Attack/Bomber Payload & Range

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Zipper730

Chief Master Sergeant
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Nov 9, 2015
I'm curious if there were any trends in the RAF & USAAF when it came to attack-aircraft, light/medium/heavy, and very heavy bomber aircraft, such as...
  • Minimum acceptable & desired maximum payload (i.e. 2000-4000 pounds)
  • Minimum acceptable & desired maximum range (i.e. 2500 miles)
  • Minimum acceptable & desired payload/range (i.e. 1500 miles w/ 2000 pounds)
  • Minimum acceptable & desired maximum speed (i,e 350 mph or greater)
...for given periods of time (i.e. 1935-1939; 1939-1942; 1942-1944; 1945)?

Airframes , buffnut453 , davparlr , drgondog , X XBe02Drvr
 
Last edited:
It's strange to revise such a thread, but this is something I've been curious about.
 
pbehn said:
It developed into a science of its own, with another science to determine the effects post war.
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That wasn't a joke Zipper, the resources poured into this as a science were huge and then post war the investigations into what was effective were also huge. See the discussions on load out of bombers for massed raids, it changed from front to back, and in an extreme case bombs like the tallboy and grandslam were supposed to miss their target in many cases (but not by much).
 
Zipper730 said:
I thought you were being sarcastic, I apologize.
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Read the studies on the most effective methods of hitting refineries and steel works. Look at the calculations of tonnage of bombs dropped against losses of planes aircrew etc. Look at the photographs taken to establish targets, confirm the weather and investigate the results. All of the best allied combat aircraft had a photo recon version, they were highly valued at the time but don't contribute to any kill loss ratio apart from losses which are not really counted because they aren't part of any "campaign".
 
Zipper730 said:
P pbehn , I was thinking about 1943-1945 era
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That is what I am discussing, from D-Day onwards the allies were taking 85,000 pictures per day. In total I believe the allies took about 10 million pictures, they weren't taken for fun, but to assess and improve the effects of raids and identify targets.
 
Zipper730 said:
P pbehn I honestly get the vibe you're just being difficult rather than actually answering. There are general rules of thumb and you know it.

]
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You are obsessed with rules of thumb. The allies may have started off with rules of thumb but put a huge effort into doing better than a rule of thumb to make different rules of thumb. The weapon loadout was refined through the war, different bomb loads were used for cities and industrial targets. If you know the answer why ask a question? Payload range speed is a moving feast, the further the mission the fewer bombs you can carry, eventually there is a range that a bomber can carry itself and its crew but no bombs how that helps anything is a mystery to me.
 
I do like to start with rules of thumb because those give rise to more detail later on.
 
Wes,

I was curious if you knew anything else about the rules of thumb for various bomber sizes. You know quite a bit about aircraft of varying types, so I figured you might have something useful on the typical rules of thumb during the WWII era.
 
Zipper730 said:
Wes,

I was curious if you knew anything else about the rules of thumb for various bomber sizes. You know quite a bit about aircraft of varying types, so I figured you might have something useful on the typical rules of thumb during the WWII era.
Click to expand...
It is 579 miles from London to Berlin, why would anyone develop a bomber with a 2500 mile range in 1935, or 1940 or 1942? Or want to drop 1 ton of bombs at 1500 miles range at any time?
 
Zipper730 said:
for given periods of time (i.e. 1935-1939; 1939-1942; 1942-1944; 1945)
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Progress was both the result of technical improvements and increased demands by air staff/customers.

Curtiss A-14 First flight July 17th 1935.

two 775hp engines. 2 position props, 654lb bomb load. max gross weight 11,738lbs, 526 sq ft wing.

Douglas XA-26 first flight July 10 1942, just 7 years later.

two 2000hp engines, constant speed feathering propellers, 4000lbs internal bombload, 2000lb more external. 31,000lbs max gross weight.
Squadron use is one to two years after first flight.

Air staff could not ask for things that didn't exist yet (like 2000hp engines in 1936/37) as aircraft capability increased air staff could ask for more range, or bigger bigger bombloads or more speed of combinations. Ask for too much and you wound up with nothing (German Ural bombers or Bomber B). It was a very fine balancing act and some countries got it right at times and the same countries also got it wrong at times.

pbehn said:
It is 579 miles from London to Berlin, why would anyone develop a bomber with a 2500 mile range in 1935, or 1940 or 1942? Or want to drop 1 ton of bombs at 1500 miles range at any time?
Click to expand...

Well, the British did develop a bomber with 1400 miles of range with a 1000lb load in the late 30s or actually two if count 1940.

The First was the Blenheim IV, the 2nd was the original Mosquito bomber.

The original XB-17 (or Boeing 299) was designed for over a 2000 mile range while carrying a "useful bombload" this was August of 1934.
 
Every aircraft ever designed started with a specification. Every specification listed what the end user expected the projected aircraft to accomplish.
The manufacturers then had to come up with a proposal that would meet or exceed those expectations.
In many cases the manufacturer had to make trade offs based on what the available technology could provide.
As technology improved, capabilities could be increased.
 
Zipper730 said:
Wes,

I was curious if you knew anything else about the rules of thumb for various bomber sizes. You know quite a bit about aircraft of varying types, so I figured you might have something useful on the typical rules of thumb during the WWII era.
Click to expand...
"Rules of thumb" is a chimera, to my way of thinking. AFAIK nobody ever published any such document. No law says you can't analyze an entire class of aircraft and generate your own rules of thumb, if that makes you feel better. Each aircraft is it's own development exercise, constrained only by the available technology, the desires of its customer, the available finances, and the creativity of its design team. Planes of any particular time period tend to be similarly constrained by the state of the art, thus bear certain similarities.
If you want to generate a spreadsheet of traits and similarities in order to create pigeonholes to sort them into, be my guest. I can't see the point in it.
 
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