Bomber escort logistics?

In the Pacific Theater, it was common practice to assign one B-29 to the escort fighters to form up on, and then act as group navigator for the fighters to the target. Upon reaching Japan, the B-29 so assigned would orbit at a designated location until the fighters were finished with the mission. it would then "escort the escorts" back to the Iwo Jima base. That way, the fighter pilots didn't have to deal with long distance overwater navigation.

drgondog said:

In spring 1945, 2000+ bombers and 1000+ US fighters were overlapping their assemblies.

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I believe that all of the 1000+ did not assemble with the bombers (if any), as they had their relay points along the route.
Also the bomber stream was stretched, so I would guess that they did not all took off at the same time also.
Arthur Price in his book gave a very schematic picture of the fighter relays of the 11 Jan 1944 mission, Halberstadt/Brunswick/Oschersleben -raid. Total of 14 FG's, but only one (P-51's) over the target.

All that assembly - in poor weather - just to try to get into this formation. Amazing...

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Aozora said:

Fortunately its all flat! I've been told that molehills are the highest natural feature...although it is rumoured that some trees do exist.

The 8th AF used "assembly ships" brightly painted, war weary (usually) B-24s as an aid to getting the various Bomb Groups formed up

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First time I've seen a photo of the second one down from the top. P.R.U. Blue?

Geo

Fish flopping in a mud puddle, Drgondog, that is YOU buddy. And not a very nice one ...

At least you weren't required to PERFORM the duty in the event. I'd have figured a way, or at least tried my best. Perhaps one item you may have overlooked ... if you send normal escorts until they are required to turn back and then send later planes that are configured for range but don't have to fight their way in, THEY could catch the formation, drop the extra longs range tanks and then continue escort. The Luftwaffe may not have had the planes to attack both bomber streams and a stream of fighters that could drop tanks and kill them. If they did at first, they would not for long. Same result after a short period of intense fighting. You nmight remeber the Hellcat had a service ceiling abit ofer 37,000 feet. Enough easily for Europe.

As I stated before, not optimum, but possible. You sound like the fish out of water to me. I work on these planes today. Do you?

Why not stop being insulting and discuss? Or are you so egotistical you simply can't discuss nicely? I will if YOU will, but it takes two twits to do it. Wanna' BE one of them? Or continue being an insulting guy?

I know the answer but had to try. I'll still welcome you if you manage to visit the Planes of Fame. If not, I suppose we both will not lose any sleep over it.

GregP said:

I work on these planes today. Do you?

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Seriously, Greg...that means nothing in this discussion.

I have worked on a B-17F, Bf109E and several other aircraft over my lifetime and it doesn't qualify me for anything. I have shook hands and held conversations with Space Shuttle Astronauts and that gives me zero qualification. Zero.

Dragndog, shortround and several other people have presented hard statistics and facts regarding Hellcat operations proving it was not suited for long-range ETO ops and yet you insist on pressing the issue. The bottom line is that a "what-if" for the Hellcat just simply won't work.

What if the Luftwaffe took a Bf109 loaded with external tanks and towed a winged fual-tank behind it and flew to New York...it could be done, right? And when it got there, the pilot flipped off the statue of Liberty...what then?

This thread is about bomber escort logistics, not fanciful one-way missions with improbable aircraft.

No it doesn't mean I fly them, but it DOES mean I talk with the pilots who DO. I Have ASKED ... and I BELIEVE them not the dog.

You believe whatever you want, makes no difference to me. I really don't care since it wasn't a scenario that played out for real.

The point is ... it COULD have and this guy just can't see it. Well, we can't all Narffle the Garthog, can we? All is well and that's OK with me.

By the way we flew a Hellcat 1,500 miles nonstop for an airshow ... so I KNOW it can be done. Sorry, but the facts speak for themselves, and it really doesn't make sense to me to be acrimonious about it 70+ years later. If it does to you, we live in different worlds, philosphically. That's OK, too.

I'm not the fish flopping in the mud puddle, Drgondog is. My objection is the venom, not the facts. I already KNOW them.

Naval reserves are WAY more than for land planes. READ about it. If flying a land-based mission, the reserves would be wildly different. The base doesn't move around as it does in the ocean, as I said before. Naval flight planning is MUCH different from land-based flight planning.

But, work it out for yourself. Assume you HAVE to make it succeed or lose the war. How would you DO it? Forget saying no, work it out.

Then let it go, it never happened in real life so ONE of us is wrong. Which one is singularly unimportant ... the war is well over and we KNOW who won.

This is a what-if only. And it CAN be done but is difficult and unconventional and there was no reason to DO it, as with most what-ifs.

Since this one got so acrimonious, I'll not try another what-if. I said that before but slipped ... not again.

Sorry Greg, Dragndog and the others ALL presented sound hard facts that prove your scenario wouldn't work.

*MAYBE* if the ship took off immediately with no assembly, stripped of all hardware and loaded to the gills with fuel AND praying to God it didn't encounter eny Luftwaffe elements or bad weather...then *maybe* it could be done..hardly a comforting image.

Looking at the charts and data presented, it's a no brainer. So why argue over such a moot point when the factory and military data indicate otherwise?

By the way we flew a Hellcat 1,500 miles nonstop for an airshow ... so I KNOW it can be done. Sorry, but the facts speak for themselves, and it really doesn't make sense to me to be acrimonious about it 70+ years later.

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So I'm assuming then, "you" took off and climbed to the rally point while the other hellcats formed up, then cimbed to your assigned combat altitude and then had to "jink" over the bomber formations along the way...tell me, how was your war loadout? Full belts of MG ammo adding to the weight and what was the external fuel supplied?

You seem to keep falling back on this "flipflop" term for some reason, when everyone is presenting ACTUAL combat rated stats, not a happy little cruise across peaceful skies under conditions that weren't even though about back then.

B-17s were ferried across the Atlantic and the Pacific during the war, but were they carrying a bombload, armed or fully crewed? No...and why was that? Because of this thing called range.

So could a Hellcat follow the route of the historic escorts? Yes.

Could it have done so in a wartime escort capacity? No.

Pure and simple.

It's OK, assume whatever you want. We took off and flew to a destination ... 1,500 miles away. It is possible.

Even if you think it isn't, you could at LEAST escort the bombers a good way there. We only disagee on the distance, and that would be stettled really quickly. Maybe one or two missions. No possibility it couldn't be determined.

One of us would be wrong. I think it is you and you think it is me.

So, we should discuss over a beer and not be impolite in here about it. When you visit, I'll buy.

Not so pure and simple.

If you DO visit, PM me. This is tedious.

GregP said:

We took off and flew to a destination ... 1,500 miles away. It is possible.

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Greg, would be helpful to know the parameters of that flight.

At what speed and altitude was it flying, and how much fuel was it carrying?

GregP said:

Even if you think it isn't, you could at LEAST escort the bombers a good way there. We only disagee on the distance, and that would be stettled really quickly. Maybe one or two missions. No possibility it couldn't be determined.

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Before the P-51B, the USAAF had aircraft that could escort the bombers "a good way there". The problem was that it wasn't far enough. Bombers were mauled once they were out of escort range.

Sorry Greg, I have agreed with you on many other things before. But I just can't see it with the Hellcat. Plus, even if somehow you could do it, it just didn't have the performance to be competitive in the late 43 to mid 44 period. The 109Gs and late 190As, let alone the 190Ds would have ran rings around it.

The Corsair is theoretically possible, but would require significant re-engineering to fit enough fuel into it. And, for that task, would not have been any better (and in some ways quite a lot worse) than a late model P-47, let alone a P-51.

There were 3 possibilities of planes that not only could have the range but have the performance to both survive and do the job in that environment:

Early-mid 43: LR Spit VIII, MR P-47 and a LR P-38.
Late 43 onwards: P-51 (B/C/D plus it was a VLR), Late model LR P-47s. LR (even VLR with the late models) P-38s and a LR Spit VIII and then XIV (both Spit versions being technically straightforward).

The Spits were out because of internal RAF politics (despite tremendous USAAF pressure to provide it), the other possibility the P-38 was out because of various technical issues and that miserable mach limit (which as it got faster it got closer to in level flight, let alone diving at those altitudes), therefore all the US really had at the beginning that was really effective was the MR (Medium Range) P-47s of the time. Hence the slaughtering of the bombers.

The Mustang was so good for the job, not just because of its range but its performance was more than enough to be competitive (in fact it was markedly superior in many flight regimes). The LR P-47s weakness was their also poor mach limit (though not nearly as bad as the P-38), it's weight (not helped by the huge fuel consumption requiring lots of fuel for the range required) which, though it was a very hot ship at altitude, severely impaired its climbing performance (not just in speed but in fuel consumption). It did help its dive of course, but that's where its mach limit really started to bite. Thus it was sub-optimal as a LR/VLR escort and dropped as such as soon as there were enough P-51s.

The P-51 started out as a LR fighter (even without the rear tank, when that was added it was a VLR), all it needed was high altitude performance, amply given by the Merlin.

For that role there were no USN planes with the range and performance required at that time to do that job and survive in that incredibly harsh environment.

To put the Hellcat into that you would have to effectively increase its combat range (for that role) by 50% or more .... and increase its performance by at least 20-30mph ... and increase its high altitude performance by about 10,000ft.

Doing all that means you are really looking at a VLR version (if possible) of a Bearcat, a much later design.

The Mustang was heavy by ETO standards, it got away with that by clever aerodynamics, USN fighters were even heavier (as all carrier planes are), therefore to create a plane with all the attributes required for that ETO role means pulling a big technical rabbit out of the hat.

Edited to add: Thinking about it,the USAAF wasted too much time trying to get Portal to release a LR Spit. They should have just gone over his head, got all the Spit VIIIs allocated to the USAAF (easily done, just threaten to hold up Lend Lease until they do) and do their own conversions and just completely ignored the RAF.

I suppose you could launch F6Fs off carriers in the North Sea for the final leg, but how many carriers would you need? And how many were available?

Or, have the carriers as a waypoint - land, refuel and relaunch. But that takes time, and to service the numbers of aircraft required would still require many carriers.

wuzak said:

I suppose you could launch F6Fs off carriers in the North Sea for the final leg, but how many carriers would you need? And how many were available?

Or, have the carriers as a waypoint - land, refuel and relaunch. But that takes time, and to service the numbers of aircraft required would still require many carriers.

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And how vulnerable to subs and night attacks?

For Greg to get back in the conversation he has to show what kind of fuel consumption the F6F-3/5 would have at 300 mph TAS at 30,000 feet - when he can only hint at 12,000 feet and 200mph.

drgondog said:

And how vulnerable to subs and night attacks?

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Yes, there is that!

Let's see If I can contribute something here

Looking at aircraft data sheets at wwiiaircraftperformance.com, we can see that planes are using part of internal fuel in order to take off and climb into necessary altitude. Eg. Spitfire VIII/IX will use 23-26 imp gals to take off and climb to 20000 ft, depending how big a drop tank they are lugging around. That amount of fuel is then deduced from internal tankage, and resulting range is stated after that - Spit HF.IX will have the range of 434 miles at most economical cruise, or 252 miles at maximum weak mixture regime. Mileage is some 6.9 mpg, or 4 mpg. The plane will, of course, fight, and the extra consumption makes a dent at the remainder of the fuel - 15 min at combat power will decrease the range to 188 miles (m.e.c. cruise) or 108 miles (m.w.m cruise).
Spit HF.VIII will do much better, 660 or 390 miles of range, mpg is either 6.8 or 4 mpg, depending whether its the m.e.c. of m.w.m.cruise. After 15 min at combat power, the range is either 420 or 261 miles. We might call that range as 'return range' - the fighter arrives to the fight using drop tanks, and will fight on what is remained in the internal tanks.

However, that procedure (TO and climb on internal fuel always, drop/rear tanks notwithstanding) is at the contrary to what manual (for Spit IX, XVI;dated Sept 1946) says:



In other words, switching at 2000 ft to either rear tanks (if present) or drop tanks. That procedure saves how much - 15-20 gals? - during the climb? It then translates into between 60 miles (worst case) and almost 140 miles (best case). Or, the 'return range' should be increased up to, at m.e.c. power, 327 miles (Spit IX) or 559 miles (Spit VIII). On maximum weak mixture, it's 168 (Spit IX) or 320 miles (Spit IX).
Spit HF.VIII cruised at 220 mph (most economic cruise) or 322 mp/h (maximum weak mixture) at 20000 ft. Obviously, the plane will cruise back at m.w.m mixture at least half of the way, until rendezvous with friendly fighters, for a realistic 'return range' of some 250 (Mk.IX) or 450 miles (Mk.VIII).

I'm open to corrections.

I think you have it right. There is no need to climb to 20,000ft on internal (main tank) fuel. There IS a safety need to take-off using the main tank/s and NOT switch until enough height had been gained to allow for the engine cutting out when the the tanks are switched. What the safe height is, 2,000ft, 5,000ft I don't know but 20,000ft sure seems excessive.
But do not disregard the time/fuel needed to form up either even if it is coming from drop tanks.