Bollocks to no engine production or aluminium smetlting
The Story of the Commonwealth Aircraft Corporation From "Technology in Australia (1788 - 1988)"
It arose from the initiative of Essington Lewis, who was at the time the Chief General Manager of BHP, and who formed a syndicate of BHP, Broken Hill Associated Smelters and G.M.H. to undertake a study leading to the establishment of military aircraft and engine manufacturing facilities in Australia. These companies were later joined by I.C.I., Electrolytic Zinc (for aluminium smelting, set up and in production by 1941) and Orient Steam Navigation Company.
The nucleus of the newly formed company was provided by L. J. Wackett's team, operating at the Tugan Aircraft premises in Sydney. This company was taken over by CAC and Wackett became its first manager. A factory was constructed at Fishermen's Bend in Melbourne and Wackett began to operate from the new premises in September, 1937. In order to enable rapid local production, a licenced design was adopted, both for the airframe (the North American NA33, later known as the Wirraway), and for the engine (Pratt and Whitney Single Wasp. These were being received from 1939, rated at 650 hp).
The innovations needed to put this aircraft into, and maintain in production, consisted of the replacement of the unobtainable British engine, the Taurus, with the locally produced twin-row Wasp engines. This was the main reason why the two stage Wasp was built (locally) ….to get the Beauforts operational. The first locally built, locally engined Beauforts rolled off the lines in October 1941. Local sources of supply had to be arranged for many sub-components (for example the airframes depended on locally smelted and worked aluminium, specifically set up for that purpose in 1940 which were originally to be imported).
Right on Parsifal
Essington Lewis is a much underrated person in this history. Much of the glory for CAC goes to Wackett but it was Lewis who led and financed the world wide search for what aircraft and engines were to be produced by CAC (more below on that search in the last four paragraphs). The whole team, Lewis, Wackett and a group of RAAF officers was lead and financed by Lewis.
One of the many things that Lewis and Wackett contracted prior to the outbreak of war in 1939 was the manufacture by CAC of Lockheed Hudson powerplants, complete except for propellers.
While insignificant in the short term this contract was to not only save the Australian Beaufort program but to also provide the powerplant for the Boomerang. The first 52 Australian Beaufort's actually used Hudson powerplants bolted to an adaptor structure which attached to the same wing fittings as the normal Taurus powerplant. Number 53 and subsequent were fitted with Australian designed mounts and Australian designed cowls and gills though these, like the earlier ones, used the same adaptor structure.
The Boomerang used the Australian Beaufort powerplant with minimal changes other than the mount which was technically a mixture of Wirraway and Hudson.
The British government fought bitterly to prevent the Wirraway being produced and suggested CAC assemble Tiger Moths, then build Tiger Moths, then build other obsolescent designs such as the Fairey Battle.
One major "ace" the Brits had in their pocket was that the Australian Government had to pay import duties to the UK government for any non British aircraft and components.
This resulted in many Wirraway parts being redesigned unnecessarily to avoid the import duty (by maximising "British" content), the installation of Vickers Mk V machine guns rather than the Browning's that even the RAF admitted were a far superior weapon, plus the installation of British radios, gunsights, bomb-shackles etc, etc. The Hamilton Standard prop was replaced by the dH propeller which was nothing more than the HS built under licence by dH but did make it duty free.
Much of the redesign was what could best be called cosmetic - the CA-1 hydraulic shelf for instance is almost identical to the BC-1 shelf except for the width and the changes that causes. Many castings are identical except they use British specification materials, some skins and frames are identical except for using British specification alloy, every non special bolt is the standard SBAC British specification, etc.
It is also highly probably that the British Governments decision to ask the Australian Government to create DAP and produce 90 Beaufort's for RAF Singapore was purely a face saving exercise coming as it did so soon after Lewis and his team decided to manufacture the Wirraway (even without an official order).
The remaining Essington Lewis papers are held by Australian Archives, probably still in Melbourne. I spent some time in the mid 80's scouring the index of Lewis papers in Melbourne and found many gems there however all the Lewis papers (other than indexes) were still classified at that time. Two, of many, that caught my interest were approximately titled
Japanese aircraft under consideration for manufacture in Australia and
Negotiations with Sumitomo metals for the licensed manufacture of aircraft aluminium in Australia.
Naturally I applied for access to these two documents (the limit for requests at that time) and the very helpful Archives staff assisted me in raising the relevant documentation to ensure the greatest possible chance to have these two files declassified.
Several months later I received a letter informing me that those documents had been sent to the RAAF at Russell Offices in Canberra, that they had been lost, and that I could appeal to have the documents traced. When I discussed this with the Archives staff their first question was
Could the contents of these files embarrass the RAAF. When I replied to the effect
Very much so because this would likely prove that the Japanese had advanced aircraft and that this was known to Lewis and Wackett and the RAAF officers on his team long before Pearl Harbor. The immediate response from the archives staff was that there was no sense in appealing because the RAAF always destroyed any classified document that could possibly embarrass them.
Needless to say I did not request the declassification of any other Lewis papers.
Mi
CONTINUED