DH Mosquito Design Analysis

MIflyer · Feb 15, 2018

Get out your copies of 633 Squadron and Mosquito Squadron! Here is a WWII vintage design analysis of the Mossie.
Part 1

MIflyer · Feb 15, 2018

Here is Part 2.

MIflyer · Feb 15, 2018

And here is a little on production.

Crimea_River · Feb 20, 2018

Interesting. Thanks for posting.

buffnut453 · Feb 20, 2018

Mosquito...the Mary Poppins of WW2 aircraft: practically perfect in every way!!

Gemhorse · Feb 21, 2018

We still have the remains of 6 Mosquitoes down here in NZ, from the 80-odd we brought after the War, then we wanted jets so we got DH Vampires...
But this is where they rebuild the DH Mosquitoes now...
-They sure squeeze my lemons when they fly overhead at the airshow, the juice just about runs down my legs...

Cheers

Crimea_River · Feb 21, 2018

To clarify, 2 of the 3 flying Mossies were built in NZ. The other was done in Canada and 2 orgs in the UK are working to build a flyable Mossie. Avspecs in NZ is continuing work on another order.

MIflyer · Feb 21, 2018

You know for a while there Kermit Weeks' Mossie, one of those used in 633 Squadron, was the only one in flying condition in the world. I am glad to see some others now, and more coming along.

An interesting book that covers some of the Mosquito exploits is The Sixth Floor, about the Danish resistance movement in WWII. The Gestapo located high value prisoners in the 6th floor of Shell House in Denmark, the oil company HQ they took over, in an effort to protect their HQ from Allied bombings. The Danes pleaded for the Allies to bomb Shell house, thereby killing the prisoners as well as the Gestapo and preventing their network from being captured. Finally the RAF came to do the job, Mosquitoes with Mustang escort.

On the morning of the attack the Gestapo took one of the prisoners on the 6th floor down to the 5th floor for interrogation. They seated him facing the windows while the Gestapo agents faced him, their backs to the windows. He was not restrained. He looked out the window and saw two Mosquitoes inbound, knew exactly what that meant, got up and ran out the door and headed down the stairs. The Gestapo agents were stunned by his reaction. After all, there was no way he could get away; there were guards and even a machine gun nest in the lobby. The bombs hit while the prisoner was running down the stairs and by the time he got to the lobby the Germans had a lot more to worry about than someone running. Everybody still alive was running; the building was coming down around their ears. The prisoner made it out the front door and got away clean.

Peter Gunn · Feb 21, 2018

Good stuff as always MI... two thumbs up!

wuzak · Feb 21, 2018

MIflyer said:
You know for a while there Kermit Weeks' Mossie, one of those used in 633 Squadron, was the only one in flying condition in the world. I am glad to see some others now, and more coming along.

An interesting book that covers some of the Mosquito exploits is The Sixth Floor, about the Danish resistance movement in WWII. The Gestapo located high value prisoners in the 6th floor of Shell House in Denmark, the oil company HQ they took over, in an effort to protect their HQ from Allied bombings. The Danes pleaded for the Allies to bomb Shell house, thereby killing the prisoners as well as the Gestapo and preventing their network from being captured. Finally the RAF came to do the job, Mosquitoes with Mustang escort.

On the morning of the attack the Gestapo took one of the prisoners on the 6th floor down to the 5th floor for interrogation. They seated him facing the windows while the Gestapo agents faced him, their backs to the windows. He was not restrained. He looked out the window and saw two Mosquitoes inbound, knew exactly what that meant, got up and ran out the door and headed down the stairs. The Gestapo agents were stunned by his reaction. After all, there was no way he could get away; there were guards and even a machine gun nest in the lobby. The bombs hit while the prisoner was running down the stairs and by the time he got to the lobby the Germans had a lot more to worry about than someone running. Everybody still alive was running; the building was coming down around their ears. The prisoner made it out the front door and got away clean.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NOy00V5N-pk

pbehn · Feb 21, 2018

That is a great read, with lots of surprises.

Airframes · Feb 21, 2018

Not the best illustration of the actual attack in that video. It shows the 'cartoon' aircraft approaching from the opposite direction, whereas the Mosquitos attacked on the other side of the building, to the left of the doors marked 'Shellhus' in the drawings, having approached over the reservoirs.
I had the honour to be part of the 50th anniversary, in the present day Shell Hus, with Ted Sismore, other surviving aircrew, and some of the former Danish Resistance men who had been prisoners in the building at the time.

MIflyer · Feb 21, 2018

I must admit that I was surprised to discover that Denmark had signed a non-aggression pact with Nazi Germany and did not oppose the small German occupying force, got along famously with them, it seems. But then the Gestapo showed up and demanded all the Jewish people be turned over. The Danes' response to that was just as courageous as their pre-war response to the Nazis had been feckless.

The accidental strike on the girls school was quite tragic.

pbehn · Feb 21, 2018

MIflyer said:
I must admit that I was surprised to discover that Denmark had signed a non-aggression pact with Nazi Germany and did not oppose the small German occupying force, got along famously with them, it seems. But then the Gestapo showed up and demanded all the Jewish people be turned over. The Danes' response to that was just as courageous as their pre-war response to the Nazis had been feckless.

The accidental strike on the girls school was quite tragic.

With a regime like Nazi Germany not signing a non aggression pact is in itself an act of aggression, Denmark was in no real position to do anything else, its only border is with Germany.

MIflyer · Feb 21, 2018

"...not signing a non aggression pact is in itself an act of aggression..."

Very true! Fat lot of good it did them, though. Or the USSR, either.

pbehn · Feb 21, 2018

MIflyer said:
"...not signing a non aggression pact is in itself an act of aggression..."

Very true! Fat lot of good it did them, though.

What is the alternative? A little like Puerto Rico today. Faced with complete destruction I think they played a great game.

MIflyer · Feb 21, 2018

Any of y'all ever read the book about the Mossie raid on the Amiens prison? I think it is entitled Jehrico. While it seems not to be very widely available now, and is not that well written in some respects, it is really jam packed.

When the Mossie strike took down the walls all kinds of people escaped the prison. The French police did something very clever. When they discovered that the Germans had identified some Resistance fighters the police would arrest them on false charges, such as chicken theft or stealing a bicycle. The Germans never thought of looking in prison for the Resistance fighters, so they were at least safe from interrogation or worse.

When the Mossie raid hit one French thief realized that he would have a better chance of not being recaptured if the records of who was in the place were destroyed. So in the chaos he made his way to the offices so he could burn the files. He was in the process of setting the place alight when another man walked in and said, "You thought of it too?" The man was an American OSS agent and when they had the prison files burning he suggested they go do the same thing at Gestapo HQ. The Gestapo were all out chasing prisoners and so only one man was guarding the HQ. They killed him and set fire to the place.

They then went on to steal a German motorcycle with sidecar along with uniforms and went whizzing off. The Germans spotted them and gave chase. They bailed out of the cycle and ran into the woods, as the Germans fired away at them. Running down the side of a hill they found two French policemen with motorcycles watching them. The French thief thought they were caught but the OSS agent simply ran up the the cops and explained the situation; the French cops gave them a ride out of there on the backs of their motorcycles.

I only recently discovered that the Mossies had a Typhoon escort on that mission. It was snowing along the way and main effect of the Typhoon support seems to have been to scare the bejesus out of Mossie crews when they came screaming by out of the snow.

Airframes · Feb 21, 2018

Note that the loss of life at the Jean D'Arc school was not directly caused by the accidental bombing. The children and nuns lost were drowned in the cellars, when the fire crews attended the resulting fire.
Here is a pic of the memorial on the site of the school, taken on the 50th anniversary of the attack, 21st March, 1995, and a pic of the present day Shell House, taken on the same day.
Further info can be found in a thread I posted some time ago, but I can't remember where !
Sorry to interrupt this thread.

Gemhorse · Feb 26, 2018

If I recall correctly, the Typhoon escort was RAF 198 Sqn. and because of the bad weather didn't connect so were not able to escort - The nearby Luftwaffe were alerted to the Amiens prison attack and II/JG 26's Fw-190's chased & attacked the stragglers which unfortunately shot down the 140 Wing's raid leader, Grp. Capt. Percy Picard & his nav, Flt. Lt.'Pete' Broadlley - Some will remember Percy Picard from his role as the pilot in the famous "Target for Tonight" wartime movie...

In regard to Crimea_River's statement that the first built was in Canada is indeed correct, but I believe all the new wood fuselage was the first-off Glyn Powell's moulds from his factory here in NZ...

-The last flying Mosquito RR299 crashed at Barton Aerodrome in UK on 21 July 1996 killing both crew, Steve Watson & Kevin Moorhouse- A huge human tragedy, & unfortunately, a loss as RR299 was also a 30+ years UK Airshow circuit favourite - It was a T.III dual-control trainer based on the FB.VI...- Glyn Powell's one is an Aussie-built T.43, a version of the T.III - At the time of the 1996 crash there were around 31 surviving Mosquitoes worldwide. It really is marvelous that Kermit Week's and others are now able to gradually return these awesome aircraft to the skies and airshows for all to see, the sound of those two Merlins...wow... and such a huge testament to the talents of ALL those involved in Warbird Restoration, worldwide...

Cheers

_Douglas_Bader_ · Apr 24, 2018

Isn't it funny that "Freeman's Folly" turned out to be the "Wooden Wonder" that pissed off Goering enough to turn him green?

DH Mosquito Design Analysis

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