Blackburn Skua was it that bad?

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tomo pauk said:
Again, the FAA purchase policy/politics emerges beyond criticism.
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No, whoever said that? You just havn't proven your point.
The RAF controlled new aircraft specs in 1937 when the Fulmar project began. If it was RN or RAF specs that was at fault, the Fulmar was a bit of a "dud" or at least a rather inadequate aircraft. (but was also all that was available.)


Ok, for spotting "over the horizon" in the central Med or mid-Atlantic, shipborne radar is out of range unless they are probably within 20 - 40 miles (in '40 - '42} There are no Coastal Command aircraft available in the mid North Atlantic in 40-42, and pretty thin in every other ocean. Gibraltar Alexandria are out of range, Crete is Nazi occupied, and Malta has very limited capabilities in 41-42 due to the Axis blockade. What long-range radar equipped "strike CV planes" were you talking about in 40' - '42?

tomo pauk said:
Could we agree that was the way FAA was admitting that converted bomber is not suitable for air defense air superiority tasks?
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No. The Fulmar was certainly inadequate in many ways, as I have said. However the "Improved Fulmar" (AKA Firefly) was the best, most capable carrier DB/fighter-bomber in 1943 (IMHO)

Civettone said:
So I think I can also agree with Tomo. The British in the end did give up the Fulmar concept so perhaps if they had come up with a decent single-engined fighter in the same time frame, the Fulmar would not have been needed.

Kris
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Not at all.

Let's not get confused here - Fighters are not the same as fighter bombers! The Fulmar was never intended to be the RN "fighter"

There were 3 basic needs in the RN carrier force:
1.) Fighters
2.) Torpedo-bombers
3.) Dive-bombers/ Recon


1.) Fighters - The US had the Buffalo, Japan had the Zero. By early 1938, the RN had Sea Gladiators on it's carriers:


They also had Grumman Martlets (Wildcats) from the summer/fall of 1940. From the outbreak of war until the fall of 1940 the RN tested Hurricanes for shipboard use, these went into service in the beginning of 1941. The Fulmar was never intended to replace the Martlet/Sea Hurri, but was embarked on board for a different role.

2.) TB - In the summer of 1940, the RN had Swordfish, which although slow were reliable, easy to handle in bad weather. The Albacore had just been introduced, but did not perform as well as expected. However, the much superior Barracuda prototype first flew in Dec 1940, and production began just over a year later.

3.) DB/Recon - The Royal Navy had a long history of compensating for it's limited space aboard carriers by combining DB/Recon with a secondary fighter role to create the "Fighter-Bomber". Now please remember YOU CANNOT COMPARE A FIGHTER-BOMBER WITH A FIGHTER!!! A fighter bomber was never expected to take on single-seat fighters, that was the job of the Sea Glad/Martlet/Sea Hurri. It's role was to shoot down enemy bombers while the FAA fighters engaged the enemy fighters. The first (WWII-era) FB was the Skua, introduced in 1937. The Fulmar was basically the following plane in the "Fighter-Bomer" role - except it couldn't bomb (Edit - 1 x 250 lb bomb) and was rather inadequate as a fighter.

Fighter-Bomber to intercept enemy bombers while the fighters dealt with the enemy escorts -
And that was exactly how it was used by the RN!


Note - not one enemy single-seater kill for the Fulmars, but they shot down 66 bombers ( 1- Bf 110) for 20 Fulmars lost in the air. (not too shabby as it turned out!)

However the FAA didn't give up on the Fulmar concept - by the Fall of 1940 when it was clear that the Fulmar was outclassed, the FAA put a request for a replacement aircraft. (Nov 1940), the prototype flew just over a year later, and deliveries of the Firefly began just ~28 months after the request. For comparison, the SB2C Helldiver took well over FIVE years from proposal to service.

The Firefly basically fixed all of the Fulmar's problems.

1.) Range 1,364 vs 783 miles
2.) Ceiling 29,000 vs 16,000 feet
3.) Payload 2,000 lbs vs 250 lbs
4.) Dive capability - The Firefly had the Fairey-Youngman retractable flaps for DB ( low-alt) operation
5.) Speed 319 mph vs. 259 mph (and even 286 mph with bombload) Unlike the slower Fulmar, the Firefly could easily catch almost all enemy naval-strike bombers in service in the spring of 1943

Ju 87B - 238 mph
Ju 88A - 280 mph
BR20M - 286mph
Cant Z1007 - 283 mph
SM 79/84 - 267 mph
B6N2 Tenzan - 298 mph
Ki -21 Sally - 302 mph
G4M Betty - 266 mph
Ki -49 - 305 mph

6.) Firepower - To bring down enemy bombers it had 4 x 20mm cannon, compared to the .303's of the Fulmar. If you want enemy bombers shot down FAST, (before they bomb your carriers!) then 4 x 20mm is the way to go.
 
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dunmunro1 said:
Of course this shore based pilot might have formed a very different impression of the Buffalo if he had to fly it on and off a carrier...and then conduct long range missions over the North Atlantic by himself in poor visibility.
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I wasn't aware of the USN having any problems operating the Buffalo at sea. Have you any examples or comments to support your view?
 
Glider said:
I wasn't aware of the USN having any problems operating the Buffalo at sea. Have you any examples or comments to support your view?
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I
nitially serving with VF-3 and USS Lexington's VF-2, this model was a fast, nimble and well-armed fighting plane, though plagued (as were subsequent F2As) with an overly-delicate retractable landing gear and a maintenance-hungry powerplant.
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USN Aircraft--Brewster F2A Fighters

The USN found the F2A to be unsuited to carrier service which is why they ordered so few.

I should add that the FAA never operated them from carriers either, I wonder why?
 
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One website contained this about the F2A

In June 1940 VF-3 Fighter Squadron aboard the aircraft carrier USS Saratoga became the first squadron to receive the Navy's first carrier-borne monoplane fighters. In the event, however, the U.S.Navy only kept 11 of these F2A-1s in service, the remaining being ceded to the Finnish Air Force which was fighting a desperate defensive battle against the Soviet Union. During the course of 1939, 43 F2A-2s with a more powerful engine and a few minor changes were ordered to replace the F2A-1s. In 1940, orders started to reach Brewster from European purchasers: 40 B-339s for Belgium; 170 B-339Es series for Great Britain; 72 B-339Ds and 20 of the B-439 variant (with the more powerful 1,200 hp engine instead Of the 1,100 hp model) for the Netherlands East Indies Air Force. Brewster's factory was working at full stretch during the early months of 1940 but serious problems arose during the second half of that year. The most alarming was the U.S.Navy's discovery that the F2A's landing gear was not strong enough to stand up to flight deck landings, even when these were smooth and slow. The second came when the RAF reported from Britain that the Buffalo, as it had been called, fell short of contemporary European fighter performance; the third set. back stemmed from requests for more armor protection from European buyers and from the U.S.Navy (for the F2A-3). This led to an increase in weight and adversely affected the plane's performance: it now suffered from instability and was difficult to handle. There was no easy way of solving these faults: the landing gear had its two weaker struts strengthened but no further improvement was possible without completely redesigning the whole aircraft.
 
Although I can agree with most of what has been said about the Fulmar ... I have my doubts about some things.
I believe the second crew member was there for the radio beacon and for an extra pair of eyes. But I do think this was a luxury unneeded both before as after the Fulmar? What aircraft did the Fulmar replace? What replaced the Fulmar? Or the Firefly ?
How come the Americans or French did no longer feel the need to have two-person fighter aircraft in the Atlantic ?

And the Fulmar was a fighter bomber except for the fact that it couldn't carry bombs?? I agree with the notion that the Fulmar was intended to deal with bombers just like the later Firefly but the story of a FB without bombs???

Kris
 

The Fulmar replaced the two seat Skua as a fleet fighter. The Fulmar was due to be replaced in 1942 with the two seat Firefly, which could carry two 1000lb bombs and carried 4 x 20mm cannon, but production difficulties meant that the Sea Hurricane, Martlet and Seafire effectively replaced it in the fighter role.

Before radar that 2nd pair of eyes would have been invaluable, but radar really made the single seat fighter possible and while it allowed the carrier to spot enemy aircraft it also enabled it to guide it's own aircraft back to the carrier, since the single seat pilot only had to get within radar range to be vectored back in. You might think that IJN experience proved that single seat fighters were viable without radar, but then look at how many times the IJN carriers were caught by surprise. Even off Ceylon the RAF was able to bomb the IJN flagship before they were detected (they missed) and intercepted.

I don't know why the Fulmar never carried bombs but most sources state that it could carry two 250lb bombs, and I would guess that if you stripped out 6 guns and 6000 rds of ammo that it might carry two 500lb bombs. I think it boils down to the FAA not facing CVs until after the Fulmar was past its prime, and bombing, rather than torpedoing, non CVs was never very successful. Certainly if all the Fulmars on Ceylon could have attacked the IJN carriers, even with 250lb bombs it might have made a difference.
 

The Fulmar replaced the Skua (Fighter-bomber/Dive-bomber/Recon) in late 1940, and was itself replaced by the Firefly in 1943 (Fighter-bomber/Dive-bomber/Recon)

Civettone said:
How come the Americans or French did no longer feel the need to have two-person fighter aircraft in the Atlantic ?
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Well, if you look at the "3 parts" of the FAA aircraft group, 1st - fighter, 2nd - Torpedo-bomber, 3rd - Fighter-bomber/Dive-bomber/Recon, the 3rd role was filled from 1937 - 1940 by the Skua, and from 1943 - 1954 by the Firefly. Both aircraft were fully capable Dive-bombers, and every other Dive-bomber also had a 2 man crew, the Stuka, Val, Dauntless, Helldiver, Judy, Vengance.

It is only in the years 1941 1942 that the FB/Recon was filled by the Fulmar, however this lackluster plane could only carry a 250 lb bomb (or 500 lb?)

Civettone said:
And the Fulmar was a fighter bomber except for the fact that it couldn't carry bombs?? I agree with the notion that the Fulmar was intended to deal with bombers just like the later Firefly but the story of a FB without bombs???
Kris
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Yeah it's pretty lame all right.
I have in my reference that it could only carry a single 250 lb bomb, Tomo wrote "500 lb" (2 x 250?) so I'm not quite sure what the exact load was. (But it wasn't more than 500 lb)
In any event, 250 lb bombs were pretty impotent against heavier ships, and without dive flaps it was much less capable than the Skua at this.
 

Well not exactly. When the Firefly project was started (Nov 1940) the Marlets were already avaiable, and the Hurricanes were just finishing sea tests, and starting to be put on RN carriers. Even if the Firefly had been available by the end of '41, it still wouldn't have replaced Sea Hurri's, as the RN always operated single seat fighters alongside the FB/DB/Recon in WWII

The delay for the Firefly only meant that operation Pedestal was Sea Hurri's Fulmars, not Sea Hurri's Fireflys.

I don't know how they could plan to have the Firefly in 1942, as 28 months for a Dive-bomber launch - service was pretty damn quick. Both the Judy Helldiver took over 5 years (60 months)

Considering that Fairey developed an entirely new method of retractable flaps, it's hard to see how it could be done quicker. It was the retractable F-Y flaps that made possible excellent low speed dive bombing operations, while still allowing the aircraft to get up to 319 mph with flaps retracted.

It was the retractable flaps better streamlining of the aircraft that allowed the Firefly (loaded) to get 27 mph faster with less power (by weight) than the Fulmar

Fulmar (unloaded)= 7.77 lb/hp - 259 mph
Firefly (w/bombs)= 8.23 lb/hp - 286 mph
Firefly (unloaded) = 7.08 lb/hp - 319 mph
Dauntless (loaded) = 10.4 lb/hp - 250 mph
 
The Fulmar was ordered in March 1938, first flew in Jan 1940, and entered squadron service in June 1940.

The Firefly design was completed in Sept 1939, was ordered in June 1940, and first flew in Dec 1941. However, the first flight was considerably delayed due to production priorities for Merlin engines which put the Griffon on hold, and the general dislocation of the UK aero industry after the fall of France and during and after the Battle of Britain. The f4F was not initially ordered by the UK, but instead they received them by default by taking over French and Greek orders. The early f4F/Martlet was not considered by the FAA to be viable for combat as it did not have armour or self sealing tanks, was not equipped with carrier landing gear and had fixed wings.

The Sea Hurricane was not ordered until June 1940, and then as a stopgap measure, and unlike the Firefly was not designed to FAA specs. If the FAA would have had the Fulmar and Firefly in large numbers, they would probably have not bothered with fixed wing single seat fighters.
 
FB

I agree with pretty much everything you have said, but it is untrue to say that the FAA did not rely on the Fulmar as its mainstay fighter defence until well into 1941. It was still frontline material for the RN well into 1942 in fact.

AFAIK the Sea Hurricane was first operational in any numbers in September 1941, and the Martlet whilst available was not in large scale use until about the same time. The RN fought many of its early war battles with the Fulmar, and quite successfully I may say.

Fulmars did not carry bombs until the latter part of their career, but they are credited with something like 250000 tons of shipping I havve read (but cannot locate the source....I will keep looking)
 
I imagine that in the 3 years before the start of WWII that Hawkers, Supermarine and Rolls Royce were working flat out to try and build sufficent modern fighters for the defence of Great Britain a task which was only completed just in time. Can you imagine the response if the RN FAA had come along and said we want a modern single seat carrier fighter as well. I bet they were told to go away and make do with what they were given. Or in anglo saxon Bugger Off.

I think we all agree that the Fulmar was obsolete as a fighter but it was available in just enough numbers to do the job. There is an old saying "a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush". To translate One obsolete Fulmar on a flight deck is better than two modern fighters sitting half built in a factory.

The fact that the Fulmar did as well as it did shows that the FAA pilots must have been good.
 

Nice. I've always loved a choice that is so narrowed down with intention to favor a particular plane.
 

.
 
tomo pauk said:
Nice. I've always loved a choice that is so narrowed down with intention to favor a particular plane.
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The Fulmar did enter carrier service in the fall of 1940. Why is it unfair to compare it with other carrier borne fighters available at that time?
 
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dunmunro1 said:
The Fulmar did enter carrier service in the fall of 1940. Why is it unfair to compare it with other carrier borne fighters available at that time?
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Because it' unfair to compare planes that are about to be fielded with planes that are about to be phased out (F2F and A5M at least; Fulmar (as a fighter) doesn't stand a chance vs. F2A, F4F and A6M).
 
Originally Posted by fastmongrel
I imagine that in the 3 years before the start of WWII that Hawkers, Supermarine and Rolls Royce were working flat out to try and build sufficent modern fighters for the defence of Great Britain a task which was only completed just in time.

And they still produced 2000+ Battles that used Merlins, plus 1000+ Defiants that also used Merlins. Could we say that was helping the Hawker, Supermarine RR?

Can you imagine the response if the RN FAA had come along and said we want a modern single seat carrier fighter as well. I bet they were told to go away and make do with what they were given. Or in anglo saxon Bugger Off.

Who ever said that FAA would steal RAF planes? Fairey could've produced a single-seater fighter that would kick butts INSTEAD of a converted bomber, not ALONG it.

I think we all agree that the Fulmar was obsolete as a fighter but it was available in just enough numbers to do the job. There is an old saying "a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush". To translate One obsolete Fulmar on a flight deck is better than two modern fighters sitting half built in a factory.

Fulmar was available in numbers in 1941. By that time much better designs were at hand. So that would be 2 birds in the hand by that time. And for those 4 moths of late 1940 Sea Gladiator would do the fleet defense as good as Fulmar.

The fact that the Fulmar did as well as it did shows that the FAA pilots must have been good.

The CREWS were damn good. The two-seat layout required twice the crew, risking twice the casualties, while a beter performing plane would enable even better results.

Good points tomo pauk and with the benefit of hindsight I totally agree with you but while we know the Battle was a deathtrap and the Defiant was about as much use as an anvil with wings. In 1937 which I think was probably about the latest a new design of carrier fighter could have been ordered for service in 1940 they were still modern aircraft and were considered vital for the coming war.

With hindsight a lot of aircraft ordered in that period were a waste of time but this only became obvious in 1940

Without cancelling orders already placed I dont imagine there was any spare capacity to start a new fighter and I know for certain there wasnt the spare design staff available. My Grandfather trained as a draughtsman with the electrical engineering company Dick, Kerr Co of Preston Lancashire starting his apprenticeship in 1917. When he finished his training there was no work for him so he retrained as a Pharmacist. In September 1939 if you believe his story he was kidnapped off the street and sent to work for Metropolitan Vickers in Manchester as a draughtsman despite the fact that he had been dispensing pills for the last 14 years. He ended up working on electrical torpedoes and was the only person in his drawing office with the proper qualifications all the others were women who had 6 months training then did the rest of there training on the job.

I believe the Fulmar was designed to meet the same contract that went to the superior Hawker Henly when it lost that order it was modified to meet the FAA specification. Even the changes to become a Recconaisance Fighter took a long time, as you say it was only available in quantity by the end of 1940. For Fairey to go back to the drawing board and start from a clean sheet of paper might have taken even longer.

If I could go back in time equipped with my hindsightscope I would have smacked a few of the crustier admirals on the head and diverted money to Grummans to hurry along the Wildcat/Martlet and got them working on the Hellcat in 1937
 
tomo pauk said:
.And they still produced 2000+ Battles that used Merlins, plus 1000+ Defiants that also used Merlins. Could we say that was helping the Hawker, Supermarine RR?
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How many of these planes were produced before the war?

About 50 Defiants were produced by the end of 1939. Even if somebody came in Jan 1st 1940 and shut the factory down, scraped every partly completed airframe in the building and all unused parts and had the plans for a great naval naval fighter rolled up in cases behind him, just how soon do you think the first "NEW" fighter would roll out the door? June? August?
How long before the factory was even making 20 month? Dec of 1940?

As forthe Battle, about 1000 had been built by the start of the war and they equiped 15 squadrons. WIth more squadrons converting.

It is all very well to say that these planes shouldn't have been built, and you are right, somebody should have pulled the plug on them before the production totals ever got as high as they did.

But you have to equip those bomber squadrons with SOMETHING. Going to war in Hawker Harts certainly wouldn't have worked. Any twin engine bomber bigger than an Avro Anson would have sucked up even more resources. Cutting the number of bomber squadrons in half might have allowed for a better bomber but it might not have made the engine supply situation that much better.

And none of this would have made a whole lot of difference to what was available to the FAA in1939-1940.

Scrap the Defiant on the drawing board and build a Naval Hurricane? great, you have 50 as of Jan 1st 1940 many of them either just out the door at the factory or in depot. one to two squadrons working up.
ANd these would be a MK I Hurricane with no armor, no self sealing tanks, and If you are lucky the DeHavillind bracket pitch prop. It basicily means they they can't take on 109s on a one to one basis.
 
tomo pauk said:
Because it' unfair to compare planes that are about to be fielded with planes that are about to be phased out (F2F and A5M at least; Fulmar (as a fighter) doesn't stand a chance vs. F2A, F4F and A6M).
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well thats a scientific appraisal. The British had the least developed Fleet air arm out of the three big navies. Compared to the F2-A, which could not effectively operate from Carriers I dont think the dsifference is that great as to be able to say "didnt stand a chance"

Against the F4-F-3 and the A6M-1 in the fall of 1940, I would still back the Fulmar....in the soupy conditions of the North Atlantic and with an airgroup of only 20-40 planes. You see, with an air group of that size, and without the multi role capability of the Fulmar, the fictitional American or Japanese carrier (say a shoho or an American CVL) is not going to be able to carry a sufficiently large air agroup of specialized aircraft, to undertake searches, provide effective CAP, and deliver effective strikers as well simultaneously , in the same way as a British carrier could....and it all gets down to the Fulmars multi role capability.

Lets devise a what if scenario against an American CVL, versus say an Illustrious class carrier. the Illustrious class has a CAG of say 36 consisting of 16 Fulmars, and twenty Albacores. The Albacores are night capable and fitted with ASV radar.

Our American opponents have a CAG of 32, generally 16 Fighters, and 16 SBDs. The SBDs have an effective strike range of about 250 miles, and a scouting range about double that if unarmed. The Albacores have an effective strike range of 150 miles.

The problem for the Americans is that their fighters cannot be used for search, they lack the navigational ability to do that effectively. The Fulmars can. This means that the SBDs have to severely dilute their strength to just locate the British carrier, whilst the British dont.

Almost certainly the British commander would be well appraised of the location of the US Light carrier whilst the American commander would not. This is because the American carrier commander would almost certainly limit the search range of his SBDs so that they can undertake armed recons to try and surpise the British carrier. The British commander can use his Fulmars to their full range, to keep an eye on the US carrier until dusk. He then closes the range and launches a full strike at full range. Scratch one flat top....and all because the Fulmar was able to do two things and the Single seat fighters in the American inventory cannot.

This concept of carrier warfare does not work when you have CAGS that are larger, as the British found in the Indian Ocean in April 1942. But if you want to compare apples to apples, then try limiting the size of the opposing CAGs and see what happens to your specialized aircraft......
 
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