Consolidated PBY vs. Heinkel He-115

[parsifal]

German seaplanes sank only three western allied subs for the entire war that I am certain of. not sure about their success or lack of it in the east against the Russians, but up until December 1941 I am only aware of one successful sinking, carried out in conjunction with DKM surface forces and the a/c in that situation was a Ju-88 not the more maritime oriented seaplanes. Some subs were lost to mines laid by LW a/c, but it is impossible to tell which boats were loss to mines laid by surface craft and which were laid by a/c. Point is, DKM and even more so the LW ability to sink submarines by air was abysmal.

During the war, DKM admitted and Allied sources confirm, to the loss of over 250 U-boats to solely Allied air attacks, of which the PBYs are thought to be responsible for about 50 of that number. Other U-boat losses in which the dominant cause of the loss arose from air action of some sort are calculated to have caused the loss of an additional 100 or so boats. The allies put in a massive effort at airborne ASW and most of the kills were achieved after 1942, but impressive results were nevertheless achieved.

 

[GregP]

I want to see a dogfight between a Martin Mars and a BV 238! The crisp maneuvering would no doubt be something to see ... maybe one could firebomb the other?

 

[Shortround6]

How about a Supermarine Walrus vs a He 59?

Notice the 4 bladed prop.

 

[BiffF15]

That's the first thing I noticed. Looks like two (2 bladed props) bolted together...

Cheers,
Biff

 

[pbehn]

That's the first thing I noticed. Looks like two (2 bladed props) bolted together...

Cheers,
Biff

Easiest way to make a four bladed prop from wood?

The Supermarine flying boats had Schneider trophy heritage Supermarine Sea Lion II - Wikipedia while the Sunderland was a big ungainly looking beast that was surprisingly agile and heavily armed for a sea plane.

 

[parsifal]

There were two occasions that ive heard of in which a supermarine walrus (or more correctly supermarine Seagull V) engaged in a dogfight. The first one involved a fight between an RA CR 32 and the onboard seagull from HMAS HOBART. The other incident was an RN cruiser, but the details I would need to look up.

In the case of HOBART's Seagull, I understand the seaplane got low and fought it out with the CR-32 fighter at deck level . Fighting at sea level covered her vulnerable blind underbelly and prevented close range high speed passes by the Italian fighter. It got down to a fight about sturdiness and stability of the gun platform, and the seagull evidently won on those criteria.

 

[swampyankee]

German seaplanes sank only three western allied subs for the entire war that I am certain of. not sure about their success or lack of it in the east against the Russians, but up until December 1941 I am only aware of one successful sinking, carried out in conjunction with DKM surface forces and the a/c in that situation was a Ju-88 not the more maritime oriented seaplanes. Some subs were lost to mines laid by LW a/c, but it is impossible to tell which boats were loss to mines laid by surface craft and which were laid by a/c. Point is, DKM and even more so the LW ability to sink submarines by air was abysmal.

During the war, DKM admitted and Allied sources confirm, to the loss of over 250 U-boats to solely Allied air attacks, of which the PBYs are thought to be responsible for about 50 of that number. Other U-boat losses in which the dominant cause of the loss arose from air action of some sort are calculated to have caused the loss of an additional 100 or so boats. The allies put in a massive effort at airborne ASW and most of the kills were achieved after 1942, but impressive results were nevertheless achieved.

In defense of the Germans, there were a lot more German submarines to sink: they were operating in a somewhat less target-rich environment than the Allies' ASW forces. Once the Axis was defeated in North Africa (and how much of their materiel and personnel got back to Europe?), there would seem to be fairly little for German ASW to do.

 

[parsifal]

All true to an extent. nevertheless the germans entered the war with about 2 million tons of shipping and seized or captured around 3 million tons up to the fall of France. a lot was seized from Holland and Norway, but the germans at the beginning of the war also seized a vast quantity of Baltic shipping from the neutrals. It caused major diplomatic incidents with Sweden Norway and even Finland. At the outbreak of the war with Russia, vast quantities of Soviet shipping was seized by the Germans in German ports.

During the war the Germans constructed about 1.5 million tons of shipping. The short end of the story is that Germany, like every other industrialised nation needed maritime traffic even in the context of local coast trade that they were limited to after 1942.

My best estimate is that then Germans either built, or acquired about 7.5 million tons of shipping during the war (hard figures on this subject are incredibly hard to find) , and lost in that period 6.5 million tons to all sources. About 30-35% of those losses arose from the actions of allied submarines, amounting to 2.3 million tons of shipping lost in northern waters.

that's more than enough to be considered a significant impact. yet the germans were never able to respond effectively to this threat to their mercantile trade by an effective airborne ASW effort.

 

[swampyankee]

Parsifal,
I didn't have those numbers. Thanks; I had also forgotten about coastal shipping.