- Thread starter
-
- #981
Ad: This forum contains affiliate links to products on Amazon and eBay. More information in Terms and rules
The Spitfire needs about 80IG to fly 452 miles at Max weak mixture, so add a 20IG reserve and there's 100IG for the return flight. It will burn about 100IG to the target zone, leaving 85IG for combat, if we have 200IG of internal fuel and a 90IG DT. Of course there's no reason to fly at MWM over water or over the UK, so about 1/3 of the mission can be flown at ME speed:
View attachment 549370
with greatly reduced fuel consumption, so an allowance of 200IG for transit and 85IG for combat is more than sufficient.
There in no reason that Spitfire losses from fuel exhaustion would be excessive. The main difference, compared to a Mustang is that the Spitfire will have to spend less time at it's assigned leg of the escort mission, before breaking off to return to base. Spitfires and P47s were flying escort for the Schweinfurt raids, and did not suffer excessive losses from fuel exhaustion because they RTB when their fuel state required it but, of course, that meant that they couldn't cover the entire bombing mission. LR Spitfires would have to provide escort in stages by overtaking the bombers along their route, rather than flying continuous close escort.
You don't want to be carrying the 90 IG slipper tank because even an Me 110 will make mincemeat out of you if it bounces you while you fly in a straight line only making gentle manoeuvres, that's why I suggested the P-40 tank. Longest Spitfire raids are to La Palice, 370 miles, Mk VII with slipper tanks mostly over water, East Timor 445 miles, with Mk VIII, totally over water. I do agree though that the idea is marginally plausible but you don't want to be lumbered with that big slipper tank over hostile territory.
Even the post war Mk XVIII with its strengthened wing only carried 176 internal.
The biggest problem I see trying to perform LR escort missions in 41/42 early 43 is dealing with JG 2 and JG 26 who were at their height in fighting power and confidence. Trying to fly LR missions with a premium fighter group sitting just across the channel in a heavily fuel loaded fighter is going to be folly regardless if it's a Spit or P51. If the opposing fighter group used tactics such as Parks peeling off the escorts of BoB fame range is pointless because you'll never use it, the last thing you will see will be a ground directed FW190 if you are below 20,000ft, a Me109F if above.
The need for a LR escort doesn't really exist until the 8th AF gets into high gear in 1943. However, its better to lose single seat fighters than 4 engine bombers.
Stating that a Spitfire with increased internal and external fuel will have an increased combat radius, is simply stating a fact and in no way implies that it would equal a Mustang as a LR escort fighter.
Where to begin... It almost sounds as though you're arguing that the Spitfire was incapable of engaging in any combat because it didn't have enough fuel...yet we all know that this isn't true.
A Spitfire VIII with a 75IG fuselage tank, 124IG main tanks and 45IG slipper tank carried 245IG of (effectively) internal fuel
If the Spits spot the 110s at several miles it might be the 110s that are mincemeat.Can an average of 60 Spitfires at a time defend 240 - 300 bombers. It sounds doubtful. All you need is Me 110's to bounce the Spitfires with their 90 IG tanks still on them over the North Sea and they're mincemeat.
If the Spits spot the 110s at several miles it might be the 110s that are mincemeat.
Lets see if ive got this right( and it seems logical, to me anyway) the range of an escort fighter would be limited to the miles it could fly on internal fuel only from the point at which it was likely to encounter enemy fighter oposition to the target and then home again. Because you've got to drop your tanks at that point.Not in dispute.
Not what I am arguing at all. what we are arguing about is how far from bases the Spitfire could engage in combat.
in my mind internal fuel only counts if you have it for the return trip, this may be in stark contrast to some other people.
Maybe I am simple minded but what is the difference between stuffing 71 gallons of fuel in the rear fuselage that has to burned/used to make the plane safe to fly before you reach the area where enemy fighters may be encountered (let alone the bombers target) and simply using drop tank/s that hold 71 gallons more than the drop tanks used with the rear fuselage tanks? You can't fly home on fuel you used to take-off and climb to operational hight with no matter what tank it was in.
Question on the 45 gallon slipper tank. Was it self-sealing or not?
Given enough time (projected started early) I don't see the plumbing of the wings for wing drop tanks as an insurmountable problem. The bigger problem is using wing leading edge tanks and drop tanks on wings not designed to hold the weight. WHich is part solved by limiting maneuvers with the drop tanks, which just about everybody did.
Likewise I don't worry too much about how difficult it was to jettison the slipper tanks as I assume that given enough interest either the problem would have been sorted out or alternative tank/s designed. Using twin 44 gallon Hurricane tanks sounds like too much of a bodge to get very far, you want the simplest fuel system possible to cut down on accidents caused by either pilot error (wrong tank selected) or leaky fittings, sucking air into the system is as bad as leaking fuel.
I don't know how difficult it was to put wing tanks in the MK IX. If any rib noses had to be taken out? or how hard it was to run fuel lines in an existing wing. the rear fuselage tank set up may have been seen as an easy way to modify existing aircraft.
The Main problems as I see it for the escort Spit is properly engineering the wing for the increased loads (and that includes loads imposed by taking off on less than perfect airfields) and getting the plane to fly properly (solve a lot of the problems by just sticking 33-37 of fuel behind the pilot and forgetting the remainder of the 71 gallons).
If doesn't give the impressive number on paper though
I have noted before that American sources don't always agree on number of victories, in the posted link the P-38 also has 1928 victories combined in the ETO/ MTO. You are of cause right on the sortie/ loss rate being higher for the P-38; but the P-38 also has a higher ratio of victories to sorties: 67 sorties per victory vs. 113 for the P-40, using the highest numbers.
I guess you didn't read the linked article:
A 30 or 45IG combat slipper tank is retained during combat for a effective 180/195 IG of internal fuel after the wing torpedo tanks are released prior to combat. This was completely achievable with existing mods to Spitfires except for the wing mounted DTs and that could have been done with little effort.
It wasn't done because there wasn't any specific customer for such a mod, and there wasn't sufficient production capacity to provide the USAAF with sufficient Spitfires for them to mod them. However, if the Spitfire was license built in North America, then the USAAF would probably have gone ahead with it, especially if the Mustang was never ordered by the BPC.
The need for a LR escort doesn't really exist until the 8th AF gets into high gear in 1943. However, its better to lose single seat fighters than 4 engine bombers.
I believe there was an incident off the coast of The Hague in 1941/42 where a Spitfire squadron with those tanks attached got annihilated by Me 110's.
I had read it long before you posted it sir. I just didn't reach the same conclusions you did. To me the article was saying 'maybe' with a lot of strong caveats. It's the same thing we are doing here, exploring an idea, it's not some scientific proof that it actually was plausible. I remember a lot about bent wings and drop tanks bouncing off the plane and all kinds of other problems.
This is where my eyebrows raise the highest. As Shortround6 asked you, are those slipper tanks self-sealing? Because if not, you are essentially taking an A6M2 into combat with Bf 109G and Fw 190s..
Similarly, what is the drag penalty for carrying that tank? How much does it affect top speed? Cruise speed? acceleration? Climbg? High G turns? Power dives (escape!)
I don't agree, it wasn't done because it wasn't feasible. The problem with the Spit was a big part of what made it great- that thin, high efficiency, low drag wing. Couldn't fit both gas and guns in it. Those 'bag' tanks in the leading edges of the wings... were those self-sealing?
You are talking about a scenario that sounds like getting into a knife fight while carrying a stack of dishes in one hand and a bucket of water in the other.
The Spit was turned from a short range interceptor to a medium range fighter with the Spit VIII and subsequent marks. It just wasn't possible to really make it into a truly long range fighter. Same thing basically happened to the P-40 in the Pacific, that is what Robert DeHaven said anyway, it was just left behind in 1944 due to range limitations and gave way to the P-38.
I was reading up on the P-47N, that was quite a long ranged beast but it came too late to matter. The P-51 was really quite useful despite it's limitations, there is no denying that.
I'm a little confused about some of the statements on the CBI to the effect that the Brits were isolated there. The USAAF (including 23rd, 51st and 80th FG) was operating there at the same time, weren't they working together closely? I have never quite understood that.
Wikipedia says:
"After consultation among the Allied governments, Air Command South-East Asia was formed in November 1943 to control all Allied air forces in the theater, with Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard Peirse as Commander-in-Chief.[11] Under Peirse's deputy, USAAF Major General George E. Stratemeyer, Eastern Air Command (EAC) was organized in 1943 to control Allied air operations in Burma, with headquarters in Calcutta.[12] Unlike the strained relations and confusion encountered in coordinating Allied ground force commands, air force operations in the CBI proceeded relatively smoothly.
Relations improved even further after new U.S. military aid began arriving, together with capable USAAF officers such as Brigadier General William D. Old of CGI Troop Carrier Command, and Colonels Philip Cochran and John R. Alison of the 1st Air Commando Group.[13] Within Eastern Air Command, Air Marshal Sir John Baldwin commanded the Third Tactical Air Force, originally formed to provide close air support to the Fourteenth Army. Baldwin was later succeeded by Air Marshal Sir Alec Coryton. U.S. Brigadier-General Howard C. Davidson and later Air Commodore F. J. W. Mellersh commanded the Strategic Air Force. In the new command, various units of the Royal Air Force and the U.S. Tenth Air Force worked side-by-side. In the autumn of 1943 SEAAC had 48 RAF and 17 USAAF squadrons; by the following May, the figures had risen to 64 and 28, respectively.[12] "
It sounds from all that as if RAF and US 10th & 14th Air Force etc. should have been working together fairly efficiently. I'm surprised RAF couldn't get some replacements for their Hurricanes. I think even Martlets would have been more useful for that Theater. Again from the Wiki, it sounds like by summer of 1944 (which is pretty late) Anglo-American forces had come to dominate the air battle:
"After a period of reshuffling, Eastern Air Command's air operations began to show results. In August 1944, Admiral Mountbatten noted in a press conference that EAC fighter missions had practically swept the Japanese air force from Burmese skies. Between the formation of SEAAC in November 1943, and the middle of August 1944, American and British forces operating in Burma destroyed or damaged more than 700 Japanese aircraft with a further 100 aircraft probably destroyed.[15] This achievement considerably reduced dangers to Air Transport Command cargo planes flying in support of the Hump airlift operation. By May 1944, EAC resupply missions in support of the Allied ground offensive had carried 70,000 tons of supplies and transported a total of 93,000 men, including 25,500 casualties evacuated from the battle areas. These figures did not include tonnage flown in the Hump airlift missions to China.[15] "
That sounds like an extremely high number of ground-troop casualties ... feel sorry for anyone stationed in that Theater it must have been really tough.
In the case of Vietnam and Indonesia, the Brits used Japanese troops for a while to maintain order before French and Dutch troops arrived.
N.B. The Martlet was a low altitude fighter, unlike the American Wildcat and British Hurricane.
Apparently Royal Navy had FM-2s as Wildcat Mk VI