Blackburn Skua was it that bad?

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800-900 km/h for Pe-2 Tu-2 when diving? Perhaps you could point to some sources?

Also, "shallow dive" would be around 30 deg dive. From 60-90 deg it's "steep dive".

Fighter-bombers in WW2 could never attack the ground target with both accuracy and power as dive-bombers could.
 

Tomo,

I agree with your definitions of shallow dive but I disagree that fighters using shallow dive techniques were not as accurate. If that was the case, why were there no new dive bombers designed after around 1943(ish)? I believe shallow dive attacks are still in use by the RAF as a means of delivering high-accuracy attacks on pin-point targets when LGBs or other precision weapons are unavailable or tactically unviable. As for the power - I presume you mean weapon load? How about the Mosquito, then? That could deliver easily the same weapon load as a dive bomber and yet hold its own in air combat. The P-51 and P-47 were both capable of carrying quite a heavy bomb load and, unlike Stukas etc, didn't need air supremacy to be effective.

KR
Mark
 
They did need air supremacy to be effective.

If intercepted on the way to the target it is quite true they (the fighter bombers) could drop bombs and defend themselves but that means the bombing mission is not done and the intercepting fighters have done their job even if they don't shoot down a single plane. They have stopped the bombing mission and defended the target.

If not intercepted they could do the job but how do you KNOW that you won't be intercepted? Use escort fighters or establish air supremacy before you under take bomber missions with fighters.

Dive bombing may have lost is attraction as AA defenses were built up. Compare AA outfit of a 1940 ship to a 1944 ship or the AA outfit of a 1940 army division (infantry or aromured) to a 1944 division.
 
 

When the original specification was issued, the Skua was as fast as the latest "enemy" fighters, the Italian CR 32 and the Japanese Kawasaki Ki-10.


Blackburn couldn't afford to build new aircraft "on spec", as they were already fully engaged with other projects, and the Air Ministry wouldn't realease Merlins for some un-ordered project in any event.

What role did you imagine for the "Super Skua"?

You should remember that the fall of 1940 was desperate times for the British, they had more urent needs to fill.
There were 4 projects under way with the FAA, at least 2 of which Blackburn participated in.

1.) A new topedo bomber to replace the Albacore. (spec 1937) This was the Barracuda, which was awarded to Fairey, but Blackburn was also helping with this project. The first Barracuda prototype flew Dec 1940, with production beginning in Feb/Mar 1942

2.) A new FB/DB/recon aircraft to replace the unimpressive Fulmar as recon, with added functions of DB. This was a 1940 spec, which was the 1943 Firefly

3.) An immediate need for single seat fighters. The Hurricane was already being tested on RN carriers, it would go into service in early 1941

4.) A single seat strike fighter (spec 11/1940) This project WAS awarded to Blackburn, (Blackburn Firebrand) so the Blackburn engineers would have been busy with this project, rather than some "on spec" improvements to the Skua.

It wasn't really until the summer of 1940 after the first real British combat during the war (Norway, Dunkirk) that the FAA had a good idea of what planes were inadequate, and what future development should look like.

As Blackburn had submitted a proposal the 1937 spec (Barracuda) obviously the Air ministry felt that Fairey had the better design. It is not clear that the "Super Skua" would be better than a Barracuda, and also doubtful that it could be ready before the Barracuda in any event.

As for a Super Skua replacing the Firefly, as Faiery had won the competition in 1940, obviously it was considered superior. I also doubt that the (improved) Skua would be adequate without a major re-design, as it was the retractable flaps that allowed the Firefly to operate well at both low and high speeds.
Do you imagine that a Merlin engined Skua could operate up to 320 mph? And how much e-design would be needed for the higher stresses?


At the end of the day, I don't see how a better aircraft could be produced quicker, at least not from a 1940 standpoint. And 1n 1938-1939 the procurement of naval aircraft was handled by the RAF, who were urgently concerned with upgrading RAF aircraft, the needs of the Royal Navy were low priority. (as the existing aircraft were considered adequate, operating away from land)


 
Something to remember when considering "what ifs" is not only how long it actually took to go from drawing board to squadron service but that not all companies had equel resources in engineers and draftsmen.

England did have a very good aircraft industry but until rearmament got truely under way (and this took several years into the war) it was a lot of rather small companies. Even during the war and into the fifties the English companies were not that big.
Someone once commented that during the late 40's to early 50's Boeing had more engineers in it's landing gear dept than Avro, Handly Page and Vickers had all together working on 3 different "V" bombers.
This last maybe an exageration but no one designer or engineer, no matter how talented, could get a concept PLANE to production without dozens if not hundreds of other engineers doing the detail calculations and drawings for an metal combat plane of WWII.
Of course no hundred average engineers pulled in of the street could design a great aircraft either without knowledge and passion about what they were doing.

In 1930's England many of these companies also had to move from small shops that had built airplanes made of wood and fabric by the dozen (or fewer) in the late 20's to metal framed,fabric covered planes built, in many cases, in single digits in the early 30's with the Depression to trying to fill orders for hundreds of all metal airplanes in brand nes factory buildings while training hundreds if not thousands of new workers.
 
I just fail to see the need for high performance fighters, (with all the delays and teething problems that brings) when the existing crop of mediocre fighters were able to fulfil all th missions expected of them. Fleet defence is not the same as air superiority, and the Skua and the Fulmar (and indeed, the sea Gladiator) fulfilled that role in spades.

What was missing for the FAA until well into 1942, was numbers. The RN suffered very badly from a shortage of both planes and pilots, so any delay in supply of either, or any conversion to types likely to increase attritional non-combat losses (like narrow tracked high performance fighters) is simply working counterproductive to the RNs primary mission at that time. At that time, the RN was engaged in maintaining the war winning strategy of keeping the germans blockaded. They did not need to go gallavanting around the oceans near to europe to do that.

A complication was of course malta, where the %RN was forced to come close to the enemy shores, but here range was still more important than performance. If the carriers could be kept out of range of the enemies land based fighters, then the enemies bombers had to fight it out with the low performence fighters of the RN. even against axis fighters the RN did not do too badly, because the long endurance of its fighters enabled it to increase availability at the critical points over their task forces as they battled their way to Malta and other outposts. Shorter ranged, but higher performance fighters would have reduced that availability, because of shorter rangge and endurance.

Lastly, the limited deck capacities of the RN carrier fleet dictated multi-role capability. Without that the ability to put up credible numbers in the fleet defence role would have been even less than it was.
 

.
 
Hi-perf fighters could do both things - fleet defense air superiority. So that choice is better then a 1940 design that lack some of main assets of a fighter: speed climb rate.
The only designs of high performance fighters available to the RN in 1940 would have been land based fighters lacking in wing folding and endurance. Without wing folding the numbers able to be carried would have dropped to about half that actually carried. If the RN had been forced to wait whilst wing folding wa s developed, it would have fought the cruacial battles of 1940/41 without any fighters

Aha, so let's stuck our precious scarce pilots in a slow unwiedly fighters so Germans have no trouble shooting them up, while they would have trouble catching their bombers.

It was not just numbers of pilots that were short, it also a shortage of airframes. Historically the Germans had very little success in shooting down FAA fighters, even on those few occasions when the RN was operating within fighter range of the Luftwaffe.

The advantage of the Fulmar (at least) was its endurnace. This was crucial in the fleet defence role. Whereas single engined fighters, like the Hurricane might have an hour or so endurance, the Fulmar might have 4 hours. If the aircraft turnaraound rates on a carrier were an hour (a typical figure) the Hurricane force of say twenty fighters, could maintain a continuous patrol of 10 fighters. The Fulmars could maintain a continuous patrol of 16.7 fightersw.

Moreover, if the Task Force being protected was a convoy heading for Malta, whilst the Carriers held back to provide some distant air cover, the equations gets even worse. If the form/flight time is twenty minutes to the TF to be protected, and the Hurricanes are providing the cover, and it takes the hour to turn round the fighter on the carrier, then each fighter is going to provide topcover for 120 minutes per day (8 hours) Attacking aircraft can easily penetrate a screen like that....all they need to do is loiter for a bit and wait for the short ranged fighters to run out of petrol before delivering their strike.....even if they attack, the ability of the short ranged fighters to vector is going to be very limited.

By comparison, the Fulmar force could provide continuous cover for over 6 hours out of the 8 that the target is to be protected in a given day.

Fulmars did on occasion have some trouble catching German bombers, but their record speaks for iteself. To the end of 1940, a force that did not exceed 50 aircraft (and most of the time was a lot less than that, had managed to shoot down something like 60 enemy aircraft, whilst losing no more than two or three in combat themselves....few aircraft can claim such a favourable exchange rate

At that time, the RN was engaged in maintaining the war winning strategy of keeping the germans blockaded. They did not need to go gallavanting around the oceans near to europe to do that.

If they really assumed that they would be like 1000 miles away all the time, that's wishful thinking.


Like the first world war, the biggest single factor in the defeat of the Germans was the crippling blockade that stunted the german economy and prevented her access to world markets. Without the Carriers, that would not have been possible

As previously explained, Fulmars did not generally suffer badly becuase of their low performance, Their endurnace allowed them to concentrate and loiter when on CAP for much longer, and this allowed them to concentrate their numbers

They were the primary scouting aircraft of the RN. They assisted in the attacks on the bismarck and at matapan, as w3ell as at Taranto, by acting as Pathfinders. Spitfires and Hurricanes could not undertake this role.

Little known, the RN Carriers sank or disabled a large amount of Italian merchant shipping. Fulmars assisted in that effort
 
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To a degree the Fulmar was a missed opportunity in that had they designed it as a single seat fighter whilst keeping the range the weight saving would have been considerable and its performance, in particular the climb improved. I am not saying it would be the equal to a 109 or a Spitfire but it would have been a lot better than it was.

The strange thing was that between the wars the RN used a lot of single seat fighters without any problems and its a shame they seemed to forget this in the late 30's.
 
what was needed was a high performance fighter that did not sacrifice endurance. The RN would also have had to develop float plane cruisers to fulfil the scouting role

In 1941 the only navy in the world that posessed such a force structure was the IJN. And even though it was rapidly brought to ground by the USN, in December 1941 it was the most well trained and equipped navy in the world and its naval air arm peerless. The only criticism I would level against it was its lack of night capability

The zero was designed to a philosophy that initially listed the priorities as

1) Endurance
2) Speed
3) Agility
4) Firepower

This priority list was contained in a pre-war report submitted by Lcdr Shibata, one of the IJNs leading pilots, and the commander of the flight training school. However this priority list was rejected by Mitsubishi, and eventually settled on a priority of 1/3/2/4 in theur design. Nevetheless, endurance always remained the number one design priority for the Japanese, and in this they were absolutely correct. Of course the low engine power of the zero dictated lightweight, unprotected construction, which led to its early demise. If the Japanese had possessed engines of higher power, they would have improed the strength and armour protection IMO

If the Brits had sat up and taken some notice of this thinking, then perhaps their programs might have turned out differently. But until 1938, naval aviation was controlled by the RAF, which wasnt all that interested in the needs of the RN. It was assumed that carrier based aircraft would inherently be of lower performance, and that two place aircraft were neded for overwater spotter roles, for which the Fulmar was expected to fulfil as well as pure fighter roles. Perhaps they could have gone to war with a Zero/Jake equivalent. But the thnking at the time was that all the airborne assets had to be on the carrier, and that dictated aircraft with a multi-role function

The very worst thing the Brits could have done in that 1937-39 period was to change late and then try and rush a single engined high performance fighter through and abandon the types they had in the pipeline at that time. If they had done that, they would have gone to war with Fairey Flycatchers and the like. An unmitigated disaster in other words. The quicker they got fighters into service, the better
 
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Agree.
Single-seater 'Fulmar' would've been a great asset for FAA.
 
Was the Fulmar always flown as a 2 seater or whilst at sea away from Admiralty eyes were unofficial modifications carried out.

If you took away the observer and stripped all the equipment for the observer ie seat, oxygen system and instruments if he had any I assume he operated the radio. How much weight could have been saved

I am thinking if they could have lost say 250 pounds would that have improved the climb rate and made the aircraft a bit more nimble.

Also as the Fulmar did most of its work at sea level up to about 10,000 feet would clipping the wings as was done to low level Spifires have made any difference to performance.
 
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Stripping equipment out of a plane helps but not to anywhere near what leaving it out of a new design does.

In a "rubber" plane (one on a drawing board) 1 pound of equipment which equels payload is actual worth about 3-4 lbs in gross weight.

Clipping wings might gain 4-8mph but would have to be balanced against higher take-off and landing speeds.

THe real question is whither any of these improvements or alternatives would have actually made any real difference. Clipping the wing of a Fulmar and getting the 265mph top speed up to , say 271 mph, vrs a 109 doing 300-320 mph depending on altitude (and no the FUlamar isn't going to fight at above 10,000ft, it doesn't have to) isn't raly going to change the outcome of very many fights.
Changing the climb rate from under 1300fpm ( Or just over for a MK II) by a few hundred fpm isn't even going to be noticed by fighters climbing at over 3000 fpm.

Please try looking at the performance figures for a Sea Hurricane MK I , There was more than one version and in the worst case ( most converted for sea duty) speed was under 300mph.
 
Blackburn Skua was it that bad?
The Blackburn Skua always seems to be in peoples lists of worst aircraft of WWII but was it really that bad as a dive bomber. It seems to have had similar performance figures as other contemporary dive bombers and going on what I have read it was the first aircraft to sink a major warship during combat. The only problems I can see was it could only carry a 500 pound bomb and the engine was a bit underpowered. Was it a flawed aircraft in any way or has it just had a bad press.
 
tomo pauk said:
Agree.
Single-seater 'Fulmar' would've been a great asset for FAA.
Click to expand...

I should say I completly desagree both with you and Glider.
At time they were concieved due poor navigation means and instruments a secund crew member was not a luxury to perform navigator tasks in the middle of the sea. The performance loss due to the secund crew member was fully awared by the navy from the mainstream, and accepted...
I disn't see any GPS in 1940!

Regards
 

On the other hand the USN and the IJN had operated siingle seat carrier fighters for years without any major problems. Indeed the FAA had operated Hawker Nimrod single seat fighters since 1931 (and sold some to the IJN).
So I must disagree with the idea that a second crew member was a requirement for navigation. All the experience showed that single seat fighters operated with success at sea.
 
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