Build me a US Mosquito

[Milosh]

Three of the original Mossies lasted quite a long time.

W4051 PRI AAEE/PRU/1PRU/521/540/8OTU SOC 22.6.45
W4052 NFII Mkrs/AAEE/FIU/Mkrs SOC 26.11.46
W4053 TIII Mkrs/16OTU Engine caught fire on approach Barford St John 1.7.45

http://www.dehavilland.ukf.net/_DH98 prodn list.txt

 

[tyrodtom]

Three of the original Mossies lasted quite a long time.

W4051 PRI AAEE/PRU/1PRU/521/540/8OTU SOC 22.6.45
W4052 NFII Mkrs/AAEE/FIU/Mkrs SOC 26.11.46
W4053 TIII Mkrs/16OTU Engine caught fire on approach Barford St John 1.7.45

http://www.dehavilland.ukf.net/_DH98 prodn list.txt

With just reading part way down that list illustrates how dangerous just flying could be under wartime conditions.

 

[Shortround6]

But with the benefit of hindsight, it may appear that numerous US developments may have been better spent on license producing the Mosquito.
P-61 as one example.

A lot of things could have been changed with hindsight.

It took 2-3 years (with the 3 years being more common) to get plane from design to service use. Bigger planes take more time. You want a hotshot light bomber in 1942???
Better put pen to paper in 1939. DeHavilland and done a number of design studies and was working towards the final Mosquito concept in the fall of 1939.

A US bomber had the choice of the Allison V-1710 or high drag radials.

The Mosquito was ORIGINALLY designed for a 1000lb bomb load. Better than expected performance helped allow for the increase to 2000lbs in addition to reducing the psychical size of the 500lb bombs. Perhaps teh British bomb fins were too big. An American plane doesn't get such advantages. It's bomb bay has to be big enough to hold the existing bombs.
And the American bombers of the the time weren't that far off. A new fuselage and smaller wing on a "B-25" might yield some surprising results. The First B-25s were good for 2000 miles with a 3000lb bomb load and could hit 322mph top speed. That is with a .30 cal in the nose, a .30 cal out the top, a .30 cal in the waist and a .50 cal in the tail and no self sealing fuel tanks. Ditch the guns, Cut the crew to 2-3men and use a smaller fuselage and smaller wing and the increase in performance might be startling.

 

[tomo pauk]

Wouldn't we call the plane with new fuselage and new wing somewhat differently than B-25?

 

[Shortround6]

Yes we would, just pointing out that an awful lot depends on the actual requirements ( lots of defensive guns, a few defensive guns, no defensive guns) and that the US bombers weren't all that slow before the multiple power turrets and other things were added.

The Mosquito was a rather amazing design and had a few elements of luck in it's development and history.

Would it be remembered anywhere near as well if it's bomb load had stayed at 1000lbs without either external bombs or a redesigned bomb bay?

Would it be remembered anywhere near as well if it had only meet it's design goals/promises instead of exceeding them?

Would it be remembered anywhere near as well if it's engines hadn't been increased in power by about 30%?
and increased in altitude capability?

 

[tomo pauk]

I don't think that Moquito had any particular 'luck'. It's designers were 'right' (not the only time DH people were 'right'). Any ww2 plane received engines of more HP as the war unfolded, so Mossie does not stand here as an exception. Many a bomber was capable to carry ever incresing bomb load to ever incresing distance, again Mossie is no exception.

Now if we're going to ditch all the guns/turrets, ammo crew, maybe a B-26 with such a surgery would be even a better proposal? We can even stay on the 65' span wing, and go without increasing the wing's incidence.

 

[mhuxt]

I've no record of any Israeli Mossies delaminating. Two are recorded as having disintegrated, the one for which I have details is blamed alternately on a hot-dogging pilot and on a servicing issue. If they did ground them after the second incident, they were back in the air again soon after.

The delamination issue came up on FB.VIs in India/Burma, and was traced to a manufacturing fault at Standard Motors. The order to inspect went out on 25 October, next FB.VI operation took place on 9 November. I've no indication the PR ops with 684 Squadron, which had exclusively Hatfield-built aircraft, were affected at all. I don't know whether we're talking in general terms or Mosquito-specific, however I don't have a source describing wood shrinkage being an issue for Mosquito servicing, am always looking for new material though.

 

[Shortround6]

Any ww2 plane received engines of more HP as the war unfolded, so Mossie does not stand here as an exception.

Actually very few American bombers increased power to any large extent. The A-20 pretty much stayed at 1600hp per engine after the Early French/British planes went from 1200hp to 1600hp, a few of the last may have gotten 1700hp engines. The B-25 went all the way from 1600hp to 1700hp. The B-26 went from 1850hp to 2000hp engines. B-17s and B-24s went from 1200hp to 1350hp engines (and it took until 1944 for the B-24s).

Many a bomber was capable to carry ever incresing bomb load to ever incresing distance, again Mossie is no exception.

While many American bombers did increase both bomb load and range it was usually at the expense of speed and ceiling.

The Americans had the dueling advantage/disadvantage of starting late. We didn't have very much invested in the way of tooling or production lines for things like B-18s or B-23s so there was no incentive to upgrade older air-frames like He 111 or Wellingtons.
Same sort of goes for the engines. The R-2600 and R-2800 never had 87 octane versions, (91 octane perhaps), and pretty much started out "fully" developed in comparison to some other engines. Large power increases ( or even small ones) needed major redesign, not tweaking.

The DH designers were very skilled and had a good concept. They were also lucky. If the fuel hadn't gone from 100 to 100/130 to 100/150 or R-R hadn't developed the two stage supercharger would a Mosquito with Merlin XX engines at 1300hp each be a competitive bomber or night fighter in 1944?

 

[tomo pauk]

Mossie went from 1300 HP engines to ~1750 HP ones (in 2 stage Merlin) - not such a great power increase. Wellington went from 1000 HP to ~1500 HP engines, Ju-88 went from Jumo 211B to Jumo 213 or BMW-801, Soviets did not produced the Pe-2 with ASh-82 because the radials were in short supply. Tu-2 was not built with Mikulins because the war ended. Ju-87, Avenger, SB2C - all of them received more HP as the war progressed. So Mossie was hardly an exception.

The DH designers were very skilled and had a good concept. They were also lucky. If the fuel hadn't gone from 100 to 100/130 to 100/150 or R-R hadn't developed the two stage supercharger would a Mosquito with Merlin XX engines at 1300hp each be a competitive bomber or night fighter in 1944?

Too many 'ifs' here, but I'll bite:
A Mossie with single stage Griffon would still be competitive.

 

[GregP]

I really like the Beech A-38 Grizzly ... but without the 75 mm cannon. It already had six 12.7 mm MG, and I'd delete the 75 mm cannon and add four 20 mm cannons, fixed forward fiiring of course. I'd also make the entire six 12.7mm MG fixed forward firing or move two of them to a single tail turret and delete the dorsal and beklly remote turrets.

It was fast, handled well, could get slow and takeoff and land in a small space. The real issue was the supply of R-3350 engines, and I think we COULD have broken some free for the aircraft if we had wanted to do so. It may well have been poitics that killed the A-38; I can't say for sure. Of ourse, we're talking early 1944, but it could easilty have been oeprational quickly.

Might have been faster without the two remote turrets (fix them forward firing) , too. When tested, it was flown by USAAC pilots and serviced by USAAC mechanics and earned a reputation for very good serviceability and relaibility, so we already KNOW it would have not been a major issue to deploy. If the two turrets were removed, there would be no need for a gunner unless a remote tail turret were added (maybe, maybe not ...), and it could have been a single seat unit with devastating firepower.

 

[mhuxt]

If the fuel hadn't gone from 100 to 100/130 to 100/150 or R-R hadn't developed the two stage supercharger would a Mosquito with Merlin XX engines at 1300hp each be a competitive bomber or night fighter in 1944?

The answer is yes. 150 octane was used by fighter Mosquitos, but there's no evidence it was used in bomber craft, and as I've posted here before, the fuel used in PR Mosquitos was no more energetic than that which was used in B-17s. The earliest Mossies used the single-stage Merlin 21; Canadian-built B.XX with single-stage Packard Merlin 31s first went into action over Europe in December 1943 and remained in action until the end of the war.

 

[stug3]

I really like the Beech A-38 Grizzly ... but without the 75 mm cannon. It already had six 12.7 mm MG, and I'd delete the 75 mm cannon and add four 20 mm cannons, fixed forward fiiring of course. I'd also make the entire six 12.7mm MG fixed forward firing or move two of them to a single tail turret and delete the dorsal and beklly remote turrets.

It was fast, handled well, could get slow and takeoff and land in a small space. The real issue was the supply of R-3350 engines, and I think we COULD have broken some free for the aircraft if we had wanted to do so. It may well have been poitics that killed the A-38; I can't say for sure. Of ourse, we're talking early 1944, but it could easilty have been oeprational quickly.

Might have been faster without the two remote turrets (fix them forward firing) , too. When tested, it was flown by USAAC pilots and serviced by USAAC mechanics and earned a reputation for very good serviceability and relaibility, so we already KNOW it would have not been a major issue to deploy. If the two turrets were removed, there would be no need for a gunner unless a remote tail turret were added (maybe, maybe not ...), and it could have been a single seat unit with devastating firepower.

The main reason the A-38 wasnt produced was that the B-29 also used R-3350s and had priority. I think the weight saving mods you mentioned would have been good ideas with maybe a variant keeping the 75mm to go after larger targets like ships, etc. I wonder if recoil from the gun had the same adverse effects as in the B-25?