wuzak
Captain
Fulmar in 1941/42/43: feasible and/or plausible upgrades?
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This is nitpicking and you know it. Once again, you are missing the point, RCAFson. The Avenger issue was not about the time it entered service, but that a bigger aircraft could land on a smaller carrier. As for the Japanese aircraft and their carrier trials, when they first went to sea is irrelevant, also just because they didn't have self sealing tanks and armour doesn't make them less effective at the job they were designed for compared to their contemporaries. The fact that they were more advanced in concept compared to the Fulmar and Albacore is the issue that you are studiously ignoring.
Nothing you have written is convincing enough that the two-seat fighter concept wasn't outdated by 1940; making bogus unsubstantiated claims about the abilities of these aircraft does nothing to reinforce your point; claiming that the Firefly was a good fighter because it shot down Japanerse aircraft doesn't prove a thing. In mid 1940 over Dunkirk, an Avro Anson shot down two Bf 109s and damaged a third, but that doesn't make it a good fighter. Yes, the FAA had high hopes for the Fulmar, but that doesn't detract from the fact that its policy of deploying it was based on pre-war strategies that were found wanting in modern warfare.
wuzak
Captain
Shortround6
Major General
I would certainly agree that the 2nd seater performed an important function in the Fulmar. The RN had their system of getting the planes back to the carrier and the 2nd seater was part of it. His ability to operate the radio was important also. One of the reasons the Bf 110 had the rear gunner was NOT for extra eyes or for the pea shooter out the back but to operate the SAME radio used in He 111s.
Now, perhaps, the 2nd seater was thought to be needed in 1940 when work started on the Firefly. But radios did not stay the same from 1937 to 1945. By the time the Firefly entered service (belatedly) other aircraft and other navies were showing that the 2nd seater was no longer needed. Different radios(?) and different priorities.
The Firefly was not a good concept for a fighter. It was a compromise. And, yes, the weight penalty for a 2nd crew man is a lot bigger than some people think. Especially in the initial design stage. Stuffing a 2nd crew man into an existing design is sometimes much easier because the customer will relax or forget about some of the initial rules/requirements.
Things like take-off speed, landing speed, and even tire size. The RAF had a requirement that lasted at least until 1938 if not longer that ALL aircraft could not use tires with more than 35lb/sq/in pressure to avoid rutting the grass fields for instance, increase the weight of the airplane by 300-400lb might mean fitting the next larger size tire. Once the shooting started this requirement and a few others were quickly forgotten, but many a British plane carried rather large tires ( and nacelles to house them) to the end of their production.
A lot of fighters carried a payload of around 20% (give or take, without bombs) made up of guns, ammo, fuel, oil, pilot, etc. In a "rubber" airplane on the drawing board a 200lb crew man can easily turn into about 1000lbs of gross weight. Granted a few things are fixed like engine and propeller but the fuselage will have to grow some, seating and cockpit heating/ventilation accounted for, doubling the oxygen system etc. Now you need 8-12 sq ft more wing for the landing speed to meet the requirement ( with an existing design the customer may just eat the 1-2 mph difference but for an initial design?) which means another 30-40lbs, landing gear may or may not be the same. the extra size of the fuselage and the wing mean more fuel to get the same range which again may mean a bigger wing to get the take-off performance and around it goes.
A lot of bombers/torpedo planes were big enough to begin with to take an extra crewman (for 2 to 3) without a lot of trouble but they were a lot bigger than fighters to begin with, and at max load were often restricted to 2 men.
There are times when multi-purpose airplanes make sense but air superiority is not one of them.
Now, perhaps, the 2nd seater was thought to be needed in 1940 when work started on the Firefly. But radios did not stay the same from 1937 to 1945. By the time the Firefly entered service (belatedly) other aircraft and other navies were showing that the 2nd seater was no longer needed. Different radios(?) and different priorities.
The Firefly was not a good concept for a fighter. It was a compromise. And, yes, the weight penalty for a 2nd crew man is a lot bigger than some people think. Especially in the initial design stage. Stuffing a 2nd crew man into an existing design is sometimes much easier because the customer will relax or forget about some of the initial rules/requirements.
Things like take-off speed, landing speed, and even tire size. The RAF had a requirement that lasted at least until 1938 if not longer that ALL aircraft could not use tires with more than 35lb/sq/in pressure to avoid rutting the grass fields for instance, increase the weight of the airplane by 300-400lb might mean fitting the next larger size tire. Once the shooting started this requirement and a few others were quickly forgotten, but many a British plane carried rather large tires ( and nacelles to house them) to the end of their production.
A lot of fighters carried a payload of around 20% (give or take, without bombs) made up of guns, ammo, fuel, oil, pilot, etc. In a "rubber" airplane on the drawing board a 200lb crew man can easily turn into about 1000lbs of gross weight. Granted a few things are fixed like engine and propeller but the fuselage will have to grow some, seating and cockpit heating/ventilation accounted for, doubling the oxygen system etc. Now you need 8-12 sq ft more wing for the landing speed to meet the requirement ( with an existing design the customer may just eat the 1-2 mph difference but for an initial design?) which means another 30-40lbs, landing gear may or may not be the same. the extra size of the fuselage and the wing mean more fuel to get the same range which again may mean a bigger wing to get the take-off performance and around it goes.
A lot of bombers/torpedo planes were big enough to begin with to take an extra crewman (for 2 to 3) without a lot of trouble but they were a lot bigger than fighters to begin with, and at max load were often restricted to 2 men.
There are times when multi-purpose airplanes make sense but air superiority is not one of them.
Here is a well considered passage about the FAA's pre-war approach to fighter development made by Jeffrey Quill, Supermarine test pilot and a rather astute individual who knew more about the subject than me at least. Quoted directly from his brilliant book Spitfire, a test pilot's story;
"...as aeroplanes developed in performance and load carrying capacity, the Admiralty became faced with the problem of providing the fleet at sea with a defence not just against reconnaissance aircraft but also against a potentially devastating form of air attack - the air launched torpedo. At this stage the doctrine that it takes an aeroplane to destroy an aeroplane still held sway, but later, in the inter-war period the Navy's attitude towards the air defence of the Fleet changed. It was considered that the best defence against high level bombers and torpedo launching aircraft would be the intense and concentrated anti-aircraft fire which could be mounted in capital shps, rather than dependence on the then uncertain and unreliable operations of single-seat fighters."
Gunnery was the Navy's stock-in trade and they placed great faith in certain technical developments in anti-aircraft gunnery which were being studied in the early 1930s. Therefore they reasoned that carrier borne fighters should be confined to the minimum required to destroy enemy shadowing aircraft. But common sense and the restricted space available on aircraft carriers demanded that the fighters that were embarked should at least have a dual role. Since enemy carrier-borne reconnaissance aircraft were unlikely to be of very hgih performance it was argued that the fighters to intercept them need not be of very high performance either. These views, taken with the concept that naval fighters should be capable of attacking enemy aircraft carriers and putting their flight decks out of action with machine gun fire and by dive bombing attacks with light bombs so as to immobilise their aircraft very early on in a fleet action led to the Skua, a dive bomber with a fixed gun armament and just sufficient performance to fulfil the now secondary task of defending the fleet against enemy shadowing aircraft. Thus by the late 1930s the single-seat fighter had all but disappeared from the Navy except for the small force of Sea Gladiators which was retained to protect the older carriers, Furious, Glorious, Courageous and Eagle, whose flgith decks were not armoured and whose anti-aircraft fire was not yet up to the latest standards."
"It should be remembered that until the late 1930s the single-seat fighter suffered from severe limitation, especially at sea. It had no bad-weather capability, no navigation capability when out of sight of land or the fleet, very little night capability, very restricted range and firepower and no radio communication air-to-air or air-to-ship. Their Lordships could hardly be expected to commit the safety of the Fleet to such a dubious mode of defence. The gunnery policy, however, failed to take fully into account the advances made in the late 1930s in the land based bomber in terms of speed, range and bomb load or the extent to which the Fleet in war would find itself operating within range of such shore based bombers."
"This was to be brought home forcibly to the Admiralty very early in the war when on 25 September 1939 the Home Fleet put to sea from Scapa Flow to cover the rescue by the cruisers and destroyers of Humber Force of a British submarine in trouble near the Horns Reef off the coast of Denmark. The Home Fleet included the aircraft carrier Ark Royal with the Skuas of 800 and 803 Sqns on board and the battlecruiser Hood. Early next day the fleet was detected by three German reconnaissance flying boats (Do 18s) and in accordance with their design function the Skuas were launched to intercept. One of the flying boats was destroyed by a Skua of 803 Sqn (the first German aircraft to be destroyed by the Fleet Air Arm in the war) but the other two managed to escape to radio a sighting report back to base."
"The result was an attack on the fleet by four Ju 88s from the Island of Sylt operating as dive bombers in the course of which one of the Ju 88s planted a 1,000 lb bomb just off Ark Royal's bow throwing a huge wall of water over the forward end of her flight deck and another scored a hit on HMS Hood, fortunately without the bomb exploding. This was a let off for both ships and significantly no German aircraft were destroyed by anti-aircraft fire. Weather conditions were overcast, which no doubt influenced both the effectiveness of the German attack and the ships' anti-aircraft fire but obviously the incident called into question the wisdom of having no high performance interceptor fighters at sea."
"...as aeroplanes developed in performance and load carrying capacity, the Admiralty became faced with the problem of providing the fleet at sea with a defence not just against reconnaissance aircraft but also against a potentially devastating form of air attack - the air launched torpedo. At this stage the doctrine that it takes an aeroplane to destroy an aeroplane still held sway, but later, in the inter-war period the Navy's attitude towards the air defence of the Fleet changed. It was considered that the best defence against high level bombers and torpedo launching aircraft would be the intense and concentrated anti-aircraft fire which could be mounted in capital shps, rather than dependence on the then uncertain and unreliable operations of single-seat fighters."
Gunnery was the Navy's stock-in trade and they placed great faith in certain technical developments in anti-aircraft gunnery which were being studied in the early 1930s. Therefore they reasoned that carrier borne fighters should be confined to the minimum required to destroy enemy shadowing aircraft. But common sense and the restricted space available on aircraft carriers demanded that the fighters that were embarked should at least have a dual role. Since enemy carrier-borne reconnaissance aircraft were unlikely to be of very hgih performance it was argued that the fighters to intercept them need not be of very high performance either. These views, taken with the concept that naval fighters should be capable of attacking enemy aircraft carriers and putting their flight decks out of action with machine gun fire and by dive bombing attacks with light bombs so as to immobilise their aircraft very early on in a fleet action led to the Skua, a dive bomber with a fixed gun armament and just sufficient performance to fulfil the now secondary task of defending the fleet against enemy shadowing aircraft. Thus by the late 1930s the single-seat fighter had all but disappeared from the Navy except for the small force of Sea Gladiators which was retained to protect the older carriers, Furious, Glorious, Courageous and Eagle, whose flgith decks were not armoured and whose anti-aircraft fire was not yet up to the latest standards."
"It should be remembered that until the late 1930s the single-seat fighter suffered from severe limitation, especially at sea. It had no bad-weather capability, no navigation capability when out of sight of land or the fleet, very little night capability, very restricted range and firepower and no radio communication air-to-air or air-to-ship. Their Lordships could hardly be expected to commit the safety of the Fleet to such a dubious mode of defence. The gunnery policy, however, failed to take fully into account the advances made in the late 1930s in the land based bomber in terms of speed, range and bomb load or the extent to which the Fleet in war would find itself operating within range of such shore based bombers."
"This was to be brought home forcibly to the Admiralty very early in the war when on 25 September 1939 the Home Fleet put to sea from Scapa Flow to cover the rescue by the cruisers and destroyers of Humber Force of a British submarine in trouble near the Horns Reef off the coast of Denmark. The Home Fleet included the aircraft carrier Ark Royal with the Skuas of 800 and 803 Sqns on board and the battlecruiser Hood. Early next day the fleet was detected by three German reconnaissance flying boats (Do 18s) and in accordance with their design function the Skuas were launched to intercept. One of the flying boats was destroyed by a Skua of 803 Sqn (the first German aircraft to be destroyed by the Fleet Air Arm in the war) but the other two managed to escape to radio a sighting report back to base."
"The result was an attack on the fleet by four Ju 88s from the Island of Sylt operating as dive bombers in the course of which one of the Ju 88s planted a 1,000 lb bomb just off Ark Royal's bow throwing a huge wall of water over the forward end of her flight deck and another scored a hit on HMS Hood, fortunately without the bomb exploding. This was a let off for both ships and significantly no German aircraft were destroyed by anti-aircraft fire. Weather conditions were overcast, which no doubt influenced both the effectiveness of the German attack and the ships' anti-aircraft fire but obviously the incident called into question the wisdom of having no high performance interceptor fighters at sea."
Claimed to shot down or shot down?
577 B5N1s, 16 B5N2s and 55 D3A-1s produced by 1 Jul 40 and 577B5N1s, 106 B5N2s and 118 D3A-1s by 31 Dec 40.
The fixed wing A6Ms were carrier capable but the elevator clearence was so tight that IJN decided that it was better use them as land-based fighters. I cannot find out when the Model 21 (with folding wingtips) was included in IJN CAGs but it seems that when Hiruy operated off Hainan in Sept. 40 it still had A5M4s in her fighter component. So you might well be right that A6M wasn't a 1940 CV fighter but 1941.
Here's the complement of the IJN's newest fleet CV in Dec 1939:
Hiryu: 12/1939; 16 A5M2 20 D1A2 38 B4Y1
HIRYU aircraft carrier (1939) - Aircraft Carriers - Aircraft Carrying Ships - Japan - Ships - Navypedia
So except for the A5M2 the rest are biplanes.
Kaga in Dec 1940 after re-entering service after a rebuild:
So Kaga in Dec 1940 still operated the A5M along with biplane TBs and DBs.
We have discussed how the Firefly had a delayed entry into service after their nominal production starts and it is pretty obvious that the same held true for the Zero, Val and Kate. One look at the B5N1 specs and it's 770hp engine, should be enough to cause any cautious researcher serious doubts about it's ability to operate off a CV while carrying a worthwhile weapons load.
This is not the point and you guys are aware of it. You're haggling over petty semantics and avoiding the fact that the IJN's potential in 1940 - whether these aircraft had indeed embarked on carriers or not was still greater and more advanced than anything the FAA had in service in 1940 or in the next year or two. As has been repeatedly demonstrated, the two-seat fighter, regardless of when it entered service was an outdated pre-war concept based on FAA doctrine that had been found to be lacking once the war began.
Actually it is a very ill considered passage that betrays Quill's ignorance of RN and FAA doctrine and operational practice.
The older CVs operated the GSG because their lifts were large enough to accommodate a fixed wing fighter, while the 4 newer fleet carriers (The non Armoured Flight Deck Ark Royal and the 3 Illustrious type AFD CVs) had smaller lifts that forced the use of folding wing aircraft including fighters. This was the reason for the reliance on the Skua on Ark Royal and the why the Fulmar was rushed into service.
Quill's reasoning falls apart when he states that it was overcast...how exactly does a single seat fighter mount an interception when it can't see the enemy's approach and the fleet is not yet equipped with radar? How many times was the IJN's carriers caught with their pants down by Allied bombers? I can think of at least twice in 1942. In fact in a pre-radar scenario it is the twin seat fighter with long endurance, to mount standing patrols, and an extra pair of eyes that will have the best probability of visually spotting an approaching aircraft, although it must be emphasized that the probability of any fighter interception in typical North Atlantic conditions is very low especially considering the IJN's experiences in the IO and Pacific. The RN conducted it's first radar directed interception late on April 23 1940 when HMS Carlisle used her type 280 radar to direct Ark Royal's Skuas onto an approaching flight of He-111s. A few months later Illustrious would be using her Fulmars to perfect naval radar GCI. The very idea that the RN would not attempt to make a fighter interception in favour of AA is completely ludicrous.
Thanks for the IJN CAG info but if you think that B5N1 had inadequate power with 770hp engine how about Swordfish with 690hp engine? And when operated from rather small Ryujo in the Bay of Bengal one B5N1 managed to drop a 800kg bomb during the attack on an Indian harbour Vizagapatan, usually they carried around 500kg loads during that operation.
Juha
And this alone betrays your ignorance and your refusal to let go of a pre-war policy that had little justification in the war. Clearly every other carrier armed nation preferred single-seat fighter defences before and during WW2 to the FAA's approach. It was the FAA that changed its policy - as Quill states, not any other nation. Remember, the RNAS instigated ship based aircraft during WW1 and introduced single-seat fighters aboard seaplane tenders firstly in the form of Bristol Scouts and Sopwith Pups and Camels, then HMS Furious and Argus once those two ships entered RN service. The Fairey Flycatcher was one of the best inter-war biplane fighters amd served the FAA well. Quill is right; the FAA changed its policy. So it is you who is ill considered.
You haven't provided anything that justifies your statement that Quill's quote is not accurate. It's fact and when time and time again evidence has been provided that singe-seat fighters were the way ahead in modern carrier warfare, you just won't accept it. How can you sit there and make such a unqualified and - using your words - ill considered statement when Quill was there and his words are clearly right? "obviously the incident called into question the wisdom of having no high performance interceptor fighters at sea." Both the IJN and USN flew long range sorties in their single-seat fighters in the Pacific, which totally nullifies the FAA's reasons for hanging on to two-seat fighters.
Claiming that fighters would not have made a difference due to the weather again betrays your ignorance. Many combat ops at sea were flown in overcast conditions and yes, it does affect accuracy, but if there were single-seat fighters swarming about, the Ju 88s would not have had much chance to affect an attack. You don't necessarily need radar at such close range.
It certainly is the point. What aircraft the IJN actually had on their carriers in 1940 shows the real state of affairs. In Dec 1940, in contrast to Kaga, Ark Royal would be operating a squadron of Fulmars, a squadron of Skuas and several squadrons of Swordfish for about 54-60 aircraft total, so while Ark Royal has fewer aircraft they are not inferior to Kaga's. In late 1941/42 the crippling effects of the BofB's effect on FAA production and development and the loss of 3 fleet CVs (one in 39/40/41) reduced the FAA to a low ebb but without war and/or without the loss of so many fleet CVs the RN would have retained both numerical and qualitative superiority over the IJN in 1940 and up to mid 1941.
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wuzak
Captain
wuzak
Captain
A nicer place for a Griffon.....
The Swordfish's Pegasus III was TO rated at 775hp at SL. The Swordfish was also lighter, had 50% more wing area and weighed about 1000lb less.
If Ryujo actually had B5N1s it would probably have taken a very windy day for one to get airborne on such a short flight deck.
They seems to be at that time B5N1s and more probably the plane carrying the 800kg bomb was just the last to take off (max t/o lenght) and flown by the most experienced pilot. After all specs for B5N1 demanded ability to carry 800kg torpedo or that weight in bombs. Of course normal take off with 800kg torpedo was thought to happen from faster and longer 1-line CVs and at least when operating from smaller Ryujo, at least during that Bengal op, the usual load seems to have been 500kg
Again, the IJN had lots of SS fighters at Midway yet the SBD's made their drops undetected...leading to the slaughter of their non-armoured flight deck carriers. In April 1942 9 RAF Blenheims attacked the IJN CVs off Ceylon, and they were undetected until the bombs hit the water. It was the USN's use of radar that allowed the SS fighter to be truly viable. The Admiralty and the FAA were never opposed to SS fighters, but they were realistic about their actual potential in a pre-radar environment. If you have to mount standing patrols, then a 2 seat fighter will have a better chance of detecting and thus intercepting an approaching force of strike aircraft.
The fact is that Quill's book and his description of the FAA's requests for folding wing Seafires is a lot more complex than you imply. The Admiralty, according to Quill requested 50 folding wing Seafires in Jan 1940 (after making preliminary inquiries), but it was the RAF who argued against the request due to anticipated development time, and the loss of 200 Spitfires to the RAF from the already low Spitfire production numbers leading the Admiralty to drop the request. By 39/1940 the Admiralty and FAA were aware that Radar had the potential to make a short range, high performance SS fighter truly viable for fleet defence but events, not Admiralty or FAA incompetence, conspired to thwart the early introduction of a folding wing SS fighter although the Sea Hurricane showed up in early 1941, but by then the two largest RN carriers capable of operating them in large numbers had been lost (and not to aerial attack).
wuzak
Captain
Didn't the RN have radar before the war?
And the IJN never did?
And the IJN never did?
wuzak
Captain
Perhaps if Fairey was seconded into Seafire development and production instead of continued development and production of the not-so-brilliant Fulmar and the never-going-to-be-ready-in-time Firefly the FAA coul dhave had Seafires in late 1941, Seafire XVs in early 1943, etc.
Perhaps if the FAA said Hurricanes were all well and good for disposable catapult convoy defence fighters but not for our fleet defence fighters. And if they stuck to their guns and demanded that Seafires be built for them they may have got them - when they needed them.
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