Battle of Britain Hurricane or Wildcat

[The Basket]

I'm not talking about the Hurricane in 1940...I'm talking about the Hurricane in 1936.

The Spitfire and the 109 were both far more modern designs. Even Hawker called the design the monoplane Fury. Of course...the war came in 1940 just as the Hurricane was at its peak...if the war came in 1942 then the Hurricane would have already been used in ground attack. Hurricanes against Fw190s?

You can say that Camm made the right design at the right time.

 

[Shortround6]

A few thoughts on some of the proceeding posts.

1. Training mechanics: The world of 1937-1940 was very different from today. The number of cars per 100 people of population was no where near as great as even the 1950s and varied quite widely even among western nations. training men who had used a horse for plowing (or pulling the milk wagon) to be aircraft mechanics or armorers is a little harder than training men who had owned or at least driven cars in private life. Most armies even had a shortage of truck drivers let alone enough men who could work on aircraft engines. The US probably had the highest percentage of recruits who were familiar with engines before entering service.

2. Standardizing of types: while a competent mechanic can figure out what to do with a strange engine based on principles, working on a familiar engine goes faster. The mechanic sometimes knows what size wrench or socket he needs for a particular nut or bolt before hand and in some cases even knows what length extension may be needed or if a special tool is needed to begin with. trying to service planes for several flights per day may make this speed of service important. Even if it just changing spark plugs every few days on each airplane. Or checking valve lash every so many hours. Squadron mechanics often exceeded the expectations of the higher command but here wasn't much sense in making things harder than they needed to be.

3. the 20mm hispano: Few complaints seem to come from the Beaufighter squadrons either. The lack of stiffness in the initial Spitfire wing mountings were a problem. Turning the gun 90 degrees to lay on it's side to help bury the drum magazine in the wing didn't help either. The first Spitfires with 20mm guns also didn't have any .303 guns which meant that if ONE 20mm jammed the plane was basically unarmed. The Recoil of a single 20mm would slew the plane too much to keep on target.

4. the Whirlwind was held back by the procedure of ordering a single prototype as well as some of the other factors already mentioned. R-R overwork with both the Merlin and the Vulture meant the Perrigine never got the attention it needed but the fact that it was still being flown in combat several years after production stopped tells me it couldn't have been all that bad.

5. deflection shooting: I guess it kind of depends on how many "G"s the firing plane is pulling. If the shooter is flying level and shooting at a target that is crossing it's path at 90 degrees then vision isn't much of a problem although hitting the target aircraft with more than a few bullets is.
If the shooter is banked 90 degrees in a tight turn trying to cut the corner on a turning target aircraft then vision becomes a much bigger problem. To pull numbers out of thin air if a plane is going 300mph in a tight turn how many degrees a second is it turning? What is the time of flight of the bullets to the target plane? How fast is the target plane actually going and or turning? How far ahead of the target does the shooter have to aim?
In the steep bank if the shooter has to aim more than 5-8 degrees ahead of the target the shooter maybe in trouble. How many degrees of downward vision does the pilot have in some of these aircraft? The higher cockpit/ more angled slope of the fuselage of the F4F may offer a better view in this case.

 

[pbfoot]

Mark, Based on your posts, I believe you will very much enjoy Lundstrom's book. In appendix 3 of the same book there are side views of Wildcats showing the various insignias in 1941-42. Those side views make it clear why the Wildcat had decent over the nose visibility compared to many other fighters. Of course you are correct that when the attacker has wings level in a full deflection run, extraordinary visibility over the nose is not necessary, except in an overhead run. However, depending on the speed of the target, in a high side, flat side and low side run, that wings level attitude can only occur for a split second as the attacker must be in a bank in order to maintain lead. Also, and I am not quoting exactly. Lundstrom said something like the USN, of all the air forces except for the IJN, (in a limited way) that spent an extensive amount of time teaching full deflection gunnery. He also stated that some individual pilots in the other air forces taught themselves to be effective full deflection shooters. I have read, in evaluations of the FW190 and P47, if memory serves, that those AC did not have sufficient over the nose visibility for good full deflection shooting. I believe those mentions were on the Williams site.

I'm gonna say that Lundstoms opinion is one but others like Slick Goodlin and I'll paraphrase said training in most facets of flying were better in the Commonwealth Forces , Goodlin if your not familiar was trained in Canada and transferred to USN after Pearl becoming a Naval test pilot . I'm going to have to go to library to grab the book

 

[Waynos]

I'm not talking about the Hurricane in 1940...I'm talking about the Hurricane in 1936.

The Spitfire and the 109 were both far more modern designs. Even Hawker called the design the monoplane Fury. Of course...the war came in 1940 just as the Hurricane was at its peak...if the war came in 1942 then the Hurricane would have already been used in ground attack. Hurricanes against Fw190s?

You can say that Camm made the right design at the right time.

All of which I agree with, but none of which shows the Hurricane was ordered as a stop gap. When it was ordered it was the best we could get. It was far from clear whether the Spitfire could even be produced at all at that time. If anything was in production as a stop gap at that time I would say it was the Gladiator, which entered service in the same year as the Hurricane.

Unless of course you can show something I am unaware of that shows the Huirricane was ordered into production as a stopgap?

 

[The Basket]

Nope...the air ministry ordered the Hurricane ok.

I is saying Hawker designed the Hurricane to be a stop gap as it wasn't a new design but an evolution of an existing one.

 

[timmo]

Deflection et al! Been there, done it. SO glad that I was not told all the theories at that time.

1. Towed targets fired at them. Much better at towing!!
2. What % of WWII kills were deflection? All mine were stern chase.
3. Hurricane = 1 wing Fury? Indeed - that's why I converted without thinking.

=Tim

 

[Waynos]

It depends how you define stop gap I suppose.

If you mean 'we'll build this for now until our other design is ready' as you referred to with the Typhoon earlier, then it would be. But that was not the case. As I said F.18/37 had not been issued and the other designs did not exist.

It was simply a case of 'this is the very best we can build to meet the requirement, then when complete we will look at the next requirement'. If this is 'stop gap' then every military plane ever made is a stop gap.

 

[Cromwell]

The Hurricane was excellent in the narrow timeframe in which it was competent. It wasn't a loser...it was exactly what was needed.

The Hurricane was a stop gap Design.

The Spitfire was our best fighter and you put your best front row centre. The survival of the UK was going to be fought by 11 group. Not over Scotland.

Yes, Exactly - Sydney Camm deliberately chose to make use of the piles of tubing, fabric and dope lying around - and the people (fitters and factory workers) who knew how to use it. He even said as much in his memoirs / biog - go and take a look if you wish.

From an old Aeroplane Mag October 2007 'Database' on the Hurricane :-

"For the Hurricane Camm retained the tubular frame construction of the biplane ere - a wise decisions... "

Basically if you look at the back end of any 30s biplane it is also the back-end of the Hurricane

Literally put your hand over the front half of a pic of the Hurricane - do the same with, say, the Fury or the Gauntlet (Gloster and Hawkers were hand-in-glove)

Then, you will see it is the same technology - in fact even the Engine Cowlings look remarkably similar for say the Fury and the Hurricane, especially the Hurri K5083 the prototype, which also had tail struts, fabric wings, and a nice and clear-view canopy that kept collapsing in test dives ! *

* that is why the canopy of the Hurricane became such a Greenhouse in the end, to bolster it up.

 

[buffnut453]

It's a question of risk. Making the leap from fabric-wrapped metal skeletons to stressed-skin cantilever monoplane fighters was a considerable undertaking in 1936 given the required performance (speed, altitude, firepower) improvements. While an evolutionary approach like the Hurricane may suffer performance and growth penalties in the long run, it hits the near-term target of being easy to produce using existing processes and workforce skill sets. Perhaps the term "generation bridge" is better than stop-gap?

 

[Cromwell]

A few thoughts on some of the proceeding posts.


3. the 20mm hispano: Few complaints seem to come from the Beaufighter squadrons either. The lack of stiffness in the initial Spitfire wing mountings were a problem. Turning the gun 90 degrees to lay on it's side to help bury the drum magazine in the wing didn't help either. The first Spitfires with 20mm guns also didn't have any .303 guns which meant that if ONE 20mm jammed the plane was basically unarmed. The Recoil of a single 20mm would slew the plane too much to keep on target.

Actually, the early 20mm Hispanos in the 'Beau were a pain to reload especially at High-Gs

They used cassette-style ammo cans initially that the Navigator / Co-Pilot had to physically load as well as take out the empty ones, during combat whilst thrashing about on a winter night chasing a Ju88 or 111.

Later on they had belt feed it is true (ditto Mossie, Tempest, IIC Hurricane and so on)

Note also (as I mentiond earlier) the later Hurricane 'Universal Wing' may have had the same planform as the earlier Brownings-wing, but it was totally different inside.

It had a rigid Box structure to prevent the flexing you are talking about from the 20mm Cannons (and later the 40mm cannon, and other heavy loads like bombs and rocket projectiles etc)

In some ways the Hurricane mirrored the later Stuka developments to a remarkably close extent. From MG to Cannon to Anti-tank Cannon pods, and much higher power and load carrying and range etc.

 

[Cromwell]

It depends how you define stop gap I suppose.

If you mean 'we'll build this for now until our other design is ready' as you referred to with the Typhoon earlier, then it would be. But that was not the case. As I said F.18/37 had not been issued and the other designs did not exist.

It was simply a case of 'this is the very best we can build to meet the requirement, then when complete we will look at the next requirement'. If this is 'stop gap' then every military plane ever made is a stop gap.

Very true - I am also not convinced that the real-life performance was so poor as we seem to be saying on some posts. Don't forget we were on the defensive for 39-41 (more or less) and perhaps lacked the mentaility to aggressively attack, putting our guys on the back foot in some ways.

It also made an excellent Navy plane, and really the Navy should have not wasted time and money on silly beurocratic specifications that produced the Fulmar, and spoiled the Firefly to an extent - and the awful Barracuda most of which were simply rolled off the deck once war was over.

In fact I often think that the Defiant - sans Turret - would have made an excellent Navy attack plane, with the rear gunner given a set of Twin MGs like the Douglas Dauntless

 

[Cromwell]

Nope...the air ministry ordered the Hurricane ok.

I is saying Hawker designed the Hurricane to be a stop gap as it wasn't a new design but an evolution of an existing one.

BTW - side issue - but is there some Ali G creeping in there ( for real ? )

"I is saying.."

 

[The Basket]

I'm typing on my phone.
Which means typos and the spell thingy brings up strange words.

Poor grammer is the price for progress.

All metal machines were certainly about so the use of wood and fabric meant that Hawker Hurricane was always a short termer.

It wasn't the air ministry or fashion or even my good self which made the Hurricane an obsolete fighter. But the good old Bf 109. And aint that the truth.

 

[Shortround6]

All metal machines were certainly about so the use of wood and fabric meant that Hawker Hurricane was always a short termer.

It wasn't the air ministry or fashion or even my good self which made the Hurricane an obsolete fighter. But the good old Bf 109. And aint that the truth.

Whatever wood there was in a Hurricane was used to fair out the rear fuselage to shape. It provided no structural strength.

Other "short termers" of the time include the French MS 406 with it's fabric covered rear fuselage, and the American Vought Vindicator dive bomber. A number of other planes of the 30s also used fabric covering so hawker was by no means alone.

What did help doom the Hurricane to second rate status was opinion of British researchers that there was little difference in drag between the thick wing used on the Hurricane and the thin wing used on the Spitfire. Mitchell didn't believe the researchers but without large and/or high speed wind tunnels everybody in England was relying on guess work or gut feelings.

The Hurricane didn't go through as many permutations as the 109 did. 109A-Ds weren't quite in the Hurricanes league.

 

[FLYBOYJ]

2. Standardizing of types: while a competent mechanic can figure out what to do with a strange engine based on principles, working on a familiar engine goes faster. The mechanic sometimes knows what size wrench or socket he needs for a particular nut or bolt before hand and in some cases even knows what length extension may be needed or if a special tool is needed to begin with. trying to service planes for several flights per day may make this speed of service important. Even if it just changing spark plugs every few days on each airplane. Or checking valve lash every so many hours. Squadron mechanics often exceeded the expectations of the higher command but here wasn't much sense in making things harder than they needed to be.

Keep in mind that there was a lot more to be done than attending to the powerplant. Additionally at the squadron level, line mechanics rarely tore into engines, at least under normal circumstances, from what I was told. That was left to an "intermediate" maintenance" organization (a dedicated engine shop).

 

[Waynos]

I'm typing on my phone.
Which means typos and the spell thingy brings up strange words.

Poor grammer is the price for progress.

All metal machines were certainly about so the use of wood and fabric meant that Hawker Hurricane was always a short termer.

It wasn't the air ministry or fashion or even my good self which made the Hurricane an obsolete fighter. But the good old Bf 109. And aint that the truth.

I think that more and more we are arguing on semantics only, but I'm game if you are

The Hurricane had an all metal structure, Hawkers had been using steel tube structure for a decade already by the time they built the Hurricane. The Fury and Hart families also had all steel structures. Hawkers simply continued with the method for which they had all the expertise and for which the factory was kitted out. There was no element of 'choice' about it. Camm started looking at the Hurricanes possible replacement in 1937, by this time Hawkers were having a new factory built at Langley and the new aircraft could be built there and so monocoque construction was considered *for the first time*. This does not make the Hurri a stop gap, it is just a natural progression for Hawkers.

Supermarine and Messerschmitt, by contrast, were both making their first real forays into fighter design (after the formers failure with the 224 Spitfire) and had nothing to lose by going for broke with stressed skin designs.

 

[tomo pauk]

Deciding between 1936 and 1939 (= Hurricane vs. F-4F) planes is pretty silly (no offense) - every time the later design would win in one-on-one competition. But since there is like 600 x of '36 design, or 60 x of '39 desing available for BoB, the choice is clear.

 

[Waynos]

Just as an antitdote for the apparent general feeling that the Hurricane was a bit of a dog that was ok for the BoB. The book 'Hawker Aircraft Since 1920' by F K Mason makes the point that during the whole of WW2 the Hurricane accounted for 55% of all RAF and FAA fighter kills, 33% for the Spitfire and 12% ascribed to 'other types'. Some dog!

I always feel uneasy reading threads, on any type, that draw empirical conclusions on which type is best from the analysis of data regarding aircraft performance figures, common sense should tell us that 'doing the maths' (why do Americans leave the 's' off?) is only a part of the story.

 

[Shortround6]

Keep in mind that there was a lot more to be done than attending to the powerplant. Additionally at the squadron level, line mechanics rarely tore into engines, at least under normal circumstances, from what I was told. That was left to an "intermediate" maintenance" organization (a dedicated engine shop).

there may be quite a bit that was done at squadron level without tearing into the the engine. As mentioned, spark plug changes and valve checks. Replacement of accessories, such as generators, pumps of various types, starters as I am sure you are more aware of than I am.
Special tools may be little more than an open ended wrench that has been cut off and had a piece of rod welded to it so as to get into a hard to reach area to keep a nut or bolt from turning while the force is applied from the other side.

A rapidly expanding air force also has to supply trained men for those "intermediate maintenance" organizations

You are quite right about there being more than just engines. Even without getting into the actual airframe there are instruments (dealt with at squadron level by replacement ?), hydraulic and electrical systems, landing gear and brakes and of course the flying controls. These, of course will vary more from plane to plane ( Fairey Battle to Spitfire to Whitley) than the engine but in a peace time expansion PLAN standardization might not have been a bad thing.

 

[FLYBOYJ]

there may be quite a bit that was done at squadron level without tearing into the the engine. As mentioned, spark plug changes and valve checks. Replacement of accessories, such as generators, pumps of various types, starters as I am sure you are more aware of than I am.

Yep - usually things that were "bolted" on the engine were "R&Rd" at the squadron level. Tearing into them were usally done at a specialized shop.

Special tools may be little more than an open ended wrench that has been cut off and had a piece of rod welded to it so as to get into a hard to reach area to keep a nut or bolt from turning while the force is applied from the other side.

agree...

A rapidly expanding air force also has to supply trained men for those "intermediate maintenance" organizations

Agree as well - working the basckshop can be a bit boaring but many times the conditions are a lot better.

You are quite right about there being more than just engines. Even without getting into the actual airframe there are instruments (dealt with at squadron level by replacement ?), hydraulic and electrical systems, landing gear and brakes and of course the flying controls. These, of course will vary more from plane to plane ( Fairey Battle to Spitfire to Whitley) than the engine but in a peace time expansion PLAN standardization might not have been a bad thing.

All very true - and even in today's worls that's done in all armed services