How good a plane was the P-40, really?

[PAT303]

The Fiesla series was a modernisation of the Emil based on wartime experience the same as the Spitfire MkIII was going to be on the MkI/II, war advances development.

 

[pinehilljoe]

I picked 1943 for a reason. They just didn't "turn off" the production lines for the P-40 and P-39 in 1944, it took a number of months to wind things down. Perhaps if they really needed more P-51s (with engines from where?) they just would have shoved hundreds of P-40s in various stages and piles and piles of parts out the doors, followed them with the jigs and fixtures and tooled up to make P-51s. How many months where nothing is coming out of the factory?
Nov 1943 was the last time Curtiss built over 400 P-40s in one month. Dec was 200, Jan-March bounced from a high of 283 to a low of 241, April saw 203 and and Sept saw 202, several months during the summer saw numbers under 100 per month.

Bell was more sudden, they dropped from making 4947 P-39s in 1943 to 1729 in 1944, Aug saw the last 13 P-39s, of course Bell built 1725 P-63s in 1944. Curtiss was building ????? after the P-40. What do you do with the workers? The Curtiss plant was hundreds or thousands of mile from the other aircraft plants. Maybe Curtiss made B-29 ailerons as a subcontractor?

Planning was looking several years down the road, then "stuff" happens. Sometimes good (only took a few months to stuff the Merlin into the P-51) sometimes bad (Continental engine and few other US engines, Sabre engine/Vulture).
Hawker got "stuffed". They had 3 airframes flying with 3 different engines in 1940/41. NONE of them were combat ready in 1941-42. The Sabre is questionable for at least part of 1943(longer?). The Centaurus finally shows up in 1945. 3-4 years late.

Of course not only did Hawker get stuffed. So the RAF (and maybe Westland

The RAF needs something, anything, to tide them over, even if they want to build more Spitfires that is going to months (over 12) to get any real numbers and you need some sort of fighters in NA, in the Far East and to send to Uncle Joe and you need them NOW!
Meetings with Napier could have been done with wire recordings or playing phonograph records, "We are working on it and everything should be fine next month" on repeat. repeat. repeat.
The Hurricane II was never going to be in front once the 109F showed up. Then they stuck the four 20mms in (bomber interceptor?) and then it was ground attack pretty quickly.
With the Sabre (Vulture/Centaurus ) fiasco what choice did the RAF have? They were buying (begging) all the P-40s they could get.

and again, it takes months, and months, to change factories over. Even in 1941/42 (?) Curtiss had 7 parallel production lines running. 7 complete sets of tooling.

It is hard to believe at its peak in 1945, Curtis was a larger company than General Motors, and yet was not able to transition to the jet era, design jet planes, an in house jet engine, or get a piece of what would be the very lucrative pilotless aircraft (tactical and strategic missile) business.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

Sometimes I think firms get too big, especially on very lucrative government contracts. They can kind of bloat themselves to death.

 

[BarnOwlLover]

Same thing happened to Packard. After they stopped making Merlins for P-51s and early F-82s (P-51 left mass production by Dec. 1945, only 22 XP-82s and P-82B/C/D got made, not to mention that Packard let the license lapse as they didn't want to pay Rolls-Royce's $6K per engine licensing fee that R-R was pushing for post war), Packard slowly faded away in the post war years as an auto manufacturer. I believe in the mid 50s it was absorbed by Studebaker, which itself wasn't in great shape then, either.

 

[GrauGeist]

Curtiss had quite a few irons in the fire aside from the P-40, although they had a Messerschmitt-like obsession with trying create something better out of the P-40 instead of a clear sheet build. I get the idea Curtiss (and Messerschmitt) had with trying to incorporate existing components, but at some point, the decision must be made to step away and start fresh. Neither did and spent far too much time and money trying to be thrifty.

Curtiss also had several prototypes like the XF14C, XP-62, XP-55, XBTC, XBT2C and the mixed power XF15C. Some held promise but arrived too late.

The one star in the lot, though, was the SC-1, which was perhaps one of the best floatplaness of the war. Arriving late in the war, it never had a chance to prove itself.

 

[Frog]

Just my 2 c about the overlap of obsolescent models while much more performing ones were produced.

You have the situation with the car industry.

An example as this site is full of beloved Citroën fans : the last high performance 2CV was produced in 1988 in France, and 1990 in Portugal because of the EU environmental restrictions.

 

[WARSPITER]

Even Germany had similar problems with 'next generation' planes. The ME-210 series had it's first examples ready in 1939
but there were so many problems it didn't enter production until April 1942. Even then production was stopped due to pilot
complaints and the BF 110 was put back into production.

Not always easy to gain a clear transition.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

Even Germany had similar problems with 'next generation' planes. The ME-210 series had it's first examples ready in 1939
but there were so many problems it didn't enter production until April 1942. Even then production was stopped due to pilot
complaints and the BF 110 was put back into production.

Not always easy to gain a clear transition.

Not just Me 210. The He 177 was an extreme example of that. I know this is hotly debated but it seems like they could have had the 262 in action as a fighter a good bit earlier than they did. They never came up with a real replacement for the Bf 109 either. The Fw 190 was excellent for it's time, but it too, arguably, kind of hit a wall. Even the Ta 152 wasn't necessarily superior to the end of the war Allied fighters.

Basically IMO, the Germans had best or second best military aircraft in every category from 1940-42 (with exceptions like the Spitfire). Their bombers, particularly the Stuka, were very important to their success.

But they never really replaced the Stuka. And by 1943, they were starting to fall behind. The Fw 190 had it's fearsome moment in 42-43. They managed to keep upgrading the Bf 109 to stay competitive, but it still had the inherent limitations on range which really limited it's utility.

The 262 was a quantum leap, but they never got enough into service. Maybe it was impossible to iron out all the issues with a jet engine in time.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

Just my 2 c about the overlap of obsolescent models while much more performing ones were produced.

You have the situation with the car industry.

An example as this site is full of beloved Citroën fans : the last high performance 2CV was produced in 1988 in France, and 1990 in Portugal because of the EU environmental restrictions.

Similar with the Volkswagen beetle or bus. There was still a market for those and they were making them in Mexico until 2003. If they let them sell those in the US or Europe today I bet they would make a mint. Same with say, a 1960s era Ford Mustang or Chevy pickup truck etc., or a 1970s Datsun. Something you could fix easily and keep running out of your garage. There would be a huge market for that I think.

The problem I guess is that if you did that, people might buy one car and keep it for 40 -50 years instead of buying a new one every five or ten years.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

Veering that line of thought back toward WW2 fighters...

I have a car broken down right now with what will probably turn out to be a bad sensor. I'm not sure if I really need or want the sensor, though in aggregate I like the car and appreciate many new features it has compared to a 2CV.

In WW2, newer fighters, particularly the Allied and Japanese ones, promised many benefits but came with a lot of new technologically sophisticated systems that were hard to keep working properly in the (often miserable, dangerous, primitive) conditions in the field. They also had new systems that weren't working 100% correctly and needed to be modified to fully ready for war-service.

The turbos on the P-38 and P-47. Various systems in the F4U. The Sabre engine for the Typhoon and all kinds of other issues. Running a DB 600 clone in the Tropics for the Ki-61, various issues with the bigger motors on the Ki-44 and N1K etc., posed a lot of nearly insurmountable challenges. There was also a learning curve just adapting to using these new planes. The P-47 was the size of two regular fighters. The P-38 had two engines. This meant lower serviceability / availability rates for combat, and fewer pilots who could fully utilize the new advantages.

So in 1943, a Ki-43 or an F4F or P-40 still looks like a pretty good option, assuming the plane is still good enough, with or without special tactics, to survive in combat against the enemy aircraft it encounters.

At the same time, a P-39 or Hurricane ... or a Ki-27, doesn't seem to be cutting it any more. So it's kind of a tightrope.

 

[GregP]

It is hard to believe at its peak in 1945, Curtis was a larger company than General Motors, and yet was not able to transition to the jet era, design jet planes, an in house jet engine, or get a piece of what would be the very lucrative pilotless aircraft (tactical and strategic missile) business.

Curtiss-Wright is still in business. Just not the aviation business.

See: www.curtisswright.com

 

[Frog]

Curtiss-Wright si still in business. Just not the aviation business.

See: www.curtisswright.com

And even after having been nailed by the Truman Committee.

 

[tomo pauk]

So in 1943, a Ki-43 or an F4F or P-40 still looks like a pretty good option, assuming the plane is still good enough, with or without special tactics, to survive in combat against the enemy aircraft it encounters.

At the same time, a P-39 or Hurricane ... or a Ki-27, doesn't seem to be cutting it any more. So it's kind of a tightrope.

Versions of the P-39 as available in 1943 were very good fighters. Not slower than any Japanese or a Soviet fighter, the P-40, let alone a Hurricane or Ki-27. Yes, range/radius was short, but they were able to rank well against the German opposition in 1943-44.

 

[PAT303]

I bet they would make a mint

I bet any car maker who made a cheap easy to fix basic car would find a ready market for them, no frills, no BS just simple cheap transport.

 

[yulzari]

I bet any car maker who made a cheap easy to fix basic car would find a ready market for them, no frills, no BS just simple cheap transport.

Sadly the competition is from second hand modern cars with all the bells and whistles. There ly always a niche market but only niche. One only has to look at the Dacia Sandero. The basic model is the cheapest on the market, it is a perfectly sound motor car but hardly any are sold as base models. Far, far more with many added extra features bumping the price up as the public want their bells and whistles. For those spending only the price of the base model you can buy a good second hand something more impressive.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

Versions of the P-39 as available in 1943 were very good fighters. Not slower than any Japanese or a Soviet fighter, the P-40, let alone a Hurricane or Ki-27. Yes, range/radius was short, but they were able to rank well against the German opposition in 1943-44.

Maybe there was a missing ingredient, but in North Africa they were pretty well slaughtered. I know the Russians did alright with them, (and loved them). Maybe the difference was the big workup they got, or maybe the climate? I don't know.

In US hands, there was only ever one P-39 ace, and quite a few of them flew in New Guinea and the Solomons. They were taken out of action (put into 'maritime patrol') pretty quickly in North Africa after a couple of very bad engagements, though they were used later in Italy as fighter-bombers.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

I agree though, on paper especially later model P-39 looks good, faster than P-40, A6M, Ki-43, Hurricane. Probably faster than most 1943 vintage Soviet planes too. Good climb rate, pretty good turn, looks like roll is fairly middling.

Maybe the pilots just needed better training.

 

[GrauGeist]

They never came up with a real replacement for the Bf 109 either.

Messerschmitt tried and just like Curtiss, envisioned using existing parts to "simplify" production of the new type.

Problem is, too much time spent on that vision detracted from any benefit that may have been gained.

For Curtiss, the P-40 "upgrades" were:
XP-46
XP-53
XP-60 and several sub-variants.

For Messerschmitt, the Bf109 "upgrades" were:
Bf109Z
Bf109T
Bf109X (not to be confused with the Bf109 V21 fitted with a P&W R-1830 project)
Me309
Me509

 

[WARSPITER]

I bet any car maker who made a cheap easy to fix basic car would find a ready market for them, no frills, no BS just simple cheap transport.

Toyota Hilux CHAMP. $20,000 and up (Australian dollars I think so less in US money). Hand wound windows in base model !!!
Only 2 speakers and so on.

Tray allows other configs such as camper, delivery van etc.

Toyota is only to going to market these in Asia as they will not be sophisticated enough for the rest of us.
Probably some issues with safety rules as well which is ridiculous considering you can ride a bicycle or
motor cycle on the road anyway.

 

[PAT303]

View attachment 764731

Toyota Hilux CHAMP. $20,000 and up (Australian dollars I think so less in US money). Hand wound windows in base model !!!
Only 2 speakers and so on.

Tray allows other configs such as camper, delivery van etc.

Toyota is only to going to market these in Asia as they will not be sophisticated enough for the rest of us.
Probably some issues with safety rules as well which is ridiculous considering you can ride a bicycle or
motor cycle on the road anyway.

So a 79 series Land Cruiser without the $100,000 price tag?.