Yes you are correct:evangilder said:
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Yes you are correct:evangilder said:Didn't they later use the Centaurus for the Hawker SeaFury?
Seafury F.B. Mk.11
Crew 1
Power plant One 2,550 h.p. Bristol Centaurus 18
eighteen cylinder radial air-cooled engine
Armament Four 20mm Hispano Mk.V cannon.
Eight 60lb rockets or 2,000lb of bombs
Maximum speed 460 m.p.h. at 18,000ft.
Wing span 38ft 4¾in.
Length 34ft 8in.
Height 14ft 7½in.
http://www.slug.balancer.btinternet.co.uk/aircraft/seafury/seafury4.htm
The Hawker Sea Fury Carrier borne fighter-bomber was the British Fleet Air Arm's last piston-engined fighter, developed during WWII it did not see service with the Fleet Air Arm until after the war. It was arguably the fastest piston powered aircraft ever manufactured.
It was a development from the Hawker Tempest, itself a development of the Hawker Typhoon. Originally, the Hawker Fury was designed by Sidney Camm in 1942 under F.2/43 specification, to provide the RAF with a lightweight replacement for the Tempest II.
On 23 June, 1942, Luftwaffe Pilot Oberleutnant Arnim Faber erroneously landed his Focke-Wulf Fw 190A-3 fighter at RAF Pembrey, apparently having mistaken this airfield for a Luftwaffe channel coast airfield. The British were thereby presented with a working example of the Fw 190 fighter, which had been giving the RAF an extremely difficult time. The Hawker Fury design was a direct result of the examination of Faber's Fw 190A-3. Examination of Faber's aircraft was largely responsible for the preparation of Specification F.6/42, which called for a new, high-performance fighter.
The design was modified in 1943 to meet a Royal Navy specification (N.7/43) for a carrier-based interceptor and named the Hawker Sea Fury. Hawker was designated to work on the land-based version, and responsibility for the naval conversion was assigned to Boulton-Paul Aircraft Ltd. of Wolverhampton.
Early in 1944, a revised naval specification, N.22/43, supplanted N.7/43. and in April 1944 contracts were placed for 200 F.2/43 planes for the RAF and 200 N.22/43 planes for the Fleet Air Arm. The first Sea Fury prototype, SR661, flew on 21 February, 1945. It was powered by a Centaurus XII engine driving a four-bladed propeller. This airplane had a deck arrester hook under the rudder, but retained fixed wings. The second Sea Fury prototype, SR666, was powered by a Centaurus XV driving a five-bladed propeller and was a fully navalized aircraft with folding wings. The prototype Sea Fury SR661 was subsequently tested for its suitability as a naval fighter, and in deck landing trials, at the A&AEE Boscombe Down in May 1945. Tests were still underway as the Japanese surrendered in August 1945.
With the end of the Second World War, the RAF cancelled all production contracts for the Fury, deciding to concentrate all of its future efforts on jet fighters. The Royal Navy reduced its order for Sea Furies to 100 aircraft, and canceled the Boulton-Paul contract in its entirety.
The first production aircraft - a Mark 10 which was a carrier-based version, with folding wings- did not make its initial flight until September 1946. Although originally intended to serve with both the RAF and FAA, the RAF order was cancelled at the end of the war. The first deck trials with Sea Fury TF898 began aboard HMS Victorious during the winter of 1946-47. The Mark 10 was approved for carrier operations in Spring 1947, and five Fleet Air Arm squadrons were then equipped with the Sea Fury. The Mark 10 was followed by the Mark 11 fighter-bomber - 615 of these were eventually delivered to the Navy. It became the Fleet Air Arm's principal single-seat fighter and remained so until the introduction of the Sea Hawk jet fighter in 1953.
The Sea Fury served throughout the Korean War, replacing the Seafire, which was not really built for carrier operations, being too fragile.
The Sea Fury was used by the FAA, Canada, Holland, Australia, and other countries including the Iraq Air Force. A total of 75 Sea Furies served with the Royal Canadian Navy(R.C.N.) between 1948 and 1956. All flew from the Aircraft Carrier HMCS Magnificent in 871 squadron.
http://www.fleetairarmarchive.net/Aircraft/Seafury.html
Nonskimmer said:Ah! Thanks for the link Adler, I was looking for that site!
evangilder said:Didn't they later use the Centaurus for the Hawker SeaFury?
GermansRGeniuses said:the lancaster kicks ass said:but the merlin in the spit, what a great looking combination...........
Actually, I prefer the Daimler engine in the Spitfire...
P/O (Sous Lt) Bernard Scheidhauer and P/O (Sous/Lt) Henri de Bordas of 131 Sqn departed Westhampnett early on the afternoon of November 18th 1942 to undertake a Rhubarb to the Normandy peninsular.
Making land fall at St Aubin sur Mer they picked up and followed the Caen to Cherbourg railway attacking several targets along the way. During the sortie they were met by light flak and purposely avoided Carentan because of the concentration of flak in the area.
At the small town of Ecausseville, de Bordas lost sight of his partner, he continued to circle for as long as he could calling out on his RT but to no avail. He returned to Westhampnett.
Scheidhauer's aircraft (EN830) had suffered some sort of damage and started to loose fuel, his RT had also gone US. For some reason he headed west instead of north, after crossing a stretch of water he sighted land which he mistakenly thought was the Isle of Wight.
Picking out a suitable field he place his aircraft down into a wheels up landing. Coming to rest in a field of turnips close to Dielament Manor, Trinity.
Climbing from the aircraft he was met by several locals who informed him of his navigational error, he was in fact in German Occupied Jersey and not the Isle of Wight.
Scheidhauer tried to destroy the aircraft, he attempted to acquire some petrol to set fire to it, but none was available, he smashed the instrument panel as best he could and gave away various items of equipment to the gathering crowd.
The Germans arrived after about 20 mins and he was taken prisoner finally ending up at Stalag Luft 111.
En830 was dismantled and shipped to mainland Europe:-
it reached Echterdingen minus guns and ammunition, with the gun ports closed. The radio had been replaced with ballast, but it still had its original Merlin 45 engine. Several flights were made by Daimler-Benz pilots before conversion was attempted. A decision was made to replace the instruments and the entire electrical system with standard German equipment, because the Luftwaffe used a 24 volt system, whilst the RAF used a 12 volt standard.
After the Merlin engine was removed, it was discovered that the Spitfire's front fuselage cross-section was very close to that of the standard Bf.110G's engine cowling. A new engine support was designed, and a standard DB 605A-1 engine (Wk-Nr 00701990) was mounted to the fire wall. The work was completed at the Sindelfingen Daimler-Benz factory, near Echterdingen.
A 3.0 m. diameter Bf.109G propeller was added, together with the carburettor scoop from a Bf.109G. This made the modified Spitfire's all-up weight, without armament, 6,020 lb. (2730 kg). The armament weight was an estimated additional 661 lb. (300 kg.). Its weight with armament, before the engine modification, had been 6,680 lb. (3030 kg.).
After a couple of weeks, and with a new yellow-painted nose, the Spitfire returned to Echterdingen. Ellenreider was the first to try the aircraft. He was stunned that the aircraft had much better visibility and handling on the ground than the Bf.109. It took off before he realised it and had an impressive climb rate, around 70 ft. (21 m.) per second. Much of the Spitfire's better handling could be attributed to its lower wing loading.
The Spitfire's wing area was about 54 sq. ft. (5m²) greater than that of the Bf.109. The Messerschmitt was faster at low altitude, but at 11,000 ft. (3350 m) the speeds evened out. The DB 605A engine gave better performance, according to the test group, than the Merlin, which was rated 150 hp below the German engine. It gave the Spitfire a ceiling of 41,666 ft. (12700 m.), about 3,280 ft. (1000 m.) more than a Bf.109G with the same engine and 5,166 ft. (1475 m.) more than that of a Spitfire Mk.V.
After a brief period at Rechlin confirming the performance data, the modified Spitfire returned to Echterdingen to serve officially as a test bed. It was popular with the pilots in and out of working hours. Its career ended on 14th August, 1944, when a formation of US bombers attacked Echterdingen, wrecking two Ju.52s, three Bf.109Gs, a Bf.109H V1, an FW.190 V16, an Me.410 and the Spitfire. The remains of the hybrid Spitfire were scrapped at the Klemm factory at Böblingen
A small piece of EN830's wooden prop still exists from the crash landing in Jersey as does Scheidhauer's flying helmet.
Hello to all -
Miro Nedeljak sent the following color profile of EN 830. After digging through my files, I came across the following additional information on the color scheme of this aircraft....unfortunately the sources don't agree exactly.
Color scheme 1): Black spinner, yellow nose and tail fin, upper surfaces RLM 70 green, undersurfaces RLM 65 blue. Stammkennzeichen CJ+ZY in black letters. from an article entitled 'Achtung - Spitfuer' published in an unknown newsletter by Richard P. Lutz, Jr. original source (Letectvi + Kosmonautika).
Color scheme 2): RLM 71 Dunklegrun upper surfaces, spinner and propeller blades; RLM 65 Hellblau undersurfaces, extending up to the underside of the tail planes. RLM 04 Gelb nose and tailfin. from a 1/72nd scale drawing by Heinz F. Jacobs published in an unknown newsletter.
I think the color profile provided by Miro more closely matches Heinz's drawing and color references; however I'd appreciate comments regarding the information provided by these three sources.
Heinz's drawing is particularly interesting because it shows EN 830 both before and after the DB engine conversion. However, I have yet to see an actual photo of EN830 in Luftwaffe markings before the Daimler-Benz engine was added. Heinz's drawing of EN830 with its original Merlin engine shows the forward cowling in RLM 71.
R.P. Lutz's article mentions that the Germans had originally planned to mate a DB 601 engine to a captured Spitfire in 1941, but the project was abandoned due to problems with the engine installation. This idea was resurrected after extensive testing of EN830 with its original Merlin engine at Rechlin in 1943. After flying EN830 to Echterdingen it was found that the Spit firewall was very similar to an Me 109G which made the DB engine installation easier to accomplish. A three-blade VDM Me-109G propeller was also mounted. Richard also mentions that EN830 was modified with German metric flight instruments. EN830 was destroyed on August 14, 1944 during a raid on Echterdingen by B-17s of the 8th Air Force. The remains of EN830 were scrapped at the Klemm factory in Boblingen.
What do you mean for its timeDerAdlerIstGelandet said:For its time the Canberra was a good aircraft.