1941/42: fighter with single stage R-2800, a missed opportunity?

GregP said:

Yeah, 1941 / 1942 and maybe 1943 were ramp up years. I already SAID that. You can't produce anything when you are building the factory and tooling. You have to produce when the factories are completed.

What is your point?

The production numbers were good for late 1942 to mid-1943 onward, but not much before that.

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The point was that the factories were built pre-war (in the US perspective) based largely on the orders for aircraft by other nations (primarily the UK and France) and also on the expansion of the USAAC, which was being undertaken in the expectation of the possibility that the US would enter the war.

IIRC, the VLR Bomber project (which spawned the B-29) was started in 1940, the aim of which, in part, was to be able to bomb Germany from the Continetal USA in case Britain fell.

GregP said:

Jabberwocky,

The stimulus was for design. The production facilities were pitiful and were NOT improved until we went to war. Sure, new designs helped, but we didn't have anything like wartime training, wartime production, or wartime anything.

All we did was develop a design corps with knowledge of how to set up production on a small scale. When war was declared, we figured out to scale it up for wartime production and NOT before. Yes the designs helped, but we were NOT in wartime production until sometime in 1943. Look at the production numbers, not wartime propaganda. Numbers didn't really ramp until 1943.

We made one P-38 in 1940; 207 in 1941; 1,479 in 1942; 2,497 in 1943; and 4,184 in 1944. 1945 saw 1,66 as we ramped down from P-38 production.

The P-51 was zero in 1940; 138 in 1941; 634 in 1942 (not exactly a production record, huh?); 1,710 in 1943 (still slow); and 6,982 in 1944. We made 6,103 in 1945 in half a year ... and then stopped.

The F6F was zero in 1940 and 1941 and we really ramped up to a whole 10 in 1942. 2.547 in 1943; 6,140 in 1944; and 3.578 in half of 1945.

So when exactly DID we ramp up? Basically late 1943 to early 1944. The fight was a holding action until then for the USA, not for the rest of the Allies.

You can find the numbers as easily as I can. Naval production looked the same.

Not sure about Army ground vehicles and don't care. This is an aviation forum, not a tank forum. I love to work on tanks and ride / drive them, but they aren't my cup of wartime history tea.

The Europeans, on the other hand, WERE ramping up since Hitler was making his ambitions known. If the UK had not started ramping up, they'd have been speaking German in short order. I am grateful they had foresight and ACTED while we slept.

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Greg, the aircraft you chose to highlight your argument are interesting.

The F6F wasn't even conceived in 1940. The F4F was only just getting into production in mid 1940.

The P-38 was still in the prototype/pre-production stage in 1940. The British and French still ordered 667 of them. Which dwarfed th enumber the USAAF had ordered at that stage.

The P-51 also hadn't been conceived (at least officially) by the time the British Purchasing Commission came to see North American. The P-51 was a result of the BPC's desire for ever more P-40s.

A comparison between F8F and F6F. Please note that distance between prop shaft and pilot's headrest is about equal. The fuselage of the F8F is far shorter (circa 5 ft). It is also shallower, since the supercharger air intake and oil cooler's intake were located in wings, not under engine as in the F6F. Not depicted here, the wing was also far smaller and lighter.
BTW, one wonders whether the (X)F6F-6 would've been a more useful fighter than F8F-1.

GregP said:

Yeah, 1941 / 1942 and maybe 1943 were ramp up years. I already SAID that. You can't produce anything when you are building the factory and tooling. You have to produce when the factories are completed.

What is your point?

The production numbers were good for late 1942 to mid-1943 onward, but not much before that.

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My point? Correcting misinformation.

When you wrote:

There was NO possibility to tool up for a war footing before we declared war ... we were still coming out of the depression that started in 1929. Only a declaration of war could get us to think about a war footing.

So, we were doomed to START tooling uo for war around new year 1942, and there is ZERO possibility of doing so sooner.

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and

production facilities were pitiful and were NOT improved until we went to war.

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Those are demonstrably false.

1. The US aircraft industry was expanding production at a record rate from late 1938 through to 1941 - thanks in no small part to foreign orders which dwarfed those of the US military at the time. At the end of 1939, of the $680 million million of orders for the entire US aircraft industry (civilian and military), $400 million was for Anglo-French military types.
2. The US armed forced began their expansion to "start tooling up for a war" in the second half of 1940, not in the beginning of 1942. Look at the various 'group' schemes and the proposals for a 10,000 aircraft USAAF that were approved in 1939 and funded in 1940.
3. US production aircraft/engine capacity more than trippled between the beginning of 1939 and the end of 1940.

Again, from the official history:

The British Royal Air Force and the French Air Force played a major part during 1938 and 1939 in increasing the actual and potential production of the American aircraft industry.

...

From the long-range viewpoint, of greatest significance for the United States was the willingness of foreign countries to pay for the plant expansion which was considered necessary in order to meet their orders on time. It is accurate to say, then, that the initial expansion of the American aircraft industry in 1939-40, and one which was of great benefit to the country, was paid for by Great Britain and France.

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Don't think so at all Jabberwocky.

The USA was firmly in a peacetime buildup until after Pearl Harbor. We had done some designs, but were procuring them at very small rates. You (maybe not YOU, but someone) have mentioned my choice of aircraft. OK, let's look at them. The percentages of total production are for 1940 through 1945:

P-38: 0.01%, 2.06%, 14.74%, 24.89%, 41.70%, 16.60%. Built 83.19% in 1943, 1944, 1945.
P-39: 0.14%, 9.70%, 20.24%, 51.82%, 18.11%, 0.00%, Built 69.93% in 1943, 1944, 1945.
P-40: 5.92%, 17.10%, 29.35%, 32.40%, 15.23%, 0.00%. Built 47.63% in 1943, 1944, 1945. The USAAF started the war with this one.
P-47: 0.00%, 0.01%, 3.39%, 28.23%, 45.05%, 23.32%. Built 96.60% in 1943, 1944, 1945.
P-51: 0.00%, 0.89%, 4.07%, 10.98%, 44.85%, 39.20%. Built 95.04% in 1943, 1944, 1945.
F4F: 1.34%, 4.10%, 18.60%, 19.45%, 39.60%, 16.92%. Built 75.96% in 1943, 1944, 1945.
F4U: 0.01%, 0.00%, 1.55%, 19.91%, 47.37%, 31.16%. Built 98.44% in 1943, 1944, 1945.
F6F: 0.00%, 0.00%, 0.08%, 20.75%, 50.02%, 29.15%. Built 99.92% in 1943, 1944, 1945.

The ONLY fighter with lass than half built in 1943 - 1945 was the P-40.

That accounts for 95,639 fighter aircraft, 84.49% of which were built from 1943 - 1945.

I think I just proved my point that 1943 - 1945 were the wartime production years and the rest was ramp-up, unless you just want to argue for the sake of arguing. I don't wish to pursue that.

Production was in the late war years.

However, the investment in facilities for production was in the early war years - 1940/41/42.

Take the P-38, for example. As you say, only one was built in 1940. However, some 700 or so were on order. The bulk of these (667) were from British and French orders. It is these orders that gave Lockheed the confidence to obtain the facilities to build them.

The P-40 was another example. It was being built in decent numbers in 1940. But where did they go? Many went to Europe. And there were many more on order from Britain and France, and greater production was required. Hence the British Purchasing Commission turning up at North American looking for additional production facilities for the P-40.

Yes, they started ramping up for wartime production about Dec 7 1941. Prior to that time they produced designs, prototypes, and low rate initial production units that were GOING to be acquired slowly ... until war nixed that option.

The P-40 was an easy change since it was built before the war as the P-36. All they really did was change engines and propellers. The former P-36 production line was already in use and simply changed over to P-40's. They also only built about 5.44% of the F4F Wildcats in 1940 - 1941, so they apparently could NOT change over biplane production lines to the Wildcat with the same ease as with the P-40.

OMG

Well, let's see.

The French ordered 100 Hawk 75As, 100 Hawk 75A-2s, 135 Hawk 75A-3s and 395 Hawk 75A-4s. 284 A-4s were built before France fell, though they weren't delivered.

Curtiss Hawk with Armee de l'Air

Considering the numbers of aircraft the USAAC were ordering at that time (1938/39), orders for 730 Hawk 75s would have been very welcome to Curtiss.

They also had plentiful orders for P-40s for the French and British in 1939/40. The USAAC even deferred supply of P-40s so that they could be delivered to Britain.

I imagine such an order would be quite welcome for any aircraft maker of the time ... or even today.

tomo pauk said:

The ever elusive XF6F-4, ie. the Hellcat with single stage R-2800:

http://www.alternatewars.com/SAC/XF6F-4_(Land)_PD_-_November_1_1942.pdf

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Does anyone have any daata on how center of gravity was maintained on the XF6F-4 version???
Not only was the XF6F-4 engine lighter than those used in the -3 and -5 versions, but the R-2800-27 single stage two speed engine had no need for the intercooler(s) used on the two stage engine Hellcats. That is a lot less weight in the nose of the XF6F-4. Was weight added to the nose, engine mounts exxtended, or aft fuselage equipment repositioned to maintain balance????

The weight difference for the bare engines was 180 lbs (mostly due to a smaller S/C), plus maybe another 150-200 lbs for the inter-coolers? OTOH, much of the that weight was 'subtracted' from the area of the fuselage rather close to the wing leading edge, so the effect to the CoG were not that pronounced?

wuzak said:

Well, let's see.

The French ordered 100 Hawk 75As, 100 Hawk 75A-2s, 135 Hawk 75A-3s and 395 Hawk 75A-4s. 284 A-4s were built before France fell, though they weren't delivered.

Curtiss Hawk with Armee de l'Air

Considering the numbers of aircraft the USAAC were ordering at that time (1938/39), orders for 730 Hawk 75s would have been very welcome to Curtiss.

They also had plentiful orders for P-40s for the French and British in 1939/40. The USAAC even deferred supply of P-40s so that they could be delivered to Britain.

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The scale of French and British ordering in 1939/1940 was, for the time, simply staggering. In 1939, the Anglo-French Purchasing Commission initially ordered 2400 fighters and 2160 bombers and 13,000 engines. By the end of 1939, orders had swolen to more than 8200 aircraft and 20,000 engines, this was more than the USAAF and USN had ordered in the previous five years combined. By March 1940, the orders had reached 14,000 aircraft and more than 25,000 engines.

In addition, with the first orders came a $37 million capital investment kicker for expansion of manufacturing facilities and another $7 million to finance the design/research of new aircraft types. Inflation adjusted, that $44 million was over $750 miillion in 2014 dollars. By June 1940, the British and French had committed $72 million on capital expansion incentives for US manufacturers ($1.2 billion in 2014 dollars). By the beginning of 1941 the British and French had paid $123,840,000 in special additions for the capital expansion of US aircraft/engine manufacturing. That's a little more than $2.1 billion in current dollars.

Given that between September 1939 and July 1940 $52 million ($877 million in 2014 dollars) had been actually spent by US companies on exapansion, I'd argue it is fair to say the 1939-1941 expansion of US aircraft manufacturing (more than tripling capacity) was paid for by the French and British.

Can't argue with that conclusion, Jabberwockey, though the industry still needed a lot MORE expansion to handle the production numbers of 1944 and 1945.

When the US started tooling up maybe subject to interpretation but may be indicated by President Roosevelt's speech of May 16 1940. (full text here : http://www.airforcemag.com/MagazineArchive/Documents/2009/June 2009/0609fullkeeper.pdf )

were he said (in part);

" During the past year American production capacity for war planes, including engines,
has risen from approximately 6,000 planes a year to more than double that number,
due in greater part to the placing of foreign orders here."

and " Our immediate problem is to superimpose on this production capacity a greatly
increased additional production capacity. I should like to see this nation geared up to
the ability to turn out at least 50,000 planes a year. Furthermore, I believe that this
nation should plan at this time a program that would provide us with 50,000 military
and naval planes."

Now it takes several years to build and equip a factory and hire and train a work force. The factories that began to produce large numbers of engines and aircraft in 1942 were planned and started construction in 1940 ( those that were NOT already expanding or under construction from the foreign orders). However to reach the 1944 production numbers even more plants and/or larger plants were needed. For example the Ford plant building R-2800s had ground broken on construction in Sept of 1940 and started making engines (in more than a handful) in Nov 1941. Production reached just under 800 a month by the end of 1942 but even before then it was decided that that was not enough and an "expansion" was ordered that roughly doubles the floor space. a further "expansion" was ordered soon after that resulted in over triple the original floor space and resulted in a peak production of over 2400 engines in one month in the middle of 1944. Now when did Ford gear up to build R-2800s, before or after Pearl Harbor?
In actual fact,,,, both.
Buick, Chevrolet and Studebaker were all brought in to manufacture aircraft engines in the fall of 1940 a few months after Ford and Packard but results don't show up until after Pearl Harbor. Once again, building construction, machine tool production and installation and work force hiring and training. I have no details on when or if the Buick, Chevrolet and Studebaker plants were expanded after initial construction.

Some idea of initial expansion of production my be taken from looking at some pre-war numbers for P&W and Wright.
By late 1938 P&W had delivered about 13,500 engines from the companies start in 1925. That includes Wasps, Wasp Juniors, Hornets ( of two types), Twin Wasps, Twin wasp Juniors and a few twin Hornets. In 1939 P&W built 1792 Twin Wasps, in 1940 they built 3643 Twin Wasps and in 1941 for the first 11 months they built 5810 Twin Wasps and 1469 R-2800s (production of the smaller Wasp and Wasp Junior are not listed).
Wright had sold about 8,000 Cyclone engines up until Aug of 1938, starting before 1930, with 1300 sold in 1937 and about 1000 sold in the first 7 months of 1938. in 1939 they built 2056 Cyclones (R-1820s), in 1940 2272 (+ 1925 R-2600s) in 1941 they built 4552 Cyclones and 7186 R-2600 engines. Granted production went up even more after that and plants were added in Cincinnati (first engines delivered in the summer of 1941 so plant construction started when?) and Wood-Ridge but they numbers sure indicate that more was going on that adding 2nd or 3rd shifts of workers to existing plants.

Nice find, Shortround.

I'd listen to any of Roosevelt's speeches but draw the line at Lyndon Johnson campaign speeches and any of Jimmy Carter's speeches.

They rank right up there with any talking by Pee Wee Herman.

GregP said:

Nice find, Shortround.

I'd listen to any of Roosevelt's speeches but draw the line at Lyndon Johnson campaign speeches and any of Jimmy Carter's speeches.

They rank right up there with any talking by Pee Wee Herman.

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How do you rank the Governator?

At least he won't be able to say, "I'll be back!"

GregP said:

Not sure what you guys are saying. Here is a test of the F6F-3:

http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.org/f6f/f6f-3-42874.pdf

that clearly shows a 375+ mph aircraft. The Hellcats we fly are all faster than the numbers above, but they don't DO that very often these days except in a dive from height. But they CAN.

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Sorry, couldn't help myself. Had to post this. Enjoy.

P-39 Expert said:

Sorry, couldn't help myself. Had to post this. Enjoy.

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Nothing to enjoy there. We all know that stripped-down A/C can out-perform fully-outfitted A/C.
Plus, how exactly does it contribute to the thread?