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The Beaufighter carries a lot of internal fuel which means a large combat radius. It can easily strike maritime targets 600 miles away. Once the torpedo is gone it's almost uncatchable by December 1941 Japanese fighter aircraft. A few squadrons of these could cause serious damage to Imperial Japanese Army transport fleets at the beginning of the Pacific war.Fuel Capacity:
A total of 550 Imperial gallons (2500 litres) in four fuel tanks consisting of two 188 Imperial gallon (854.5 litre) fuel tanks in the centre-section and two 87 Imperial gallon (395.4 litre) fuel tanks in each outer wing section. Long-range fuel tanks when fitted include one 29 Imperial gallon (131.8 litre) fuel tank mounted outboard of each engine nacelle. A 24 Imperial gallon (109 litre) fuel tank can be installed in the port gun bay and a 50 Imperial gallon (227.2 litre) fuel tank can be installed in the starboard gun bay, with the guns removed.
Range:
1,470 miles (2366 km) on internal fuel with torpedo. 1,750 miles (2816 km) with torpedo and long range tanks.
Bristol's Blenheim, Beaufort and Beaufighter were significant part of not only RAF, but other airforces. Later combat-plane designs, Brigand Buckingham, were too late for the ww2.
Starting date being Blenheim's 1st flight, 12 April 1935, how would you further develop the 'line' of the planes? The engines should be the historical Bristol products, yet the planes should accept other ones available for the historical users. Armament electronics also being historical types. The designs should be tailored for more roles - no tightly-knit approach (but also not too big the resulting plane)
Timing of the designs should be 1940 (1st design), 42 (second), 44 (3rd), or, 1940 (1st design), 43 (2nd design).
Beaufort was designed produced in order to equip the RAF with a torpedo-bomber.
My take on that would be a plane with a bomb bay, mid- or high-wing, featuring maybe both slats fowler flaps, so the wings can be of somewhat thinner profile. Low-risk part of the engines would be covered by usage of the Pegasus engines (for prototypes 1st series), wing being stressed for Merlin and Hercules (such planes built from, say, Spring of 1940). The MGs would be 4 in the wing roots (replaced with belt-fed Hispano when available), space for 4-6 in outer wings, 2 in the back. An adaptation for the NF job would include 4-6 belly mounted MGs, ammo feed from bomb bay (all akin to the NF Blenheim); we should have the Merlin, or even Hercules versions by then. Radar as available. All in all, a British Ju-88?
you would be starting over again in 1938-39 and throwing out all the work done up to that point, delaying service entry by months if not a year or more.
Designing the plane to use Hercules or Merlin engines and house 20mm guns in the wing roots would call for almost an entire new wing (especially with Fowler flaps) and slats would do squat. Twin engine bombers should not have an angle of attack of 14-15degrees or higher.
Aircraft need to be in the right place at the right time to do any good.
How many torpedo armed Beaufighters were at Rabaul and Ambon during January 1942 to fight Japanese invasion forces?
From April 1935 - End 1939, the British have plenty of time to design a far better airplane, than an warmed-up Blenheim./QUOTE]
To do what? In the 1930s nobody believed that France would be defeated, so there was no (visualised) chance of the Germans using the Channel, meaning that they had to go round the top of Scotland, and risk the attentions of the Navy, and all destroyers carried torpedoes.
The Beaufighter was rushed into service as a nightfighter, to replace the Blenheim fighter, and was only considered for other roles when the Mosquito proved that it could take over the nightfighting role, especially with the two-man crew together, rather than several feet apart.