Freebird
Master Sergeant
I'm not really an expert, but if substituting Merlins was so difficult, would not radials be even more prohibitive?
The problem was not about finding alternative engines, it was the design changes
Did We Really Think It Was A Good Idea?
- Thread starter Waynos
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I'm not really an expert, but if substituting Merlins was so difficult, would not radials be even more prohibitive?
The problem was not about finding alternative engines, it was the design changes
There are radials and radials. I suggest instalation of an engine of modest size weight (=Taurus; Twin wasp would do too I hope), not something like Hercules or R-2800.
Now, the brits did have a WORKING plane in 1939 that could do anyting Whirlwind could do in 1940: the Gloster F.9/37. It was the 2nd fastest combat-worthy plane of the world back then, even faster then Whirly by some 20 km/h.
Again, just too bad Bristol (and Australia) wasnt building them instead of Blenheim-Beeaufort-Beaufighter line.
Good book Colin. Re-reading pages 40-42, I get the impression that 'Teddy' Petter was a brilliant but uncompromising designer who believed fiercely that "small was best." Good attributes for a designer but lousy when it comes to business and the art of selling aeroplanes especially if you're rubbing officialdom the wrong way.
Sir Roy Fedden was hopeful that Westland would try Bristol engines on the Whirlwind, but to quote Bingham;
Westland's joint Managing Director, Eric Mensworths was more diplomatic writing to Shoto Douglas explaining that with design changes, Merlin 20 engines could be installed offering a top speed of 410 mph, but by now Douglas, Beaverbrook and Dowding had had a gutful of Westland and the Whirlwind.
There's a good entry in Gunston's "Fighters of the Fifties" book where he heaps praise on Petter's sticking to his "smaller is better" approach regarding the Gnat but reading between the lines I wouldn't have liked to have been a shareholder in Folland at the time.
The SNCAC NC 900 fighter-bomber produced in "caves" at Cravant, near Auxerre. The BMW 801D/2 were completely stripped and rebuilt by Voisin but proved unreliable...
Flyboy2
Senior Airman
Hi Graeme, you were right, it just was flown once and had to be ditched, but glided very smoothly.
Still, once the designers realized it wouldn't have been able to be flown with armament, and only a limited amount of fuel, it kinda becomes useless
Still, once the designers realized it wouldn't have been able to be flown with armament, and only a limited amount of fuel, it kinda becomes useless
michaelmaltby
Colonel
Thanks for that, Graeme. Did SNCAC make them after the war briefly ..?
Michael
Michael
Hi Graeme,
>There's a good entry in Gunston's "Fighters of the Fifties" book where he heaps praise on Petter's sticking to his "smaller is better" approach regarding the Gnat but reading between the lines I wouldn't have liked to have been a shareholder in Folland at the time.
Hooker in "Not of of an Engineer" mentions that Petter defended the Gnat airframe against performance-degrading modifications so fiercely that he did not provide the type with low-pressure tyres for the NATO light-weight fighter-bomber competition though poor-field capability was a stated objective. The competition was won by the Fiat G.91 ... I'm not even sure that the Gnat was officially entered.
Regards,
Henning (HoHun)
>There's a good entry in Gunston's "Fighters of the Fifties" book where he heaps praise on Petter's sticking to his "smaller is better" approach regarding the Gnat but reading between the lines I wouldn't have liked to have been a shareholder in Folland at the time.
Hooker in "Not of of an Engineer" mentions that Petter defended the Gnat airframe against performance-degrading modifications so fiercely that he did not provide the type with low-pressure tyres for the NATO light-weight fighter-bomber competition though poor-field capability was a stated objective. The competition was won by the Fiat G.91 ... I'm not even sure that the Gnat was officially entered.
Regards,
Henning (HoHun)
Yep. They built 64 of them but service life was less than two years and several were sold to Argentina. A little more here, close to the top...
Non-Luftwaffe Focke-Wulf 190s
Njaco
The Pop-Tart Whisperer
My only contribution - personnally - would be the Mistel combinations. Always thought too much effort for little return.
michaelmaltby
Colonel
Thank you, Graeme
MM
MM
Downwind.Maddl-Land
Airman 1st Class
Ref the Defiant; Old Wife's Tales never die or even simply fade away! Please see my #29 post "http://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/aviation/boulton-paul-defiant-7448-2.html"
It ain't wot u got - its the way that u use it!
It ain't wot u got - its the way that u use it!
Demetrious
Airman 1st Class
- 104
- Aug 22, 2007
Gee call me crazy, but that's probably because the P-38 was a fighter and the Mosquito was a bomber. A bomber doing better in a ground attack role then a fighter? Mysteries never cease, huh?
I am honestly mystified as to where you think the Mosquito was a superior fighter, or even all-rounder, then the P-38. The P-38 was faster, turned better, climbed better, rolled better, etc- as one would expect from a fighter aircraft being compared to a light bomber. The Mossie was a fantastic bomber interceptor and strike aircraft, but it was no fighter by any stretch of the imagination.
I think you're getting the P-38 designation confused with an entirely different aircraft. Perhaps you're thinking of the A-20 Havok light bomber? I think you must, because I find it extremely unlikely that the USAF ever tried to use an air superiority fighter as a strategic level bomber.
michaelmaltby
Colonel
Demitrious - I'm not confusing the A-20 and the P-38 at all. The USSAF fried a number a bombing missions where one P-38 was a Pathfinder and the rest dropped "on clue" - they carried a reasonable pay load - but then the B-17 didn't exactly carry an impressive bomb payload - compared to for example the Lancaster. When you think of some of the pin-point missions the Mosquito pulled off for the RAF, the P-38 could have done much the same kind of missions ...
MM
MM
Dr Christmas needed a Bullet - between the eyes, but unfortunately lived to the grand old age of ninety-four, eventually dying in 1960.
Captain Allington Jolly flew the second bullet, straight into a farmer's barn and killed.
Cuthbert Mills was the first to die...
("The World's Worst Aircraft" by James Gilbert)
michaelmaltby
Colonel
Demitrious ..
"Although the Lightning didn't do so well in the air-to-air combat role in Northern Europe, it was regarded as an excellent strafer and light fast bomber aircraft. To capitalize on this capability, a number of P-38Js and P-38Ls were field-modified in the UK as formation bombing "pathfinders", fitted with a glazed nose with a Norden bombsight, with the machine guns and cannon deleted and a hatch under the nose for the bombardier. They were called "Droop Snoot" machines. A Droop Snoot pathfinder would lead a formation of other P-38s, each overloaded with two 900 kilogram (2,000 pound) bombs, and the entire formation would release when the pathfinder did. The rest would then go on to strafe the target..."
MM
"Although the Lightning didn't do so well in the air-to-air combat role in Northern Europe, it was regarded as an excellent strafer and light fast bomber aircraft. To capitalize on this capability, a number of P-38Js and P-38Ls were field-modified in the UK as formation bombing "pathfinders", fitted with a glazed nose with a Norden bombsight, with the machine guns and cannon deleted and a hatch under the nose for the bombardier. They were called "Droop Snoot" machines. A Droop Snoot pathfinder would lead a formation of other P-38s, each overloaded with two 900 kilogram (2,000 pound) bombs, and the entire formation would release when the pathfinder did. The rest would then go on to strafe the target..."
MM
Demetrious
Airman 1st Class
- 104
- Aug 22, 2007
Wow. I stand corrected. I'd also like to know who the genius was who thought the P-38 would make a good level bomber. Also from Wikipedia:
Wow, I hope they didn't have any automated release mechanism incorporated the way bombs or drop tanks did...
Well said. I just read up on that on Wikipedia and had a hearty laugh. A biplane without any bracing struts whatsoever? And the wings fell off? Wow, what a surprise!
FLYBOYJ
"THE GREAT GAZOO"
It was actaully a great idea and probably should of been used more in the ETO.
"The Droop Snoot first saw service on April 19, 1944. The first mission was to attack the Florennes airfield in Belgium. Bad weather halted this mission, and a different mission was scheduled for later in the day. Lt. Col. Harold Rau led 38 P-38s to Gutersloh, Germany. The formation of P-38s managed to drop 26,000 lbs. of bombs in a concentrated area with good observable results. Droop Snoots and Pathfinders were successfully used by the 8th, 9th, and 15th air forces.
In theory this version of the P-38 seemed to be an idea of limitless utilization. The idea of using fighters to deliver significant amounts of ordinance in saturation bombing was tremendous. They would be able to drop their loads, and then act as fighters on the way back home. They would be able to destroy ground targets, and possibly destroy significant numbers of Luftwaffe aircraft and pilots. However, in practice, the Droop Snoot/Pathfinder variations saw only limited action. The idea was never really taken seriously by Gen. Doolittle and his staff. The romantic idea of heavy bombers being able to carry out the daylight bombing practice was prevalent in the minds of the American leaders. Tremendous amounts of heavy bombers were being produced, and nobody wanted to change that. Also, many of these people were preaching the idea of heavy bombers to such an extent, they would not allow themselves to go back on their ideas. After all, the B-17 was the symbol of the Allied effort in the ETO. One very realistic problem encountered by the P-38s was questions about the range. A B-17 would not have to sacrifice range to carry a full load. Even though a P-38 was capable of carrying two 2,000 lb. bombs, it would have to operate on a limited range. P-38s normally carried one 2,000 lb. bomb, and one 310-gallon drop tank. Still, it would not have the range similar to a B-17 or B-24. After the invasion of Normandy in June 1944, the P-38s would have been able to operate out of the liberated areas of France, which would have been very favorable to their range problems. However, at this point in the war, B-17s and B-24 were being produced in large numbers, crews were readily available, and the P-51 Mustang was able to escort bombers deep into Germany. The P-38 was already being phased out in Europe. Even though the operational records do not show the Droop Snoot/Pathfinder versions of the P-38 to be significant, it still showed the P-38 to be used in almost any role imaginable. No other fighter had this ability at this stage in the war."
457th Bomb Group Message Board: Re: P-38 Droop Snoot Aircraft.
G'day Flyboy2. Found this today. It looks like that famous image is the Antonov KT. It's erroneously captioned as the Antonov A-40 on Wikipedia. Looks like the A-40 was never built?...
(Letter to the editor. AI 1972)
Colin1
Senior Master Sergeant
It was and it should have been used more
the reasons it wasn't were precisely those outlined in the piece although it's difficult to know why tactically-bombing 'B-38s' could prove a threat to the production of strategically-bombing B-17s. It should have looked more attractive to the people who should have been looking, a measured, tactical raid hitting the enemy in the teeth and then shooting him up on the way home, in the air or on the ground; its effect on the Luftwaffe's ability to put up fighters to meet the strategic bomber streams if those fighter airfields were being regularly disrupted by B-38s doesn't seem to have been something that was considered.
I can conceivably see a parallel in Vietnam where B-66s lead F-105s on similar runs, so the USAF must have seen something in it that the USAAF didn't.
Greater implementation in this role would have cemented the P-38's place as the supreme MRCA of WWII, although I tend to think it held that title anyway.
FLYBOYJ
"THE GREAT GAZOO"
Good points.
From that site I posted...
"The idea was never really taken seriously by Gen. Doolittle and his staff. The romantic idea of heavy bombers being able to carry out the daylight bombing practice was prevalent in the minds of the American leaders. Tremendous amounts of heavy bombers were being produced, and nobody wanted to change that. Also, many of these people were preaching the idea of heavy bombers to such an extent, they would not allow themselves to go back on their ideas. After all, the B-17 was the symbol of the Allied effort in the ETO."
Demetrious
Airman 1st Class
- 104
- Aug 22, 2007
Hmm. You raise an interesting point. The P-38 (like the P-51) could carry 2,000lbs of bombs, which was pretty tremendous for a fighter. By contrast, the B-17 could only carry 8,000 pounds meaning a mere three-ship fighter formation had the same effective bomb load as a B-17, while being about a fraction as vulnerable from either fighters or flack. And since the configuration of the P-38 allowed them to carry a Norden bombsight, accuracy should have been on par with the heavy bombers.
That is incredible versatility from a fighter. A shame it was not used more.
