (Jul 26, 2005)

Considering that in the Pacific in the early years, there was very little else that was up to the job, I would say the Wildcat performed very well.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 26, 2005)

Would this make it "VERSATILE"?!?


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## evangilder (Jul 26, 2005)

Probably, but it also makes it _ugly_!


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 26, 2005)




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## the lancaster kicks ass (Jul 26, 2005)

them roles don't make it versatile, almost any fighter can, with the addition of bombs, be a figher bomber, and it doesn't need much to be a recon aircraft...........


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 26, 2005)

And if it carried a gland-slam?

Just another F4F note....

In early 1941, Grumman began work on an ultra-long-range photo-reconnaissance version of the Wildcat. An F4F-4 was extensively modified to this configuration, with nonfolding "wet" wings and distinctive twin "tailpipes" that were actually used for dumping excess fuel to lighten the aircraft for carrier deck landings. A single camera was installed behind the cockpit, an autopilot was fitted for long missions, and the armament and gunsight were deleted. The first such "F4F-7" performed its first flight on 30 December 1941. 

The F4F-7 could carry a load of 2,596 liters (685 gallons) of fuel, giving the type a range of 5,950 kilometers (3,700 miles). A hundred were ordered but only 21 were delivered. In 1942, one flew across the US, coast to coast nonstop, in eleven hours. When the flight plan was filed, an Army air traffic controller called the Navy and said it looked as though there was a mistake. A Navy man replied: "The flight plan is correct. All Navy fighters have a 3,000 mile range." This was a record flight, but the F4F-7 was a secret and the record wasn't claimed. 

The F4F-7s served in the Solomons but the actual need for an extremely long range reconnaissance fighter was slight. Those F4F-7s that were delivered were used for spares hulks, with some possibly modified back to a fighter specification. 

There were trials in which Wildcats were towed by bombers such as the B-17 to give them longer range. These experiments were said to have worked out fairly well from a technical point of view but the scheme did not go into service. 

From: http://www.vectorsite.net/avwcat.html


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## the lancaster kicks ass (Jul 26, 2005)

that's quite a feat, but that doesn't make her versatile........


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 26, 2005)

Ok- that's it - She's going into "Pimp my ride." We'll see what Versitle is!


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## the lancaster kicks ass (Jul 26, 2005)




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## Nonskimmer (Jul 26, 2005)

*sigh*

You guys are hopeless.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 26, 2005)




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## mosquitoman (Jul 26, 2005)

If I wanted to shoot something down, I'd take the Hurricane
If I wanted to not get shot down I'd take the Wildcat


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 26, 2005)

mosquitoman said:


> If I wanted to shoot something down, I'd take the Hurricane
> If I wanted to not get shot down I'd take the Wildcat



Ok - the games begin - 173 Wildcats were lost in combat. 548 Hurricanes were lost in the BOB alone. Hurricane was a good aircraft, I'd take my chances in a Wildcat.  

http://www.csd.uwo.ca/~pettypi/elevon/gustin_military/strength.html


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## plan_D (Jul 27, 2005)

The Hurricane was largely out-numbered during the Battle of Britain and German aircraft were actually good. And they were Hurricane I in the BoB, not IIB. 

That's something a lot of people forget about the Battle of Britain, the numbers. When people rant about how the Luftwaffe was only beaten by superior numbers; the RAF had to deal with the same situation as the Luftwaffe. RAF interceptors were going up against formations 10-20 times their own size! 

No one could ever call the Spitfire or Hurricane poor planes due to those high losses because they were severely out-numbered, but I know some people still do.


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## the lancaster kicks ass (Jul 27, 2005)

yes to base your argument on loss figures for the most numerous british plane in the largest air battle of all time stikes me as a bit stupid.........


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 27, 2005)

Good point D - I'll go on to say that the Hurricane was some advantages over the F4F - Speed, manuevability and firepower. I think the Wildcat was more rugged, could absorb more damage, had a range advantage, and was more reliable with its radial engine


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## plan_D (Jul 27, 2005)

I'll agree with that.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 27, 2005)

But as for Mr. Mossie - I used to think about the F4F in the same light, well based on this thread, I'm a believer! \/


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## wmaxt (Jul 27, 2005)

FLYBOYJ said:


> But as for Mr. Mossie - I used to think about the F4F in the same light, well based on this thread, I'm a believer! \/



I'll agree too, if were talking a Hurricane with 20mm guns, otherwise I think I'll go with the Wildcat and it's .50s.

I think the P-40 Hawk series in the same light as the Wildcat/Hurricane none of these aircraft got the credit they deserved for their workhorse duties in the war. Their work allowed the flashier planes shine.

wmaxt


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## Jabberwocky (Jul 27, 2005)

Just to add some fuel to the fire, the Hurricane and the Wildcat actually carried out a mock dogfight in July, 1943.

Both sets of pilots had completed combat tours and the fight took place in England.

This is also shamelessly stolen from the IL2 Sturmovik forums, where the discussion was rehashed in much the same way (for about 10 pages). I know its plagurism of the worst sort, but hey, it helps with the discussion, right?


All the Fine Young Eagles by David L. Bashow
ISBN; 0-7737-2976-3

Page 248-9.

After a few rounds from the bar, a discussion developed regarding the merits of the Wildcat versus the Hurricane. It continued until the American issued a challenge they would have four Wildcats at Torbay the following morning. The tactics were simple. Four pairs, each consisting of a Wildcat and a Hurricane, would meet at an agreed upon altitude, in each of the four quadrants of the sky, North. West. South and East of the airport. They would meet, fly in formation for a minute or two, then break up and approach each other head on. From then on it was a straight dogfight, with each pilot trying to get on the other fellow's tail. Flight Commanders were not allowed to fly on either side. We were part of the large audience assembled on the ground to see the show. Everything went according to plan. The aircraft met, flew in formation for a minute or two, and then began dog fighting. In a couple of minutes there were four Hurricanes on the tails of four Wildcats, and they stayed there, to great applause and shouts from the audience below.

After landing, everyone adjourned to the hangar to hash over the situation. The Americans seemed completely nonplused by the turn of events. They could not understand how things could have turned out the way they had. It must have been some kind of aberration that could never happen again, so they issued another challenge for the following afternoon. This time, they announced. Flight Commanders could fly, so I decided to get in on the fun in Hurricane 5485. That afternoon the two readiness aircraft: equipped with depth charges**, were sitting on the tarmac. "Butch" Washburn and "Gibby" Gibbs were the readiness pilots that day and Butch said to me. "You know Bill, I think we can take on these buggers with those readiness aircraft." "Why not?" I replied ... "Have a go." We lined up a fourth pilot and the exercise was carried out all over again with four Hurricanes on the tails of four Wildcats once again. Butch Washburn was so keen that he stayed on the Wildcat's tail until it landed on the runway. The Americans were forced to admit that the Hurricane was the better aircraft. Even when it was ladened with depth charges. We had a party in the Mess that night with the Americans becoming more generous and more lavish with their praise as the evening wore on. According to some of them, if 128 Squadron, complete with aircraft and personnel. could suddenly be transported to the Pacific Theater, we would make short work of the Japanese Air Force. Yes, it was a great party ...

**OK so before you jump all over me that Hurricanes can't carry depth charges it was a local improvisation.

From the same book page. 245-46;

Flying at Torbay took on an operational atmosphere. The Cansos and Venturas were almost constantly on patrol, and they occasionally returned to base after encountering a German Submarine. These attacks bolstered everyone's morale.
Shortly after we reached Torbay, someone in our armament section devised a way to make bomb racks out of the angle iron used in the double bunks so familiar to all service personnel. The racks were okayed by Eastern Air Command Headquarters in Halifax, and for the rest of the time at Torbay we were able to carry a depth charge under each wing. Four of our Hurricanes were fitted with these racks, and two aircraft were kept on constant readiness. Also, with twelve machine guns on each aircraft, the Hurricanes constituted a very formidable weapon against an enemy submarine.

A British Major, an armament expert, arrived about this time from London. The purpose of his visit was to discuss with aircrew the latest tactics of German submarines. Instead of diving immediately on seeing a patrol aircraft, the subs were now armed with deck guns and were shooting back. Several patrol aircraft had been shot down. All available crew from the three Torbay squadrons were called together for a talk by the Major, who spent most of his time raving about the Hurricanes armed with depth charges that he had seen on the flight line. "In all my travels to squadrons around the worId," he said, "I have never seen such a deadly combination. The Number One aircraft could clear the deck of all living things with one burst from his twelve machine guns, and Number Two could drop his depth charges at leisure. It's marvelous!" After his talks, the Major visited our Squadron and talked with the pilots. He left an Air Ministry address with Squadron Leader Cannon, the CO, and made him promise to forward to him the results of any encounters a Hurricane might have with a German submarine. "No matter where I am in the world, I'll get the message." There was no message to pass on to the Major for two reasons. Firstly, we never did get to attack a German sub, and secondly, the same day as his visit, a Canso carrying the Major to Botwood, Newfoundland, crashed while landing on glassy water, killing everyone on board, including the Major."

So what does this mock combat prove?

Almost nothing.

It proves that on that day with those pilots in those specific planes that the Hurricane pilots won. That’s all it proves. It doesn’t prove that the USN pilots were inferior or that the Hurricane was superior. It means that on that day they got beat. That’s all, its anecdotal.


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## FLYBOYJ (Jul 27, 2005)

Good Stuff! I used to live close to Edwards AFB in California, I worked at Mojave Airport, about 30 miles to the north. During WW2 Edwards (then called Muroc) was a huge AAF base. Mojave was a Marine base. In 1943 there was a P-38 training squadron at Muroc and an F4F squadron at Mojave. Legend has it that these guys would battle it out over the windy skies of the "Antelope Valley" and sometimes the Wildcats won over the P-38s!


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## vanir (Jul 28, 2005)

Yeah, I'd still pick a Wildcat over a Hurricane, especially one of the early wooden-prop ones used at the start of the BoB.

Aside from cannon equipped jobs, it'd probably take a few hits and you could outdive the living hell out of 'em. In head to head squadron combat, I'm guessing you're going to take a few hits no matter what you're in.


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## plan_D (Jul 28, 2005)

Hawk-75s during Operation _Torch_ shot down a few Wildcats and they were equipped with six .30 cal. The Hurricane IIB has 12 .30 cal, I think it could destroy them quite effectively.


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## vanir (Jul 28, 2005)

Yeah but how many rounds did they have to put in 'em? Rumour of the PTO is Wildcats could take damage others would fall apart with.


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## plan_D (Jul 28, 2005)

The rugged but it was no Corsair or Thunderbolt, I reckon 12 .30 cal wouldn't have too much trouble. I don't know exactly how many rounds would have to hit the Wildcat but with an increase in RoF due to the massive amount of guns, it would increase chances of hitting a vital spot. 

On top of all that, the Hurricane isn't exactly weak. It could take a lot of punishment and get home.


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## Glider (Jul 28, 2005)

Last year we went to Newfoundland for our holiday and I read up on the Hurricane squadrons based thee. They also used to arm their planes with depth charges so great minds think alike.
Pity it wasn't taken up more widely


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## the lancaster kicks ass (Jul 28, 2005)

i don't know if these were just typos but a few people have said the Hurricance Mk.IIB was armed with .30s, they were actually .303s.........


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## plan_D (Jul 28, 2005)

.30s, .303s and 7.62 mm are all basically the same round. Stop being a pussy.


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## the lancaster kicks ass (Jul 28, 2005)

i'm just thinking that some people might come on here, take that information as fact and miss use it again and again.........


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## plan_D (Jul 28, 2005)

No because everyone knows it's .303 cal. Plus the fact, even if they did say .30 everyone would know what they're talking about since it's basically the same. 

In fact, it might even be the same but the Americans miss off the last three.


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## Jabberwocky (Aug 5, 2005)

From what I have read the Hurricane seems to have been more of a 'pilots aircraft'. It was small and light and very nimble, a real challenge but at the samwe time a joy to fly.

The Wildcat, on the other hand, seems o me to be a more effective team aircraft (or though that may be an aspect of the eventual tactics that were evolved for it) or maybe a machine that was simply designed for a war rather than combat. It was fairly heavy, very rugged, nicely armoured, could dive well and was more than adequately manuverable (although not compared to it Japanese opponents, who had a veritable mania for agile single seat fighters). 

Put these aircraft in a one-on-one situation and I would feel more confident in a Hurricane. Lighter, more agile in the horizontal and vertical and more heavily armed in later versions. As an offensive weapon in a classic dogfight its the superior aircraft.

Unfortunately, or maybe fortunately from another perspective, WW2 aviation didn't work like that. It was a TEAM effort. Co-operative tactics were a pre requisite for sucess. A one-on-one or even a four-on-four enccunter was unlikely. Usually there were DOZENS of fighters involved in engagements. Here is where the Wildcat, with its survivability and escapability, tends to come out on top.


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## FLYBOYJ (Aug 17, 2005)

Jabberwocky said:


> From what I have read the Hurricane seems to have been more of a 'pilots aircraft'. It was small and light and very nimble, a real challenge but at the samwe time a joy to fly.
> 
> The Wildcat, on the other hand, seems o me to be a more effective team aircraft (or though that may be an aspect of the eventual tactics that were evolved for it) or maybe a machine that was simply designed for a war rather than combat. It was fairly heavy, very rugged, nicely armoured, could dive well and was more than adequately manuverable (although not compared to it Japanese opponents, who had a veritable mania for agile single seat fighters).



I think this is a good way of putting it!


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## the lancaster kicks ass (Aug 18, 2005)

yes that's a good way to sum it up but i'd still pick the hurricane in a one-to-one..........


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## FLYBOYJ (Aug 18, 2005)

I'd take an F4F over a Mk I.


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## Graf (Aug 19, 2005)

As someone put it before, the F4F *is* a manueverable aircraft. Put up against the Zero however, everyything, even the nimble Spitfire will be put to shame. 

Having said that I would take the Wildcat over the IIB anyday. Of course the Hurri was and is a great fighter for its day but not many aircraft can withstand the punishment of those .50s.


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## the lancaster kicks ass (Aug 21, 2005)

FB said:


> I'd take an F4F over a Mk I.



as the title of this topic suggests, we're talking about the Mk.IIB



Graf said:


> the F4F is a manueverable aircraft



as is the hurricane........



> not many aircraft can withstand the punishment of those .50s



not many aircraft can withstand the punishment of 12 yes 12!!!!! .303s...........


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## plan_D (Aug 21, 2005)

If Hawk-75s with six .303cal can shoot down Wildcats then a Hurricane IIB with twelve .303cal wouldn't have too hard of a time.


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## FLYBOYJ (Aug 21, 2005)

the lancaster kicks ass said:


> FB said:
> 
> 
> > I'd take an F4F over a Mk I.
> ...



I know - that's why I stated it - I'd take a MkIIB over the F4F 8)


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## Jabberwocky (Aug 24, 2005)

Graf said:


> As someone put it before, the F4F *is* a manueverable aircraft. Put up against the Zero however, everyything, even the nimble Spitfire will be put to shame.
> 
> Having said that I would take the Wildcat over the IIB anyday. Of course the Hurri was and is a great fighter for its day but not many aircraft can withstand the punishment of those .50s.



Dont write off the Hurricane as any type of slug, Sir Sydney Camm knew what he was doing in the early 1930s (although, despite my love of it, we can forgive him just a little for the Typhoon). While the Hurrican may not outpace or outclimb the Spitfire, just because it didn't have those greyhound lines, doesn't mean that it wasn't very nimble. Sure the Wildcat was agile, but a Hurricane has it beat for manuverability in a fair fight.

Comparig it to is WW2 stablemate, the Hurricane had a better rate of role, better turning circle, faster turn and much lighter control requirements (pounds of stick force) than the Spitfire. Its still not quite in the Ki-27, Ki-43, A5M or A6M leauge, but then the Japanese did always had a mania for horizontal manuverability. Both the Wildcat and the Hurricane fell prey to the nimble Japanese birds.

Stick a Merlin XX (1850 hp at 21000 feet!) on a Hurricane, add a Bendix-Stromberg carburettor, reinforce the airframe, add a dozen .303s at 250 yards convergence, plumb in a 90 imp. gal. center line drop-tank and you have a very capable bird. Switch out the Merlin XX for a Merlin 24 or a 27 (1,640 hp at 3000 feet) and all of a sudden the Hurri loks very good at low alt as well.

I would argue that the Hurricane was the superior DEFENSIVE fighter of the pair. It operated as a interceptor far better than the Wildcat. It could climb to altitude faster, manuver better to close with its target and inflict significant damage when it got there.

The Wildcat was probably a superior OFFENSIVE weapon; greater range, carrier capable, heavier armament, an exellent team based airplane against foes who had trouble at higher altitudes.


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## FLYBOYJ (Aug 24, 2005)

Jabberwocky said:


> I would argue that the Hurricane was the superior DEFENSIVE fighter of the pair. It operated as a interceptor far better than the Wildcat. It could climb to altitude faster, manuver better to close with its target and inflict significant damage when it got there.
> 
> The Wildcat was probably a superior OFFENSIVE weapon; greater range, carrier capable, heavier armament, an exellent team based airplane against foes who had trouble at higher altitudes.



I think that sums it up!


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## Bernhart (Feb 22, 2007)

I have a book on hurricanes at home and there is a piece in there were pilots flying hurricanes out of halifax took on wildcats from a carrier that had docked there. They started flying towards each other at same hieght. evey instance hurricane got on the tail of the wildcats and wildcats couldn't shake them,


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## Jank (Feb 22, 2007)

"_I have a book on hurricanes at home and there is a piece in there were pilots flying hurricanes out of halifax took on wildcats from a carrier that had docked there. They started flying towards each other at same hieght. evey instance hurricane got on the tail of the wildcats and wildcats couldn't shake them_."

Really. 

Did the story also have a giant clown with pigs flying out of his butt?


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## Bernhart (Feb 22, 2007)

that's what I like about this forum, the intelligent postings and replies


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## Doodard (Jun 13, 2007)

DAVIDICUS said:


> I don't know how accurate the data is that I have presented for each aircraft. (Consider the source and whatever knowledge you can bring to bear)
> 
> So how would these two allies fare in a head to head dogfight?
> 
> ...


Hurricanes were more forgiving and when equipped with cannons were deadly. But useless for Arctic service. Wildcats - radial engines and better rate of climb for interceptions made from carriers. Large cockpits and not as responsive.


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## Glider (Jun 13, 2007)

Doodard said:


> Hurricanes were more forgiving and when equipped with cannons were deadly. But useless for Arctic service. Wildcats - radial engines and better rate of climb for interceptions made from carriers. Large cockpits and not as responsive.



Why usless for Arctic Service? We few them on escort for Russian Convoys and the Russians used thousands with a fair degree of success.

Granted they were not in the same league as the 109 F/G or the 190, but neither is a Wildcat.


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## Jabberwocky (Jun 14, 2007)

Jank said:


> "_I have a book on hurricanes at home and there is a piece in there were pilots flying hurricanes out of halifax took on wildcats from a carrier that had docked there. They started flying towards each other at same hieght. evey instance hurricane got on the tail of the wildcats and wildcats couldn't shake them_."
> 
> Really.
> 
> Did the story also have a giant clown with pigs flying out of his butt?




Read my post on the previous page....


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## MacArther (Jun 14, 2007)

F4F, and if possible, the F4F-3, because I'd need that extra ammo in case things got hairy and I had to "plow a path" to get back to a squad member or group. Sounds stupid, probably, but this is coming from someone who has no flight experience other than airliners and the air show I saw the other......something.


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## Bernhart (Jun 14, 2007)

opps missed that Jabberwocky my bad..


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## Freebird (Nov 12, 2007)

The Hurricane actually did quite well against the Zero in the early battles.


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## R Leonard (Nov 12, 2007)

Which was? Either? Both?

Define early days?

How many engagements?


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## FLYBOYJ (Nov 12, 2007)

freebird said:


> The Hurricane actually did quite well against the Zero in the early battles, better ratio than the Wildcat I think


Read "Bloody Shambles" Vol. I......


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## JoeB (Nov 12, 2007)

And vol 2, and on into vol 3 (the continutation of Shambles, titled "Air War for Burma")  . And compare to "The First Team" in 2 volumes by John Lundstrom, and "Guadalcanal" by Richard Frank for F4F actions told from both sides. Thestatement that Hurricane fared better in 1942 is quite the wrong way around almost no matter how you define or qualify it. 

Wildcats weren't encountering enemy fighter much in Jan-April '42 when Hurricanes were being consistently beaten, mainly by Japanese Army Type 1's (Oscar) and Type 97's (Nate), planes at least slightly and considerably, respectively, inferior to the Zero. There were only a few outright Hurricane v Zero air combats, all those documented on both sides in Shambles were disasters for the Hurricanes (I counted 33 Hurricanes and 6 other Brit types lost v 5-6 Zeroes in three combats involving Hurricanes, one over Singapore in January and two over Ceylon in April, one over Surabaya isn't documented on the Japanese side in that book and neither side's claims were reliable enough to conclude anything based on one sided accounting). But again the number of Hurricane v Type 1 combats was considerably more, and results also consistently against the Hurricanes, if not quite as badly. 

By the time F4F's and Zeroes encountered one another May, action for the RAF in Far East had died down: the Japanese had conquered everything they immediately planned to, and it was just a relatively quiet Burma-India front, again JAAF facing Hurricanes. But the F4F fought the Zero to an almost exact standsill from the get go. Lundstrom found 10 F4F's downed by Zeroes and 14 Zeroes by F4F's at Coral Sea and Midway. Frank's numbers for G'canal campaign to November 15 are more complete though don't absolutely separate pure F4F v Zero combat. But Zero air combat losses in that period were 115, F4F 101, and the great majority of each was at the hands of the other, so again closely matched, a very different story from the Hurricane's 1942 Pacific career v the Type 1 and to a lesser extent the Zero.

Joe


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## R Leonard (Nov 12, 2007)

Geez, you guys take all the fun out of it


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## Glider (Nov 13, 2007)

There is little doubt that the Wildcat had a better record against the Japenese but the tactics used had a major impact on the results, the British being woeful in the early years.
It should be remembered that the Hurricane held its own until late in 1944 against the Japanese in its IIc version so I wouldn't get to hung up on the first combat results bad as they were.


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## JoeB (Nov 13, 2007)

Glider said:


> There is little doubt that the Wildcat had a better record against the Japenese but the tactics used had a major impact on the results, the British being woeful in the early years.
> It should be remembered that the Hurricane held its own until late in 1944 against the Japanese in its IIc version so I wouldn't get to hung up on the first combat results bad as they were.


The all purpose explanation, tactics. Operational results make no difference. Any that don't jibe with what we think or want to think about a plane based on its paper stats or its legendary reputation (often based on overstated wartime claims) just disappear, poof! it was all tactics. 

F4F units in 1942 were demonstrably much more effective against the Japanese than Hurricane units. Anything beyond that which tries to bucket it by 'plane' v 'tactics' tends to be unbacked assertion, or more legend. The F4F units didn't generally use specialized anti-Zero tactics in 1942, and as far as 'boom and zoom' that's what the Zeroes tried to do too, especially by later in 1942. Everybody wanted the altitude/energy advantage in a fight. 

Later on in Burma Hurricanes fought alongside more effective Allied types; the Allies had overwhelming numbers (which the Japanese didn't have, strategically speaking, in 1942, they did tend to concentrate their numbers more effectively than the Allies did early in the war); it was strictly the JAAF never actual Zeroes, and the Hurricane results per two sided accounts, not their own claims, were still not very impressive anyway. I wouldn't get too hung up on that period.  Read "Air War for Burma". 

And in any case then we'd have to consider the FM-2's air combat record in 1944-45 which was phenomenal; it can't be comprehensively calculated in terms of actual results, but hardly any FM's were lost in fighter combat while being credited with dozens of enemy fighters; and there's a two side documented case of FM's routing a force of Type 4's (Frank) and Type 3's (Tony) without loss, types never faced by Hurricanes. But we're changing the subject in two directions really. 1942 combats were very important, because that was when the Allies had any real chance of losing or negotiating a peace with Japan, and the Hurricane was a much less effective fighter than the F4F then, for whatever combination of reasons, the relative importance of each factor would never be proven.

Joe


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## Freebird (Nov 13, 2007)

JoeB said:


> And vol 2, and on into vol 3 (the continutation of Shambles, titled "Air War for Burma")  . And compare to "The First Team" in 2 volumes by John Lundstrom, and "Guadalcanal" by Richard Frank for F4F actions told from both sides. Thestatement that Hurricane fared better in 1942 is quite the wrong way around almost no matter how you define or qualify it.
> 
> Wildcats weren't encountering enemy fighter much in Jan-April '42 when Hurricanes were being consistently beaten, mainly by Japanese Army Type 1's (Oscar) and Type 97's (Nate), planes at least slightly and considerably, respectively, inferior to the Zero. There were only a few outright Hurricane v Zero air combats, all those documented on both sides in Shambles were disasters for the Hurricanes (I counted 33 Hurricanes and 6 other Brit types lost v 5-6 Zeroes in three combats involving Hurricanes, one over Singapore in January and two over Ceylon in April, one over Surabaya isn't documented on the Japanese side in that book and neither side's claims were reliable enough to conclude anything based on one sided accounting). But again the number of Hurricane v Type 1 combats was considerably more, and results also consistently against the Hurricanes, if not quite as badly.
> 
> ...



Obviously the British were badly outnumbered and were using outdated equipment in early '42, so it would be hard to see how they could "win" air battles, when outnumbered. The point was not to "win" air battle by kill ratio, it was the effect that it had on the war. The main Zero vs. Hurricane engagement in early '42 were the engagements over Ceylon. The Japanese were trying to destroy the port other infrastructure. The two engagements over Ceylon were not strictly Zero vs. Hurri, because the Hurri's were trying to down Jap bombers, not only the Zero's. From what I can tell were about 40 - 50 Hurri's in Colombo, Ceylon _(some taken from the Hermes, with disasterous results for the unprotected carrier) _ and it was attacked on April 5 '42 by about 80 (carrier) dive-bombers with about 60 fighters escorting. There were 21 Japanese planes shot down, vs. 19 Hurricanes. (6 Swordfish TB's were also destroyed) The second attack on the 6th by 54 bombers, with approx equal # of fighter escort. 15 japanese planes were shot down, vs. 11 Hurricanes. 
Partly because of this battle, (40 Japanese aircraft shot down + many damaged) and with the Allied resistance stiffening, the Japanese decided to withdraw from the Indian Ocean, the carriers went back to Japan to replace losses. If however, they had managed to wipe out most of the RAF FAA fighters on the ground (as happened in Pearl, Phillipines, Poland, Russia etc.) or if they had destroyed all the defending fighters with minimal losses, they might have made further inroads in the Indian Ocean. 

Quoted from W. Churchill "The Turn of the Tide"
_"The Japanese were making a raid and a demonstration. If, of course they had found Ceylon unprepared and devoid of air defence they might have converted their reconnaissance in force into a major operation. They might have encountered the British fleet and inflicted a severe defeat on it. If this had happened, no one could set limits on their potential action. The stubborn resistance encountered at Colombo (Ceylon) convinced the Japanese that further prizes would be dearly bought. The losses that they had suffered in aircraft convinced them that they had come in contact with bone"_


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## Glider (Nov 13, 2007)

You may want to read what I wrote before sounding off. Let me take you through it a bit at a time
_There is little doubt that the Wildcat had a better record against the Japenese _
I dont think you can disagree with this
_but the tactics used had a major impact on the results, the British being woeful in the early years._
There is no doubt that the Britsh tactics were dreadful in the early war years and there is no doubt that this had a lot to do with their losses. Trying to dogfight a Jap plane was suicide, not using what speed advantage you had, was stupidity itself and sticking to flights of three totally obsolete. 
However lessons were learnt, leading to my next part.
_It should be remembered that the Hurricane held its own until late in 1944 against the Japanese in its IIc version _
Notice, held its own, not more than or better than, just held its own against the Japanese, no more, no less.
Now the last part of my posting
_so I wouldn't get to hung up on the first combat results bad as they were_
A simple reminder that the plane was better than the first results would indicate.

Nowhere did I say or mention or claim that the Hurricane was better than the Japanese it faced or was more effective than the F4.


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## JoeB (Nov 13, 2007)

freebird said:


> April 5 '42 by about 80 (carrier) dive-bombers with about 60 fighters escorting. There were 21 Japanese planes shot down, vs. 19 Hurricanes. (6 Swordfish TB's were also destroyed) The second attack on the 6th by 54 bombers, with approx equal # of fighter escort. 15 japanese planes were shot down, vs. 11 Hurricanes.


Again, read "Bloody Shambles". The Japanese losses you quote are what the British claimed at the time, not what the Japanese lost.
In the Apr 5 raid the British also lost 4 Fulmars (fighters, albeit very weak ones) and 19 Hurricanes, besides the 6 Swordfish, a PBY and an Albacore. The Japanese actually lost 1 Zero and 6 Type 99 Carrier Bombers ('Val'), latter not all necessarily downed by British fighters, AA made claims too.

On April 9 (not 6th), 8 Hurricanes were downed (3 others damaged) v 3 Zeroes, plus 2 Type 97 Carrier Attack Planes ('Kate'), but one of the Zeroes was apparently hit by AA while strafing, suicide crashing into a Royal Marines AA emplacement.

One of the other two known combats between Zeroes and Hurricanes is recorded from both sides: 9 Zeroes from the 22nd Air Flotilla were escorting bombers over Singapore Jan 22 when engaged by a slightly superior number of Hurricanes. The Hurricanes downed 1 Type 96 Land Attack Bomber ('Nell) and 2 Zeroes for 5 losses; Buffaloes then attacked and lost 2 for no result.

But you're ignoring the fact that Hurricanes engaged Japanese Army Type 1's and Type 97's, planes inferior to the Zero, in a fairly large number of combats from January to April 1942 with also consistently poor results. That seriously undercuts any argument that the Zero engagements were a fluke. 

In these details we've added non-fighter targets; the F4F's ratio was far above 1:1 if including non-fighters. But fighter forces that couldn't cope with enemy fighters were attrited down to nothing pretty quickly, after which they couldn't accomplish anything against any other target. So fighter-fighter ratio was in fact an important indicator of fighter effectiveness.

Also before the subject gets further diffused or changed, I think you should take a line in next post to just admit your original categorical statement was wrong.

Joe


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## fer-de-lance (Nov 13, 2007)

Problem with the Ceylon accounting is that IJN records admit to a much smaller number of losses. Less than half of the forty claimed by the British were actually lost. 

On April 5th JNAF losses were only one Zero-sen and 6 Type 99 Kanbaku (Vals), not the 18 or 21 claimed. 

During the April 9th strike on Tricomalee, JNAF losses were 3 Zero-sen, 4 Type 99 Kanbaku (Vals) and 2 Type 97 Kanko (Kates).

This is what Joe referred to earlier as the unreliability of "one-sided accounting". Both sides overclaim and only the admitted losses can be relied upon to be closer to the truth. (Even then, crashed on landing and aircraft written off due to damage are sometimes left off the "losses" column).

In the eyes of Nagumo and his pilots, there was no effective opposition. Somerville was high-tailing it to Mombasa and everything worth attacking had been sunk or destroyed. THAT was the reason the First Carrier Striking Force left. I'm afraid the "stubborn resistance encountered at Ceylon" was only in the mind of Winnie and not Chuichi. 

Hate to say it, but the Senior Service and, for that matter, the "crab blue cladded bunch" didn't exactly wrapped themselves in glory during this campaign. 

Have to hand it to Somerville, he did the right thing to avoid certain destruction of the two carriers. HMS Indomitable and Formidable lived to fight another day when they could be equipped with "proper" carrier aircraft like .... eh .... the ones made by Grumman.  

Ironic, isn't it that the FAA 880 Sq Sea Hurricanes on HMS Indomitable were replaced in April 1942 by the 806 Sq equipped with ... Grumman Martlets (Wildcats in RN parlance).


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## pbfoot (Nov 13, 2007)

fer-de-lance said:


> .
> 
> Hate to say it, but the Senior Service and, for that matter, the "crab blue cladded bunch" didn't exactly wrapped themselves in glory during this campaign.
> 
> ...


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## Freebird (Nov 13, 2007)

JoeB said:


> Again, read "Bloody Shambles". The Japanese losses you quote are what the British claimed at the time, not what the Japanese lost.
> In the Apr 5 raid the British also lost 4 Fulmars (fighters, albeit very weak ones) and 19 Hurricanes, besides the 6 Swordfish, a PBY and an Albacore. The Japanese actually lost 1 Zero and 6 Type 99 Carrier Bombers ('Val'), latter not all necessarily downed by British fighters, AA made claims too.
> 
> On April 9 (not 6th), 8 Hurricanes were downed (3 others damaged) v 3 Zeroes, plus 2 Type 97 Carrier Attack Planes ('Kate'), but one of the Zeroes was apparently hit by AA while strafing, suicide crashing into a Royal Marines AA emplacement.
> ...


Perhaps you are right about that.
I don't really know enough about the early Wildcat battles, so how well did they fare in combat prior to Midway?

Well as for the Hurri I was going by the numbers of losses, if the actual # was closer to what you claimed then it does not look nearly as good (to put it mildly). 

As fer-de-lance points out there were inaccurate accounts both + -, so if the planes were badly damaged in combat but crashed on landing it was not always counted. How many planes made it back but were written off I wonder?


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## fer-de-lance (Nov 14, 2007)

pbfoot said:


> fer-de-lance said:
> 
> 
> > .
> ...



Yes, any Canso driver who can keep the Hiryu's CAP at bay for seven minutes so that the radioman can get out a contact report deserves his One Boiled Egg ... 

Well, out of the 300 JNAF aircraft, there would be about a third in a raid with 30-odd Zero-sen escorting. All the rest are Vals and Kates ... That's a "target-rich environment ... not bad odds. 

As for Wildcats, sure they played against similar odds (proportionately) .. VMF-211 at Wake Island ... VMF-212 at Henderson vs 25th Kokutai Sentai at Rabaul.


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## pbfoot (Nov 14, 2007)

Wake Island would be comparable to the Glads in Malta, but did not the F4F usually have the advantage of height in Guadaulcanal when facing the Zeros as opposed to the Hurricanes which were surprised to find the Japanese over Ceylon and were attacking from below.
Quote from my source on previous post which indicates the Brits had totally undermestitated the range at which IJN aircraft could operate something the Wildcats in Guadualcanal were aware of 4 months later
" Instead of the tactical advantage of having the
defending fighters awaiting the Japanese from above, it
was now the Japanese who held the advantage of height.
And the defenders suffered accordingly. Almost half
the defending force – four Fulmars and 15 Hurricanes – was
shot down, as were six Fairey Swordfish torpedo aircraft
of 788 Squadron, which arrived on the scene from
Trincomalee. In fact, the Swordfish, certain that any
fighters over Colombo must be friendly, flashed recognition
signals to identify themselves as British as the Zeros
approached."


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## JoeB (Nov 14, 2007)

pbfoot said:


> Wake Island would be comparable to the Glads in Malta, but did not the F4F usually have the advantage of height in Guadaulcanal when facing the Zeros as opposed to the Hurricanes which were surprised to find the Japanese over Ceylon and were attacking from below.


Again let's not focus entirely on Ceylon for Hurricanes, because there are a fair number of other examples. In Jan-April '42, when fighting greatly died down on British fronts v Japanese, the Hurricane results, as given in Bloody Shambles combat by combat as I count, fighter to fighter:
Zeroes: 2 combats over Ceylon, 27 Hurricanes lost for 3 Zeroes
Zeroes: 3 other combats with both sides known: 8 Hurricanes 3 Zeroes
Type 1's: 12 combats, 20 Hurricanes, 4 Type 1's
Type 97's: 9 combats, 8 Hurricanes, 5-6 Type 97's
1 Hurricane was lost in a combat with either Type 1's or Zeroes w/ no J loss, and 7 in combats where the Japanese side is not given. A few were Dutch Hurricanes, and a few combats were along with the AVG but only one has a real claim overlap, that's 5 v 6 Type 97's.

So the Hurricane combat effectiveness problem v the Japanese in the early campaigns was not a fluke of one situation. The Hurricanes were not outnumbered and surprised in every one of the 26 two-side documented combats, not nearly, but came out on the short end of all of them, except 2 combats v. Type 97's.

In the set piece interceptions over G'canal by F4F's, of Type 1 Land Attack Planes ('Betty') escorted by Zeroes, F4F's often had altitude advantage, but sometimes didn't. Plus, not all combats over G'canal involving land based planes in 1942 were those set pieces. Some were battles over convoys or carrier based planes of one side v landbased ones of the other, which occured at lower altitude. And a significant % were carrier fighters on both sides. At Coral Sea and Midway as already mentioned Lundstrom found the score between carrier based fighters was 14 (Zeroes, plus 2 Type 96's) v 10 carrier based F4F's. The numbers for Eastern Solomons and Santa Cruz are included above in Frank's numbers for all G'canal thru Nov 15 1942, but the carrier Zeroes did a bit better in the second two carrier battles. But overall the exchange in actions between carrier fighters was also around 1:1, where there was no tendency for altitude advantage on either side, and a general numerical advantage for the Japanese.

I suggest reading the references given above, count up and consider in their totality all the combats, and then see if a plausible case can be made that the Hurricane v F4F effectiveness difference can easily be explained by one factor like tactical situation. I don't see how.

Joe


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## JoeB (Nov 14, 2007)

pbfoot said:


> Wake Island would be comparable to the Glads in Malta, but did not the F4F usually have the advantage of height in Guadaulcanal when facing the Zeros as opposed to the Hurricanes which were surprised to find the Japanese over Ceylon and were attacking from below.


Again let's not focus entirely on Ceylon for Hurricanes, because there are a fair number of other examples. In Jan-April '42, when fighting greatly died down on British fronts v Japanese, the Hurricane results, as given in Bloody Shambles combat by combat as I count, fighter to fighter:
Zeroes: 2 combats over Ceylon, 27 Hurricanes lost for 3 Zeroes
Zeroes: 3 other combats with both sides known: 8 Hurricanes 3 Zeroes
Type 1's: 12 combats, 20 Hurricanes, 4 Type 1's
Type 97's: 9 combats, 8 Hurricanes, 5-6 Type 97's
1 Hurricane was lost in a combat with either Type 1's or Zeroes w/ no J loss, and 7 in combats where the Japanese side is not given. A few were Dutch Hurricanes, and a few combats were along with the AVG but only one has a real claim overlap, that's 5 v 6 Type 97's.

So the Hurricane combat effectiveness problem v the Japanese in the early campaigns was not a fluke of one situation. The Hurricanes were not outnumbered and surprised in every one of the 26 two-side documented combats, not nearly, but came out on the short end of all of them, except 2 combats v. Type 97's.

In the set piece interceptions over G'canal by F4F's, of Type 1 Land Attack Planes ('Betty') escorted by Zeroes, F4F's often had altitude advantage, but sometimes didn't. Plus, not all combats over G'canal involving land based planes in 1942 were those set pieces. Some were battles over convoys or carrier based planes of one side v landbased ones of the other, which occured at lower altitude. And a significant % were carrier fighters on both sides. At Coral Sea and Midway as already mentioned Lundstrom found the score between carrier based fighters was 14 (Zeroes, plus 2 Type 96's) v 10 carrier based F4F's. The numbers for Eastern Solomons and Santa Cruz are included above in Frank's numbers for all G'canal thru Nov 15 1942, but the carrier Zeroes did a bit better in the second two carrier battles. But overall the exchange in actions between carrier fighters was also around 1:1, where there was no tendency for altitude advantage on either side, and a general numerical advantage for the Japanese.

I suggest reading the references given above, count up and consider in their totality all the combats, and then see if a plausible case can be made that the Hurricane v F4F effectiveness difference can easily be explained by one factor like tactical situation. I don't see how.

Joe


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## pbfoot (Nov 14, 2007)

Most of these losses occured early on in the conflict during the first 4 months what were the losses like later in the conflict . Every allied aircraft was taking a beating including the Spitfire over Darwin are we to assume because the Spit was clobbered by Zeros the Wildcat was better then it or can we assume tactics changed to focus on the strong points of the aircraft.


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## HoHun (Nov 14, 2007)

Hi Joe,

>The Hurricanes were not outnumbered and surprised in every one of the 26 two-side documented combats, not nearly, but came out on the short end of all of them, except 2 combats v. Type 97's.

Thanks for the great summary!

>I suggest reading the references given above, count up and consider in their totality all the combats, and then see if a plausible case can be made that the Hurricane v F4F effectiveness difference can easily be explained by one factor like tactical situation. I don't see how.

I believe the decisive factor is not the tactical situation, but rather the tactical doctrine.

I believe one might add that the tactical properties of a fighter aircraft include one important aspect easily forgotten in hindsight, it's "mystery factor" - the degree to which its tactical abilities are unknown to the enemy.

If a fighter pilot is not aware of the strength and weaknesses of the enemy aircraft compared to those of his own, he might fail to use the strengths of his own aircraft properly. In my opinion, that's why the Hurricanes lost against the Zeros though technically, the British fighter might well have been superior.

"Hurricane over the Jungle" by Terence Kelly contains an interesting account of Hurricane operations from Tjillitan on Java with 605 Squadron. On receiving a radio warning of an impeding attack, they usually scrambled a handful of fighters that climbed to 34000 ft, where the Hurricane would barely fly but where they never encountered a Zero. When they spotted the enemy formation below, each pilot would make a diving pass when he judged he was in a good position, diving at one enemy aircraft, then through the enemy formation and on to escape. Apparently, it was very hard to hit, and to find out whether one had hit, and according to Kelly 605 squadron didn't file any claims (partially because there was no-one to accept the claims anyway).

However, I consider this account interesting because it illustrates that even the Hurricane did have strengths that could be employed tactically, even when badly outnumered.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## JoeB (Nov 14, 2007)

pbfoot said:


> Every allied aircraft was taking a beating including the Spitfire over Darwin are we to assume because the Spit was clobbered by Zeros the Wildcat was better then it or can we assume tactics changed to focus on the strong points of the aircraft.


The F4F never took a sustained beating in fighter combat. It did in some particular combats of course, but not in any period of months as Hurricanes did in 1942, and yes as Spitfire V's did defending Darwin in 1943. They did about as poorly as Hurricanes did v Zeroes and Type 1's in 1942, worse in fact than P-40's had done in 1942 performing the same mission in the same place v the same Japanese Navy fighter unit, not even just the same type of plane (the 3rd Air Group had been renamed 202nd Air Group by 1943); the P-40 result had been about 1:2 in favor of the Zeroes. Also we can note that AVG P-40's cumulatively to end June '42 had a ratio of ~3:1 in their favor against both Type 97's and Type 1's; to compare to the Hurricane results.

Tactics would certainly be *one thing* to look at, but if possible in a substantive way, not just as some fudge factor along the lines of: "results don't jibe with our preconceptions, must be 'tactics'". And then preconceptions about the airplanes should also be reconsidered; as well as general preconception about how to measure them, for example that stuff like max speed and climb rate strongly dictated fighter v fighter combat success; did they actually? An F4F could turn better than either of the British planes (or the P-40) and an F4F pilot could track a target in deflection a lot better looking down the plane's stubby nose. Perhaps those were more important plane performance factors than we assume, against such opponents as Zero and Type 1. I don't know that the F4F was really inferior to the Spit V as fighter v fighter combat machine against a plane like the Zero or Type 1. The actual 1943 would seem to undercut any clear certainty about that. 

But I don't believe 'plane' and 'pilot' and 'other' factors can necessarily be neatly separated. I started responding to a flat statement that the Hurricane did well v Japanese fighters 'early', and better 'it was thought' than the F4F; that at least is clearly not so.

Joe


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## pbfoot (Nov 14, 2007)

What I was trying to infer was the tactics in early 42 were probably changed a great deal in a few months . the learning curve was steep and by the time Guadaulcanal rolled around a consensus on how to use the tools at hand was formed . It was a different type of flying from the ETO where the RAF learned its craft also the hard way. How would of the F4F done in Malta I'll wager not well


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## JoeB (Nov 14, 2007)

pbfoot said:


> What I was trying to infer was the tactics in early 42 were probably changed a great deal in a few months . the learning curve was steep and by the time Guadaulcanal rolled around a consensus on how to use the tools at hand was formed . It was a different type of flying from the ETO where the RAF learned its craft also the hard way. How would of the F4F done in Malta I'll wager not well


That's what I was also trying to imply, you simply assume that because the results don't meet your preconceptions and/or simple paper stats comparison.

But was there in fact a lot of inter-air arm consultation about tactics among say between RAF, KNIL air corps, USAAF and the USN between early and mid 1942? no. What the USN knew from the early battles from the other air arms was this was a tough opponent, that's about it. James Thach invented his 'weave' (aka Beam Defence Manuever, unique USN tactic) in part based on reports about the Zero from China in 1941. He used it in his division (of 4 a/c) at Midway (with success confirmed in J accounts), but it wasn't std in this period. And specific anti-Zero tactics also were influenced by tests of the Zero recovered in the Aleutians in July, but restoring it, testing it and issuing reports also wasn't done until the end of the period (stats for F4F's were to Nov 15 '42). 

So that's my point, if we look at tactics development substantively and historically, not as a fudge factor where we just assume stuff, a combined-Allied tactics learning curve explanation over a few months in 1942 becomes a less than compelling explanation. Less so still considering the Spit debacle in 1943.

I don't know about F4F's at Malta, I wonder if you're considering actual Hurricane/Spit results there or claimed ones, the Hurricane in particular was no stranger to being on the short end of exchange ratio's in fighter combat, but that's too much of a tangent. For the Pacific we have actual comparisons against the same opponents in the same general time period suggesting at least a reasonable possiblity that intangible performance factors rendered the Hurricane (and perhaps Spitfire V) considerably less formidable than it looked on paper, as compared to the F4F, against those kind of opponents.

Joe


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## slaterat (Feb 25, 2008)

A quick flip through Ospreys "Hurricane Aces 1941-45" would seem to indicate that the Hurri did far better than the stats posted above. Jack Storey and Frank Carey shot down 7 nates just by themselves in that time period. 

The initial deployment of Hurricanes in January 1942 to Burma amounted to 30 hurricanes MK IIa s and some Mk Is, split between 3 squadrons. Not much of a force really. In almost all of these combats the Hurricanes being on the defensive ,without radar were consistantly outnumbered and still climbing when combat occurred. They never stood a chance in Ceylon. In Burma though they did much better giving as good as they got, though still heavily outnumbered.

If you take look at one of their few offensive actions such as the raid on the Japanese airbase at Magwe on March 23 1942, a force of 9 Blenheims and 10 Hurricanes destroyed 16 Sallys on the ground and 11 Oscars in the air, 9 by Hurricanes. This for the loss of 2 hurris and 2 blens.

In many of the accounts I have read , the RAF pilots consider the Hurricane an even match for the oscar or the zero. Terence Kellys books , Hurricanes over the Jungle, Hurricane and Spitfire Pilots at War and The 9 Lives of a Fighter Pilot are all good reads on this subject.

Slaterat


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## HoHun (Feb 25, 2008)

Hi Slaterat,

>In many of the accounts I have read , the RAF pilots consider the Hurricane an even match for the oscar or the zero. Terence Kellys books , Hurricanes over the Jungle, Hurricane and Spitfire Pilots at War and The 9 Lives of a Fighter Pilot are all good reads on this subject.

I liked Kelly's books quite well, too 

With regard to the Hurricane, a performance comparison below ... no reason for the Hurricane pilot not to be confident!

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## Elvis (Feb 25, 2008)

I didn't read through the entire thread, but I gotta wonder about this one.
In a slow speed turning battle, I wonder if the Hurricane wouldn't have an advantage, if for no other reason than its very thick wing.

I remember receiving an issue of Popular Mechaincs as a kid and there was an article in there about a guy who built his own Hurricane (1/2 or 3/8 scale, I believe).
When asked why a Hurricane over the more popular Spitfire, he stated that the thick wing was easier to build in the scaled down mode he was working in.

I'm thinking that, although the wing does taper down quite a bit as you go out from root to tip, there may be enough of the "thick area" to improve low speed handling, over a more common wing that would've been fitted to any a/c of the day.

Also, is it just me or does the top speed listed for the Hurricane seem a little high?
342mph?
Seems I see speeds in the 325-335 mph range more common for the Hurricane.
Maybe it's just that particular version.

...so which one would I pick?

1/2 metal - 1/2 wood cloth  ... or ...  *A Flying Tank*? 

I'll take the tank, in "dash 3" varient, please.
If I can't outmanuver him, I will at least be in a more robust machine.




Elvis


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## HoHun (Feb 25, 2008)

Hi Elvis,

>In a slow speed turning battle, I wonder if the Hurricane wouldn't have an advantage, if for no other reason than its very thick wing.

I had a short look at the numbers, and while I don't have exact data on either type's wing, my guess is that the Hurricane was too heavy to compete with the much lighter A6M2 when it came to turning (despite the Hurricane II's greater power).

>When asked why a Hurricane over the more popular Spitfire, he stated that the thick wing was easier to build in the scaled down mode he was working in.

It probably flies better, too - aerodynamics don't scale well 

>Also, is it just me or does the top speed listed for the Hurricane seem a little high?
>342mph?
>Seems I see speeds in the 325-335 mph range more common for the Hurricane.

Quite possible - note that the Hurricane II in my diagram uses fairly high boost pressures that weren't cleared yet when the type first came out.

Additionally, the RAF first selected one set of figures as representative for the Hurricane, then revised these figures to read somewhat higher later. If you rely on the earlier version of the test documents, you'll end up with slightly lower figures.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## Jerry W. Loper (Feb 25, 2008)

Elvis said:


> I didn't read through the entire thread, but I gotta wonder about this one.
> In a slow speed turning battle, I wonder if the Hurricane wouldn't have an advantage, if for no other reason than its very thick wing.
> 
> I remember receiving an issue of Popular Mechaincs as a kid and there was an article in there about a guy who built his own Hurricane (1/2 or 3/8 scale, I believe).
> ...



I'm at work and away from my books, but I'm pretty sure the max speeds I've seen listed for the Hurricane II are:
Hurricane II prototype - 348 mph
IIa - 342 mph (armament 8 x .303-cal.)
IIb - 339 mph (armament 12 x .303-cal.)
IIc - 336 mph (armament 4 x 20-mm.)
IId - 286 mph (of course the big drop is because of the 40-mm armament)

P.S. The very fastest speed I've ever seen listed for a Hurricane is an estimated 350 mph for photo-recon Hurricanes in North Africa that were stripped of armament.


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## renrich (Feb 25, 2008)

JoeB, I am a fan of Lundstrom also. Don't believe I have ever seen any books as well researched and authoritative as his are. In the discussion youall are having about the records of the F4F and Hurricane against the Japanese I believe one edge the Wildcat would have would be the ruggedness of the AC versus the Hurricane, especially the radial engine. You also might recall the Lundstrom mention of the "pin cushion' tactics of the Wildcat pilots. The other factor I would not discount is that of the skill and training of the USN and USMC pilots. In a word, on average, I think they were better trained, particularly in aerial gunnery than the Commonwealth pilots and for that matter the AAF pilots in the early days of the Pacific campaign. One last comment, to get in a slow turning fight with a Zero, in any Allied plane was a poor idea.


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## pbfoot (Feb 25, 2008)

renrich said:


> , I think they were better trained, particularly in aerial gunnery than the Commonwealth pilots and for that matter the AAF pilots in the early days of the Pacific campaign. .


I don't know what your basing this on . Are they smarter , did the US have a better training syllabus . I have a tough time swallowing this


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## HoHun (Feb 26, 2008)

Hi Jerry,

>I'm at work and away from my books, but I'm pretty sure the max speeds I've seen listed for the Hurricane II are:
>Hurricane II prototype - 348 mph

Are the boost pressures listed in your books? I don't think the prototype would be using the +14 lbs/sqin boost setting that was only cleared later in the war. The boost pressure uncertainty makes it difficult to learn something from the figures you posted ...

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## HoHun (Feb 26, 2008)

Hi Renrich,

>You also might recall the Lundstrom mention of the "pin cushion' tactics of the Wildcat pilots. 

Hm, what are the "pin cushion" tactics? I believe I haven't heard of that move before ...

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## Elvis (Feb 26, 2008)

Jerry Loper HoHun,

I stand corrected on the speed of the Hurricane.
Thanks for the info.

--------------------------------------

HoHun,

Why did you bring up the Zero fighter plane in response to my post?

My post concerned the Hurri vs. Wildcat, as per the originating post in this thread.
I would think any airplane would be at a disadvantage dogfighting a Zero.

...hmmm, maybe I should've quoted the author. 

Sorry for any confusion. I wasn't referring to Hurricane vs. Zero, I was referring to Hurricane Vs. Wildcat.




Elvis


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## renrich (Feb 26, 2008)

PB, I was not casting aspersions on Commonwealth pilots. Obviously intelligence on all sides was probably equal on average although American pilots at that time were more likely to have mechanical experience such as driving a car or tractor because of cultural differences. However, by definition, a Navy or Marine pilot qualified for carrier operations has to have more training than a land based pilot. Also the USN was the only service on either side at that time that concentrated on teaching deflection shooting. The amount of time spent on gunnery instruction for USN pilots was probably well in excess of that type of training in other services. The "pin cushion" tactic is referred to on page 536 of Lundstrom's "The First Team and the Guadalcanal Campaign."


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## HoHun (Feb 26, 2008)

Hi Elvis,

>Why did you bring up the Zero fighter plane in response to my post?

Sorry, misunderstanding on my part!

>My post concerned the Hurri vs. Wildcat, as per the originating post in this thread.

With regard to that comparison, I think you are absolutely right - the Hurricane would easily outturn the F4F. 

The Hurricane is characterized by a a better power loading and a better wing loading, lower parasitic drag and - not to forget! - features a propeller of much larger diameter, which is more effective at producing thrust at low speeds.

I think the story quoted in post #76 in this thread (link below - hope it works this time) about Hurricanes out-turning Wildcats on a consistent basis is entirely credible:

http://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/av...s-grumman-f4f-4-wildcat-1550-2.html#post88018

(Just in case you haven't read it yet 

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## JoeB (Feb 26, 2008)

slaterat said:


> A quick flip through Ospreys "Hurricane Aces 1941-45" would seem to indicate that the Hurri did far better than the stats posted above. Jack Storey and Frank Carey shot down 7 nates just by themselves in that time period.
> 
> If you take look at one of their few offensive actions such as the raid on the Japanese airbase at Magwe on March 23 1942, a force of 9 Blenheims and 10 Hurricanes destroyed 16 Sallys on the ground and 11 Oscars in the air, 9 by Hurricanes. This for the loss of 2 hurris and 2 blens.


The stats I gave are based on the losses recorded by both sides. Your examples give Hurricane claims. Likewise if we gave stats based on Japanese claims, the Hurricanes would look alot worse than the stats I posted. The accuracy of claiming was low in that theater and period. Using either side's claims gives a quite inaccurate picture. 

The stats I gave include Burma up to the end of the Japanese conquest there in spring '42. Magwe was still an Allied base March 23 1942, was actually struck by the Japanese that day. Maybe you mean the Blenheim/Hurricane strike on Mingaladon March 21? but it didn't feature Hurricane aerial claims that big, most were strafing claims, of fighters, which were Type 97's (Nates). They apparently suffered no aerial losses to Hurricanes, but one was downed by a Blehheim. Besides that the Japanese recorded 2 a/c destroyed and 11 damaged all on the ground. Anyway, again, that period in Burma is included in the aerial combat exchange stats I gave.

The Japanese OOB fighter strength commited Dec 8 '41 to SEA theater was no bigger than Allied overall. Later on in many sub-theaters the Allies were outnumbered, but in part because the Japanese had destroyed more Allied fighters than vice versa. The claims and strength issues were related, again a familiar pattern in WWII. The enemy 'seemed to have an inexhaustible supply of fighters' in part because most kill credits didn't represent real enemy losses.

A couple of comparative OOB's in Burma:
Feb 3: 20 AVG P-40's, 11 Hurricanes, 4 Buffaloes; v 43 Type 97's
March 20: 8 P-40's, 25 Hurricanes; v 86 Type 97, 15 Type 1 (Oscar), 4 Type 2 (Tojo), though the other two AVG sdns in China were mainly facing the same Japanese units, for example sparring frequently with the Type 1's, of the 64th Sentai at Chiangmei in northern Thailand, counted as Burma front in that OOB.

In general, recorded losses were not provably 100% correct and complete either, on either side, but in general here we're comparing relative results. There's no reason to think Japanese records and accounts of their losses in combats with Hurricanes are consistently less accurate than accounts of combats with P-40's, F4F's, etc. All the stats I quoted are on an equivalent basis in that respect. The Hurricane's poor record in fighter combat v the Japanese in 1942, much poorer than the F4F's, is a fact; the reasons why are open to some interpretation.

Joe


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## slaterat (Feb 27, 2008)

Joe

Thats right I got Magwe and Mingaladon mixed up. The raid stemmed from Magwe. The RAF Hurricane claims were for fighters in the air , not straffed on the ground.

In Francis K Masons book "The Hawker Hurricane", he gives the total number of Hurricanes deployed to Burma in that time period as 46. 10 survived leaving 36 lost to combat and other causes. As many as 20 were destroyed on the ground leaving only about 16 lost in air combat. Its a revision of an older book so it would probably be less accurate concerning RAF claims, but quite accurate on RAF losses and deployments.

Argueing about stats is pointless I suppose and reconciling claims is a very difficult task. The kills mentioned in Hurricane Aces 1941-45 are often quite detailed mentioning locations, wreckage, witnesses and verification of the downed pilots name and unit.

In any case the sampling in Burma early 1942 is very small. By March the JAAF still outnumbered the allies 3 to1 in fighters. In Jack Storey's first combat it was 25 Nates vs 6 Hurricanes [actually 4 as 2 got lost on the climb], he still downed 2 nates , confirmed by wreckage, using the superior power loading of the Hurricane to outmanouevre his opponents with climbing turns.

Joe could you give me the titles and publishers of your references as I am interested in this little known theatre of the war.

IMHO the 3 most underrated fighters of the war are the P 40 ,The Wildcat and the Hurricane. Overall I'd have to say the Hurricane is my favorite it made a larger contribution to the war. It fought from the beginning to the end, downing more ea than any other allied fighter, won the BoB and fought in every major theatre. Its advantages lay in its enormously strong airframe, the ability to absorb heavy punishment, ease of repair, reliability and manueovrabilty.

Vs the wildcat I'd say the Hurri I and the Wildcat are about equal
a Hurri mk II though, has has a clear performance advantage, is tougher, better armed and more manueovrable. The only adv to the Wildcat would be dive and roll rate perhaps.

Slaterat


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## JoeB (Feb 27, 2008)

slaterat said:


> Joe
> 1. Thats right I got Magwe and Mingaladon mixed up. The raid stemmed from Magwe. The RAF Hurricane claims were for fighters in the air , not straffed on the ground.
> 
> 2. Argueing about stats is pointless I suppose and reconciling claims is a very difficult task.
> ...


1. No problem on base names, but see references below, Bloody Shambles doesn't mention those aerial claims, but in any case the Japanese didn't record any aerial losses (except to the Blenheims), and the opponents were not Type 1's (which as you see from the OOB were rare in Burma in that period, the main opponent was the Type 97).

2. I don't think it's pointless if looking at the right stats. The stats I gave are for the Pacific War through the period covered by Bloody Shambles v 1 and 2, so including Malaya and Dutch East Indies for Hurricane v JAAF, and Ceylon for v JNAF. The scale of combat in the theater was small enough that correlating losses in each combat from both sides *is* generally possible; again I summarize only results where the losses in specific combats, I don't include Allied losses from combats where the Japanese losses aren't known, but that's only a few actually. The results were consistent, the Hurricanes shot down more than they lost in IIRC *one* combat, out of a few dozen combats with Japanese fighters in that period. There isn't enough variance in the result combat to combat to say that pure statistical noise caused it. It's one theater in one period of the plane's career that's true, but it's not actually a statistically insignificant sample mathematically speaking, for that opponent and period.

3. The most on point is "Bloody Shambles" by Shores et al, vols 1 and 2 (Grub Street is the publisher). For comparison to AVG P-40's "Flying Tigers" by Ford (some but not most also covered in Shambles), for comparison to USAAF P-40's in Philippines "Doomed at the Start" by Bartsch (covered in less detail in Shambles); for USN F4F's in 1942 "The First Team" and "The First Team in the Guadalcanal Campaign" by Lundstrom, for USMC F4F's "Guadalcanal" by Frank. All those examine individual combats using both sides' records.

4. On paper or in one on one dogfight practice maybe, but the record of the two types in combat v Japanese fighters in 1942 was quite different. F4F's fought Japanese Navy Zeroes at just about 1:1 real exchange ratio, in actually a fair variety circumstances, in 1942, they downed a handful of obsolescent Navy Type 96's without loss, they didn't meet the JAAF in 1942. The Hurricanes fought JNAF Zeroes and JAAF Type 1's at a ratio of ~1:5. The Zero result was in a few big combats, but the Type 1 result was a over a bunch of small ones and actually worse; ~1:1 v the obsolescent Type 97. The Hurricane and F4F samples are of same order of magnitude size counting by Allied losses (around 63 Hurricane losses to J fighters in the bottom up Hurricane sample I gave, ~100 F4F's lost to Zeroes in '42) samples are only much different size counting by Japanese fighter losses (16 to Hurricanes in the sample, also ~100 to F4F's).

Joe


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## kool kitty89 (Feb 27, 2008)

It should also be noted that .303 Brownings were not as powerful as .30 cal M2 Brownings. (although certainly better than Vickers K guns)

A slightly heavy round but much lower velocity (poorer trajectory and range and muzzel energy) and slightly lower ROF. 

See: The WWII Fighter Gun Debate: Gun Tables


That said I'd take 12x .303 Brownings over 4x or even 6x .50 cal M2 guns when fighting the japanese. (with the exception of the N1K and maybe the Ki-84 or Ki-100)


The Hurricane IIB could out-turn, out-climb, and out run an F4F-4, but the Wildcat could dive and zoom climb better with greater weight realitive to drag. The Hurricane's wing acted as an airbrake in dives while the F4F (Marlet) was known to out dive (and zoom) early war Bf-109's. (the P-47 could do the same with late war 109's)


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## Elvis (Feb 28, 2008)

FWIW,

Modern loading of the .303 British round is 180gr. bullet @ MV of 2400fps.
Modern loading of the .30-06 (.30M1) is 150 gr. bullet @ MV of 2700fps.
(Remington ammo - 1974 catalogue)

Quick calculation shows ME of .303 British to be 2302.7716 lbs.-ft.
.30M1 shows ME of 2428.7046 lbs.-ft.

------------------------------------------

Aviation-History.com shows Hurri IIB with a top speed of 320 mph @ 19,700 ft. (340 mph @ 21,000 ft.)
F4F-4 318 mph @ 19,400 (only altitude listed)

Hurri IIB operational weight of 8470 w/ 2x 500 lb. bombs.
F4F-4 max. T/O wt. is 7952 w/2x 100 lb. bombs.
Subtract the bombs and the F4F has a slightly higher t/o weight. This _may_ be due to additional armour protection.

Range for Hurri IIB is 460 miles on internal fuel only (920 mi. w/ 2x 44 gal. aux. tanks)
F4F-4's range is 770 miles. No mention if internal only or if that includes external fuel stores, as well.

Hawker Hurricane - Great Britain
Grumman F4F Wildcat - USA



Elvis


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## kool kitty89 (Feb 29, 2008)

I thought the Merlin XX had only a single-stage 2-speed supercharger giving a critical altitude of only ~18,500 ft similar to the Packard Merlins used on the P-40F/L. Or was it just the Merlins used on the P-40 were lower altitude models?

Plus higher muzzle velocity of the .30-06 (note aircraft versions had a higher muzzle velocity: ~870 m/s compared to ~840-850 m/s for ground units) gave the round flatter trajectory resulting in better accuracy and longer effective range.


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## renrich (Feb 29, 2008)

Kool Kitty, I believe that if you study the ballistics on the 50 BMG round versus the 303 British you will change your mind. The throw weight of the 6- 50s in the Wildcat was 9.54 pounds per second.The throw weight of four 30 cal US guns is 2.5 pounds per second. So 8 of those would be 5 pounds per second. Besides throw weight you have to take into account that the 50 BMG had a much longer effective range than the 30 cal plus the sectional density of the 50 BMG gave it substantially more penetration. One reason that the Thach Weave was so effective was that the Wildcat could start scoring hits on a Zeke before the Zeke had a good chance of replying with it's 30 cals or 20 mms. Even though the early Zeros had no armor or SS tanks the shelter supplied by the big radial engine was just as substantial on the Japanese AC as for the Americans. A 30 cal bullet hit on a radial engine would not have nearly as good a chance of damaging the engine as a 50 BMG slug would have. The lesser effectiveness of the 30 cal compared to the 50 BMG is the reason the US quit using the 30 cal early in the war on it's fighters. Even the SBD had cowl mounted 50s.


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## Elvis (Mar 1, 2008)

kool kitty89,

NUTS, I forgot to include bullet drop in those figures.
When I get home, I'll fish that catalogue out again and post the drops.
How far out would you like them? 
I think most factory listings go out to 400 yds.




Elvis


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 2, 2008)

*renrich, *

The Hurricane Mk.IIB carried 12x .303 guns, so the weight of fire would be roughly 7.5 lbs/s by those figures. (.303 figures vary slightly and those values seem high on both accounts) Except for the radial rngine, .303 rounds would shread a Zero, Oscar, Nate, or most other Japanese a/c. (except a few late-war a/c) With incendiary rounds it could easily set those fuel tanks alight, wich would subsequently drain and explode. (usualy) Aganst a N1K, or maybe a J2M, Ki-84, and maybe a Ki-61 or Ki-100 I'd want somthing heavier.

12x .303's have a better chance of hitting a target. As said the .30 M2 (M1919) and .50 M2 browning have better ballistics with higher muzzle velocity and muzzel power. The .50 has much more firepower than either RCMG and the higher sectional density results in better energy retention, in addition to penetration.


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## Elvis (Mar 2, 2008)

MV for .30M1 and .50M2 are roughly the same, at around 2700-2800 fps.
Its the weight and size of the projectile that makes the difference here.
Approximately .200" and 600 grains.



Elvis


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## renrich (Mar 2, 2008)

KK, I believe it is debatable that it is easier to hit with 12 303s than with 6 50s especially taking into consideration the AC. Was not the Hurricane with 12 303s optimized for ground attack mission. I can't imagine the Hurricane with those 4 extra guns and ammo being as agile as the 8 gun model. The other factor is that range estimation is so much easier with the 50 cals than with 30 cals because the trajectory is so much flatter. And one doesn't need as many hits with a 50 as one needs with a 30 for lethality. I know that all countries went to the 50 cals in place of 30 cals as the war went along.


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## slaterat (Mar 2, 2008)

I just ordeed all three books in that series. Yes the third and concluding volume of the Bloody Shambles series ,"Air War for Burma" has been released. I cant wait to get my hands on these.

Francis K Mason describes the while RAF effort in S.E. Asia early 42 as "to little to late"
Hurricanes were wasted in piecemeal deployment against much larger Japanese forces. 


Thanx Joe for the heads up on "Bloody Shambles" I owe ya one.

Slaterat


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## slaterat (Mar 2, 2008)

The effective range of the 303s would be much shorter than the .50s. However using a box convergence, in stead of a point, at 150 yards, would be deadly against unarmoured Japanese aircraft. I would think that the dixon/dewild ammo would be devasting to the fuel tanks. 12 303s puts out more lead than a minigun. 

The IIb was considered the best air to air fighter of all the Hurricane mks. The IIc with 4 x20mm lost some handling and speed because of the extra weight and drag of the cannons. Howevere in the North Afrika desert and in Burma , many IIc units deleted 2 of the 20 mm cannons in the interest of better performance. These would certainly be very close or equal to IIb s with the advantage of cannons.

Slaterat


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 3, 2008)

In any other situation I'd opt for .50's or maybe cannon, but aganst most Japanese a/c a high volume of (nominaly inferior) .303 (or other RCMG round) could be more effective.

Plus the Brits didn't seem to shift to .50 cal guns (except in lend-lease and other US built a/c), they either soldiered on with .303's or were given 20 mm Hispano cannons often along with some .303's. Though some late model Spitfires did use 2x .50's in place of 4x .303's, there aren't alot of other examples.


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## Elvis (Mar 3, 2008)

KK89 makes a good point that the English seemed to simply skip the "50 cal step" and went straight from .303 to 20mm. However, the change seemed to take most of the war.
Effective range of the .50, vs. the .30 is another consideration.
Anyone who's ever seen the Discovery channel show "Firepower" has probably seen the episode where he tests the semi-auto version of the BMG.
He was splitting concrete blocks with a single shot at 600 yds.
You'd have to point your gun at Mars and use an unusually high powered load to hope to even make it out to 600 yds. with a .30 (either "M1" or ".303")...and then there's the consideration of accuracy and effectiveness at that range, as well.

Wasn't the POA on most of the .50 cal equipped Mustangs (used as an example here) around 300-400 yds.?




Elvis


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## Elvis (Mar 3, 2008)

Kool Kitty89 said:


> Plus higher muzzle velocity of the .30-06 (note aircraft versions had a higher muzzle velocity: ~870 m/s compared to ~840-850 m/s for ground units) gave the round flatter trajectory resulting in better accuracy and longer effective range





Elvis said:


> kool kitty89,
> 
> NUTS, I forgot to include bullet drop in those figures.
> When I get home, I'll fish that catalogue out again and post the drops.
> ...



*Kool Kitty89*,

Forgive me for taking so long to get back to you on this...apparently I'm now old and quite forgetful.

I'm not at home, but I found the trajectory and velocity stats on-line.
This is from the Remington website.

Remington.com - Products - Ammunition - Ballistics

You'll notice that the MV for the .30-06 (aka .30M1) is little higher than what I quoted.
'06 rounds are loaded a little hotter these days.
The round is SAAMI rated at around 63K CUP (IIRC) and most are just loaded closer to that rating today.
I believe the WWII vintage rounds were loaded closer to 50-55K CUP, thus the slightly lower MV.
The MV for the .303 British is the only one I've ever seen listed for it.



Elvis


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## renrich (Mar 3, 2008)

The Spitfire IX with the E wing used two 50s instead of the 303s. The A6M went to cowl mounted 50s in place of the 7.7s. The late model A6Ms also had armor and ss tanks. The Germans went to cowl mounted 50s in both the FW and BF 109s. The US went to all 50s on the P40s. The rationale for the 8-303s in the BOB British fighters was that it would take 266 hits from the 303 to be lethal against a bomber. With a closing speed of 180 mph and a thousand rounds per minute rate of fire per gun and only two seconds of firing time one needed eight 303s to theoretically get the job done. That formula was out the window in a head on pass. I am sure that if 50s had been available and the RAF had used them the LW would have been sorry. I have had a lot of experience with the 3006, 308 and various calibers like that hunting and some experience on the range with the M60(308) and the M2 50 cal BMG. I will go with 6- 50s all day against any WW2 AC.


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 3, 2008)

But inless you have cowl/nose mounted guns convergence zone is a major factor too though .50's could be practically set farther out than .303's.

And RCMG's aside I'd thke the F4F-3's (and FM-1/2) armament over the F4F-4's in almost any situation. (particularly aganst the japanese) Fewer guns but slightly more total ammo and much longer firing time, plus the 2 added guns in the F4F-4 were placed farther out so were less acurate. They also offered less weight.

There was a reason the FM-2 went back to 4x .50's...


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## renrich (Mar 3, 2008)

KK, agree wholeheartedly. The F4F4 was not big enough or with enough power to carry all the additional weight of the 2 extra guns. 4- 50s with 400 rounds was a better weapons load than 6-50s with 240 rounds. The only reason the 6 gun model was adopted was because of British insistence. Maybe the Brits had a fetish for lots of guns? Some sort of a phallic thing?


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 3, 2008)

One other odd thing I remember is that when the Brits were evaluating there Buffalo I's in 1941 one of there coments was there were "too few guns" but 4x .50's are at least as effective as 12x .303 and better in most other characteristics, with better range, trajectory, penetration, and higher % of chemical load for incendary bullets. (albeit 2x synchronised and slower firing, though more acurate without convergence)

And in service Buffaloes often had 2x (and some times all 4!) .50 cal's replaced with .303 guns, to lighten the aircraft (along with liting fuel load), but the gain in performance (~100 ft/min climb and ~3 mph top speed) was not nearly worth the loss in firepower. (or range)


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 4, 2008)

It also turns out (according to pilot accounts) that by the time the Buffaloes got to commonwealth forces the 4x .50's had been reinstalled.


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## renrich (Mar 4, 2008)

KK, I got the formula the RAF supposedly used to decide for the 8-303s from an article about the Spitfire in the "Air and Space, Smithsonian" magazine. The formula was that 266 hits by 303s was needed to bring down a bomber, therefore at a closure speed of 180 mph, the fighter would have two seconds to make the kill if the guns were firing at 1000 rounds per minute and you had eight guns. If you do the math, eight guns are going to be putting out 133.3 rounds per second so 2 seconds will give the 266 figure. That is about the most optimistic scenario I have ever heard of. In two seconds every bullet is going to hit the target? BS If their theory about 266 303s is needed to kill a bomber is correct, I wonder that they ever had a kill. A head on pass would give even less firing time. They needed 50 cals in those Spits and Hurris. This article stated that originally the Spitfire wing was to be pure ellipsoid. When the need for 8- guns was realised, it was not a problem for the Hurricane but the Spitfire wing had to be redesigned to the shape we know now to accomodate the eight guns. They would have had an easier time with 4 50 cals.


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## claidemore (Mar 4, 2008)

I believe the 8 x .303 Brownings would fire 160 rds per second (20 rds a second or 1150/1200 rds/min per gun) giving a Hurricane a firing time of 17.5 seconds, five/six - 3 seconds bursts. A 12 gun Hurricane IIb would fire 240 rds/second. 

4 x .50 at 750-850 rpm would give 50-56 rds per second. 

Also, I'd like to point out, that the pilots flying these planes were aware of the convergence problem, and at extremely short ranges, they were known to bring to bear the guns of one wing only, to make sure the enemy plane didn't fly harmlessless throught the 'hole'.


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## renrich (Mar 5, 2008)

I hope you don't think I am saying that the 8 guns have only a 2 second firing time. The two second firing time is based on a closure speed of 180 mph(which does not sound realistic) I suppose the two second window is the length of time the fighter is in range and on target.


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## claidemore (Mar 5, 2008)

Renrich: no misunderstanding bud, just wanted to contribute some numbers to the discussion. 

I like numbers, they are the ultimate weapon against colorful rhetoric. 

Cheers!


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 5, 2008)

I totally agree that 4x .50 cal guns would have been better for the BOB. (plus there would likely be a longer firing time). They probably could have used 6x .50's but that might put a penalty on climb, and ammo load. (particularly important for an interceptor)

It would probably take a 4 sec burst with decent aim and positioning to down an average twin engine bomber at the BOB as long as the pilot focused on the vulnerable areas of the bomber. (fuel tanks, engines, and -depending on armor- cockpit)


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## renrich (Mar 5, 2008)

KK, obviously I have never engaged in ACM or any air to air gunnery but in reading about and talking to men who have engaged in practise shooting at a sleeve and in looking at gun camera film it looks to me, that for most pilots, putting a few bullets into the target anywhere is about the most they can hope for. In other words, shooting at a specific part of the enemy AC is beyond the skill of most pilots.


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 6, 2008)

I meant aganst the Bombers, though you can't realy aim at a specific part you can aim in a general area and the inner wings are you're best bet with the engines, fuel tanks and fusalage/crew all in the general area. So it would be most effective to aim just outboard of the fusalage, particularly when outside the convegence zone for the guns.

And outside of gun camera footage and flight sims I dont have any experience in gunnery either...


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## Elvis (Mar 8, 2008)

From the gun camera footage I've seen, over the years (and I don't exactly sit around all day looking at WWII gun camera footage, mind you) it seems to me the practice seemed to be to actually slightly overshoot the target and let them fly into it (or, in the case of strafing runs, undershoot and you fly into the target).

...and no, I don't have any experience firing guns in flight, either.

180MPH closure speed makes me think the formula the British used had been in practice for some time (maybe since the latter half of WWI?), but had never been updated.



Elvis


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## renrich (Mar 8, 2008)

That closure speed seems a little fast to me. A German bomber might be doing 150 mph. Consequently the fighter would have to be making 330 mph. The engineers working that formula may have postulated that the fighter would be in a shallow dive but it seems to me that the fighter would have to be in full military power and in a shallow dive for at least a fair length of time to achieve that speed, especially when that formula was being used in 1933 or so. Perhaps they were thinking the bomber was doing 120 mph and that the British fighters were going to be able to get 300 mph.


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 8, 2008)

But that would also have been a time when twin engine bombers were out-performing single eingine fighters. When the Blenheim first apeared no RAF fighter could catch it.


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## renrich (Mar 8, 2008)

All the countries were designing fighters to go 300 mph and were getting there in 1935. Perhaps they were predicting they could go there. How fast would a Blenheim go when it was on a bombing run with a full load of bombs?


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## Graeme (Mar 8, 2008)

kool kitty89 said:


> when the Brits were evaluating there Buffalo I's in 1941



A&AEE Boscombe Down tested the Buffalo (both British and Belgium models) and produced a report in July 1941.
A few of the salient points from it were;

_“The unique undercarriage prove too fragile for service use.
Performance was not outstanding, although take-off run (with flaps) was only 215yds.
Carbon monoxide was dangerously high in the cockpit. Fish-tail exhausts were trialled but proved ineffective but did provide good flame damping qualities.
It was easily loaded to give an excessively unstable (aft) CG. An acceptable limit was found and recommended for the Service.
The aircraft was unsuitable for hot climates on account of predicted excessive oil temperatures.
The gun firing trials of the four 0.5in guns in the British version proved generally satisfactory, but rearming the wing guns was awkward, and firing the guns at low altitude caused oil to obscure the windscreen.”_

They were rejected as a first-line fighter in Europe following trials by No.71 Squadron based at Church Fenton.
_
“The aircraft was unsuitable for hot climates on account of predicted excessive oil temperatures.”_
Knowing this they sent the them to Singapore!, which proved disastrous. 
_
“In an attempt to improve its inferior performance its all-up weight was reduced by changing the 0.5in guns to 0.303 calibre, cutting the ammunition to 350 rounds and restricting the fuel to 84 gallons”._


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## Graeme (Mar 8, 2008)

kool kitty89 said:


> When the Blenheim first apeared no RAF fighter could catch it.



Are you referring to Lord Rothermere's privately produced civil Bristol Type 142 _Britain First _? then yes, but surely not the Blenheim *bomber* of March 1937, as the Spitfire and Hurricane were then in existence?



renrich said:


> How fast would a Blenheim go when it was on a bombing run with a full load of bombs?



Obsolete (Blenheim I) by early 1938, it proved unable to exceed 215mph at 10,000ft when carrying a full complement of four 250lb bombs and full fuel.


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## Elvis (Mar 9, 2008)

Elvis said:


> 180MPH closure speed makes me think the formula the British used had been in practice for some time (maybe since the latter half of WWI?), but had never been updated.





renrich said:


> That closure speed seems a little fast to me. A German bomber might be doing 150 mph. Consequently the fighter would have to be making 330 mph. The engineers working that formula may have postulated that the fighter would be in a shallow dive but it seems to me that the fighter would have to be in full military power and in a shallow dive for at least a fair length of time to achieve that speed, especially when that formula was being used in 1933 or so. Perhaps they were thinking the bomber was doing 120 mph and that the British fighters were going to be able to get 300 mph.


...and thus, these are the stupid remarks we make when we work 12 hours on 2 hours of sleep.
As usual, Renrich is on the mark.
I stand corrected.

 




Elvis


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## HoHun (Mar 9, 2008)

Hi again,

>I think the story quoted in post #76 in this thread (link below - hope it works this time) about Hurricanes out-turning Wildcats on a consistent basis is entirely credible:

>http://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/av...s-grumman-f4f-4-wildcat-1550-2.html#post88018

Below a turn rate analysis for the two types at 0 km, 5 km and 10 km altitude ... doesn't look too good for the Wildcat in direct comparison.

(Clmax used is 1.23 for the Wildcat, 1.2 for the Hurricane.)

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 9, 2008)

Are those for the F4F-4?

THe lighter F4F-3 would have had better turn rate though. (as would the FM-2 with its more powerful engine)


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## HoHun (Mar 9, 2008)

Hi Koolkitty,

>Are those for the F4F-4?

Roger.

>THe lighter F4F-3 would have had better turn rate though. (as would the FM-2 with its more powerful engine)

That's right. I'm not sure about the exact weight of the F4F-3 (and the subtle differences of its engine to that of the F4F-4), but using 7000 lbs and the same engine as the F4F-4, I get results for the F4F-3 that are close to, but don't quite match, those of the Hurricane IIB. Only at sea level, where the R-1820-86 enjoys a power boost from running in "neutral blower", my generic F4F-3 is almost equal.

I don't have an engine chart ready for the R-1820-56 of the FM-2, but it appears to be more powerful than the R-1820-86 only near sea level, and the FM-2 is a bit heavier than the F4F-3, so the extra power and the extra mass counteract each other to some degree.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## Elvis (Mar 10, 2008)

From the good folks at Ken's Aviation...

_The name Cyclone was first used by Wright for their P-2 radial engine in 1925. 
The R-1820, introduced in 1931, was a improved version of the P-2 with higher displacement.
The R-1820 remained in production through the 1950s by Lycoming and Canadian Pratt Whitney.

9 cylinder, air-cooled, radial 
displacement: 1,823 cubic inches (29.9 liters) 
bore x stoke: 6.125 x 6.875 inches 


R-1820B: 575 hp 
R-1820-22: 950 hp
R-1820-33: 775 hp 
R-1820-39: 930 hp
R-1820-45: 930 hp
R-1820-51: 1,000 hp w/turbocharger 
R-1820-53: 1,000 hp w/turbocharger 
R-1820-54: 900 hp
R-1820-65: 1,200 hp w/turbocharger 
R-1820-66: 1,350 hp
R-1820-76A: 1,425 hp
R-1820-77: 870 hp
R-1820-80: 1,495 hp
R-1820-82WA: 1,525 hp
R-1820-84: 1,425 hp
R-1820-86: 1,425 hp
R-1820-87: 1,200 hp
R-1820-97: 1,200 hp w/turbocharger 
R-1820-103: 1,425 hp_







Elvis


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## claidemore (Mar 10, 2008)

I love your graphs HoHun, keep em coming please! 

Been following this thread for a while and doing a bit of research online. Here's some numbers (mostly from Wiki, but a few other/better sources as well) and some comparative performance evaluations.

Hurri IIB, 340 mph (w/o trop filter, 320? with) climb 2780 ft/min, range 600 mi, 12x.303 mg, good turn, poor dive.
Wildcat F4F-4, 320 mph, 1950ft/min, range 770 mi, 6x.50mg average turn, excellent dive. 
P40B-345-352 mph, 2100 ft/min, range 730 mi, 2x.50 4x.30, good turn, excellent dive
Brewster Buffalo F2A3, 321mph, 2290 ft/min, 965 mi,4x .303 or .50 good/excellent turn, good dive

A6M2-316 mph, 3100 ft/min?, 1200 mi, 2x20mm 2x 7.7, excellent turn, poor dive
Ki-43 II Hayabusa, 329mph, 29-3000ft/min, 1000 mi, 2x7.7 +1x 13mm or 2 x 13mm, excellent turn, poor dive
Ki-27 Nate, 275 mph, 3010 ft/min, 390 mi, 2 x 7.7 , excellent turn, poor dive

Looking at these numbers and hopefully objective 'general' comparisons of turn and dive characteristics, I can see why the Hurricane might not fare so well against the 1942 Japanese fighters. 

It really didn't have any distinct advantages in flight performance. It could not climb, turn or dive better than an Oscar, Nate or Zero. It did have a max speed advantage over the Nate. Apparently the Buffalo could dive away from the Japanese planes, and those pilots/squadrons who did so enjoyed relative success. (in looking at the various engagements fought by Hurricanes in Burma 1942, they almost never had a tactical advantage at the start of a fight, which didn't help their record. Bad luck and no significant perf advantage = poor success)

Both the Wildcat and P40 had much better dive speeds, and general concesus seems to be that this was the advantage that they exploited successfully. P40 also had a max speed advantage. 

In the mock dogfight of anti-sub Hurricanes against Wildcats, the Hurri was able to get on the Wildcats tail and stay there. Since it could outclimb and outturn the Wildcat, this is no surprise. A Zero or Oscar would have done the same. 

As much as I admire the Hurricane, the P40 replaced it in North Africa in the fighter role with the RAF, and the Spitfire replaced it in Northern Europe and eventually in the CBI theatre. P40s also replaced it in Canada with the home based fighter squadrons, most notably in the Aleutian campaign. This in spite of the fact that Hurricanes were being built in Canada. 

The Hurricane was a good plane, even a good fighter, but an excellent fighter has to be able to do at least one thing much better than its opposition to have consistent success.


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## HoHun (Mar 10, 2008)

Hi Claidemore,

>I love your graphs HoHun, keep em coming please! 

Glad they're appreciated 

>It really didn't have any distinct advantages in flight performance. It could not climb, turn or dive better than an Oscar, Nate or Zero. 

Well, from my limited knowledge I tend to think it was actually a better diver than the Japanese types. Below 5000 m, it certainly held quite a distinct speed advantage over the A6M2, too.

It's important to remember that the Spitfire V, which held all the technological advantages you mentioned over the A6M, did not fare too well in the direct matchup either. That really points to a tactical rather than to a technical background.

>P40 also had a max speed advantage. 

The P-40 is another interesting case as it racked up quite a record against the Japanese, while being considered an inferior fighter in direct comparison to the Spitfire V in Africa. That seems to fit my perception of the importance of tactics ...

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## claidemore (Mar 10, 2008)

HoHun,

I agree with you 100% on your take on tactics. It was mentioned earlier in this thread that the Hurricane did much better vs the Japanese planes in 1943 and onwards. The Hurris were the same, but the Oscars were all type II and type III, much better planes, (type III 360 mph) so the difference in results has to be tactics. 

About the Hurricane dive speed: I could not find a max dive speed for a Hurricane anywhere. I'm guessing one of you aeronatical computating guys could figure that out! 
Given it's sturdy construction, you are probably right that it would have had a max dive speed greater than the lightly built Oscar or Zero. What I did find concerning the Hurricane , was that it built up speed very slowly in the dive as well as reports that 109s could easily dive away from them. Poor initial dive speed would make it difficult to disengage, hence my 'conclusion' of poor dive characteristics. 

If somebody knows the max dive speed on these planes, feel free to point out my erroneous conclusion!


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## JoeB (Mar 10, 2008)

claidemore said:


> HoHun,
> 
> I agree with you 100% on your take on tactics. It was mentioned earlier in this thread that the Hurricane did much better vs the Japanese planes in 1943 and onwards. The Hurris were the same, but the Oscars were all type II and type III, much better planes, (type III 360 mph) so the difference in results has to be tactics.


Again as long as 'tactics' isn't a catchall to explain everything that simple paper comparisons, or theoretical simplified calcs, or a few anecdotes, won't explain. Is tactics a factor?, sure, but I think it's repeatedly used as such a catchall.

On Hurricane's later performance v Type 1, it's also 'been stated on this thread'  that it didn't do so badly v the Type 1 in 1942 which is just wrong. In 1943 the Allies in Burma had very strong numerical advantage over the Japanese (more than the Japanese had had in '42), and a lot of the Allied strength was other types (eg of the US 10th AF). And still Hurricanes did not do as well in '43 in Burma as F4F's had in '42, against Zeroes (Hurricanes met Zeroes one more time in Burma in '43 and got clocked, again). See the third volume of "Bloody Shambles" "Air War for Burma". How about rolling forward to the F4F-4's record in 1943 in the Solomons when it got to fly alongside better Allied types in superior numbers? (was better) or the improved but not totally different FM-2 in '44-45 (overwhelming: hardly any were shot down by Japanese fighters, true record is not possible to calculate comprehensively but ratio of credits to air combat losses was better than that of the F6F or F4U in the same period) so rolling forward the comparison is just a tangent, IMO, lots of other factors come in, not just 'tactics'.

Re: P-40's the AVG's eventually did well in '42, though mainly against Type 97's. Against actual Zeroes (which AVG never met) by mid-late '42 some (RAAF and USAAF) P-40 units were doing around 1:2, much better than the 1:5 the Hurricane had recorded v Type 1's and Zeroes in '42, but very early on (Philippines and Dutch East Indies) did almost as badly as Hurricanes. And no consistent actual P-40 results in 1942 were as good as the F4F's results. Anyway P-40 is another tangent IMO like rolling the comparison forward.

And again, old ground, but please read the references, F4F's did not fly specific anti-Zero tactics much in 1942. The Beam Defense Manuever (Thach Weave) was used by Thach's division at Midway but didn't become standard until 1943. In some periods of the Guadalcanal fighting USMC F4F's engaged Zeroes in dogfights on purpose (after they felt they were facing enemy units of reduced quality, though this isn't obvious in changes in OOB of the actual JNAF units they were facing AFAIK, anyway they thought so, did so, and did alright). And in general ca. late 1942 the *Zeroes'* preferred tactic v the F4F was noted by the USN as fast diving firing passes with quick breakaway. 

That observation reflected the JNAF lesson instituted between the Chinese fighting and Pac War, of more emphasis on close coordination among 3 planes sections ('shotai'), without radio, but with enough training and practice for the 'shotai' members to anticipate one another's actions in mainly hit and run firing passes. There was a conscious move away from the previous individual aerobatic tactics, though obviously from Allied accounts there was a some reversion to those in the heat of combat. Like the escape manuever 'hineri-komi' where a Zero would sideslip out of a loop at the top to reverse position on a plane on its tail. 

So if we look at tactics as an actual factual topic, not a catchall, it gets pretty complicated. Which form of JNAF tactics were used in particular combats? How about JAAF tactics? Lots of unknowns, all on top of documented variation in F4F tactics.

So '*has to be*' tactics, after exhausting IMHO a pretty short list of other factors (speed in standard sources, simplified theoretical turn calcs etc.) is an unsatisfying analysis, with all due respect. In short I just don't see the data with which to exactly and certainly describe why the F4F had a much better combat record against Japanese fighters than the Hurricane did in 1942, which is one certain fact. Tactics is probably part of the explanation, more subtle factors of the plane itself in favor of the F4F as fighter combat machine v a plane like the Zero, were likely another factor IMO. I don't see the data to move either opinion to fact.

Joe


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## slaterat (Mar 11, 2008)

It really comes down to numbers, and the wildcat never faced the overwhelming numbers the Hurricanes did. The wildcats operations against the zero were primarily in carrier vs carrier actions where the numbers were much more closely matched.

Oh and my 3 volumes of "Bloody Shambles" arrived yesterday. Great books a real must have for anyone interested in this theater. I've just started reading them and it confirms that time and time again small numbers of Hurricanes were deployed and wasted against far superior numbers, almost always taking off late and still climbing to the fight when combat occurred. The best climbing speed of a Hurricane is between 150 and 160 mph doesn't sound much fun with Oscars and Zeros coming down at you at 300+ mph.

ATropicalized Hurricane IIb would do 335 mph with an initial climbrate of 2,850 ft /min. It has a full rear sheet of armour protecting the pilot from his feet to the top of his head. Frontal armour is provided too as well as self sealing fuel and oil tanks/lines and an armoured windscreen.The Hurricane also used a substanial amount of tubular and heat treated steel in its construction making it one of the toughest fighters of the war. It was also very easy too repair and fly.

In a dive the Hurricane's airframe can take everything you can give it. RAF pilots routinely dived them past 450 mph. Terrence Kelly claims to have taken his Hurricane to 590 mph wrapping his speedo around the clock and up to 300mph again. The Japanese admit the Hurricane could dive far faster than a KI 43.

Accounts by pilots indicate that a Zero ,Oscar or Nate could out flat turn a Hurricane. However a climbing turn would seem to favor the Hurricane.

Remember Hurricane squadrons came from Europe or Africa where the Hurricanes were superior in the dogfight, something they had to unlearn in SE asia. Allied intelligence on Japanese aircraft was pitiful at the start of the Pacific war.

Slaterat


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## Elvis (Mar 11, 2008)

JoeB said:


> In short I just don't see the data with which to exactly and certainly describe why the F4F had a much better combat record against Japanese fighters than the Hurricane did in 1942, which is one certain fact.


Joe,

Could that record be the result of how American pilots were rotated in and out of combat, then sent back to teach new pilots what they had learned?
Seems none of the Axis powers ever adopted that pratice.



Elvis


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 11, 2008)

The Hurricane would have a higher max dive speed (and better high-speed control) than the Zero or Oscar, but dive acceleration wouldn't be much better due to the thick wing. (though the Hurricane's weight would help, and it could certainly out-dive a Nate) It was tough too, but no more so than the P-40 or F4F, and the F4F had a radial engine as well.

Depending on the model, the Hurricane would have had better altitude performance than those japanese fighters as well.


And a comment on the AVG, in addition to the hit and run tactics used their Tomahawks were not standard (though the few P-40Es they later had were) they were basically P-40C's converted to the P-40B configuration, so they were lighter. (The P-40B/Tomahawk II-A was the lightest combat capable variant) The engines were also not standard, from: The Last Curtiss P-40C


> Recent research appears to support Erik Shilling's strong argument that the AVG aircraft were very close to the P-40B configuration, which the British designated as the Tomahawk IIA. The history of the AVG fighters is nearly as interesting as the story of the AVG itself...
> ...Allison was running at 100% capacity. Simply stated, there weren't any extra engines to be had. Every block and cylinder head was already allocated to an existing contract. But, wait a minute, there were plenty of rejected blocks, cylinder heads and such. Allison realized that most of the rejected engine components were usable if the various parts were hand matched and fitted. They set up a production line and began assembling these engines. Individual parts were reworked and carefully matched. The results of this procedure were engines built to very tight tolerances. Essentially, these were 'blueprinted' engines. Dyno tests revealed that they produced as much as 220 hp more than the production line V-1710-33s going into the RAF Tomahawks and USAAF P-40C fighters. Allison had produced some very powerful and very expensive engines. Fortunately they were allowed to bury the extra cost into contracts for U.S. aircraft. These engines certainly account for the performance of the AVG's Tomahawks. In general terms, the AVG fighters could pull up to 370 mph in level flight, which is reasonable considering that these aircraft had 20% more power and less weight than the British Tomahawk IIB. Another fact not picked up on as significant by historians was the high rate of reduction gear failures in the AVG aircraft. This is easily explained when you realize that the older style reduction gear was rated for no more than 1,100 hp. With as much as 1,250 hp on tap, the reduction gearbox was over-stressed and frequently stripped gears. Later models, with 1,200 hp engines were fitted with a much stronger spur gear design that could handle up to 1,600 hp. This is the major reason that the nose is shorter from the P-40D onward.


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## HoHun (Mar 11, 2008)

Hi Joeb,

You are wrong, and worse.

>simple paper comparisons

"Paper comparisons" ... that's what the professional use in real life. Read the TAIC data sheets that were prepared in WW2 as an aid for American combat pilots in the hostile skies of the Pacific ... paper comparisons all of them. 

They proved their worth in combat, and "paper comparisons" have been prepared for possible opponents of US combat aircraft ever since.

Here ab interesting from the preface of Robert Shaw's "Fighter Combat - Tactics and Maneuvering". In case you do not know the book: It has been called the fighter pilots' bible - by fighter pilots.

"Much of what you will read here has been derived from personal flight experience, engineering analysis of fighter performance data, and 'bar talk' with other fighter pilots."

Shaw's "engineering analysis of fighter performance data" is what you are trying to downplay as "paper comparisons" here.

In my eyes, that's a rather weak attempt to ridicule data you're not comfortable with. It's certainly not what I'd expect from a serious student of air combat history.

>theoretical simplified calcs

More propaganda. "Theoretical calcs" - as if there were "practical calculations". And "simplified" ... why do you even mention it? If you grab any NACA report from the NASA's vast database, there will be simplifications in it. That doesn't detract a bit from the obvious value of these NACA reports.

If you think "simplifications" somehow taint an engineering analysis, you have no clue, or you're trying to deceive the reader.

And in fact, "dissing" an engineenering analysis you have not even looked into is pretty low and makes you look stupid. 

My advice is to ask "May I see your math, please?" the next time you're about to launch a post that tries to downplay the significance of a quantative analysis. 

>So '*has to be*' tactics

There is technology, and there is tactics. Since you seem to confuse the term "tactics" with the much narrower term "ACM": According to Merriam-Webster, tactics is "a: the science and art of disposing and maneuvering forces in combat b: the art or skill of employing available means to accomplish an end".

So there are just three factors in air war that we have to consider: 

1) Technology
2) "Human material"
3) Tactics.

With regard to 1), the "engineering analysis of performance data" shows a superiority of the Hurricane IIB over the F4F-4. 

With regard to 2), I have never read about the British (or Commonwealth) pilots being innately inferior to the US aviators.

So what remains? Simple enough: 3), tactics.

I really don't understand all that dancing around the obvious.

And then ...

>Again as long as 'tactics' isn't a catchall
>I think it's repeatedly used as such a catchall.
>So if we look at tactics as an actual factual topic, not a catchall

versus ...

>IMO, lots of other factors come in, not just 'tactics'.
>more subtle factors of the plane itself in favor of the F4F 
>So '*has to be*' tactics, after exhausting IMHO a pretty short list of other factors 

If you go on talking about "other factors" without ever specifying one, you should better be careful with the abundant use of the word "catchall".

It's pretty cheap, too, to criticize a list as "short" if you don't point out what you think might be missing.

I have both outlined the limits of tactics defined by technology as well as provided a specific example for the use of sound tactics in combat by Hurricane pilots, while you have done nothing to clarify the nature of your "subtle factors".

I'd be escpecially interested in those of the "subtle factors" that could override the recognized big five (speed, climb, turn, firepower and protection) and make the Wildcat a better piece of technology than the Hurricane.

It's not like air combat tactics are an unfathomable mystery - Shaw's book is pretty complete, even it it's a bit long-winded.

Kind regards,

Henning (HoHun)

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## HoHun (Mar 11, 2008)

Hi Slaterat,

>Oh and my 3 volumes of "Bloody Shambles" arrived yesterday. 

Thanks for the great summary  Sounds like "Bloody Shambles" is a very good read!

The examples for the tactical conditions, and specific strengths and weaknesses of the individual types you provide are very interesting - can we count on you to add more of the good stuff as you progress with your reading? 

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## HoHun (Mar 11, 2008)

Hi Koolkitty,

>And a comment on the AVG, in addition to the hit and run tactics used their Tomahawks were not standard (though the few P-40Es they later had were) they were basically P-40C's converted to the P-40B configuration, so they were lighter. 

Good point - the heavier P-40E really lost quite a bit of performance there.

With regard to the hit and run tactics, I once asked Pacific Theatre veteran Clay Tice (P-40 and P-38) about their tactical doctrine of the time. His answer showed that the tactical expertise of Chennault's Flying Tigers was not transferred to Clay's unit at least. He was also unaware of the results of the evaluation of the Akutan Zero and commented that if the USAAF ever distributed the report to the combat units, it certainly did not reach him.

Another Pacific War veteran, MF Kirby (P-39 and P-38), commented that their hit and run tactics were not the result of tactical training (which had only consisted of tight "welded wing" formation training and one-versus-one dogfighting between aircraft of the same squadron) but rather out of "fear". In my opinion, that was a very modest way of telling the audience that the pilots in his squadron independendly assessed the relative strengths of US vs. Japanese fighters and recognized that dogfighting was not going to yield results. 

It's my impression that both Clay's and Kirby's units frequently relied on "drag" tactics against Japanese fighters (when equipped with the fast P-38 - they were not very confident in the speed advantage of the earlier types).

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## claidemore (Mar 11, 2008)

I think the comparison between Wildcat and Hurricane has been pretty much covered. 
It's too complicated comparing the Hurricane to Oscar, Nate and Zero, so I'm just going to stick to the Oscar/Hayabusa, staying with the 'simple' theme. 

Speed:
Hayabusa II, 320-331 mph top speed depending on source.
Hurricane IIB Trop, 320-335 mph, depending on source.
Net result: similar top speed.

Turn rate: HoHun? How much would I love to see a graph on this? 
25lbs/sq ft for Hayabusa wingloading, 
30 lbs/sq ft for Hurricane II. 
5lbs/hp weight thrust for Hayabusa 
6.4 lbs/hp for Hurricane. 
Net result: better turn for Hayabusa, agrees with anecdotal info. 

Climb:
Hayabusa reports climb rates ranging form 3100 ft/min to 3900 ft/min. 
Hurricane climb rates from 2750-2850 ft/min. 
Net result: better climb rate for Hayabusa. 5lbs/hp thrust for Hayabusa compared to 6.4 lbs/hp for Hurricane should mean a better climbing turn for Hayabusa as well and that is one of the most important and often overlooked factors in air combat. 

Dive: 
Hurricane can max dive to 450 mph, but has slow dive acceleration. 
Haybusa is said to dive only a bit faster than it's max speed, Hayabusa III had max speed of 365mph, so that seems like a fair figure. Love to see stat from a reliable source rather than an estimate though. Hayabusas were known to shed wings in high G pullouts. 
Net result: Hurricane has better max dive speed, but poor/comparable initial dive. 

Range: 
Hayabusa is 1000 miles more or less depending on model. 
Hurricane, 640 miles. 
Net result: Hayabusa has longer range. 

Firepower:
Hurricane IIB has 12 x .303 Brownings
Hayabusa has either 2 x 13mm or 1x13mm and 1x7.7mm. 
Net result: Hurricane throws out more rounds, but doesn't have penetration of heavy mg. Overall the Hurricane is throwing out more weight of ammo per second and doesn't require quite the degree of marksmanship. 

Armor/ability to absorb battle damage:
Hurricane has good self sealing tanks, pilot armor, relatively sturdy construction (1400lbs heavier than Hayabusa albeit a bit larger)
Hayabusa has marginally effective self sealing tanks, pilot armor on II and III version, radial engine, but light construction. 
Net result: The Ki-43 should be able to absorb more engine damage, and against .303 it's lightweight construction would do better than against .50s. Hurricane is sturdier in construction, but has liquid cooled inline engine. Quite a few variables, but the Hurricane had a reputation for absorbing damage, the Ki-43 did not AFAIK. 

Ceiling:
Hayabusa II-36500 ft
Hurricane II-36,000 ft

Highest scoring Ki-43 ace was Satoshi Anabuki with 59 victories, highest Hurricane ace would be Pattle with 35 (possibly).

I see advantages for the Peregrine Falcon over the Hurricane, turn, climb, combat turn, range (it can operate from fields that are out of range for the Hurricane). 

Advantages for the Hurricane would be firepower, survivability, and max dive speed. Firepower doesn't help if you can't get the guns on your opponent, and toughness/survivability is no 100% guarantee, as apparently quite a few Hurricanes were shot down by Nates which may have had just two 7.7 mg. 

A Hurricane pilot against a Hayabusa that starts with no speed or height advantage, is probably gonna have a bad day IMO, and I'm a Canuck that loves Hurricanes.

Found this on Utube. check out the roll rate. 

_View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7FYVEWNNrQ_


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## JoeB (Mar 11, 2008)

slaterat said:


> It really comes down to numbers, and the wildcat never faced the overwhelming numbers the Hurricanes did. The wildcats operations against the zero were primarily in carrier vs carrier actions where the numbers were much more closely matched.


Most F4F operations v Zeroes in 1942 were landbased from Guadalcanal. With all due respect, how serious a discussion could this possibly be if we're starting out arguing very basic stuff like that.

For numbers, review each combat in all three volumes of Bloody Shambles, that statement just doesn't hold up in general. Even in the OOB's already covered *on this thread* the great majority of the Japanese OOB in Burma in 1942 was Type 97's, Type 1's alone were outnumbered by modern Allied fighters even in the worst situation faced. Anyway each combat wasn't an outing by the whole OOB of each side, that's the same fallacious argument by which Allied successes v the Germans (and Japanese for that matter) later in WWII are explained away as meaningless. You have to look at each combat, look and see, especially in those dozen or so combats where Types 1had a score of 20:4 v Hurricanes in 1942 what the numbers were. Then look at a lot of the combats in the Guadalcanal campaign, or carrier actions for that matter, not a huge difference actually.

Joe


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## JoeB (Mar 11, 2008)

HoHun said:


> Hi Joeb,
> 1. Here ab interesting from the preface of Robert Shaw's "Fighter Combat - Tactics and Maneuvering". In case you do not know the book: It has been called the fighter pilots' bible - by fighter pilots.
> 2. >theoretical simplified calcs
> 
> ...


1. You should go and re-read that book. One important point he makes is chess-like tactics have become a lot more important in the age of afterburning jets because they take a lot more time to complete manuevers (like a 360 deg turn) than WWII a/c and far more than WWI. WWI as Shaw says was largely reflexes and gunnery, modern jet combat is chess like tactics and weapons that guide themselves, WWII was somewhere in between.

2. No engineering estimation is worth a lot unless it can be calibrated to a real result, to see if the shortcuts affect the real result a lot or not. I don't see any such verifcation for the turn calculation presented, except anecdotes from the time, and we know many examples where such trial results varied depending who did them. And the central issue, which you always ignore in these debates, quickly re-emerges *who says* something like *sustained* turn capability of a WWII fighter was very important to its combat success? where is the interactive study of performance and results that quantifies that? We certainly can't refer to Shaw in that case, that's ridiculous, the baseline for most of the discussion in that book is 1980's jet fighters, planes that could pull sustained g's on the order of human endurance in some cases, fighting each other in typically small numbers on each side, and again, the completion of manuevers taking a lot longer. 

3. pointless ad hominem.

4.
1) debateable, and anyway what quantitative degree of combat effectiveness does this 'engineering analysis' equate to?
2) who says that can be ruled out as partial explanation? I doubt any nationality is 'innately' better or worse at producing fighter pilots (something the Allies learned to their grief in their underestimation of the Japanese). But who says the actual state of training, unit cohesion, leadership and general overall capability was equal in all Allied units, between Allied air arms and between them and the Japanese air arms or between *their* two air arms in the Pacific in 1942? Total equality all around would seem a highly artificial assumption.
3) Therefore that's an artificial conclusion to state as if deductive fact. And I note you didn't respond *at all* to the discussion I gave about actual historical tactical variation among F4F units, and in the JNAF. What a superficial approach to insist on treated 'tactics' as some black box constant that's deduced as 'the answer' based on a limited stats analysis and artificial assumption about pilot effectiveness.

6. Some other possible factors, either not mentioned or just asserted not proved:
-who says the ability to absorb damage was the same between Hurricane and F4F, where's it written what weighting to give this factor?
-WWII planes seldom performed really sustained turns, so how fast they could get into the turn and do the first several 10's of degrees turn was probably the most important factor. Where's this comparison in controlled conditions?
-The F4F had a stubby nose which allowed better tracking of targets in deflection shots than long nosed fighters. The good adaptation of USN planes to such deflection shooting was one reason the pilots were specifically trained in it, almost no other air arms did so formally. But the fact that they emphasized deflection shooting was a reason the plane was configured that way (as well as advantage in carrier landing). Is this a 'pilot', 'plane' or 'tactics' factor? What is its weighting?
-there was considerable variation among various WWII fighters in stability as gun platforms, both in handling and degree of flexing of the gun mounts (the wings or wherever else the guns were located). Where's this analysis, what's the weighting?

The point to reiterate most though in your completely ignoring the discussion of what tactics the two sides actually used, and variation and doubt about it. I'm not ingoring the basic stats of the two planes, like speed and and wing loading; rather, for the umpteenth time, I'm pointing out the basic and obvious fact that there is no deterministic way to say each mph of speed is worth A units of combat effectiveness, each fpm of climb is worth B units and each lb of wing loading is worth C units, let alone to weight the 'other' stuff I just mentioned. The way to weight those would be to observe actual combat results. But those results, obviously, are also affected by the specific tactical situations, pilot/unit effectiveness, etc. No way is the exact explanation of the F4F's much better performance v the Japanese fighters going to be proved, or rather the exact weighting of each factor in that success, it stands to reason more than a single factor explains it; unless...pure obstinancy plus calling people 'stupid' qualifies as objective analysis, then it's easy as 1,2,3  

Joe


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## claidemore (Mar 12, 2008)

Geez Joe, right back at you. Wheres your weighting? Where's your quantifiable analysis? All I've seen is a constant referance to 1 set of books and assertations that the F4F had a better combat record but no data or arguments as to why, just more questions and challenges to other members. 

This is the first I've heard of the Wildcat being designed for deflection shooting. AFAIK, the view over the front of a Hurricane with it's tapering nose is better than the view over the Wildcat with it's wide radial engine. And if you look at both planes you might notice that the pilot in the Hurricane actually sits a little further ahead relative to the leading edge of the wing than on the Wildcat. The Wildcat is a midwing, so the angle of view down is much shallower than the angle of view down on the Hurricane which is a low wing design. Look at a 3 angle view. Don't be fooled by the glass in the canopy, the Hurri pilot has one panel of glass behind the seat, the Wildcat does not, the Hurri pilot sits forward of the flaps, the Wildcat pilot sits directly above them. 

In any case, guns on fighters aren't sighted to shoot straight ahead into the blind spot, they are canted up a few degrees to bring them into the line of sight. Basically, any plane with correctly mounted guns is capable of deflection shooting. 

In the theatre in question, all three airforces taught deflection shooting, I've seen the RAF manual, it's quite indepth, and I've read several accounts about Japanese training in marksmanship. 

The Hurricane was a stable enough gun platform to mount 40mm anti tank weapons, could the beer barrel on roller skates with an ironing board shoved though it do that?  

That might not be a quantitave proof, but I could come up with a formula showing acceleration, terminal velocity, pound force per square inch and diagrams of nerve endings to proove that a 10 lb hammer dropped on your foot is going to hurt, or I could rely on common sense for you to believe me. Alternately, I could drop a hammer on someone elses foot and they could give you anecdotal evidence about how much it hurt. If you heard that anecdotal evidence, would you let me drop a hammer on your foot? 

As for Shaws book on fighter combat, I've read it numerous times, found it to be quiet enlightning and relevant concerning WWII combat. You might want to take your own advice and read the sections concerning guns vs guns again.

Claidemore


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## Graeme (Mar 12, 2008)

JoeB said:


> The good adaptation of USN planes to such deflection shooting was one reason the pilots were specifically trained in it, almost no other air arms did so formally.





claidemore said:


> In the theatre in question, all three airforces taught deflection shooting, I've seen the RAF manual, it's quite indepth, and I've read several accounts about Japanese training in marksmanship.



RAAF Gunnery Manual, September 1943...


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## claidemore (Mar 12, 2008)

Graeme said:


> RAAF Gunnery Manual, September 1943...
> 
> 
> > That is interesting. It is a different manual than the RAF one, different graphics (better IMO). Just goes to show that Commonwealth airforces were independant and not just fragments of the RAF.


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 13, 2008)

It does seem to use a Do-17 bomber as the target a/c though, which would imply it was probably made by the RAF...


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## HoHun (Mar 13, 2008)

Hi Joeb,

First, let me say that I'm happy with big parts of your post and feel we're really making progress towards mutual understanding, so I'm going to ignore the nasty bits.

>One important point he makes is chess-like tactics ...

Chess-like moves are not required for "tactics". According to the classical definition, any move is "tactics". Whatever you do, there would always have been another choice.

(This is jokingly highlighted in "Murphy's Rules of Combat" as "Everything you do can get you killed, included doing nothing.")

One re-curring point in my reply will revolve around the "tactics" definition - it's a rather broad term, while you use it with a narrow meaning. 

I imagine if I'd have said "employment of forces on the battlefield" instead of "tactics", you'd not have disagreed as strongly as you did.

>I don't see any such verifcation for the turn calculation presented

You did not see ANYTHING of the turn calculations presented because you failed to ask before condemning them. If you'd care to ask, I could post something that's specific enough to allow independend verification.

>2) who says that can be ruled out as partial explanation? 

If you think it is a partial explanation, by all means go ahead and suggest it.

However, human behaviour on the battlefield determined by training falls under the broad classical tactics definition (while physically determined behaviour like "blacks out under Gs due to unfavourable genetic disposal" falls under "pilots".)

>And I note you didn't respond *at all* to the discussion I gave about actual historical tactical variation among F4F units, and in the JNAF. 

True, but for two good reasons. 

1) That a battle (or war) historically had one certain result does not mean that this was the only possible result. Thus the historical result of a battle (or war) can not be used to prove that it was the only possible result - which is what you are trying to do.

2) Because I consider the tactical variations you mentioned as a very small part of overall tactics, or "employment of forces on the battlefield".

>-who says the ability to absorb damage was the same between Hurricane and F4F, where's it written what weighting to give this factor?

What evidence do you have that the F4F was superior, and that the factor was important enough to outweight the performance disadvantages of the F4F? 

The performance difference probably is worth several hundreds of kilograms, and even late-war fighters with much higher power output than the two types we're analyzing did not sacrifice that much weight for armour in order to increase the ability to absorb damage.

>-WWII planes seldom performed really sustained turns, so how fast they could get into the turn and do the first several 10's of degrees turn was probably the most important factor. 

With the Hurricane being the faster aircraft of the two, it would be more likely (everything else being the same) to enter the turn faster, giving it more energy to bleed, and it bled energy at a lower rate at the same speed and turn rate, giving it a double advantage even in an instantaneous turn. (Note that energy increases to the square of speed.)

>-The F4F had a stubby nose which allowed better tracking of targets in deflection shots than long nosed fighters. 

What evidence is there that it made any difference in combat? Of the "big five", speed, climb, armament and armour were constantly increased during the war, but there was no similar trend for "view over the nose" for fighters that did not have to land on a carrier. Apparently, this factor did not have enough impact on actual combat results to influence the design of land-based fighters at all.

>But the fact that they emphasized deflection shooting was a reason the plane was configured that way (as well as advantage in carrier landing). Is this a 'pilot', 'plane' or 'tactics' factor? 

Tactics, as it's a way to employ the available forces. I doubt the plane was consciously configured for deflection shooting (see above), but if you could provide evidence to the contrary, I'd agree that "plane" (or "technology") would have to be considered, too. 

(It would be "pilot" only if the US pilots could be trained that way, but the Commonwealth pilots could - due to their genetic disposition - not.)

>there was considerable variation among various WWII fighters in stability as gun platforms, both in handling and degree of flexing of the gun mounts (the wings or wherever else the guns were located). 

So do you mean to suggest that the Hurricane was a poorer gun platform than the F4F? I'd consider this a "too-subtle" point, but it appears moot anyway as the Hurricane seems to have a rather good reputation as a gun platform.

>rather, for the umpteenth time, I'm pointing out the basic and obvious fact that there is no deterministic way to say each mph of speed is worth A units of combat effectiveness, each fpm of climb is worth B units and each lb of wing loading is worth C units, let alone to weight the 'other' stuff I just mentioned. 

It might cheer you up that I'm despairing in an exactly symmetric way over your deterministic way of drawing conclusions from historical results. That one of the reasons I feel we're really beginning to understand each other 

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## renrich (Mar 13, 2008)

It is a myth that none of the Allies knew what the best tactics to use against the Zero were until the captured Aleutian Island Zero was tested. The formal preliminary report on the Zero's performance was forwarded to BuAer on 31 October, 1942. By then the battles of Coral Sea and Midway had been fought and the battles around and over Guadalcanal were either already fought or were at their peak. It is also a myth that the Hellcat design was based on the tests of the Aleutian Zero. On 6 October the pilot testing that Zero stated: "The general impression of the airplane is exactly as originally created by intelligence-including the performance." The performance of the USN and Marine pilots in F4Fs against crack JNAF pilots flying Zeros during 1942 is plenty of evidence that those pilots knew what tactics to use to defeat the Zero. The Wildcat had a down angle of 6.5 degrees of vision which was necessary for FULL deflection shooting. In Lundstrom's "The First Team" in appendix 2, fundamentals of fixed aerial gunnery, there is a full explanation which explains why pre war USN pilots were much more proficient at deflection shooting than the pilots of any other air force. The diagram showing an RAF fighter demonstrating deflection shooting is a low side attack which does not require good visibility over the nose. It is not a full deflection shot and it is not a desirable firing pass. "Full deflection approaches gave the fighter pilots tremendous advantage over defending gunners, presenting them with such return fire angles that the gunners faced "one hell of a time finding the lead." " The pilots of the USN and Marines were virtually the only fighter pilots trained from the beginning to utilize and regularly succeed in deflection shooting." " With the partial exception of the IJN, no other air forces during WW2 taught their pilots how to make full deflection shots." Page 531 of Lundstrom's "The First Team and the Guadalcanal Campaign" says it all IMO and explains the apparent disparity in the performance in the early part of the war between the F4F and it's pilots and the other services with their various aircraft against the Zero. "In all of WW2 no one did their job more "smartly" than the pilots of the US Navy."


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## pbfoot (Mar 13, 2008)

renrich said:


> It is a myth that none of the Allies knew what the best tactics to use against the Zero were until the captured Aleutian Island Zero was tested. The formal preliminary report on the Zero's performance was forwarded to BuAer on 31 October, 1942. By then the battles of Coral Sea and Midway had been fought and the battles around and over Guadalcanal were either already fought or were at their peak. It is also a myth that the Hellcat design was based on the tests of the Aleutian Zero. On 6 October the pilot testing that Zero stated: "The general impression of the airplane is exactly as originally created by intelligence-including the performance." The performance of the USN and Marine pilots in F4Fs against crack JNAF pilots flying Zeros during 1942 is plenty of evidence that those pilots knew what tactics to use to defeat the Zero. The Wildcat had a down angle of 6.5 degrees of vision which was necessary for FULL deflection shooting. In Lundstrom's "The First Team" in appendix 2, fundamentals of fixed aerial gunnery, there is a full explanation which explains why pre war USN pilots were much more proficient at deflection shooting than the pilots of any other air force. The diagram showing an RAF fighter demonstrating deflection shooting is a low side attack which does not require good visibility over the nose. It is not a full deflection shot and it is not a desirable firing pass. "Full deflection approaches gave the fighter pilots tremendous advantage over defending gunners, presenting them with such return fire angles that the gunners faced "one hell of a time finding the lead." " The pilots of the USN and Marines were virtually the only fighter pilots trained from the beginning to utilize and regularly succeed in deflection shooting." " With the partial exception of the IJN, no other air forces during WW2 taught their pilots how to make full deflection shots." Page 531 of Lundstrom's "The First Team and the Guadalcanal Campaign" says it all IMO and explains the apparent disparity in the performance in the early part of the war between the F4F and it's pilots and the other services with their various aircraft against the Zero. "In all of WW2 no one did their job more "smartly" than the pilots of the US Navy."


The best deflection shot of any of the western allies was a RCAF pilot named Buerling who flew against top notch German pilots with equal or better aircraft in a scenario that was IMHO far more hazardous then the SW Pacific.


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## Graeme (Mar 13, 2008)

renrich said:


> The diagram showing an RAF fighter demonstrating deflection shooting is a low side attack which does not require good visibility over the nose. It is not a full deflection shot...



Discussed in the preceding chapter, but called 'Angle Off' deflection shooting. The illustration I posted was only one of many, from an introduction to deflection shooting.



kool kitty89 said:


> It does seem to use a Do-17 bomber as the target a/c though, which would imply it was probably made by the RAF...



Quite possibly, but then if you were an Australian Defence Force illustrator, what enemy aircraft would you depict, if your country was involved in both the European and Pacific theatres? (a small image, but it's actually a Ju88).
However there is definitely an Aussie larrikin attitude in the artistry!..


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## claidemore (Mar 14, 2008)

Hi Renrich,

Just curious, how many degrees does John Lundstrom mean when he's talking Full deflection shooting? I'm not entirely sure what he means by full deflection shooting either. Can you elaborate?

I googled the RAF gunnery manual to refresh my memory and it covered up to 30 degrees of angle off. Incidentally, pre war RAF trained in a number of coordinated attacks intended for use against bombers which included various angles of deflection. 

I did some measurements on 3-angle views of Wildcat and Hurricane, and on some select photographs of the two planes in level flight from similar camera angles and I don't get any difference in angle of view over the nose for these two planes. Even if we concede a difference of a degree or two, that only adds up to a couple feet at 100 yards (guestimate).

Which brings me to the angle the guns were mounted. The WWII Fighter Gun Debate website mentions that P51's had their guns mounted 2 degrees above the line of flight. In theory you could mount guns at 45 degrees and view over the nose would not be a factor. (This was done in Schrage Musik installations on Luftwaffe nightfighters.) Even long nosed fighters like Corsairs, Dora9s and Griffon Spits were capable of deflection shooting. You just have to mount the guns according to the view available on the individual plane. 

The view over the nose of a P39 was light years better than any of the above mentioned fighters, but I don't recall them having a very good record in the Pacific. (ok, they weren't flown by navy pilots  ) 

The one advantage I do see for a Wildcat over a Hurricane in deflection shooting is the .50 ammo, 425fps faster than .303.


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## Graeme (Mar 14, 2008)

claidemore said:


> I did some measurements on 3-angle views of Wildcat and Hurricane, and on some select photographs of the two planes in level flight from similar camera angles and I don't get any difference in angle of view over the nose for these two planes.



Tried that myself but encountered a few problems. Scale? True flying 'attitide'? and where's my protractor?








Have also read that, according to one author, regards the Wildcat, that...

".._.the pilot's seat was cramped and too low relative to the location of his head and need for visibility."_


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## HoHun (Mar 14, 2008)

Hi Graeme,

>Tried that myself but encountered a few problems. Scale? True flying 'attitide'? and where's my protractor?

Looks good!  The flying attitude is not a problem, but we would need to find the sightline depression for each type for an accurate measurement of actual deflection capability. (Though we can do without for pure forward search view). As the sightline depression is measured against the design centre line (which we'd have to find, too), flying attitude doesn't enter the picture.

As it's possible (and common) to elevate the guns slightly above the design centre line to give the best match with the sightline, we can assume that both aircraft can be set up to hit the centre of the reticle at the desired combat distance.

Problems with the forward view: Refraction on the angled armour glass windscreen slightly shifts the sigthline (which would have to start at the sight, by the way  And the gun sight body itself provides a visual obstruction, too - I'm not sure if that might influence these two aircraft, but for a two-engined fighter with a stub nose, it certainly would.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## renrich (Mar 14, 2008)

Claidemore, A full deflection shot would be at 90 degrees to the target line. If you recall, from your target shooting, with a 303 or 3006 or any round in that category, the muzzle needs to be tilted up slightly to hit a target at a distance. I have done a lot of shooting with that category of rifle. To hit a mark at 200 yards the weapon must be sighted in to be around 2.5 inches high at 100 yards. Of course the trajectory will vary according to the ballistics of the cartridge. An interesting fact is with a round in the 3006 class, if you are 3 inches high at 100 yards, you will be within 3 inches of point of aim anywhere out to 300 yards. As you can see, the muzzles have to be tilted up slightly if one is to hit at any distance. However this ballistic info is not really relevent to deflection shooting. The problem with full deflection shooting is two fold. First, it requires a LOT of practise. Second, if the view over the nose is insufficent, the pilot loses sight of the target during the maneuver to fly the path necessary for the full deflection pass. My typing is too labor intensive to go into detail and I can't reproduce the diagrams and illustrations but if you can lay your hands on Lundstrom's "The First Team" you will readily see what the problem is. That book and the follow up, "The First Team and the Guadalcanal Campaign" are, IMO, the finest books about WW2 aviation ever written and belong in everyone's library that share our interests.


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## claidemore (Mar 14, 2008)

renrich said:


> Claidemore, A full deflection shot would be at 90 degrees to the target line. If you recall, from your target shooting, with a 303 or 3006 or any round in that category, the muzzle needs to be tilted up slightly to hit a target at a distance. I have done a lot of shooting with that category of rifle. To hit a mark at 200 yards the weapon must be sighted in to be around 2.5 inches high at 100 yards. Of course the trajectory will vary according to the ballistics of the cartridge. An interesting fact is with a round in the 3006 class, if you are 3 inches high at 100 yards, you will be within 3 inches of point of aim anywhere out to 300 yards. .



Thanks Renrich, I'm gonna try to get that Lundstrom book, this thread has sparked an interest for me in that theatre of the war. 

While we're talking about rifle shootin. Years ago I read an article by Wooters, who had a different idea about where to sight a hunting rifle. His idea was to sight it dead on at 100 yards, rather than 2-3 inches high like most 'experts' suggest. 90% of hunting shots are at 100 yards so it made sense to me. Wooters thinking was that anybody can judge 100 yards, but further than that there is a large margin of error. With his system, when your quarry is further than 100 yards, you just hold a couple inches below the top line of the animal and you are guaranteed a hit in the spine/lung/heart area out to about 350 yards with any modern hunting round. Been sighting dead on at 100 yards ever since. 

If I understand right, 90 degrees to the target line, fighter vs fighter, means flight path of the two planes is 90 degrees to each other? That would be a snap shot opportunity, since the speed of the target plane would move it through the cone of fire and out of range quickly and the shooters plane could not turn hard enough to maintain any sort of lead. The 240 rds per second of a IIb would be better there than the 75 or so rds of the F4F-4 in that situation. 
Sorta like shooting snipe or woodcock with #8 rather than BBshot.


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## renrich (Mar 14, 2008)

Where I hunted mostly long shots were the norm. I zeroed my .270 at three hundred yards. With the load I was using the bullet drop was about 18-24 inches at 500 yards. From a rest I made a number of kills at 500 paces. Remember, the full deflection shooter begins to fire at an angle of 90 degrees but as he continues the range decreases and the deflection angle decreases also. Therefore it is not a snap shot as it would be with a shotgun on a crossing shot with a duck or dove. However, there would be some similarity even though the shooter is not moving in bird hunting. Many time I have gotten off three shots at a crossing dove with each shot a decreasing deflection angle. You will really like Lundstrom's books because of how well researched they are. There are other members of this forum who have those books. I understand he is in poor health. In more ways than one I regret that because I wish he would do a third book finishing the Guadalcanal campaign which would include my favorite AC, the Corsair.


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 14, 2008)

Graeme said:


> Quite possibly, but then if you were an Australian Defence Force illustrator, what enemy aircraft would you depict, if your country was involved in both the European and Pacific theatres? (a small image, but it's actually a Ju88).
> However there is definitely an Aussie larrikin attitude in the artistry!..



That makes sense. (I thought of that later too...)

But the tail is wrong for a Ju-88 and the fuselage and cockpit canopy are longer than an 88's too.

The two a/c look very similar but you can see the key differences:





From http://homepage.eircom.net/~steven/luftwaffe.htm


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## claidemore (Mar 14, 2008)

Renrich:
I mostly bow hut with a recurve now, so 20-30 yds is the norm, but back a few years I was guiding a hunter from Wisconsin on the Muskwa river, northern BC. He spooked a black bear that should have been an easy shot. The bear ran down the mountain, then slowed to a walk when it got to the bottom. It was 750+ yds, and the hunter hadn't fired, so he and I took turns pot shooting at the bear (with his 06). The bear lay down, which seemed odd, but bears do odd things, so after a few minutes we started down to see if we could get closer. That bear never did move again, one of us had hit him while pot shooting at him and he was DOA when we got to the bottom. 

And that has absolutely nothing to do with Wildcats or Hurricanes.


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 14, 2008)

The way JoeB seems to be referring to "tactics" seems more like "strategy" but both are broad unspecific terms which are somewhat interchangeable.

What most seem to mean by "tactics" here is using a certain type combat "style" which "proper tactics" play to the a/c's strengths in a certain situation. 

For example the P-47 was best off using "boom zoom" or "dive zoom" tactics against most opponents (though in late models with better power loading and and a paddle prop it could handle a normal "dogfight" better, particularly when climbing or vertical maneuvers) likewise the Wildcat used similar "tactics" against the Japanese, though group tactics also proved important. The same would go for the AVG's "Hit and Run" tactics with their P-40s. (though their P-40s were also 30 mph faster in level flight than the Ki-43, and 70 mph faster than the Ki-27) Plus all these a/c were tougher than their opponents' a/c.

The "proper tactics" for the Hurricane in the ETO were usually "turn and Burn" as it was slower than its LW opponents in level and dive speed, no better in climb, and not really tougher, but it could turn tighter and faster than most opposing a/c. (principally the 109)
The situation was not such in the PTO so anyone using those tactics would have to quickly unlearn them against Japanese fighters. The only real advantages the Hurricane had over most Japanese a/c were ruggedness (albeit not of the engine), maximum dive speed, engine performance above 20,000 ft, and (debatably) armament.
-although 12x .303 guns would be more effective against an Oscar than 2x 12.7 mm's against the Hurricane, and the 2x 20mm guns of the Zero had poor ballistics and short firing time, though quite effective if you can hit a hurricane with one, and the cowl mounted 7.7mm guns of the Zero, Nate, and some Oscars would be almost useless-


That said, in the argument at hand, even if the Hurricanes could get and stay on the tails of the Wildcats (as in the mock combat, and an F4F-3 would be more agile than a -4, and the Wildcats should out-dive and out run the hurries with enough altitude: >10,000 ft) they would be hard pressed to take an F4F down even with 12x .303 guns as the Wildcat was virtually invulnerable to RCMG's. The oil cooler could be disabled, but the Wildcat would still be able to fly a good distance before the engine ceased. (due to the high capacity of oil) Other than a luck shot to the pilot (through the canopy) or a hit to the controls it would take a hell of allot of .303 rounds to down a Wildcat. 

On the other hand the Hurricane would be quite Vulnerable to .50 cal fire (albeit the Wildcat would also be vulnerable to .50s, and had a radial engine) and the engine would easily be disabled and probably set on fire with incendiary rounds.


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## renrich (Mar 14, 2008)

KK, I have a reference that shows the Hurricane IIB and the A6M5 to both have a service ceiling of around 35000 feet. The critical altitude of the A6M where it's Vmax would occur would be at about 20000 feet. The early Hurricane(BOB) could barely get to 30000 feet. Are you sure the Hurri had any significant edge in high altitude performance over the A6M? Actually, the tactics used by the F4F4 were not so much energy tactics or as the flight sims call it B&Z. The best tactic for a Wildcat was to turn into the Zero for a head on pass or if the Zero was on his tail to cut throttle or skid enough to force the Zero into an overshoot. Failing that a dive at high speed combined with turns was a means of getting away. Of course if the Wildcat had an altitude advantage, energy tactics were feasible but an altitude advantage in the context of the Pacific War was not easily attained.


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 14, 2008)

Graeme said:


> Tried that myself but encountered a few problems. Scale? True flying 'attitide'? and where's my protractor?
> 
> 
> 
> ...





The line for the Wildcat should be even higher than that as the instrument panel obscures vision even more as easily seen in the picture. (as well as the resulting high placement of the gun sight) So the Hurricane would indeed have better visibility. 

Though neither had any real rear view w/out a mirror.


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## Graeme (Mar 14, 2008)

claidemore said:


> If I understand right, 90 degrees to the target line, fighter vs fighter, means flight path of the two planes is 90 degrees to each other?



To the RAAF, the "Fly-Through" Method. Not recommended for Aussies! A confession of weakness!  (Much preferred is the "Follow-Through" method).





The principles and terminology. Later chapters go into the mathematics of ballistics and trajectories, as Renich pointed out.


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## Graeme (Mar 14, 2008)

Hi kool kitty!



kool kitty89 said:


> But the tail is wrong for a Ju-88 and the fuselage and cockpit canopy are longer than an 88's too.



Most certainly poorly drawn, (Australian artist?!  ) but it is meant to be a Ju88. Single tail is the clue. (Gives you some idea how hard it must have been to identify aircraft at critical moments).







kool kitty89 said:


> The line for the Wildcat should be even higher than that as the instrument panel obscures vision even more as easily seen in the picture. (as well as the resulting high placement of the gun sight) So the Hurricane would indeed have better visibility.



Good point, and I guess the problem is where *exactly *is the pilot's head/retinas in the cockpit? 



kool kitty89 said:


> Though neither had any real rear view w/out a mirror.



Very small, but it is there on the Hurricane...





...and the Wildcat had a Panoramic mirror (No. 66) inside the cockpit...


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## claidemore (Mar 14, 2008)

The Hurricane driver had one panel of perspex behind him, so he had a bit of an angle of view to the rear, though not a good one. Photos show the Wildcat pilot basically looking out the side of that last panel, so a bit less angle of rear view. 
Doing a rough test pressing against the cabin window here at home, you get about 10-15 degrees more view by having that extra bit of glass back there. The 'make-up' mirror would help too. 

That's one advantage the Buffalo had, all around view canopy, albeit with plenty of framework.


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 14, 2008)

And looking at the Hurricane's nose and canopy it may have had better foreward visibility than the Spitfire as well.

Now that I see it zoomed in, it is a Ju 88, but the tail fin seems too small, but the tailplane can be seen to be well foreward of the rudder which is characteristic of the Ju 88. The tail can now be seen as rounded as well and the Do 17 had squared off tail fins. (though later Ju 88s did have a squareed off fin as well, notably the Nightfighters) And both tailfins of a Do 17 may not be visible from the side view as one could cover the other.


Also the Ju 88 and Do 17 can easily be told apart in the plan view as the Ju 88 had much longer and more tapered wings and the twin tail of the Do 17 is much more obvious. (the tails are also easily seen from an off-center side view or in a rear or head-on view)


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## HoHun (Mar 14, 2008)

Hi Graeme,

>Tried that myself but encountered a few problems. Scale? True flying 'attitide'? and where's my protractor?

Here is an interesting page from Frederick A. Johnson's "Republic P-47 Thunderbolt" (Warbird Tech Series Volume 23).

It shows the angles of forward visibility of different USAAF fighters (though Navy fighters would have been more interesting in this context).

Note that obstruction created by the gunsight itself is not portrayed in the comparison.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## pbfoot (Mar 14, 2008)

a description of deflectiom shooying by Buerling....."heres the way it works . i try to shoot at 300 yds , because that is the range of my cannon is harmonized for . but often i can't work it that fine and that is where deflection shooting and alot of just plain shooting come in . 
You see if you get inside that 300yds you are shooting 2 streams of stuff at it .I have figured out how far those streams are apart and try and get one stream hitting the target forgetting the other. That means i have to aim at something else to make my hit>so i take my line off the exhaust or something else handy allow for the speed i am travelling and the speed the enemy is travelling and then let go .......I never attack from dead astern amd most of the time the way I fight depends on deflection shooting


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## HoHun (Mar 14, 2008)

Hi again,

Corrected source:

Frederick A. Johnsen's "Republic P-47 Thunderbolt" (Warbird Tech Series Volume 23).

And attached image 

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 14, 2008)

> The Hurricane driver had one panel of perspex behind him



Where, can you show on a drawing? 

I know the P-40 had a rear view with the "scalloped" decking behind the pilot with plexiglass pannels on either side. This was most pronounced on the P-40N where the pannels were enlarged and extended to the top, the sliding canopy was also a frameless type on this model. The P-36 had this as well.
The Spitfire also had rear panels to see out of.


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## Graeme (Mar 14, 2008)

HoHun said:


> And attached image



Thanks HoHun, much appreciated!



kool kitty89 said:


> Where, can you show on a drawing?


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 14, 2008)

That's faulty reasoning though. It would only apply if the panels were the same size, otherwise less framin would mean better visibillity.

Inless he meant that the Hurricane sate somewhat foreward of the cockpit wall while the F4F's was aganst the wall, and thus part of the canopy of the Hurricane would be behind the pilot...

Come to think of it that's probably what he meant. It makes more sence with a pilot in the picture.


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## claidemore (Mar 15, 2008)

Oops, turns out I was wrong. The pilot in the Hurricane has TWO panels behind him! lol
Heres two views, one slightly forward, one slightly to the rear.


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## Elvis (Mar 15, 2008)

claidemore said:


> I think the comparison between Wildcat and Hurricane has been pretty much covered.
> It's too complicated comparing the Hurricane to Oscar, Nate and Zero, so I'm just going to stick to the Oscar/Hayabusa, staying with the 'simple' theme.
> 
> Turn rate: HoHun? How much would I love to see a graph on this?
> ...


Wasn't it the Oscar that had individually controlable flaps (or were those dive brakes?) that could stuck out to "grab" the air and help the airplane turn sharper.
If I'm correct, I think that blows any advantage the Hurricane would've had in turning ability (not that it did, but _if_ it did) right out the window.



claidemore said:


> Dive:
> Hurricane can max dive to 450khm, but has slow dive acceleration.
> Haybusa is said to dive only a bit faster than it's max speed, Hayabusa III had max speed of 365mph, so that seems like a fair figure. Love to see stat from a reliable source rather than an estimate though. Hayabusas were known to shed wings in high G pullouts.
> Net result: Hurricane has better max dive speed, but poor/comparable initial dive.


Is that a typo, or did you mean to denote the Hurricane's dive speed in clicks?
...or is the typo with the Oscar, which is denoted in MPH.
Either way, something's amiss from your conclusion.
By my estimation, 450 clicks = 279mph.
That means that the Oscar's dive speed was almost 100 mph faster. 

Don't mean to nit pick, but just a few anomolies I noticed reading an otherwise very informative post.



Elvis


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 15, 2008)

Both dive speeds would make sense in MPH as those sound about right. Though I'd have thought the Ki-43's speed to be a little higher, albeit still less than the Hurri... The Zero's max dive speed was 410 mph iirc, though its ailerons would freeze up above 300 mph. (and became increasingly less efective starting at ~240 mph)


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## claidemore (Mar 15, 2008)

Yer right Elvis, that should be 450 mph for the Hurri dive speed. My bad. 

And yes, the Oscar had 'butterly' maneuvering flaps. Check out any of the videos on Utube for the Ki-43, that Oscar is one agile little sob. At slow speeds it rolls faster than you can click a stopwatch to time it. 

I always liked the looks of the Hayabusa/Oscar, but since doing a bit more reading on it, I'm impressed by its performance too. It could really climb, allied pilots report seeing it taking off way down below them, thinking the bombers they were escorting were safe, and before they knew it there were Oscars diving through em. 

The first model, the Ki-43 Is were supposed to have 2 blade props, but I haven't seen a photograph yet of one that didn't have a 3 blade. I think the propoganda video shows a 3 blade prop too,(have to check that again) and my understanding is that it was made during the production run of the Ki-43I. I suspect the same situation existed there as in 1940 with the Hurricanes and Spitfires, constant speed props being put on before being sent to operational units or even in the field, but thats just a theory. 

The leading Ki-43 pilot shot down one P38 and damaged another P38 enough to put him out of the fight, shot down two B24's, then rammed another B24 and downed it as well, all in one engagment. Four confirmed kills and one probable (I think JAAF credited him with the second P-38 ), so he was arguably an "Ace in a Day" with a two gun 'paper' airplane.


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## Graeme (Mar 15, 2008)

claidemore said:


> The first model, the Ki-43 Is were supposed to have 2 blade props, but I haven't seen a photograph yet of one that didn't have a 3 blade.



Top one is the Ki-43-Ic. Bottom one is either Ia or Ib. From the Aircam Aviation series No.13...


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## slaterat (Mar 15, 2008)

A lot of ground has been covered in this thread, a lot of catching up to do.

First on Hurricane dive speeds. Hurricane mk Is easily dived to 450-460 mph at 2850 rpm with a constant speed prop. Terence Kelly claims to have dived his tropicalized Hurri IIb to 590 mph. Douglas Bader claimed that in a long dive he could and did catch 109s.

Hurricane vs KI 43

In 1942 the Hurricane was up against the KI 43-1. The KI 43-1 best speed was 308mph at 13,600 ft, the tropicalized Hurr IIb 335 at 17,500 or 21,000ft depending on the source and or supercharger settings. The KI 43 was considered more manueovrable than a zero. At low speeds and low altitudes the KI 43 will out turn a Hurricane, the faster and higher you go the advantage goes to the Hurricane. The same goes for power loading. The Hurricane has a huge advantage in firepower and hardness. I haven't seen a climb chart for any KI 43 but inial climbrate would give the advantage to the KI-43 about 3,050 ft/ min vs 2850. 

There's a clear pattern developing here if you're in a Hurricane you want to start out at 20,000 ft and 300 mph a KI-43 isn't going to have too many options up there, he can't dive away , he cant run away. Lets turn the tables though and start the fight at 10,000 ft and co e. The speed of these planes is very close at this level the Ki-43 holds the turn and climb cards. The Hurris only option is to head for the deck hoping his armour protects him until he builds up enough speed to extend and/or out manueorvre the KI 43.

Unfortunately for the RAF in early 1942 S.E. Asia, with little or no ews, the defenders are almost always still climbing when the fighting begins. This is verified in "Bloody Shambles". Fight after fight the RAF Hurricanes are outnumbered and still climbing when jumped.Their airfields had very little and ineffective aaa.

Slaterat


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## slaterat (Mar 15, 2008)

Yes that is a very cool video of the KI-43 on u tube. I've always thought that the zero was an ugly plane but that the Oscar was a very clean and sleek design. I've got a 1/72 Hasegawa model of one hanging in my basement.

In reguards to the airframe, the Hurricane would be far tougher than the 
F4F or the p 40. There are several reasons for this.

The F4F, P40 and most WW II planes are of stressed skin construction, meaning that the skin of the aircraft is part of the load bearing structure of the aircraft. Any damage to the skin brings a resultant loss in the structural integrity of the airframe. These airframes are vunerable to machine guns ripping the skin or the overpressure from cannon shells rupturing the skin. The Hurricane is based on an older English method of construction. Although tubular steel airframes had been used since WW I, most of these used low quality mild steel that was welded together. This resulted in a heavy airframe that wasn't really that strong. Hawkers solution to the problem was to use lightweight high quality steel alloys held together with mechanical fastners.
This type of structure is very resistant to damage especially from over pressure but also from mg fire. It was also much more easily repaired. The wing is a two spar structure running clean through the fuselage. The spars are also made of steel , the two in the center section being made of heat treated spring steel using Hawkers welll known dumbell spar. The only stressed skin construction on the Hurricane was from the gun bays outward to the wing tips. Keep in mind the Hurricanes wings are also 18 inches thick at the gun bays adding to this immense strength. For its size the Hurricane is relatively light , the main drawback of this type of construction is that it leads to a bulkier less efficient airframe.

Slaterat


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 15, 2008)

The Hurricane Mk.I (and Maybe IIA) had fabric covered wings! And all Hurricanes had a fabric skinned rear fusalage iirc.

Also nearing 500 mph air compressing in the pilot tube caused massive overreadings of airspeed on most airspeed indicators of the era. The Hurricane, P-40, P-39, and similar a/c topped out between 450-500 mph for the safe limit for structural and controll limitations. (also, the P-38 was strong enough to dive faster but the controll problems limited pilots from doing this safely and could only recover from a 500+ mph dive with the recovery flaps)

Another thing: I'm not sure but I think the P-40 had better engine armor than the Hurricane (the Allison and Merlin engines themselves should be able to take similar damage) and the Merlins used in the BoB also used 100% glycol coolant (prestone) which was quite flamable, particularly at engine temperatures, so engine/radiator fires could be big problems, fast! This wasn't a problem for later merlins using 70/30 water/coolant mix which the V-1710 also used which was realitively non flamable and more efficient at cooling. (better heat capacity)


And here's a good example of a 90 degree deflection shot: 
_View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r7XJGsbhCgc_


I don't see the Zero as ugly though, The Ki 43-II and A6M-2 were fairly similar looking a/c and the planform of the Ki 43 is a bit sleeker with the more tapered fusalage and the Oscar's canopy was a bit nicer (smaller and less framing) but I wouldn't say the Zero was ugly.


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## slaterat (Mar 15, 2008)

Only the first 450 or so Hurricanes had fabric covered wings. Production was switched over half way through the second batch of 300. Thats out of nearly 15,000.

Slaterat


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## claidemore (Mar 15, 2008)

slaterat said:


> Only the first 450 or so Hurricanes had fabric covered wings. Production was switched over half way through the second batch of 300. Thats out of nearly 15,000.
> 
> Slaterat



I think metal skinned wings on Hurricanes were appearing in France in 1940 well before BoB. I seem to remember some of the 262 Squadron pilots mentioning them.

They dress up Harvards to look like Zeros in movies, and I don't see people raving about how pretty Harvards are! (joking)

I know two sisters, very similar features, almost like twins, but one is considered very pretty, the other one not. The slightest difference in proportions or angles makes a world of difference in human perception of beauty. Paint helps too, on planes and sisters. 

Claidemore


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 15, 2008)

So the late Mk.I had metal wings and the Mk.IIA would have had the same 8x gun all-metal wing?


And of course beauty is in the eye of the heholder, I pesonally like the looks of the P-47 over the P-51 (and the 190-A over the 190-D), and lets not get into Lanc's obsession over the looks of the Lancaster and French bombers...

Hoever I like the looks of the Ki 43 more too, but the Zero is certainly not UGLY...


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## slaterat (Mar 15, 2008)

Correct. There were less than 5000 mk 1s, so thats about the first 10 % of mk Is were fabric covered wings. AFAIK there's only 1 left in the world with thse early wings.

The front armour on the Hurricane was primarily to protect the pilot although the armour plate behind the spinner would add some protection for the engine. Large scale protection for the engine and rad was only added to the MK II D and MK IV 380 and 350lbs each.

Slaterat.


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## Graeme (Mar 15, 2008)

kool kitty89 said:


> So the late Mk.I had metal wings and the Mk.IIA would have had the same 8x gun all-metal wing?



Hurricane production commenced with Serial No. L1547. It was in 1939 that a late production IA, Serial No. N2423, incorporated the metal-skin wings on the production line.

It was only the "first 100 or so" of the IIA that had the 8-gun arrangement...


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## slaterat (Mar 15, 2008)

All IIa s had 8 gun wings
IIb 12 gun wing
IIc 4 x 20mm
Later in the Desert and in SE Asia many IIbs and IIcs had their armament reduced to 8x303 and 2x20mm, in the interest of increased performance.

Slaterat


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## slaterat (Mar 15, 2008)

About 4711 Hurricanes were IIcs, the most produced model

Slaterat


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## Graeme (Mar 15, 2008)

slaterat said:


> All IIa s had 8 gun wings
> IIb 12 gun wing
> IIc 4 x 20mm
> Later in the Desert and in SE Asia many IIbs and IIcs had their armament reduced to 8x303 and 2x20mm, in the interest of increased performance.
> ...



Ahh..thanks for the correction Slaterat. Makes sense as further on, the article describes the IIC as "introducing" cannon. Certainly a prolific number of variants for the Hurricane.


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 16, 2008)

Here's an interesting interview of a Japanese pilot on the Ki 43 in 1991: 
_View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-eBmnpCO18_ (Note: he refers to heavy machine guns of later Ki 43's and the .50 cal US guns as "cannons") Also the "type 2 fighter" should refer to the Ki 44.

Very interesting account, and much criticism of the a/c though he does mention the graseful "sleek lines" of the a/c. 

Is this the youtube video of the Ki 43 that you were talking about? 
_View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7FYVEWNNrQ_

That certainly shows the Ki 43's roll performance! If that's real time it would be over 180 degrees per second. (even more than the Fw 190A rolling with torq!)


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## FLYBOYJ (Mar 16, 2008)

The Oscar was probably the most maneuverable monoplane all metal fighter of WW2. Like the Zero, no armor plating made it burn pretty easily. It featured a butterfly split flap that made it turn on a dime.


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 16, 2008)

Also there's the Hayabusa song: 
_View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MS12isLjS5w_


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 16, 2008)

I thought the Ki 43 had a small armor plate behind the pilot and self-sealing tanks (albeit even more inadequate than the B-339E, F2A-3, or even P-43's).

This being before the later model A6Ms were made which added armor.

But as seen in the interview I posted even with more armor the structure of the plane was frail and easily damaged. (please do watch it it's quite interesting) He also notes that it was hard for the Ki 43 to pursue enemies due to low speed and that it was slower than the Hurricane. Along with this he says that it was as bad as the Ki-27 (type-1 Fighter) with vibrations at high speeds. (probably ~330+ mph)


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## FLYBOYJ (Mar 16, 2008)

kool kitty89 said:


> I thought the Ki 43 had a small armor plate behind the pilot and self-sealing tanks



As far as I know it had neither - you might be confusing the armor plate behind the pilot for a "turtleback" - a piece of structure that prevented the pilot from being crushed it the aircraft flipped over.


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## FLYBOYJ (Mar 16, 2008)

I stand corrected the type II did have some armor and self sealing tanks....

Didn't help much.


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 16, 2008)

Even with decent armor and competent fuel tanks the Ki 43's structure was fatally frail.

The only Japanese fighter of the War to have any real durabillity comparable to Allied fighters was the N1K, though the Ki 84 and to a lesser extent the Ki-100 and Ki-44 were pretty tough. (as far a Japanese fighters go)


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## FLYBOYJ (Mar 16, 2008)

Agree......


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 16, 2008)

That Ki-43 pilot in the above interview really stressed that point too, and how his comander was dissapointed with it. I didn't know that some of the IJA leaders were so displeased with this a/c even long before it entered service or even production!


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## Elvis (Mar 16, 2008)

slaterat said:


> In reguards to the airframe, the Hurricane would be far tougher than the
> F4F or the p 40. There are several reasons for this.
> 
> The F4F, P40 and most WW II planes are of stressed skin construction, meaning that the skin of the aircraft is part of the load bearing structure of the aircraft. Any damage to the skin brings a resultant loss in the structural integrity of the airframe. These airframes are vunerable to machine guns ripping the skin or the overpressure from cannon shells rupturing the skin. The Hurricane is based on an older English method of construction. Although tubular steel airframes had been used since WW I, most of these used low quality mild steel that was welded together. This resulted in a heavy airframe that wasn't really that strong. Hawkers solution to the problem was to use lightweight high quality steel alloys held together with mechanical fastners.
> ...


However, because the skin is stressed, its actually tougher than if it wasn't.
One of the benefits of placing things under a certain amount of tension is added resiliency.
Granted, I do agree with you that the any damage would degrade the integrity of the skin, but the plane didn't have a monoque body. It was still skin applied to a frame, so its not like the plane would just fold up and fall out of the sky.
It would only make the plane a little less "bullet-proof" in that area of damage.

...and _bolts_?

This reminds me of a tank that was once part of the USA's arsenal.
The M3 "Lee" tank.
Most (if not all) used bolts to fasten the hull together.
Because of this, the tankers used to call that one "_A Bucket of Death_".
An enemy's shell didn't neccessarily have to penetrate the armour to inflict injury or death, because the resulting impact would break some of the bolts causing them to fly around inside the tank.
That's why Sherman's (which was based on the M3) went, first, to a riveted hull, then to a welded hull, and finally a cast hull.
Each succeeding form of construction made for a safer environment for the people inside, over the prior one.
I do agree that bolting the frame together makes maintenance/repair easier, but I wouldn't say it was an aspect of making the plane any "tougher" than most others.

Thus, I have issues with the statement that the Hurricane was a "tougher" plane than an F4F or a P-40.
I think they all have their merits, resiliancy being one of them, but I wouldn't say one is any "tougher" than any of the others.




Elvis


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## Elvis (Mar 16, 2008)

slaterat said:


> I've always thought...that the Oscar was a very clean and sleek design.


I do agree with this one.
In fact, have you ever noticed how much it resembles the FW-190?
Even my avatar, the Swedish FFVS J22, has similar lines.
Simple but quite sleek....and all 3 planes had very good performance for the time.



Elvis


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## renrich (Mar 16, 2008)

Reviewed the u tube video on the Hellcat versus the Zero and as usual TV has got it pretty wrong. The pass was a flat side full deflection run. In other words the two planes were at the same altitude and the Hellcat was approaching the Zero's flight path at approx 90 degrees. The picture showed the Hellcat wings level, firing in front of the Zero and the enemy plane running into the bullets. In a flat side, full deflection run the Hellcat has to open fire when he is at about 1000 feet and about 90 degrees off the target's flight path holding a CONSTANT lead. Since the Hellcat was approaching the Zeke from his port side and the target was crossing from right to left, that means that the Hellcat had to be turning to the left and his guns had to be pointed CONSTANTLY in front of the target. As youall know a coordinated turn in an AC means that the airplane has to be banking to the left in order to be hold the CONSTANT lead which means the nose is pointed in front of the target. The higher the delection shot the more the nose has to be pointed in front of the target. That is where visibility over the nose is important because if the pilot cannot see the target while his nose is pointed in front of the target he cannot tell if he is holding the correct lead. It is a dynamic situation with the lead angle and range constantly changing. That is part of the reason that deflection shooting was difficult.


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## FLYBOYJ (Mar 16, 2008)

Elvis said:


> However, because the skin is stressed, its actually tougher than if it wasn't.
> One of the benefits of placing things under a certain amount of tension is added resiliency.
> Granted, I do agree with you that the any damage would degrade the integrity of the skin, but the plane didn't have a monoque body. It was still skin applied to a frame, so its not like the plane would just fold up and fall out of the sky.
> It would only make the plane a little less "bullet-proof" in that area of damage.
> ...



A few points there Elvis.

First off one of the things that made Japanese aircraft so flimsy was the basic skin riveted to a structure - in many cases the skins and bulkheads were never more than .032 thick in many places. In many US aircraft there was a corrugated skin riveted to the basic framework and then the outer skin was riveted to that, this being on the wings. I know the B-17 and P-38 was assembled in that manner. There was also a great use of steel and magnesium to hold major sub assemblies together. 

As far as bolts vs welding - welding of a primary aircraft structure DOES NOT produce a stronger structure with regards to combat damage resiliency. To my knowledge the only WW2 aircraft that had the majority of its primary structure welded together was the Kingfisher, and that was decided because of loads that the aircraft would take during water landings. Aircraft structures need to twist and bend and welding to a primary structure doesn't achieve that. Even aircraft with 4130 welded steel fuselages are designed to twist and bend around the welded tubing. 

For the most part, the "bolts" used to assemble primary structures are usually close tolerance metal pins with various manufacturer's names, and the methodology of assembly varies from manufacturer to manufacturer.


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 16, 2008)

Plus most explosive shells, flack, or bullets hitting an aircraft wouldn't be of the same nature as the shells hitting a tank, along with the different nature of aircraft structure to tank construction.

Welding tends to give a more rigid structure, with the welded joints being the most rigid parts, but these areas would be prone to fatigue and failure and were more brittle to begin with. (welds usualy being more hard and brittle than the base metal) On the other hand bolts and other metal fasteners allow alot more "give" and shifting of the structure and would be much more resistant to fatigue from landing and maneuvering. (and general loading on the a/c) It would probably be more restant to battle damage as well as a hit to a weld could result in the subsequent failure of the entire weld, while the same construction with fasteners would have some degree to redundancy due to multiple fasteners and the greater flexibility or "give" in the structure would be less likely to fail with most battle damage.


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## FLYBOYJ (Mar 16, 2008)

kool kitty89 said:


> Plus most explosive shells, flack, or bullets hitting an aircraft wouldn't be of the same nature as the shells hitting a tank, along with the different nature of aircraft structure to tank construction.
> 
> Welsing tends to give a more rigid structure, with the welded joints being the most rigid parts, but these areas would be prone to fatigue and failure and were more brittle to begin with. (welds usualy being more hard and brittle than the base metal) On the other hand bolts and other metal fasteners allow alot more "give" and shifting of the structure and would be much more resistant to fatigue from landing and maneuvering. (and general loading on the a/c) It would probably be more restant to battle damage as well as a hit to a weld could result in the subsequent failure of the entire weld, while the same construction with fasteners would have some degree to redundancy due to multiple fasteners and the greater flexibility or "give" in the structure would be less likely to fail with most battle damage.



And that's why there weren't many aircraft with all their primary structure welded together.


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 16, 2008)

The cockpit canopy seen in the pilot's perspective of the Hellcat in the Dogfights clip is also quite wrong. In fact it apears to be the Zero's canopy! (or at least it closely resembles it) Though the rest of the cockpit seen seem to be of the Hellcat...

It is especially obvious in this clip: 
_View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ob3lvqowHo_

Compared to this cockpit view: 
_View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Dq7LN14LnI_ And the Zero's: 
_View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1_6jtK1Y_ (from the Il-2 combat flight simulator)


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## claidemore (Mar 16, 2008)

kool kitty89 said:


> Plus most explosive shells, flack, or bullets hitting an aircraft wouldn't be of the same nature as the shells hitting a tank, along with the different nature of aircraft structure to tank construction.
> 
> Welding tends to give a more rigid structure, with the welded joints being the most rigid parts, but these areas would be prone to fatigue and failure and were more brittle to begin with. (welds usualy being more hard and brittle than the base metal) On the other hand bolts and other metal fasteners allow alot more "give" and shifting of the structure and would be much more resistant to fatigue from landing and maneuvering. (and general loading on the a/c) It would probably be more restant to battle damage as well as a hit to a weld could result in the subsequent failure of the entire weld, while the same construction with fasteners would have some degree to redundancy due to multiple fasteners and the greater flexibility or "give" in the structure would be less likely to fail with most battle damage.



I'm not a welder, but I've done some welding, and worked and talked with a lot of guys who make their living stickin pieces of metal together. So I'm sure there's others who have a better understanding of this, but here goes.... 

Generally when a weld breaks, at least a good weld, it's not the weld material that breaks, but the steel. It might break at the point it's welded, because that is usually a stress point, but technically it is not the weld that breaks (this would be a breakage due to fatigue or stress). 

Depending on the type of rod used the weld is usually stronger than the original material. Again depending on the type of rod used, the weld may or may not be more brittle than the original material, I believe that aluminum weld is not that brittle, most of the breaks on aluminum that I've seen are not at the weld points. Of course my experience there is with livestock trailers, it might be quite different in aircraft. I reckon Flyboy would have some knowledge to share there. 

I agree that a mechanical fastener is going to give more flexibility, but I'm not sure that a welded joint would be more susceptible to battle damage, in fact I believe it would be more resistant to impact and explosive force than the original material. 

Claidemore


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## HoHun (Mar 17, 2008)

Hi Claidemore,

>I agree that a mechanical fastener is going to give more flexibility, but I'm not sure that a welded joint would be more susceptible to battle damage, in fact I believe it would be more resistant to impact and explosive force than the original material. 

The advantage of a steel tube construction against explosive shells is actually mostly independend of the connection method. Unless directly struck, a steel tube will probably take no damage from a 20 mm shell exploding nearby. The real damage these shells do is to the stressed-skin surface, both by blast and by fragmentation, which weakens the target aircraft's structure.

The Hurricane with its steel-tube framing covered by fabric will lose its fabric cover, but the load-bearing structure will remain intact. (According to the Finnish experience against the Hurricane, holes in the fabric can lead to the slipstream ripping off the entire cover of the tail, resulting in aerodynamic trouble. I don't think I've ever read about this effect from Luftwaffe pilots, though, so I'm not sure about its significance.)

The Hurricane seems to have stood up reasonably well agaist the fire of the Me 109 in the Battle of Britian, and the A6M2 had a similar battery as the Messerschmitt, though the cannon shells it fired were somewhat less powerful.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## Elvis (Mar 17, 2008)

Claidmore,

Thanks for educating the others on those aspects of welding that you pointed out.
My own experience and knowledge of the aspects of welding seem similar to yours.
As far as I know, what you related is quite true.
If one welds two pieces of metal togther and the weld breaks under a stress test, the weld is considered "bad".
It should always be the strongest part of the new piece.

However, I seem to have (once again) overstated in my post that garnered so much response.
My mention about welding was only in passing (relatiing to the construction history of the M4 Sherman tank), and my point was that the post I was replying to stated that the Hurricane was tougher because it used "mechanical fasteners" (bolts).
I disagree with that statement and used the story of the M3 Lee tank as an example of why I am in disagreement.

That was all.

My apologies to the others for any misunderstanding my post may have created.




Elvis


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## FLYBOYJ (Mar 17, 2008)

claidemore said:


> I'm not a welder, but I've done some welding, and worked and talked with a lot of guys who make their living stickin pieces of metal together. So I'm sure there's others who have a better understanding of this, but here goes....
> 
> Generally when a weld breaks, at least a good weld, it's not the weld material that breaks, but the steel. It might break at the point it's welded, because that is usually a stress point, but technically it is not the weld that breaks (this would be a breakage due to fatigue or stress).
> 
> ...



The brittleness of the weld on aluminum will depend on the aluminum alloy. 2024 material will be less brittle, 7075 a bit more brittle. In either case for the structure to maintain uniformity it will need to have the stresses removed from the weld area and re-heat treated, another reason why you don't see a lot of aircraft primary structures welded.


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## FLYBOYJ (Mar 17, 2008)

HoHun said:


> The advantage of a steel tube construction against explosive shells is actually mostly independend of the connection method. Unless directly struck, a steel tube will probably take no damage from a 20 mm shell exploding nearby.


More than likely however, the tube structure will take some damage if a round is exploded within the fuselage.


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## FLYBOYJ (Mar 17, 2008)

Elvis said:


> Claidmore,
> 
> Thanks for educating the others on those aspects of welding that you pointed out.
> My own experience and knowledge of the aspects of welding seem similar to yours.
> ...



See my last post - sometimes a good weld will break under stress if there in ununiformity within the weld and adjoining areas, a reason for a welded structure to be annealed and re-heat treated after welding.



Elvis said:


> However, I seem to have (once again) overstated in my post that garnered so much response.
> My mention about welding was only in passing (relatiing to the construction history of the M4 Sherman tank), and my point was that the post I was replying to stated that the Hurricane was tougher because it used "mechanical fasteners" (bolts).
> I disagree with that statement and used the story of the M3 Lee tank as an example of why I am in disagreement.
> 
> ...


No worries Elvis


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## HoHun (Mar 17, 2008)

Hi Flyboyj,

>More than likely however, the tube structure will take some damage if a round is exploded within the fuselage.

Hm, Germans tests on the gunnery range seem to indicate that a conventional aircraft tube structure stays intact, at least in the sense that it will allow the aircraft to fly home and possibly to be repaired. The tubing presents a comparatively small attack area to the shockwave of the explosion, and a high strength (compared to the surface of a stressed-skin aircraft).

Maybe it's just that I'm talking about the macro structure of the tubing while you're talking about the crystal lattice of the material? I imagine that at that level, you'd see distinct traces of the damage, especially when we also figure in the fragmentation effect.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## FLYBOYJ (Mar 17, 2008)

HoHun said:


> Hi Flyboyj,
> 
> >More than likely however, the tube structure will take some damage if a round is exploded within the fuselage.
> 
> ...




Hi Henning.

Keep in mind that on 4130 tube fuselages, the steel tubing is taking up about 80% of the strength. The formers and stringers used to give shape to the fuselage also play a part in the equation. It is true that unless there is a direct hit on the tube, most rounds or shrapnel debris will probably pass harmless through the fabric. Even large fabric tears may not affect the aircraft's integrity if they exist on non-aerodynamic surfaces. More than likely however, I don't see this always being the exception to the rule.

Also keep in mind that any damage to that tube, especially if it was bent during a hard landing will put the aircraft out of service.


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## Elvis (Mar 17, 2008)

FLYBOYJ said:


> See my last post - sometimes a good weld will break under stress if there in ununiformity within the weld and adjoining areas, a reason for a welded structure to be annealed and re-heat treated after welding.


Ununiformity with the weld would be defined as a bad weld (possibly welding material related, but still a bad weld).

...and thanks for being understanding concerning the rest of what I wrote.



Elvis


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## FLYBOYJ (Mar 17, 2008)

Elvis said:


> Ununiformity with the weld would be defined as a bad weld (possibly welding material related, but still a bad weld).


I'm actually speaking in terms of metal ununiformity (uneven heating and cooling). I should have explained more, my bad...


Elvis said:


> ...and thanks for being understanding concerning the rest of what I wrote.
> Elvis


No sweat - see above..


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 17, 2008)

The uneven heating and cooling was the main reason for the brittleness I mentioned earlier. (at least in steel) Aluminum had some weird heat-treating characteristics (one example being aging), but we were (or I was) speaking of a welded steel structure, and in many cases the weld will (and should) be the strongest part of the material. The metal will tear more easily than the weld its self, but a weld makes a structure more rigid and if said structure is undergoing many changes in loading and forces (as an a/c will experience) the areas around the welds (and the general structure) will be more prone to fatigue and stress fractures/tears. (albeit not normally at the welds) While a bolted structure will have a degree of flexibility or "give" which will allow the structure to absorb stress more effectively.

The statement I made on a weld actually failing was for a direct hit on the weld its self (not very likely) which could cause a fracture of the relatively brittle weld material (or the base metal right against the weld, which also would be more brittle from the heat stresses of the welding process). This scenario is not very likely though.


The type of strength you want for a tank isn't the same as desired for an a/c. (plus there's not a big chance of bolts becoming shrapnel like in the M4's case) Case in point would be the fact that (as Elvis posted) the M4 went from a bolted hull to welded then to a CAST hull. I don't think cast components would ever be desirable for an aircraft's structure as it tends to be heavier and more brittle (albeit harder) than other methods. The increased weight would not be as important (or really significant) on a tank, and the advantages of lower cost and the fact that a harder heavier hull will likely be more damage resistant to the damage a tank would receive. (despite the brittleness) 

This is the opposite of what would be desirable on an a/c. Flexibility elasticity ("toughness" opposed to "hardness") are more important to the overall strength and integrity, along with lower weight.


And HoHun, you mentioned the rounds passing through fabric on the Hurricane, but the only fabric on it (except for early Mk.I's wings) was the rear fuselage. The rest was aluminum skin over the steel frame (and a small portion of stressed skin on the outer wings), granted though that the behavior of the rounds would be similar though. (but holes in the skin from HE shells would tend to be much smaller)


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 17, 2008)

Another thing about the Hurricane's survivability: Didn't the Hurricane have a fuel tank right in front of the pilot?! (just aft of the engine)

Unless there was considerable armor around it there could be a serious problem. Even with good self sealing a small leak could be made and easily cause a fire large enough to harm the pilot. (and the engine was right there too!) And with a larger fire more likely (before the tank could seal, if it could -cannon hits would not be easy-) the flames could wrap around the canopy and cause considerable harm even if there was a firewall to protect the pilot. (or force a bail-out)

That would make a very vulnerable spot, and and in the same target area of the other most vulnerable target: the liquid-cooled engine! (and of course the pilot)


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## claidemore (Mar 17, 2008)

Heres a report on a Hurricane IIb salvaged recently from a lake in Russia. 



> The third loss was Lt. P.P. Markov who was flying Hurricane Z5252. In the ensuing combat, he suffered four hits to his fuel tank, electrical panel (which consequentially caused the electric circuit to fail and why the RS-82’s had not be fired), an explosive round to the port wing and one bullet hole in the top engine cowling which missed the engine. With no electrical power, Lt Markov was forced to put down on a small frozen lake 4 miles west of Murmansk. Even though it was early June, the winter of 1941 was one of the coldest on record and the lakes were still partially frozen. Lt. Markov completed a perfect belly landing on the ice, exited Z5252 and headed for the settlement of Mishukovo. He was later brought back to his unit at Vaenga by motorboat.



Hawker Hurricane IIB ‘Trop’ Z5252

Also, the Hurricane has two tanks in the wings, 66 gals, one reserve tank of 28 gallons between engine and cockpit. 
I believe the Wildcat has a fuel tank right under the pilot? 
I did find one other weakness of the Wildcat. Not only was it's landing gear narrow, but they had "an inordinate amount" of landing accidents because the gear occasionally didn't lock down properly. The gear was a leftover from older Grumman designs, and they changed it in the F6F Hellcat.


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## slaterat (Mar 18, 2008)

Many WWII fighters including the Spitfire and the Corsair carried their entire fuel load in front of the pilot. Since most aircraft were shot down from behind without knowing what hit them , front placement of the fuel was viewed by some as superior to placement aft of the pilot.

The main fuel tanks of the hurricane are in the wingroots nestled between the two steel spars affording them additional protection . The reserve (gravity)tank is in front of the pilot. It is unpressurized, self sealing and protected with a fireproof bulkhead , armour plate and 10G(bullet resistant) cowling .

The use of mechanical fastners in the construction of the Hurricanes tubular steel frame enabled the use of higher quality, lighter and stronger heat treated steel that could not be welded with the technology of the time. This is also what made it easy to repair.

The Hurricane is tougher than most of its contemporaries because of
- its unique construction
-substainial amount of steel in its structure
-through wing construction
-very thick strong wings(2 steel spars)

Slaterat


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## Elvis (Mar 18, 2008)

FLYBOYJ said:


> I'm actually speaking in terms of metal ununiformity (uneven heating and cooling). I should have explained more, my bad...


Flyboy,

No prob, _bob_. Thanks for clarifying your earlier statement.




Elvis


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## renrich (Mar 18, 2008)

Not to nit pick but F4U1s had fuel tanks in the wings as well as the fuselage tank. It would be hard for me to imagine that a Hurricane would be harder to shoot down than a Wildcat. To begin with a radial engine is going to be much harder to put out of action than a liquid cooled engine. Two other factors are that the Wildcat was designed as a ship board AC and thus was stressed for higher loadings than a landbased fighter. The other factor is the Wildcat was manufactured by Grumman, which was known as "The Ironworks" with good reason. It was said that Leroy Grumman always doubled the the strength of various components over the design limits. The FM2 had no dive limits with or without wing stores. A quote from one of it's pilots," The F4F was as solid as a brick outhouse, almost a flying tank." Another quote, "Incidentally, if you had a Zero any place around, the safest place for him was right on your tail. That back armor would hold up beautifully; they could shoot at you all day long back there-and that's not an exaggeration!" Incidently, there is an interesting article in the latest "Air and Space, Smithsonian" about Spitfires and Hurricanes and their construction. Seems that Spits are easier to restore than Hurris because the Hurricanes requires wood working skills that are difficult to find now. The longerons and formers of the Hurri are all wood. If you see the photos of an ongoing restoration it would seem that a Hurricane would be very susceptible to fire with all that wood and fabric.


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## HoHun (Mar 18, 2008)

Hi Slaterat,

>Many WWII fighters including the Spitfire and the Corsair carried their entire fuel load in front of the pilot. Since most aircraft were shot down from behind without knowing what hit them , front placement of the fuel was viewed by some as superior to placement aft of the pilot.

Hm, all of the comments I've read were rather unfavourable since hits in the tank often would make fuel pour back into the cockpit - sometimes burning, sometimes just soaking the pilot in volatile gasoline. 

Geoffrey Page of "Guinea Pig" fame mentioned that the first thing the brilliant surgeon Archibald McIndoe asked after seeing Page's horrible burns was - "Hurricane or Spitfire?"

>The main fuel tanks of the hurricane are in the wingroots nestled between the two steel spars affording them additional protection . The reserve (gravity)tank is in front of the pilot. It is unpressurized, self sealing and protected with a fireproof bulkhead , armour plate and 10G(bullet resistant) cowling .

Admittedly, in the early Hurricane aircraft, the upper tank was neither self-sealing nor separated from the cockpit by an armoured bulkhead, both of which were introduced after the Battle-of-Britain experience showed that the Hurricane was more vulnerable against hits than the Spitfire.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## Hunter368 (Mar 18, 2008)

Good post Hohon, could not of said it better.


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 18, 2008)

Fuel under the pilot wouldn't be as bad as fuel and flames would move aft of the cockpit. 

The Wildcat's landing gear was also manual (cranked) so I can see how some accidents could occur if the pilot didn't fully extend it. (external tanks also had to be pumped manually iirc) (the F2A had wider gear that was powered, but that's no good if it's too weak for carrier landings...)

And though it wasn't originally designed for it the Hurricane's rugged structure friendly low-speed handling, and wide track landing gear made it well suited for the carrier role (though the liquid-cooled engine didn't) and was probably better suited than the Seafire was. (narrow landing gear, sensitive controls, trickier low-speed handling, dangerous stall characteristics)


Compared to the F6F, F4U, and P-47, the skin of the wildcat was pretty thin (nearly as thin as the Zero's according to a post by FLYBOYJ on another thread) but the structure had many bulkheads and strengthening supports which made it very resistant to damage or structural failure.


And are you sure all Hurricanes had that much wood? I thought the Mk.II's did away with that. (or at least the IIC, as the cannon recoil was found to compromise the integrity of wooden components in the wing)


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## Elvis (Mar 19, 2008)

Renrich,

Thanks for posting the quote.
I understand a lot of pilots felt that way about the F4F.
I couldn't agree more.



Elvis


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## slaterat (Mar 19, 2008)

Geez I dont know where to start.

Only the Corsair prototype had leading edge fuel tanks in its wings. These were deleted in the production run to make room for the USN requirements that it carry 6 .50 in the wings. The prototype had 2 x.50 in the wings and a.50 and a .30 in the fuselage.

In fighter vs fighter combat the worst place for the fuel tank is behind the pilot as this is the most likely area of attack.

Every single Hurricane built had the fire proof bulkhead between the fuel tank and the cockpit. It is an integrel part of the structure. After assembly it mates evenly with the front spar of the wing.

All Hurricanes had front armour from the summer of 39 onwards.

All Hurricanes manufactured from Feb 1940 had rear armour all others were retro fitted well before the BoB.

The wing tanks were made self sealing in early 1940 too. The reserve tank was not made self sealing until Sept 1940.(due to BoB experiance)

There is no wood in the wings of any Hurricane.

The only wood used in the Hurricane is for the steamling structure aft of the pilot. The structures are called formers and stringers. This is what gives the Hurricane its distinctive slightly ribbed look.

The fuslage longerons are the 4 load bearing tubes that run the length of the fuselage. They are made of steel.

The Hurricane was Sydney Camms first monoplane fighter and he overbuilt it too. With war on the horizon Camm knew that this plane had too work and it had to be able to go into production quickley. Anything too experimental and you've lost the war before it begins.

As you can see by 1940 the Hurricane was one of the best protected fighters in the world. The Mk IIa,b recieved additonal armour in front of the glycol header tank, an extra plate extending the rear protection downwards and a thicker head plate. The IIc also recieved additonal armour for its cannon magazines. Keep in mind that the Hurricane IIa entered operational service in Sept 1940.

Maybe some of you haven't read a lot about the RAF, Commonwealth air forces in WW II, so you don't know the reputation the Hurricane had for its toughness. There certainly seems to be alot unfounded disbelief that the Hurricane could be as tough as an American fighter, (and not even the toughest American fighter at that)

Slaterat


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## slaterat (Mar 19, 2008)

An update on "Bloody Shambles". I'm reading the middle volume first that covers from Dec 41 to May 42. I can't say enough about these books. I rate them 10 out of 10. I will read and re read these books many times. I've got a pretty decent collection of books on the WW II airwar, some are very factual but a little on the dry side. Others are fantastic first hand accounts of the pilots and men who were there, but these are sometimes lacking in details.
Bloody Shambles rolls them both together in a great combo. The amount of reasearch in these books is astonishing. There a literally hundreds of first hand accounts all cross referenced with post war records.

Just to help make my point on the toughness of the cane RAF pilot Sanddeman Allen rt'b after a fight in which he claimed on kill and a probable while his Hurricane sustained 28 cannon shell hits aand 43 bullet holes.

Slaterat


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## Elvis (Mar 19, 2008)

slaterat,

Two things...

1) If a person wanted just one set of books that gave a good overall picture of the Commonwealth's contribution to the airwar, would you say the "Bloody Shambles" collection would be your recommendation?

2) On the toughness of the Hurricane, personally, I'd say it was an equally tough airplane as some of the others mentioned, including the F4F, but my problem is your earlier statement that it was _tougher_.
I just have a hard time swallowing that.
"As tough", yes. "Tougher", well....
I do know that overall, the Hurri was always considered a very tough and reliable aircraft, but so were others (The CAC Boomerang and the Curtiss P-40, for instance).
The F4F has been quoted as being referred to by pilots as "a flying tank" and the company that made it had the nickname "The Ironworks".
There's a reason for those accolades and I've never heard them attributed to the Hurricane or Hawker.
...maybe there's a reason for that, too?




Elvis


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## FLYBOYJ (Mar 19, 2008)

As far as "Bloody Shambles" - probably the most detailed books written about the WW2 air war.

"'Toughness" between the Hurricane and Wildcat? I've had the opportunity to see both aircraft very "up close and personal" and I would have to say comparing both aircraft side by side the Wildcat takes it hands down. If I was in either aircraft and was having 20mm shells pounding me I would much rather be in the Wildcat. With that said the Hurricane, with the materials used for its construction was built like a tank. I could see this aircraft surviving not only intense battle damage, but abuse from bad landings and over Gs during flight. There were two different design philosophies as each aircraft were designed to serve two different roles, but in the end I'd have to say the Wildcat was the "tougher" of the two and that's not taking anything away from the Hurricane, which IMO was the real reason why Britain won the BoB. I place the Hurricane and the P-40 on the list as the two most under-rated aircraft of WW2.


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## HoHun (Mar 19, 2008)

Hi Slaterat,

>Every single Hurricane built had the fire proof bulkhead between the fuel tank and the cockpit. 

Hm, according to Stephen Bungay's "The Most Dangerous Enemy", that was not the case. Not only does he list details on the protection, he also quotes higher loss ratios for Hurricanes when it. His book is fairly recent, and on first reading it, I haven't spotted any errors that would shake my confidence in his research.

He might be wrong anyway, of course. However, his explanation matches the anecdotal evidence of flaming fuel pouring into the cockpit after hits (often enough, inflicted from behind - anything passing to the left and right of the back armour could hit the instrument panel and the fuel tanks).

>The wing tanks were made self sealing in early 1940 too. The reserve tank was not made self sealing until Sept 1940.(due to BoB experiance)

Well, so it seems Bungay is correct at least about the reserve tank.

>The Mk IIa,b recieved additonal armour in front of the glycol header tank, an extra plate extending the rear protection downwards and a thicker head plate. 

Thanks for the details!  Don't get me wrong, I too believe that the Hurricane was a tough aircraft and probably would have withstood A6M attacks as well as the F4F, but in the interest of historical accuracy I felt obliged to point out the dangerous vulnerability of the nose tank arrangement.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## R Leonard (Mar 19, 2008)

slaterat said:


> Geez I dont know where to start.
> 
> Only the Corsair prototype had leading edge fuel tanks in its wings. These were deleted in the production run to make room for the USN requirements that it carry 6 .50 in the wings. The prototype had 2 x.50 in the wings and a.50 and a .30 in the fuselage.



Well, not exactly, and, truth be known, that was my belief at one time as well, but I once had reason to chase down the story and found the pilots manuals are quite specific on the subject, complete with diagrams of the before and after fuel systems . . . 

The F4U-1, F3A-1, FG-1 and British airplanes, serial numbers JT 100 to JT 554 did indeed have wing tanks, built integrally in the outer leading edge panels with a capacity of 63 U.S. gallons (53 Imp. gallons) each. The wing tanks were provided with a CO2 vapor dilution system. They were generally used only for ferry purposes. 

Wing tanks and their CO2 dilution system were eliminated starting with the F4U-1D, FG-1D and British airplanes numbered JT 555 and above. These airplanes also had (hence the “D”) provision for two more drop tanks (in addition to the one drop tank capability of the earlier models) of the standard 154 gallon navy type tank, or, in a pinch the USAAFs P-38 type drop tank of 171 gallons. 

The confusion arises in that the originally planned wing tanks in the prototype XF4U were indeed eliminated as a result of the change in armament, and were moved to the outer leading edge location.

There were some 3156 Corsairs of the F4U-1, FG-1, and F3A-1 varieties produced.

Rich


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 19, 2008)

FLYBOYJ, it the reason for the Wildcat's better "toughness" the radial engine or is there some other property of the structure that made it tougher than the Hurricane?


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## FLYBOYJ (Mar 19, 2008)

kool kitty89 said:


> FLYBOYJ, it the reason for the Wildcat's better "toughness" the radial engine or is there some other property of the structure that made it tougher than the Hurricane?


"BOTH!"


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 19, 2008)

I should have said "was it just the radial engine or.." the radial engine obviously increasing survivabillity.

But what in the Wildcat's structure made it "tougher" than the Hurricane?

And a side question: which a/c would have been easier to repair in field conditions? (engine aside)


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## pbfoot (Mar 19, 2008)

Some things about the Hurricane the wing is not 18" I make it about 15" thick and some photos of fuel tanks and stringers inside fuselage


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## FLYBOYJ (Mar 19, 2008)

kool kitty89 said:


> I should have said "was it just the radial engine or.." the radial engine obviously increasing survivabillity.
> 
> But what in the Wildcat's structure made it "tougher" than the Hurricane?
> 
> And a side question: which a/c would have been easier to repair in field conditions? (engine aside)


I think the Radial had the survivability factory, no doubt.

The Wildcat was all aluminum with "many" ribs, longerons, bulkheads all held together with solid rivets. From what I remembered the thinnest part of its skin was .032, the thickest between .064 and higher in some places - I'm guessing by eyeball, I didn't have a calliper with me to measure exact.

The Hurricane seemed to have almost a "tight picket fence" of stringers in its fuselage and like the Wildcat almost seemed to be over engineered. I remember the "turtleback"having a cluster supporting each station and it would seem that was almost the strongest part of the fuselage. From what I remember the wings seemed very strong and I do remember 2 main spars. I also remember the control surfaces seeming less robust when compared to the rest of the aircraft, probably Camm's efforts to keep the control surfaces light.


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## FLYBOYJ (Mar 19, 2008)

Great shots PB - any more?


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## renrich (Mar 19, 2008)

There were 1734 F4U1s delivered to the US. All had 237 gallon fuselage tanks that were self sealing and 62 gallon tanks in each wing that were unprotected but with the CO2 system mentioned by R Leonard for a total of 361 gallons of internal fuel. These models could also carry a centerline external tank of 175 gallons. A "yardstick" range for that model with full internal and external tanks was around 2200 miles. Many F4U1s with the wing tanks saw combat. The following is an anecdote I am quoting from memory: In Boone Guyton's book about the Corsair, "Whistling Death," Guyton, a former Navy pilot but the chief test pilot in the Corsair development was chewed out by a Navy admiral during the war because the CO2 bottle for the fuel tank dilution system was located next to the CO2 bottle for the emergency blow down landing gear system. During combat in the Pacific a Navy pilot got ahold of the wrong bottle and instead of diluting the fuel tanks he blew down his landing gear which could not then be retracted. Because of the additional drag he was then shot down and killed. The admiral told Guyton in no uncertain terms that they needed to pilot proof that design and Guyton went back to the factory and they immediately changed the design, separating the bottles.


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## pbfoot (Mar 19, 2008)

FLYBOYJ said:


> Great shots PB - any more?


lots any thing in particular


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## FLYBOYJ (Mar 19, 2008)

pbfoot said:


> lots any thing in particular


Cockpit and fuselage structure?


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## HoHun (Mar 19, 2008)

Hi Pbfoot,

>lots any thing in particular

Would it be possible to post the photographs over on the Technical subforum? Your pictures seem to be just the kind of first-rate material Micdrow is always on the look-out for 

They'll probably also find a larger audience than here on page x of a long, long discussion thread 

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## slaterat (Mar 20, 2008)

Just do a google search for Hawker Restorations. They have many fine photos of Hurricanes under restoration and lots of info.

I guess we can agree that all F4Us had a 237 gal fuel tank sitting right in front of the pilot. Thats 8 times the size of the Hurricanes 28 gal reserve tank and a much bigger target. 

Hohun: Actually bullets from the rear would have to pass through the fireproof bulkhead to get to the reserve tank. Anyways its a small target and its well protected, far better than most rear mounted fuel tanks.

As far as the survivability of the spit vs hurri during the BoB. It depends on how you interpret the stats. Hurricanes formed the majority of 10 Group which saw by far the most action during the BoB. They also were vectored more often to the bombers which even when surprised could still hit back.

Elvis two things

Hawker had a great reputation for building tough fighters. I guess it depends on where you live. Take a look at their WW II lineup. The Hurricane, Typhoon, Tempest and the Sea Fury. Thats a very tough group of fighters.
These fighters are as big and rugged as any made during the war.

On rating "Bloody Shambles". Its easily the best books I've read on The Commonwealth contribution to the air war in SE Asia. They filled a big gap in my collection. I've got some excellant books on BoB , North Afrika ect.
The only short coming I can see is that if you dont know your planes you might need a copy of Janes beside you. Probably not a problem for the people who post here.

Overall the toughness of a fighter is a quality that is hard to measure. I think I've made some strong points
- the blast resistant structure 
- the large amount of steel used
- the thickness and construction ,steel spars, of the wings 
( they are 18inches thick)
chord at root 8 ft1/4 inch aerofoil section 19 % = 18.24" 

The reason I started down this path was people were posting that the Wildcat would have a big edge in toughness based on not much more than their opinion

Gotta go for now

Slaterat


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 20, 2008)

Structure aside, the radial engine gives a big advantage to damage resistance.


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## pbfoot (Mar 20, 2008)

slaterat said:


> - the thickness and construction ,steel spars, of the wings
> ( they are 18inches thick)
> chord at root 8 ft1/4 inch aerofoil section 19 % = 18.24"
> 
> ...


I trust my tape measure


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## HoHun (Mar 20, 2008)

Hi Slaterat,

>Hohun: Actually bullets from the rear would have to pass through the fireproof bulkhead to get to the reserve tank. Anyways its a small target and its well protected, far better than most rear mounted fuel tanks.

Well, Bungay maintains that during the Battle of Britain, there was no fireproof bulkhead, and I've read enough accounts of pilots burned by or at least dowsed in fuel from the forward tank that it was a real risk, regardless if there was a fireproof bulkhead or not.

What's more, Bungay quotes figures from operational losses showing that the Hurricane did not stand up to enemy fire as well as the Spitfire. Please have a bit of patience while I try to find that quote ... should have noted the page number on reading it first! :-/

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## renrich (Mar 20, 2008)

The Corsair fuselage tank was self sealing and had armor over the top and was protected from the rear by the armor behind the pilot. Only 189 were shot down by enemy AC in WW2 and the Corsair had 2155 kills. I don't think the Sea Fury was ever operational in WW2.


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## slaterat (Mar 20, 2008)

I 've measured the thickness of a Hurricane wing too PB, There was one leaning against the wall at the air museum in Calgary. It is 18 inches thick at the gun bay in the middle of the wing at the thickest section.. You're position of the tape is not right for an accurate reading. I'll trust the numbers form a reprint of the Hurricane manual used by tha actual ground crews.

I admit the air cooled radial is tougher than the liquid coolled merlin. I accept it as a fact. Just as I accept the fact that steel is stronger than aluminum.

Slaterat


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## HoHun (Mar 20, 2008)

Hi again,

>What's more, Bungay quotes figures from operational losses showing that the Hurricane did not stand up to enemy fire as well as the Spitfire. Please have a bit of patience while I try to find that quote ... should have noted the page number on reading it first! :-/

Here it is: Stephen Bungay, "The Most Dangerous Enemy", p. 197, on the period 10 July - 11 August 1940:

"However, there was a significant difference in the result, for the Spitfires had a far better rate of survival. Of those sixty-three hit by Bf 109s, only thirty-one were destroyed as opposed to damaged, whereas of the same number of Hurricanes, forty-five were destroyed. The contrast in the casualies caused by bombers ewas even more stark. Of the twendty-five Spitfires hit, only two were destroyed; of the twenty-five Hurricanes, eleven were destryoed. This is reflected in the pilot casualties. Of the total number of pilots killed, fifty-one flew Hurricanes and only twenty-five flew Spitfires."

(The rest of the text in the scans. Quite a good book, by the way - highly recommended!)

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## FLYBOYJ (Mar 20, 2008)

slaterat said:


> The reason I started down this path was people were posting that the Wildcat would have a big edge in toughness based on not much more than their opinion
> 
> Gotta go for now
> 
> Slaterat



Sure, a lot of it is based on opinion.

BTW I've spent almost 30 years in aviation and have worked on several different warbirds - everyone has opinions but I would also consider the source.


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## pbfoot (Mar 20, 2008)

slaterat said:


> I 've measured the thickness of a Hurricane wing too PB, There was one leaning against the wall at the air museum in Calgary. It is 18 inches thick at the gun bay in the middle of the wing at the thickest section.. You're position of the tape is not right for an accurate reading. I'll trust the numbers form a reprint of the Hurricane manual used by tha actual ground crews.
> 
> I admit the air cooled radial is tougher than the liquid coolled merlin. I accept it as a fact. Just as I accept the fact that steel is stronger than aluminum.
> 
> Slaterat


Always assumed the thickest part of a wing would be at the root it looks to be about 16" thick without touching the paint and maybe the one I measured is incorrect, they are rebuilding another hurris wings a couple miles away I'll ask the guys rebuilding them


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## FLYBOYJ (Mar 20, 2008)

Nice shots!!!!


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 20, 2008)

Fires on the Wing tanks would at least allow the Pilot to bail out safely. Plus I thought Linatex wasn't particularly effective sealing material iirc, was this changed in later models? (the Buffalo Mk.I used a layer of Linatex covered with a layer of Horsehide leather for its tanks and this wasn't particularly effective either iirc) I believe the RAF disliked such tanks with "external self sealing" hence the reason they requested it not be used on their Tomahawk IIB's.


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## Elvis (Mar 22, 2008)

FLYBOYJ said:


> Nice shots!!!!


I'll second that....and...*Chevy Engine Red!* YEAH!
NOW that plane's unbeatable!  



Elvis


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## slaterat (Mar 22, 2008)

Hi guys, I've got a few minutes to post here before I have to prep the house, we're having easter dinner for 19 at my house today.

Hohun, I remember reading that passage once when I was considering buying that book. I was stunned by what Bungay stated, and I wondered how it could be true after rereading this passage I realized what Bungay had done.

Fortunately my years at university, along time ago, taught me to be a critical reader. Bungay is outright guilty of statisical manipulation to the verge of lying. First you need to examine his sampling. He has chosen July 10th as the beginning, and that date is , speaking very generally here, considered the start of the BoB. His sample ends on Aug 11. Why pick this date? Why not use sampling from the entire BoB?

I will tell you why, because Aug 11th 1940 was a very bad day for Hurricanes in the BoB( compared to spitfires that day). On that day a force of about 36 Hurrricanes from various squadrons fell into a very well arranged trap. Kudos to the Luftwaffe for excellant tactical planning. No less than 25 Hurricanes were completely destroyed by 109s that day. 

Over the course of the entire Bob from June 1940 to the week of Nov 2 there were the loss of 752 Hurricanes and 431 Spitfires. Given that the deployment ratio was about 66% Hurricanes to 33% Spitfires , the survivability rate slightly favours the Hurricane with 63% of casualties and the Spitfire with 36%. Allowing for other variables the survival rate is overall about the same. As the spitfire was the better performing of the two the Hurricane must of had some other factor contributing to its success.

In any case the deficiencies in the protection for the reserve fuel tank were fully rectified in all Hurricane Mk IIs. Also a large number of fires in Spitfire mkIs and Hurricane Mk Is were fires from using 100% glycol for cooling. The glycol header tank on the Hurricane is right in front of the reserve fuel tank.
This was remedied in the Mk IIs with mixed water/glycol cooling and armour for the glycol header tank.

My sources are two books I highly reccommend for the BoB. Both have day by day accounts of the battle and cross referencing with German records.

" The Narrow Margin", Derek Wood and Derek Dempster
You can probably find this one in paperback in a used book store.

"Battle Over Britain" Francic K Mason, 1969. This is the Bible on the BoB 600 pages , day to day accounts and meticulous detail of losses on both sides.
The best book on the BoB ever written. Unfortunately probably fairly hard to find.


Slaterat


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## renrich (Mar 22, 2008)

Wouldn't the statistics during the BOB be skewed a bit that alledgedly the Spits were supposed to go after the 109s (far more dangerous than the bombers) and the Hurricanes were supposed to go after the bombers. An example how stats can be misleading: In the Pacific, the Hellcat had 5257 kills and only 270 losses to enemy AC, Really good ratio. The Corsair had 2155 kills and 189 losses to enemy AC. Very clear that Hellcat better than Corsair. Right? Not necessarily. On a closer look, Hellcat shot down 1445 bombers and 3718 fighters, while Corsair shot down only 478 bombers but killed 1662 fighters. Add to that the Corsair was in action several months before Hellcat in the Solomons when there were many veteran IJN pilots still around. Corsairs were proportionately much more likely to be engaged against fighters with veteran pilots than were Hellcats. Stats can be deceiving.


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## FLYBOYJ (Mar 22, 2008)

Oh JoeB!.........


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## HoHun (Mar 22, 2008)

Hi Slaterat,

>Bungay is outright guilty of statisical manipulation to the verge of lying. First you need to examine his sampling. He has chosen July 10th as the beginning, and that date is , speaking very generally here, considered the start of the BoB. His sample ends on Aug 11. Why pick this date? Why not use sampling from the entire BoB?

Hm, I don't take quite as dim a view on Bungay's perspective as you do.

Ending the sample on August 11 can be explained from the distinction his book makes between the fighting over the channel and that over the British island itself. August 13 was Goering's "Eagle Day". Additionally, using the entire Battle of Britain period would have lead to the mixing of data of unprotected and modified (or newly-built), protected Hurricanes, so I think his choice can be justified.

>On that day a force of about 36 Hurrricanes from various squadrons fell into a very well arranged trap. 

Well, for the scope of the evaluation, it doesn't really matter how the Hurricanes were hit, just what happened to them after they were hit. If the trap was set above the sea, there is a possible problem with regard to statistics though: If a significant number of Hurricane pilots drowned after bailing out successfully, it would make the Hurricane look overly dangerous. The same might have happened had that bailed out of Spitfires, after all.

>Allowing for other variables the survival rate is overall about the same. 

Well, but what was the combat sortie rate?

>In any case the deficiencies in the protection for the reserve fuel tank were fully rectified in all Hurricane Mk IIs. 

Good to know, as the Hurricane II is our main object of interest in this thread 

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## slaterat (Mar 22, 2008)

Hohun, 

Look at Bungays last line in your scan.
" The hurricane was twice as dangerous to fly as the spitfire"

Results from the BoB prove that this statement is simply untrue.

There are lots of variables ie sortie rate, size of enemy force engaged, advance radar warning , different tactics employed ect. That is why all statistacal conclusions need to be carefully scrutinized.

Other considersations for Hurricane squadrons at the time ,would be fatigue and losses from the Battle of France. Spitfires also got their conversions to constant speed propellers earlier, spits being converted by July 20th and Hurricanes not complete until Aug 15.

Slaterat


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## HoHun (Mar 22, 2008)

Hi Slaterat,

>Look at Bungays last line in your scan.
>" The hurricane was twice as dangerous to fly as the spitfire"

Hm, for the period in question, this appears to be quite accurate. One could argue that the Spitfire due to its higher speed was more likely to survive after being hit as it could escape more easily, but the Hurricane record after taking hits from bombers suggests ease of escape is not the critical factor.

>There are lots of variables ie sortie rate, size of enemy force engaged, advance radar warning , different tactics employed ect. 

Hm, generally true, but do you have any suggestion what effect specifically could result in such a significant bias of the results? It doesn't seem to be anything obvious at least.

>Other considersations for Hurricane squadrons at the time ,would be fatigue and losses from the Battle of France. Spitfires also got their conversions to constant speed propellers earlier, spits being converted by July 20th and Hurricanes not complete until Aug 15.

Considering that we're talking exclusively about aircraft that have been hit anyway, I'm not sure these factors really make a difference. Propeller type at least would seem to fall under the "easier escape" line of reasoning if viewed from the "of all aircraft hit ..." perspective ...

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## kool kitty89 (Mar 22, 2008)

If more Hurricanes focused on Bombers and Spits on Bf 109's in the BoB, then the Hurricane mught be more likely to be hit where it hurts. The defensive fire would be more likely to hit the nose, engine, and nose fuel tank than being hit from the rear. This would mean more likely to burn. (be it glycol or fuel)


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## claidemore (Mar 22, 2008)

kool kitty89 said:


> If more Hurricanes focused on Bombers and Spits on Bf 109's in the BoB, then the Hurricane mught be more likely to be hit where it hurts. The defensive fire would be more likely to hit the nose, engine, and nose fuel tank than being hit from the rear. This would mean more likely to burn. (be it glycol or fuel)



The tactic of having the Hurris go for the bombers while the Spits engaged the 109s was a good one, but in practice it was rarely the case. Often it was only one squadron at a time making contact, and they just split their force of whatever planes they were flying and did their best. 

The net reusults show a tendancy for the role splitting, but it wasn't the case in a great many combats. 

Claidemore


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## Elvis (Apr 12, 2008)

Seems the thread has gone slightly _askew_.

So what did we figure out? Hurri IIB? F4F-4? Even draw?



Elvis


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## HoHun (Apr 13, 2008)

Hi Joe,

Since you left me without an answer here, I'll simply consider what you wrote here an answer.

Quoting your post on "Hurricane and Spit V v Zero combats":

"And if they had met more, and the Seafire had done well, 'tactics' (except by distorting that word to mean 'all human factors') wouldn't necessarily have been the main difference v the Darwin debacle. Umpteenthly, those Spit units claimed to have adjusted their tactics and done better, it's just that Japanese accounts don't support that version of events very well (again, Allied accounts don't support the claims of the Zeroes well either, we're counting by recorded losses)."

"Distorting that word to mean 'all human factors'" ... that's obviously a direct answer to my last reply to you, which you failed to answer in this thread.

Allow me to remind you that I have quoted my definition of tactics from Merriam-Webster, and as far as I can tell, Merriam-Webster's reputation is not one for distorting the English language. Additionally, allow my to point out that you have not posted a contradicting definition.

I pointed out my source, I quoted the definition, I even offered you the phrase "employment of forces on the battlefield" as alternative formulation in case you don't like "tactics" to be used in the sense suggested by Webster's.

The you go on with "all human factors". Well, if you look at my post above, you'll find that I have listed three basic categories:

1) Technology
2) "Human material"
3) Tactics.

I did not include "all human factors" in "tactics" but in fact specifically excluded some. I also made it clear that I'm not religious about these categories if you could provide good arguments why something should be in a different category.

My point on tactics has at least partially been followed by Koolkitty, Slaterat, Basket and Claidemore (I hope I read you correctly, guys!), while as far as I can see, your "intangible performance factors" theory (post #126 of this thread) has not found much support.

Well, and your reply? "Distorting that word [tactics] to mean 'all human factors'".

It's pretty obvious that I'm not distorting anything (my definition is from Merriam-Webster - as far as I can tell, yours is a product of your own imagination), and that I have clearly not used "tactics" to describe "all human factors".

So why do you pretend I did? That's an unfair move, and as its a rather accurately aimed "inaccuracy" in representing my words, no-one is going to convince that you merely screwed up accidentally.

Joe, I've been much nicer to you than you deserve, and this latest little backstabbing attempt of yours shows me that you are not appreciating that as you should.

So you either come up with a decent response to my post #195 in this thread in the next couple of days, or I'll put you on my ignore list.

As a hint, I have since that post #195 contributed some information here that you could use to strengthen your position. You're welcome to use it for that purpose.

Kind regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## slaterat (Apr 16, 2008)

I think you made your point Hohun : ) I wouldn't put Joe on your ignore list though, he does make valid contributions to threads. After all he pointed out "Bloody Shambles " too me. I'll post some more on the series when I get a chance, I've read the middle volume and I am half way through the first.

Slaterat


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## kool kitty89 (Apr 16, 2008)

Yeah he's got a lot of good info.

Joe Baugher's Home Page

American Military Aircraft


But this "tactics" argument realy seems a bit confused...


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## JoeB (Apr 16, 2008)

kool kitty89 said:


> Yeah he's got a lot of good info.
> 
> Joe Baugher's Home Page
> 
> ...


Ahhh...that's not me, but those are good pages.

One approach to plane combat effectiveness is to work from performance stats, assuming that a given degree of degree of advantage in a certain stat will confer a certain degree of advantage in combat effectiveness. This approach might also consider results of controlled tests or anecdotes about practice dogfights between planes on the same side. But the approach essentially ignores actual combat results. Because, those actual combat results are 'polluted' by other variables like differences in tactics (in the narrow sense), and much more importantly by differences in human factors in the broader sense (how well trained, motivated, led, adequately fed in some cases!, etc. the pilots on each side were besides what actual 'tactics' are used), plus numbers, tactical situation, etc etc. But the plane performance approach assumes that plane and other factors can be distinguished by analysis, so in fact combat results don't tell us anything we didn't already know, we already knew the plane effectiveness by analyzing the stats, any discrepancy between that analysis and the actual historical results 'must' be something else; if actual results were never brought up at all it wouldn't really affect that kind of analysis.

I simply doubt that approach, that's really all. I don't see how it's confused or confusing. I think instead that combat results *might* *suggest* to us that our combat effectiveness analysis based on performance stats *might* have holes in it. Ie. I think the large discrepancy in Hurricane and F4F combat record v early war Japanese fighters *suggests* that *maybe* a performance analysis that finds them about equal v such opponents *might* be missing something. Of course you are, or anyone else is, free to disagree. 

Joe


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## claidemore (Apr 16, 2008)

Good points Joe, but I would like to defend analysis of planes based on stats/trials/anecdotes by referring to the historical record.

Trials and tests of captured aircraft were used historicaly to suggest changes/improvements of combat planes already in use, and were also used to influence design of future combat planes. 

Anecdotal evidence from pilots was also used extensively. If enough pilots said they needed something, or observed a superiority in their opponents planes, the designers and manufacturers listened to them. For example RAF pilots reported FW190s rolling and split-essing away from them easily, next thing you know they are testing clipped wing Spits and putting them into service. (Trials of a captured FW would also have influenced that decision.) 

The Soviets made hundreds of small modifications in response to pilot requests and they ended up with a couple top notch fighters in the La7 and Yak 3. 

A lot of 'airmchair' experts like to discount pilot accounts, saying they need actual numbers to 'prove' anything. I think they are ignoring a huge resource with that attitude.

Combat reports, inaccurate as they were during wartime, were also examined. Poor combat records led to various planes being withdrawn, allocated to other jobs etc. 

Since the people who were making decisions on these combat planes at the time used all these methods of analysis, it seems that we can't be too far off the mark by doing the same thing. 

Besides, it's fun. 

Claidemore


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## kool kitty89 (Apr 16, 2008)

JoeB said:


> Ahhh...that's not me, but those are good pages.
> Joe



Oh... (and all along I've been thinking that was you)


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## slaterat (Apr 18, 2008)

Henning, 

Here's another example of how flawed Bungays theory is . 

As already mentioned the spits entire fuel load was carried just forward of the pilot. The fuel was carried in two seperate tanks the top one of 48 gals and the lower one of 37 gals capacity. The catch is that in spit mkI and IIs the top tank was not self sealing,the bottom one is. Check out the spit II pilots notes. So basically as far as fuel tank protection goes early spit and hurricanes are about on par, slight advantage to the cane as its reserve tank is only 28 gals compared to the spits top tank of 48 gals. So the difference in survivability, during the early part of the BoB must be due to some other factor. In any case, over the course of the entire BoB, the survivability was the same.

JoeB 

I think I can speak for everyone here , and agree with you that combat assessment based solely on performance is flawed. Thats why forums like this one exist. Simply keeping a score card of K/D ratio doesn't answer all the questions either. Both historical context and combat results must certainly have a place in any evaluation of combat aircraft.

Slaterat


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## bf109 Emil (Apr 18, 2008)

renrich said:


> Wouldn't the statistics during the BOB be skewed a bit that alledgedly the Spits were supposed to go after the 109s (far more dangerous than the bombers) and the Hurricanes were supposed to go after the bombers. An example how stats can be misleading: In the Pacific, the Hellcat had 5257 kills and only 270 losses to enemy AC, Really good ratio. The Corsair had 2155 kills and 189 losses to enemy AC. Very clear that Hellcat better than Corsair. Right? Not necessarily. On a closer look, Hellcat shot down 1445 bombers and 3718 fighters, while Corsair shot down only 478 bombers but killed 1662 fighters. Add to that the Corsair was in action several months before Hellcat in the Solomons when there were many veteran IJN pilots still around. Corsairs were proportionately much more likely to be engaged against fighters with veteran pilots than were Hellcats. Stats can be deceiving.





I believe the reason for this lower # of kills in the corsair didn't pass, or wasn't used by navy crews, but where split between the RN carriers, after the seafire, proved poor or numerous undercarriage incidents, so RN switched to corsairs, and was also used by marines, so more where lost to AA fire, in support of land based operations, or to bomb land targets...

didn't pass is a ppor wording, better with the naval procurement board used or purchased grumman aircraft, specifically desiigned for carrier operations..f2f, f4f, f6f. I know the USN carriers launched corsairs, but maybe someone can elaborate as i think these where flown by marine pilots rather then naval aviators??

bf109 Emil


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## pbfoot (Apr 18, 2008)

slaterat said:


> Henning,
> 
> Here's another example of how flawed Bungays theory is .
> 
> ...


I don't believe the upper tank was ever self sealing I stand to be corrected but spent much time checking it out with a set of good resources


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## HoHun (Apr 18, 2008)

Hi Joe,

>But the plane performance approach assumes that plane and other factors can be distinguished by analysis, so in fact combat results don't tell us anything we didn't already know, we already knew the plane effectiveness by analyzing the stats, any discrepancy between that analysis and the actual historical results 'must' be something else; if actual results were never brought up at all it wouldn't really affect that kind of analysis.

I wouldn't disagree with that. What you're looking for when you are doing an analysis of performance (and other engineering aspects) is really the combat potential of the aircraft, and the best tactics to turn the potential into reality.

However, I'd qualify the "wouldn't really affect" bit by saying that the evaluation of actual combat results is beneficial to check one's assumptions over what factors are important in combat. That's why I thought your post regarding the various factors like cockpit visibility for deflection shooting was a good one, even though my assessment of the impact of these points is different from yours.

Another reason to rely on combat reports is to check if the historical performance data we have is in the ballpark ... usually, "ballpark" type accuracy is the best we can hope for since combat was not really a good environment for performance measurements. For example, Kelly's account of the action over Singapore allowed this kind of reality check, and it went fairly well with the data we have on Hurricane II and A6M2.

>I simply doubt that approach, that's really all. 

Hm, I think it's usefulness should be beyond doubt (remember the Shaw quote), at least when you're trying to determine combat potential of and best tactics for a type.

However, I'll admit that if you're looking at history with a different type of question in your mind, the performance analysis approach might not yield an answer at all. "Why did the F4F so well historically?" cannot be answered from an engineering analysis alone, since it combined some obvious strengths with relatively poor performance while facing an enemy with good performance (and some obvious weaknesses, too).

>I think instead that combat results *might* *suggest* to us that our combat effectiveness analysis based on performance stats *might* have holes in it. Ie. I think the large discrepancy in Hurricane and F4F combat record v early war Japanese fighters *suggests* that *maybe* a performance analysis that finds them about equal v such opponents *might* be missing something. 

That's basically correct, but it can only serve to highlight the need for a detailed analysis. You pointed out these "intangible performance factors" earlier in this thread, but in my opinion, factors with an impact large enough to create the large discrepance you noted would not go unnoticed in the historical records.

With regard to the *mights*, it's important to remember that in the absence of data, we cannot decide whether an overlooked aspect of performance or a superiority in the tactics of one side is the more likely cause for what we observe. It might as well be the one as it might be the other, so all we can learn from your statement is that we should gather as much data as we can before trying to arrive at any conclusions.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## HoHun (Apr 18, 2008)

Hi Slaterat,

>Here's another example of how flawed Bungays theory is . 

Hm, he actually suggests an alternative possibility for the Hurricane's vulnerability too, namely the wing tanks which increase the vulnerable area of the aircraft.

And he mentions a fire-proof bulkhead in front of the Spitfire pilots that the Hurricane didn't have in the early period, but were retrofitted with later.

The numbers for the early period appear to support the hypothesis of a greater vulnerability of the Hurricane, so we seem to have engineering aspects and actual combat results in agreement here.

>In any case, over the course of the entire BoB, the survivability was the same.

Do we really have numbers for the entire Battle that are comparable in focus to those provided by Bungay? I'd love to see them!  

If they do indeed show equal survivability for both types over the entire Battle, that could eiother mean that the loss numbers early on are a statistical fluke, or that the retro-fitted Hurricane was much tougher than the Spitfire, making good what the unprotected variants had lost early on 

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## kool kitty89 (Apr 18, 2008)

The Mustang had most of its fuel in wing root tanks (all on early models) and the RAF regarded it as a pretty rugged a/c.

The P-40 had a fair amount of fuel in wing tanks as well iirc, and ruggedness was one of it's prominant characteristics. (moreso than the P-51 due to the "miles" of plumbing running from the engine to the radiator, opposed to the P-40's radiator directly below the engine making a much smaller target)


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## fibus (Jul 30, 2009)

Thanks.
I didn't know this question had been l dealt with in the past.


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## DAVIDICUS (Jul 30, 2009)

Like you, I thought it was an interesting topic.


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## pbfoot (Jul 31, 2009)

I'm aware this doesn't indicate the model of the Wildcat that would be up to some one in the know on the USN but the Hurris were Mk XII' I'm not taking this as gospel for type vs type but in this case it seems the Hurri came out on top



"Along with submarine patrols, 128 Squadron carried out a number of exercises with the Army and Navy in addition to our own squadron exercises On 6 July 1943, the USS Wasp an American aircraft carrier arrived in St Johns harbour after completing a tour of duty against the Japanese in the Pacific theatre . The Wasp carried a full complement of Grumman Wildcat fighters That evening, many of the Wildcat pilots arrived at our Mess in Torbay We heard some pretty hairy stories of events that some a them had experienced an the Pacific .After a few rounds from the bar, a discussion developed regarding the merits of the Wildcats versus the Humcane IT continued until the Americans issued a challenge. They would have four Wildcats at Torbay the following morning The tactics were sample Four pairs, each consisting a.
Wildcat and a Hurricane would meet at an agreed upon altitude .
in each of the four quadrants of the sky, North west, south and east a of the airport They would meet. fly in formation for a minute or two , then break up and approach each other head on From then on it was a straight dogfight, with each pilot trying to get on the other fellows tail. Flight Commanders were not allowed to fly on either side We were part of the large audience assembled on the ground to see the show Everythmg went according to plan. All the aircraft met, flew in formation for a minute or two, and then began dogfiglmng In a couple of minutes there were four Hurricane - the tails of four Wildcats, and they stayed there, to great applause and shouts from the audience below.
After landing, everyone adjourned to the hangar to hash out . the situation The Amencans seemed completely nonplused by turn of events They could not understand how things could turned out the way they had It must have been some kind of aberrartion that could never happen again, so they issued a challenge for the following afternoon this tame, they announced flight Commanders could fly, so I decided to get in on the fun in Humcane 5485 That afternoon the two readiness aircraft, equipped with depth charges. were sitting on the tarmac Butch Washburn and Gibby Gibbs were the readiness pilots that day and Butch said to me, you know Bill, I thank we can take on these buggers with those readiness aircraft ''. "why not i replied We lined up a fourth pilot and the exercise was carried out all over again with four Hurricanes on the tails of four 'Wildcats once again Butch Washburn was so keen rhat he stayed on the 'Wildcat's tail; until it landed on the runway. The Americans were forced to admit that the Hurricane was a better aircraft. even when it was ladened down with depth charges."


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## DAVIDICUS (Jul 31, 2009)

Yes. See Jabberwocky's post on page 6 of the thread.


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## Freebird (Jun 18, 2011)

JoeB said:


> Again let's not focus entirely on Ceylon for Hurricanes, because there are a fair number of other examples. In Jan-April '42, when fighting greatly died down on British fronts v Japanese, the Hurricane results, as given in Bloody Shambles combat by combat as I count, fighter to fighter:
> Zeroes: 2 combats over Ceylon, 27 Hurricanes lost for 3 Zeroes
> Zeroes: 3 other combats with both sides known: 8 Hurricanes 3 Zeroes
> Type 1's: 12 combats, 20 Hurricanes, 4 Type 1's
> ...


 
What were the Japanese non-fighter losses vs Hurricanes?


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## Spitlead (Feb 19, 2019)

FLYBOYJ said:


> Great stuff - I like the quote from Thach “The pilot who will miss with four .50 caliber guns won’t be able to hit with eight. Increased firepower is not a substitute for marksmanship.”


In deference to the Thach quote, I would submit for those leaning towards more bullets and fewer guns vs more guns with fewer bullets, if that were the case no amount of bullets will be enough if the pilot cannot hit his target. The trade off being the number of bullets (i.e. length of time pressing the trigger) for the amount of higher burst damage with more bullets. Given that pilots often only had a few seconds to fire with the target in his sights, a high burst damage would be preferable in my opinion. The M2 .50 cal. fired 500 rounds per minute. With only 4 guns, one could only get 200 rounds on target in a 6 second burst while with 6 guns, one could get 300 rounds on target - an improvement of 50%. If a pilot were to only get one snapshot at shooting down a plane, it would be more perferable to fire the maximum number of bullets.


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## fubar57 (Feb 19, 2019)

If you don't know how to lead an aircraft or know when to pull the trigger at the correct time, having 100 guns on the aircraft would still be of no use

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## FLYBOYJ (Feb 19, 2019)

Spitlead said:


> In deference to the Thach quote, I would submit for those leaning towards more bullets and fewer guns vs more guns with fewer bullets, if that were the case no amount of bullets will be enough if the pilot cannot hit his target. The trade off being the number of bullets (i.e. length of time pressing the trigger) for the amount of higher burst damage with more bullets. Given that pilots often only had a few seconds to fire with the target in his sights, a high burst damage would be preferable in my opinion. The M2 .50 cal. fired 500 rounds per minute. With only 4 guns, one could only get 200 rounds on target in a 6 second burst while with 6 guns, one could get 300 rounds on target - an improvement of 50%. If a pilot were to only get one snapshot at shooting down a plane, it would be more perferable to fire the maximum number of bullets.


Read the above post - nuff said


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## R Leonard (Feb 20, 2019)

USS Wasp (CV-7) was sunk in the Pacific on 15 September 1942.
USS Wasp (CV-18) was commissioned on 24 November 1943.

It would have been a little difficult for either of them to be at St Johns in July 1943.

Not to mention that the first incarnation of 128 Squadron, the one that flew Hurricanes, was disbanded in March 1943 and was not re-established until December 1944 and that 128 operated Mosquitos. And if the location of this contest was near St Johns, as in Newfoundland, I believe that one might find that Hurricane flying 128 Squadron was formed and spent its service in Sierra Leone . . . west Africa, last time I looked, and operated there from 7 October 1941 to its disbandment on 8 March 1943.

So, carriers, neither of which could not have been in St Johns in July 1943 and an RAF squadron operating out of Sierra Leone, no where near St Johns, that had disbanded four months before the great contest.

For what it is worth.

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## Kevin J (Feb 20, 2019)

Spitlead said:


> In deference to the Thach quote, I would submit for those leaning towards more bullets and fewer guns vs more guns with fewer bullets, if that were the case no amount of bullets will be enough if the pilot cannot hit his target. The trade off being the number of bullets (i.e. length of time pressing the trigger) for the amount of higher burst damage with more bullets. Given that pilots often only had a few seconds to fire with the target in his sights, a high burst damage would be preferable in my opinion. The M2 .50 cal. fired 500 rounds per minute. With only 4 guns, one could only get 200 rounds on target in a 6 second burst while with 6 guns, one could get 300 rounds on target - an improvement of 50%. If a pilot were to only get one snapshot at shooting down a plane, it would be more perferable to fire the maximum number of bullets.



Perhaps the answer to the number of guns is the Russian solution, group area fighter tactics. Two skilled shooters with three stacked pairs in support. Even the Airacobra is a winner.


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## Spitlead (Feb 20, 2019)

Kevin J said:


> Perhaps the answer to the number of guns is the Russian solution, group area fighter tactics. Two skilled shooters with three stacked pairs in support. Even the Airacobra is a winner.


It's not often you hear the words "Airacobra" and "winner" together in the same sentence for air combat...

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## BiffF15 (Feb 20, 2019)

This should be entertaining.

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## buffnut453 (Feb 21, 2019)

Popcorn's ready. You may begin. 😀

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## Kevin J (Feb 21, 2019)

Copied this straight from wikipedia "The La-5 was found to have a top speed and acceleration at low altitude that were comparable to Luftwaffe fighters. The La-5FN possessed a slightly higher roll rate than the Bf-109. However, the Bf-109 was slightly faster and had the advantage of a higher rate of climb and better turn rate.[2] The La-5FN had a slightly better climb rate and smaller turn radius than the Fw 190A-8. However, the Fw 190A-8 was faster at all altitudes and had significantly better dive performance and a superior roll-rate. " So there we go, the Soviet's other war winner. Its amazing what team work can do. Ah, that reminds me of the Thach Weave and the Wildcat.


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## tomo pauk (Feb 21, 2019)

Spitlead said:


> It's not often you hear the words "Airacobra" and "winner" together in the same sentence for air combat...



Stick around.

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## Kevin J (Feb 21, 2019)

tomo pauk said:


> Stick around.


IIRC victories to losses ratio over New Guinea for the Airacobra was 1:1 and for the Warhawk 1.6:1, which is very similar to the Hurricane 1.1:1 and Spitfire 1.7:1 during the BoB. In both cases the fighter with the better altitude capability did better.

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## Clayton Magnet (Feb 21, 2019)

Just read this thread for the first time. Some funny questions too far into history to address now. Like the "RAF should have used .50's in the BoB". However, in regards to the "which was tougher" question, did the F4F not enter combat without pilot protection or self sealing tanks? I was under the impression they were rush fitted in early 1942.


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## R Leonard (Feb 21, 2019)

There were kits available to upgrade F4F-3s with pilot armor and self sealing tanks. VF-42, headed to points west from Norfolk in mid December 1941 installed the sealers at sea before reaching the Panama Canal; pilot armor was picked up and installed at San Diego in early January. I am not aware of any F4F-3 squadron that entered combat without the upgrade. 

F4F-4s came with these niceties straight from Grumman.

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## Greg Boeser (Feb 21, 2019)

VMF-211 went to Wake Island early December '41 with new F4F-3s with no armor, only one with self sealing tanks (borrowed from VF-6), and new reflector sights (also from VF-6).
VF-6 did not have factory armor installed until returning from the Marshall Islands raid launched 2 Feb 1942. They - VF-6 - were also flying the slightly less capable F4F-3A. Early self sealing tanks had a bad habit of disintegrating in the tropical heat and were suspected in a number of take off ditchings.


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## R Leonard (Feb 21, 2019)

Thanks for the correction. 

The problem with the self sealing tanks was in the lot received by VF-42, aromatics in the fuel cause the liners to disintegrate and clog fuel lines at the most inopportune moments. The squadron lost a couple of planes falling out of the sky with dead engines. Fortunately no one was lost. One pilot managed to bring a engine faltering plane back aboard where the true culprit was discovered. An emergency shipment via PB2Y to Tongatabu of new "improved" liners solved the problem.

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## Conslaw (Feb 21, 2019)

The problem with using weight of fire to determine whether more guns or more bullets is better is that weight of fire presumes that each bullet in a stream is of equal importance. The US Navy and Marine norm was deflection shooting where the pilot started firing in front of the enemy aircraft and fired through the target. You have more leeway in your timing if you have more ammunition. You also are making inherent assumptions about how many shots you are going to get on a target per mission. If you assume that you will only get one shot at one target, six guns is probably better. From the British perspective in ordering the 6-gun Marlet (what would become the F4F-4), they were looking at encounters with slingle FW Condors and U-Boats, primarily. Six guns made sense for the British. For shooting at manouvering fighters, Thatch's preference for 4 guns and more bullets makes sense.

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## Shortround6 (Feb 22, 2019)

The British ordered the six gun Martlets in the summer of 1940, The FW 200 had gone into service in April of 1940 (6 of them) flying from Danish bases, By mid may only two were serviceable. The unit was withdrawn from action in June , requiped and sent to Bordeaux-Merignac in July. 
There may be a little bit of cross over there but thinking that the Martlet (with 6 guns) was intended to be an anti Condor plane may be pushing things. The CAM ships don't show up until the Spring (May) of 1941 for example. 

My own theory is that when the Martlets were ordered, the .50 cal Browning was still a 600rpm machine gun (at best). The British are used to eight guns firing 1100-1200rpm each although smaller bullets. At some point in 1940 the .50 cal Browning was improved to around 800 rpm so that four guns could deliver almost the same firepower as six of the original guns. The US Navy never used the slower firing guns in combat ( the existing guns could be modified with a parts kit). 

I have also repeated (many times) the fact that 1940 .50 cal ammo was NOT the same as 1941/42 .50 cal ammo. The "ball" ammo was slightly heavier but around 300fps slower in velocity. 
same for the AP, a change in the propellent allowed for the higher velocity. There was no incendiary ammo in 1940. It was still in the experimental stage. 

given these facts the British Decision to go with six guns is a lot more understandable and it has a lot less to do with different philosophies about air to air combat. 

What kind of guns the Martlets were delivered with I don't know and if delivered with the slow firing guns how long it took for them to be upgraded I also don't know. 
With the original guns and ammo load the four gun plane had over 43 seconds of firing time and the six gun plane would have had 24 seconds. The Hurricane/Spitfires had around 17-18 seconds. A Fulmar with 800rpg (?) was good for around 40 seconds. 
Once the faster firing .50s showed up the firing times would drop to around 19 seconds for the six gun fighters and 34-35 seconds for the 4 gun fighters.

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## Greyman (Feb 22, 2019)

Shortround6 said:


> A Fulmar with 800rpg (?)



750 rpg for the Mk.I

1,000 rpg for the Mk.II
370 rpg for the .50s

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## Conslaw (Feb 23, 2019)

Shortround6 said:


> The British ordered the six gun Martlets in the summer of 1940, The FW 200 had gone into service in April of 1940 (6 of them) flying from Danish bases, By mid may only two were serviceable. The unit was withdrawn from action in June , requiped and sent to Bordeaux-Merignac in July.
> There may be a little bit of cross over there but thinking that the Martlet (with 6 guns) was intended to be an anti Condor plane may be pushing things. The CAM ships don't show up until the Spring (May) of 1941 for example.
> 
> My own theory is that when the Martlets were ordered, the .50 cal Browning was still a 600rpm machine gun (at best). The British are used to eight guns firing 1100-1200rpm each although smaller bullets. At some point in 1940 the .50 cal Browning was improved to around 800 rpm so that four guns could deliver almost the same firepower as six of the original guns. The US Navy never used the slower firing guns in combat ( the existing guns could be modified with a parts kit).
> ...



When did the changeover from the F4F-3 to F4F-4 occur on the production line?


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## tomo pauk (Feb 23, 2019)

Conslaw said:


> When did the changeover from the F4F-3 to F4F-4 occur on the production line?


1st F4F-4 was delivered in December 1941. Looking at numbers produced of the F4F-3, my take is that change was over some time in February of 1942.

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## Shortround6 (Feb 23, 2019)

Things may have overlapped a bit. 
The Martlet IIs (the last 90 out of 100 got folding wings) used two speed engines instead of two stage and engine wise, were equivalent to the F4F-3A. 
There were 65 F4F-3As built during 1941 to December of 1941 with fixed wings and two speed engines. Most went to the Marines (not good enough for the Navy? give it to the Marines  

Some parts have to be ordered months before the plane is assembled, just because they test flew a folding WIldcat in May of 1941 doesn't mean the production line could switch over.


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## Conslaw (Feb 23, 2019)

IIRC from Lundstrum, The Hornet and Enterprise got their F4F-4s after they got back to Pearl Harbor from the Doolittle raid. The Lexington and Yorktown fought the Battle of the Coral Sea with F4F-3s, and when the Yorktown made it back to Pearl Harbor it exchanged its fighter squadron with VF-3 from the Saratoga, which already had F4F-4s. (The Saratoga at this time had been torpedoed by a submarine and sailed to the mainland for repairs, returning just too late for the Midway battle. )


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## R Leonard (Feb 23, 2019)

Preface by saying the below ignores the existence of the XF4F-4 which was delivered in April 1941 and addresses strictly the initial F4F-4 production.

The September 1941 BuAer Monthly Status of Aircraft report notes in the section regarding status of aircraft under construction:

F4F-3 #’s 3856-3874; 3970-4057
Contract # 75736, 5 Aug 1940; 107 Ordered, 107 Delivered; further noted as “All delivered”

F4F-4 #s 4058-4098; 5030-5262; 01991-02152; 03385-03544
Contract # 75736, 5 Aug 1940
Number Ordered: 596
Number Delivered: 0
Delivery Schedule: 10 in Oct. 1941; 15 in Nov.; 16 in Dec.; then 30 per month through Aug. 1942; 40 in Sept.; then 45 per month until completion of the contract.

The October 1941 Monthly Status of Aircraft notes in its Grumman recap:
“Delays in production of the F4F-4 airplanes have been occasioned by difficulty in obtaining wing hinge fittings for the folding-wing airplanes. Delay has been caused by a shortage of machine tools to complete processing in the plant of a subcontractor (City Machine and Tool Company of Toledo, Ohio). Allocation of the limited production of folding wing fighters scheduled for October, November, and early December, has been made to the British. Deliveries of fighters to the Navy cannot be expected until December. Production of fixed wing fighters in the interim could not be continued due to the fact that jigs and fixtures had already been converted to the folding-wing type. The bureau has approved further plant expansion for Grumman which will lead to eventual output of approximately 75 fighters per month in the spring of 1942. Plans for production of the F6F’s are being actively prosecuted.”

From this I’m led to believe that by the end of September 1941 production of the F4F-3 had ceased vice the F4F-4. Note the wording above regarding the initial production going to the British. 

In fact, there were 36 G-36B (FAA F4F-4’s, folding wings, six guns) that were delivered in October 1941 to the British Purchasing Commission (BPC) in New York; they were shipped from Norfolk NOB aboard HMS Illustrious departing on 12 December 1941. An additional 54 G-36B were delivered in December 1941 to BPC in New York and were shipped in March 1942, though I am uncertain as to by what conveyance. Be that as it may, by the end of December 1941, 90 G-36B/F4F-4 types had come off the line and been delivered, just not to the USN. These 90 G-36B/F4F-4 types were from ordered through contract #127 between BPC and Grumman which called for 100 aircraft. The first 10 aircraft under the contract were G-36A/F4F-3 types, delivered to BPC in March 1941. It was after these were delivered that BPC filed a change order amending the specifications to folding wings and 6 guns.

Production reported in the October report shows no F4F-3 deliveries and notes the following production schedule for F4F-4’s:

F4F-4 #s 4058-4098; 5030-5262; 01991-02152; 03385-03544
Contract # 75736, 5 Aug 1940
Number Ordered: 596
Number Delivered: 0
Delivery Schedule: 1 in Nov. 1941; 11 in Dec.; 40 in Jan. 1942; 50 in Feb; 40 in Mar; 40 in Apr; 40 in May; 40 in June; 47 in July; 45 in Aug; 45 in Sep.; 37 in Oct.; 36 in Nov.; 50 in Dec.; 45 in Jan. 1943; 29 in Feb.

The November Monthly Status report also offers a small gem . . . on the second page, showing “Status of Procurement Program,” there is a line under 1941 which shows the F4F-3-4 with programmed as 659 and delivered as 203. Noted is that included under F4F-3-4 programmed are 21 F4F-7’s, not noted as delivered. Under the 1942 heading there appears the F4F-4 with programmed as 160 and delivered as 0. Some quick math gives us 659+160 = 819, less 203 = 616, less 21 = 595. Hmmm, but the contract for the F4F-4 calls for 596 . . . we seem to be short one.

Ah, but when arriving on page 6 all is right in the world, for in the Aircraft Under Construction section, for the F4F-4 (and there is, again, no listing for the F4F-3), the report shows:

F4F-4 #s 4058-4098; 5030-5262; 01991-02152; 03385-03544
Contract # 75736, 5 Aug 1940
Number Ordered: 596
Number Delivered: 1
Delivery Schedule: 10 in Dec.; 49 in Jan. 1942; 38 in Feb; 40 in Mar; 50 in Apr; 50 in May; 36 in June; 44 in July; 50 in Aug; 50 in Sep.; 50 in Oct.; 50 in Nov.; 50 in Dec.; 28 in Jan. 1943.

This same portion of the monthly report also confirms that none of the 21 programmed F4F-7’s had yet been delivered.

So, the first F4F-4 delivered to the USN was in November 1941, just one, but after 90 had been delivered to BPC for transfer to the Royal Navy.

And lastly, the December 1941 BuAer Monthly Status of Aircraft reports:
F4F-4 #s 4058-4098; 5030-5262; 01991-02152; 03385-03544
Contract # 75736, 5 Aug 1940
Number Ordered: 596
Number Delivered: 5
Delivery Schedule: 38 in Feb; 40 in Mar; 50 in Apr; 50 in May; 36 in June; 44 in July; 50 in Aug; 50 in Sept; 50 in Oct; 50 Nov; 50 in Dec; 28 in Jan 1943.

The report also notes in the recap section under Grumman:
“The Navy received a total of four (4) F4F-4 airplanes during the month of December and Grumman estimates he will deliver 60 of the F4F-4’s in January. From now on to completion of the F4F-4 contracts barring shortages of materials the F4F-4 airplanes should be delivered to service activities at least equal to, and probably higher than, their scheduled rate of 50/mo. The shortages of folding wing fittings have been eliminated and the propeller situation now appears to be well in hand with Curtiss giving every indication of being able to meet Grumman deliveries plus reasonable spares.”

Safe to presume that production of the F4F-3 ended in late September 1941 and production shifted to the F4F-4.

R

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## nuuumannn (Feb 28, 2019)

Conslaw said:


> From the British perspective in ordering the 6-gun Marlet (what would become the F4F-4), they were looking at encounters with slingle FW Condors and U-Boats, primarily.



The 6-gun Martlett was the Mk.II, which was based on the F4F-3; the first F4F-4s in RN service were Mk.IIIs and then the F4F-4B on Lend Lease were Martlett IVs.



Shortround6 said:


> There may be a little bit of cross over there but thinking that the Martlet (with 6 guns) was intended to be an anti Condor plane may be pushing things.



Yup. The Martlett was ordered by the FAA because of the Air Ministry's refusal to get Supermarine to build the navy a 'Sea Spitfire', which was going to divert from supply of the Spitty to the RAF. The Martlett (and indeed the Sea Hurricane) as a naval single seater was an interim until the arrival of the Blackburn Firebrand, which the Admiralty hoped was to be the next naval single-seater.


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## Kevin J (Feb 28, 2019)

nuuumannn said:


> The 6-gun Martlett was the Mk.II, which was based on the F4F-3; the first F4F-4s in RN service were Mk.IIIs and then the F4F-4B on Lend Lease were Martlett IVs.
> 
> 
> 
> Yup. The Martlett was ordered by the FAA because of the Air Ministry's refusal to get Supermarine to build the navy a 'Sea Spitfire', which was going to divert from supply of the Spitty to the RAF. The Martlett (and indeed the Sea Hurricane) as a naval single seater was an interim until the arrival of the Blackburn Firebrand, which the Admiralty hoped was to be the next naval single-seater.



Hmm, and I thought we got the Firefly because Fairey proposed it as a better alternative to building a Sea Spitfire. Just a reminder of statistics. Take a Spitfire I/II, add catapult spools, arrestor hook and folding wings, take off 20 mph, and what you get is a fighter with the same speed as a Wildcat. I think I'd prefer a Wildcat.


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## nuuumannn (Feb 28, 2019)

Kevin J said:


> Hmm, and I thought we got the Firefly because Fairey proposed it as a better alternative to building a Sea Spitfire.



The first Martletts the FAA received were diverted from a French order that went unfulfilled due to obvious reasons, but were supplimented by Martlett IIs with folding wings and improved armament.

The Firefly was built to a multi-seat specification borne out of two different specs that were canned for various reasons, as a follow on from the Fulmar. The Air Ministry (not the Admiralty) was keen on two-seaters for the navy, the reason given was that performance wise (in their minds) there wasn't much of a difference between them (a bit of an underestimation, but there you go) but simultaneously the Admiralty wanted a single seater; specifically Sea Spitfires, but had a number of single-seat designs underway at the time, which doesn't lend too much credence to the fact that it had forgotten about single seaters, its just none of them worked out as they had intended.

The logic behind the two-seaters was spelled out as being a different requirement for a fighter than that of the RAF. The FAA, it was argued wanted a fighter that could intercept long range bombers bent on attacking the fleet, therefore they would have been of large-ish size and range to reach ships at sea, whereas the RAF required interceptors for attacking a variety of bombers with differing performance, not to mention escort fighters. The naval fighter also needed long range, too. Performance difference was not predicted as being as important against such a bomber seeking ships at sea. At the early stage of the war, when the Firefly's spec was released, February 1940, it was argued that the navy fighters would not encounter single-seaters, so two-seaters were acceptable.

But, like I said, the Admiralty wanted single seaters for its carriers as it was felt they might be needed at certain times (!), and so, simultaneously, the Firebrand spec was drawn up and released later in the year, but had its origins in the two earlier specs that were initially issued before the Firefly but canned; N.8/39 and N.9/39.

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## nuuumannn (Feb 28, 2019)

Kevin J said:


> Take a Spitfire I/II, add catapult spools, arrestor hook and folding wings, take off 20 mph, and what you get is a fighter with the same speed as a Wildcat.



That's why you wait until Rolls has produced the Merlin 45 with improved supercharger, which came in late 1940/early 1941, or better still, as it transpired, wait for the two-speed, two-stage 60 Series Merlin or indeed the Griffon for even greater performance leaps.

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## Clayton Magnet (Feb 28, 2019)

Kevin J said:


> Take a Spitfire I/II, add catapult spools, arrestor hook and folding wings, take off 20 mph, and what you get is a fighter with the same speed as a Wildcat. I think I'd prefer a Wildcat.


Correct me if I am wrong, but a navalized Spitfire I/II would have been available in 1940, if the Air Ministry would have allowed it. Which would have made it a contemporary of the F3F, not the Wildcat. I think I would prefer a Seafire.

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## Kevin J (Feb 28, 2019)

Clayton Magnet said:


> Correct me if I am wrong, but a navalized Spitfire I/II would have been available in 1940, if the Air Ministry would have allowed it. Which would have made it a contemporary of the F3F, not the Wildcat. I think I would prefer a Seafire.


I don't know about the US, but we had shore based Martlet I's operational in late 1940 scoring their first victory on Christmas Day.

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## Clayton Magnet (Feb 28, 2019)

I think the first shipbourne Martlets went to sea in the summer on 1941, but I believe you are correct, the first kill was in December of 1940. The Admiralty had first requested navalized Spitfires in May of 1938, so perhaps they could have been available earlier than 1940, had the air ministry approved it.


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## Kevin J (Feb 28, 2019)

Clayton Magnet said:


> I think the first shipbourne Martlets went to sea in the summer on 1941, but I believe you are correct, the first kill was in December of 1940. The Admiralty had first requested navalized Spitfires in May of 1938, so perhaps they could have been available earlier than 1940, had the air ministry approved it.


Supermarine had only completed 46 by the beginning of 1939, 306 of their first order of 310 in September 1939. From first flight of a Seafire Ib to introduction of the Seafire FIII was two years. From first flight to service deliveries of the IB/IIC was over six months, or 12 months to service intro. The only way you're going to get a Seafire into service in 1939 is if you cancel Spitfire in favour of Seafire production. Its only when Westland production starts in 1941 that you have spare planes that can be Seafires, unless of course you want to lose the BoB by only operating Hurricanes.

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## Clayton Magnet (Feb 28, 2019)

I thought Fairey proposed a navalized Spitfire, only to be told to forget it, and concentrate on Fulmar production? I wonder what kind of agreement existed between Fairey and Supermarine for that kind of proposal to be possible

Getting off topic, my apologies


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## Kevin J (Feb 28, 2019)

Clayton Magnet said:


> I thought Fairey proposed a navalized Spitfire, only to be told to forget it, and concentrate on Fulmar production? I wonder what kind of agreement existed between Fairey and Supermarine for that kind of proposal to be possible
> 
> Getting off topic, my apologies


IIRC Fairey was asked to produce the folding wing Spitfire and came back with a better design, the Firefly. Unfortunately, its engine development got delayed in 1940 because of the 'imminent invasion' crisis.


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## nuuumannn (Feb 28, 2019)

Kevin J said:


> IIRC Fairey was asked to produce the folding wing Spitfire and came back with a better design, the Firefly.



Well, yes and no. Yes, Richard Fairey himself was asked to build folding wing Spitfires at a meeting held at the Admiralty in 1938, but he initially refused, stating that the Swordfish and Fulmar production would be stymied as a result; he also believed the Spitfire wouldn't be much better than the Fulmar as a fighter - 300 Spitfires wouldn't be worth sacrificing 200 Fulmars for in production terms, in his opinion. He was even given a veiled threat by those in attendance regarding his factories!

Joe Smith had drawn up folding wings on the Spitty by late 1939 in anticipation of an order from the Admiralty, with the support of Director of Technical Development Verney, who had written to Smith proposing the naval Spitfire previously, but oddly, it was Churchill as First Lord of the Admiralty who stopped the first iteration of the Sea Spitfire, stating to Beaverbrook that he wanted Fulmar production to be kept up, not to mention deliveries of the Spitfire to the RAF that would be interrupted if the Supermarine built the Sea Spitfire, but that wasn't up to Churchill in late 1939.

The Firefly, as I stated earlier was built to spec N.5/40 that was the successor to N.8/39 and N.9/39, to which Supermarine had proposed separate entries for, loosely based on the Spitfire; these were for two-seaters, not single-seaters, one of which was for a turret fighter.

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## ThomasP (Mar 5, 2019)

I have read that Hawker, in 1938, did a study on a folding wing Hurricane for carrier duty but were turned down when it was offered to the Admiralty. I have never run across the reason why they were turned down. I have always assumed that it was due to the need for a 2-man crew (for navigation purposes) being more important at that time, along with a limited value placed on single purpose aircraft. The folding wing and suitable navalization would have added a few hundred pounds to the Hurricane but the result would still have been faster than the Fulmar.


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## Greyman (Mar 6, 2019)

From what I've seen it was a naval fighter development of the Hawker P.4/34 (what became the Henley) that was evaluated against the naval fighter development of the Fairey P.4/34 (what became the Fulmar).

The Fulmar being better in most respects and selected.

On the subject of a single-seater aircraft meeting the Admiralty's requirements (a conversion of the Hurricane was specifically mentioned) -- it was the opinion of Captain Graham (Director of the Naval Air Division) that a single-seater would be better than nothing but a two-seater was very important for navigation and communication purposes. This was November 1937.

As others have mentioned he later said that "... speed would not be of such vital importance as in RAF fighters. It was not anticipated that the aircraft would be called upon to operate against types other than those suffering the same limitations as themselves."


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## Kevin J (Mar 6, 2019)

ThomasP said:


> I have read that Hawker, in 1938, did a study on a folding wing Hurricane for carrier duty but were turned down when it was offered to the Admiralty. I have never run across the reason why they were turned down. I have always assumed that it was due to the need for a 2-man crew (for navigation purposes) being more important at that time, along with a limited value placed on single purpose aircraft. The folding wing and suitable navalization would have added a few hundred pounds to the Hurricane but the result would still have been faster than the Fulmar.


The Fulmar was just as fast as the Hurricane, at least once you've put it into a dive. Anyway, who needs speed unless you're chasing away overflying recce planes, for that you lash a few Sea Hurricanes with souped up engines to your deck on outriggers. If the enemy wants to sink you, they have to come to you and slow down in order to get bombing accuracy. Our top scoring navy fighters: the Fulmar followed by the Sea Hurricane with the Seafire in 3rd place. FYI: Sea Hurricane Ib, 315 mph at 7500 ft, so faster than the A6M2; Sea Hurricane IIc, from 291 mph at sea level to 342 mph at 22000, as per the A6M3 and the same or better than a Seafire IIc equipped with 4 20 m cannon.


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## ThomasP (Mar 8, 2019)

In response to Kevin J post#362,

The Fulmar was a good interim carrier fighter, not least because it was a 2-seater with better navigation ability (see the thread Build a better Sea Hurricane 1938 started by fast mongrel).

However I believe you are mistaken in your assessment of the difference in performance of the various aircraft. Some of the actual speeds were as follows:

Fulmar Mk I [email protected] 9,750 Merlin [email protected] +4
Fulmar Mk II(trop) [email protected] 9,500 Merlin [email protected] +9.75

Hurricane Mk I [email protected],750 Merlin [email protected] +6.25
SeaHurricane Mk IB [email protected],000 Merlin [email protected] +6.25
[email protected] 7,500 Merlin [email protected] +16
SeaHurricane Mk IC [email protected],000 Merlin [email protected] +6.25
[email protected] 7,300 Merlin [email protected] +16
Hurricane Mk IIC [email protected],000 Merlin [email protected] +9
SeaHurricane Mk IIC [email protected],000 Merlin [email protected] +9

Spitfire Mk VB [email protected],000 Merlin [email protected] +9
Spitfire Mk VB(trop) [email protected],400 Merlin [email protected] +9
Spitfire Mk VC [email protected],900 Merlin [email protected] +9
Seafire Mk IB [email protected],000 Merlin [email protected] +9
Seafire HF Mk IIC [email protected],700 Merlin [email protected] +9
[email protected],700 Merlin [email protected] +9, 30 gal DT
Seafire LF Mk IIC [email protected] 5,100 Merlin [email protected] +??
Seafire Mk III [email protected],500 Merlin [email protected] +9
[email protected],000 Merlin [email protected]+14
Seafire LF Mk III [email protected],000 Merlin [email protected] +9
[email protected],000 Merlin [email protected]+16

A6M2 Zero Model 21 [email protected],000 Sakae 12
A6M3 Zero Model 31 [email protected],000 Sakae 21

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## Kevin J (Mar 8, 2019)

ThomasP said:


> In response to Kevin J post#362,
> 
> The Fulmar was a good interim carrier fighter, not least because it was a 2-seater with better navigation ability (see the thread Build a better Sea Hurricane 1938 started by fast mongrel).
> 
> ...



The FAA fighters were optimised for low altitude. The Fulmar II IIRC did 265 at 1750 feet and 272 at 6500 feet. The A6M2 did 273 at sea level and 296 at 10000 ft so there's only about 10 mph speed difference at low altitude. The late '42 Sea Hurricane IIc with 16 lbs boost, arrestor hook only, and individual exhaust thrusts did 291 mph sea level, 328 at 7000 ft, 327 at 10400 ft and 342 at 12400 ft as it had been cleaned up to have a similar speed to a Hurricane IIa, and so comparable with an A6M3. A Sea Hurricane Ib/Ic as you correctly state did 310/315 at 7000 ft which is faster than an A6M2, and its going to be faster all the way up to 10000 ft where at the heights that combat is going to take place. If you want a like for like comparison between a Seafire HFIIc and an FM-1 then you need to attach the 30 slipper combat tank on the Seafire to get the same range as the FM-1 which is 331 mph at about 20000 feet so I'd prefer the FM-1 as it can carry drop tanks. The LFIIc is pretty similar in performance to the FM-2. Of course if you compare the FM-1/2 against the Seafire FIII/LlII then the Seafire is superior and more than a match for the A6M5 which the FM-1/2 clearly weren't but these are fighters operational in 1944/45 not 1943/44, the mk IIc versions being available in 1942/43. The Seafire HFIIc of 1942 without combat slipper tank only did 280 at sea level compared to the 296 or so of the A6M3. The RAAF found that the Spitfire VC Trop was inferior to the A6M3 up to 20000 ft so the Seafire IIc would have been even worse. The Fulmar, Sea Hurricane and Seafire could all out dive the A6M2, while only the Seafire could out dive the A6M3. You're not going to either be defending your task force or attacking the enemies at 20000 ft, its more likely to below 10000 ft.


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## Greyman (Mar 8, 2019)

Quick sketch on speeds.

*Fulmar I* - *Fulmar II* - *Sea Hurricane I* - *A6M2*








Fulmars are from the A&AEE, Sea Hurricane is from official data points from somewhere ... MAP I believe. A6M2 is from http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.org/japan/intelsum85-dec42.pdf

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## Kevin J (Mar 8, 2019)

Greyman said:


> Quick sketch on speeds.
> 
> *Fulmar I* - *Fulmar II* - *Sea Hurricane I* - *A6M2*
> 
> ...



I've seen higher speeds for the Fulmar II lower down, although they could be without the tropical filter installed. The other figures all look fine. Only the Fulmar II had the tropical filter installed as standard.


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## ThomasP (Mar 8, 2019)

To Greyman & Kevin J,

I was using the max sustainable boost for more than 5 min, i.e. +9 or +12 lbs for the UK, Normal for the US, and whatever the Japanese called their Military power.
What are your criteria for max speeds?


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## Greyman (Mar 8, 2019)

Fulmar I -- 9,800 lb -- +9.4 lb boost, 3000 rpm
Fulmar II -- 9,980 lb -- +12.5 lb boost, 3000 rpm
Sea Hurri -- ?,??? lb -- +16 lb boost, 3000 rpm
A6M2 -- 5,555 lb -- 35" boost, 2600 rpm

The Fulmar II has the temperate cowling fitted. With the tropical cowling subtract 7 mph.


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## Kevin J (Mar 9, 2019)

ThomasP said:


> To Greyman & Kevin J,
> 
> I was using the max sustainable boost for more than 5 min, i.e. +9 or +12 lbs for the UK, Normal for the US, and whatever the Japanese called their Military power.
> What are your criteria for max speeds?



In the case of the Sea Hurricane its 16 lbs boost for 3 mins.


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## Greyman (Mar 9, 2019)

Pilot's Notes I have say "The use of +16 lb/sq.in. boost is permitted for periods of about 15 minutes at low altitudes."


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## Kevin J (Mar 9, 2019)

Greyman said:


> Pilot's Notes I have say "The use of +16 lb/sq.in. boost is permitted for periods of about 15 minutes at low altitudes."


What year are the notes printed in? My 3 minute rating is for 1941 with the FAA and 16 lbs, the RAF at the time only allowed 12 lbs for 5 minutes. I believe things had changed by 1943.


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## Greyman (Mar 9, 2019)

No date on that particular amendment, but the one before it is dated December 1941.


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## Kevin J (Mar 9, 2019)

Greyman said:


> No date on that particular amendment, but the one before it is dated December 1941.


December 1941 sounds like the time 16 lbs was cleared for 3 minutes. By the time you get to 1943, you have the Merlin 25, 32, 50 series, all cleared for up to 18 lbs boost. Improvements in metallurgy IIRC.


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## RCAFson (Mar 9, 2019)

In Jan 1942 the Merlin 30 was cleared for 16lb boost:

http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.org/merlin-ratings_3jan42.jpg

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## MycroftHolmes (Mar 10, 2019)

RCAFson said:


> In Jan 1942 the Merlin 30 was cleared for 16lb boost:



I suspect that is just putting the official seal-of-approval on something that was already being done by squadrons, since we know that Malta-based Hurricanes were being tweaked well before this.

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