Ideal night bomber for RAF: how would've you done it? (1 Viewer)

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I could be wrong but that proposal probably carried no armor or self sealing tanks. The provision of which would affect bomb load or range or both. what kind of defensive turrets? The DeHavilland method of construction was not the normal aircraft wooded construction and British manufacture of wooden aircraft in the 1930s was not so great that a vast surplus of experienced wooden aircraft workmen were available. Much is made of the ability to use workmen from the furniture industry. I wonder how much of that was propaganda. I know some companies contributed and did well but not every table maker could make airplanes. A big hang up when trying to build a bomber force of hundreds if not thousands of aircraft are all the bits and pieces. Landing gear capable of dealing with 40,000lb and up aircraft, brakes, Hydraulic systems that will be needed regardless of airframe material. Spitfires got 3 pitch props because the constant speed units were going to the bombers. I think trying for a big wooden bomber would have been about the same as a metal one, no earlier into service but no later.

Once again, we dont need to think, or speculate. The evidence is there if we look for it. Design work on the Avro Manchester began in 1936, infact some design work had already commenced even before the issue of the official specification. The plane was first flown in July 1939, and entered squadron service in November 1940. It had taken over 4 years to get from specification to service delivery stage.

In comparson, the specification for the mosquito was issued in early 1940. it took just eight months to get to first flight stage. I am unsure of its squadron entry, but it was first used operationally in September 1941, so i guess that will have to do. So 18 months to 48 months. i hardly think that is comparable. And this can be done for aircraft after aircraft, including those developed under wartime expediency conditions (look at the typhoon and the firefly for example)

Another claim is that there was no real benefit to wood construction, and wood was in short supply. On both counts I am highly sceptical, but i do know that there were shortages in aluminium smelting and working capability in the British aeroindustry. nobody argues about that. everybody knows that the Brits were short in their metal working and aluminium smelting industries.


So lets have a look at the alleged wood shortages and the lack of gain due to use of non-allied trades in the construction of the airframe. I dont think that anyone is arguing that it takes less time to build the airframe, or that it is any less difficult. But if it is accepted that Britain was short of metal workers qulaified to work sheet aluminium, and if even one wood worker could be used to build the airframe instead of the tradesmen in short supply, then there is a benefit to working in wood. In fact, in Australias case, the production of the 212 Mosquitoes in 1945 was a free bonus, that had minimal effect on our other programs for that very reason. We could utilize wood working trades to fabricate the airframe and skin, with very little effect on airframe production of other types. Canada was I believe able to achieve simlar results.

Working in wood was a definite advantage in terms of getting the program up and running

.....The Halifax was also carrying the structure to deal with a 13,000lb load even when it wasn't fully loaded. A Halifax built to carry just 6000lbs could have had a smaller wing, smaller landing gear, lighter spars, fuselage, etc.

Of course, we are comparing a bomb truck to a gazelle. Lighten up the bomb truck, give it wings and it will fly just like the gazelle, Im not arguing that the Albatross was anything special, im arguing that the concenpt of the defended bomber was a faulty concept, and that even with 1938 technology it was possible to build a much faster and survivable design.

You also criticised that the Albatross would probably lack armour atr the specified weight. I tend to agree, bu then, all the prewar British bombers lacked armour. Armour wasnt added until after war broke out. I dont think there was a big degradation of bomber performance as a result of armouring. Not sure why (it should have) but it just didnt happen. maybe fuel grades? why would the albatross be different?


It also took a while for the proposal to actual settle down, while wiki claims " twin Merlin engined Albatross, armed with three gun turrets and a six-man crew.[10] It would carry 6,000 pounds (2,700 kg) of bombs to Berlin and return at 11,000 feet (3,400 m). It had a total weight of 19,000 pounds (8,600 kg), a top speed of 300 miles per hour (480 km/h) and cruise speed of 268 miles per hour (431 km/h) at 22,500 feet (6,900 m)." One can see that somebody was being a bit optimistic. After all a Handley Page Hampden weighed just under 19,000lbs Normal loaded, had two gun positions (not turrets) 4 men, a top speed of 254mph and a range of 1850 miles with a 2,000lb load. Or compare it to a an Early B-25 without power turrets. A latter proposal according to one source called for " A two Merlin compromise design was arrived at on 11 August, with a bomb load of 4,000 lb., a top speed of 260 mph and a range of 1,500 miles" this in 1938. Ramping up supply hits the same roadblocks as every other program. All the bits and pieces that go into any airplane regardless of the air-frame material. And you still need jigs and fixtures wither you are building in wood or metal.


maybe, but then perhaps we should compare it with its closest relative, the mosquito, which succeeded it and was in fact based on that airframe. With a fully loaded airframe weight of around 20000 lbs with two Merlin XXI engines rated at 1230HP had a top speed of 360mph (fully loaded). As you have pointed out, you should need something like 60% more power to go from 300mph to 360mph, if you design in the "slow lane" . If an aircraft that is its closest relative can travel at 360mph, on maybe 2-300 more HP, then I dont think the company was being ambitious at all when they said they could get 300mph out of the DH91. The fact that handley page or indeed North american didnt achieve anywhere near that speed with their designs is just confirming that the specs and the respective bureaucracies that they were working for didnt place too much importance on speed, whereas DeHavilland had given speed a high priority, as did the Breguet team designing the Bre 482, and the germans working on their Snellbomber programs. Your logic here is not good......picking a design (or designs) built to the official specs....the very thing that IS the problem, and then saying "see, I told you, its not possible to get that much speed out of that design because the designs that were built to that spec with the same weight and engines couldnt do it." But what is missed in this argument is that other designs, also of the same weight and using engines not much more powerful achieved a substantial lift in top speed.




Maybe you have different sources than I do. According to the books I have the French didn't do it. Not only didn't they fly in 1940 (one flew in 1947) but the proposed bomb load was 5500lbs not 8000lbs. Max speed with 1940 engines was estimated at 326mph. Cruise speed was 248mph, range not given but with the 5500lb load full fuel was supposed to be 693imp gallons. Not a lot for four 1100hp engines. More fuel meant less bombs.
The 350mph (or above) speed was achieved post war but the engines offered 1500hp for take off and hundreds more hp at altitude than the 1940 engines.

This goes back to the technological reason. The Merlin X engine doesn't really offer the performance needed for the concept to work. The Merlin XX does, an extra 20% or more of power at 20,000ft for less than 50lbs per engine. In 1938 (Hooker goes to work at R-R in Jan) the XX isn't even a speck on the horizon and nobody's engines offer the power to weight at 20,000ft that the Merlin XX will in under two years.


I agree with for first flight dates and the max bomb loads. However the aircraft was almost ready for first flight May 1940, and in all probability would have entered service later in 1940. In gerneral concept and capability it was remarkably similar to the Albatross bomber proposal

My sources do not agree with yours with regards to top speed. According to Green the top speed was 350mph, which accords to the figures given in wiki and Breguet Br 482 - Bombardier lourd - Un sicle d'aviation franaise. . Both Green and the french Aviation website state that these speeds were attained using the Hispano Suiza 12Z engines, rated at 1350hp. These replaced the Gnome Rhone 14L engines in the 1940 prototypes, and were used in the 1947 test flights, because of technical holdups with the GR 14L engines prewar.

The speed attained in the 1947 test flights as i understand it was 350mph on these engines. We cannot make much further analysis, because the type did not progress much beyond that point, and was scrapped in 1950.
 
I'm going from memory but there were some problems with the supply of the laminated wood for Mosquito construction. I'm pretty sure that the laminating technology was American and that the material had to be shipped accross the Atlantic. I know I read about this but I'm b*ggered if I can find the reference now.
Maybe this would have impacted negatively on a project to build a couple of thousand large four engined bombers.

Edit:
From the honestly,if not enticingly,titled 'Composite World'.

"The oldest and largest balsa core manufacturer is Baltek Corp. (Northvale, N.J., U.S.A.). Founded by the Kohn family, the company began importing tropical hardwoods to Europe as early as the 1880s. The first lumber mills and facilities were established prior to World War II and supplied balsa wood to military customers like De Havilland in the U.K., which used end-grain balsa core laminated with plywood veneer for its Mosquito bomber. Today the company has five plants in Ecuador, with over 17,000 acres of balsa plantations. Baltek was recently purchased by Alcan Inc. of Canada, and is now known as Alcan Baltek Corp."


Cheers
Steve
 
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Thats a very intersting post for me. i went to the same website and derived a lot of information. Balteks products are also used extensively in marine engineering, where exposure to moisture does not seem to bother the material

DeHavillands brilliance was in taking this product and applying it to an aeronautical application. The system of stringers, and metal strengtheners is described in some detail in the Pt Cook Online museum, who i believe are undertaking a restoration of aq Mosquito, and have had to do a lot of background reseaerch into this issue. Here is an except. it doesnt contradict what you say, just gives a bit of an explanation of DeHavillands role in this.


"Like the Comet and Albatross mainplanes, de Havilland constructed Mosquito mainplanes out of shaped pieces of wood and plywood cemented together with Casein glue. Approximately 30,000 small, brass wood screws also reinforced the glue joints inside a Mosquito mainplane (another 20,000 or so screws reinforced glue joints in the fuselage and empennage). The internal mainplane structure consisted of plywood box spars fore and aft. Plywood ribs and stringers braced the gaps between the spars with space left over for fuel tanks and engine and flight controls. Plywood ribs and skins also formed the mainplane leading edges and flaps but de Havilland framed-up the ailerons from aluminium alloy and covered them with fabric. Sheet metal skins enclosed the engines and metal doors closed over the main wheel wells when the pilot retracted the landing gear.

To cover the mainplane structure and add strength, de Havilland woodworkers built two top mainplane skins and one bottom skin using birch plywood. The top skins had to carry the heaviest load so the designers also beefed them up with birch or Douglas fir stringers cut into fine strips and glued and screwed between the two skins. The bottom skin was also reinforced with stringers. Together the top and bottom skins multiplied the strength of the internal spars and ribs. A Mosquito mainplane could withstand rigorous combat manoeuvring at high G-loads when the aircraft often carried thousands of additional pounds of fuel and weapons. To maintain strength, trim weight, and speed fabrication time, the entire mainplane and spar was finished as a single piece, wingtip to wingtip, with no break where the wing bisected the fuselage. A finished and painted mainplane was light and strong with a smooth surface unblemished by drag inducing nail or rivet heads.

De Havilland engineers and technicians used generally the same techniques to construct the Comet, Albatross, and Mosquito mainplanes out of wood and plywood. When they designed and built the fuselage, however, they copied the methods and materials employed to build the Albatross fuselage. This airliner was the product of the brilliant mind of Arthur E. Hagg, de Havilland's Chief Draftsman in 1937. He left the company that same year but his ideas lived on in the Mosquito. Hagg created a light, strong, very streamlined structure by sandwiching 9.5mm Ecuadorian balsa wood between Canadian birch plywood skins that varied in thickness from 4.5mm to 6mm. The plywood/balsa/plywood sandwich was formed inside concrete moulds of each fuselage half, and each mould held seven birch plywood formers reinforced with spruce blocks, plus bulkheads, floors, and other structural members. As the glue cured, metal clamps held the skin layers tight to the mould. Technicians finished the edge of each half of the fuselage with male and female wedge joints as fitters attached wiring and other equipment to the inner walls. Final fuselage assembly was reminiscent of a typical plastic model aircraft kit as the two halves were glued and screwed together. Fabricators completed the final step in building the fuselage when they covered it with Madapolam (fabric).

To build the empennage, workers framed the rudder and elevator out of aluminium and covered the structures with fabric but the vertical and horizontal stabilisers were constructed from wood. Although the materials are different, Hagg's composite sandwich construction material is similar to the foam and fibreglass composite sandwich developed by Burt Rutan during the 1970s. The hydraulic plain flaps were wood. The coolant radiators were in the mainplane leading edge between the engines and the fuselage. The landing gear was simple twin shock struts filled with rubber blocks. Engine mounts were welded steel tube. The total weight of castings and forgings used in the aircraft was a mere 280lbs (127kg). "



And one point here is that I cannot find anything here that suggests any shortage of the materials.......

some utube material on the Mosquito production, to try and help understand some of its advantages.


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vf-x7tLgDbQ


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DDPkwI5-dhM



View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qmY99snA_po
 
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I wonder what a single engine fighter built in the same fashion as the Mossie would have performed like.
 
Out of curiosity, what should be weights dimensions of a Vulture-powered, 2-engined fast bomber (we'd put the reliability issues to the side for the time being)?
 
This is a situation where SRs point about technology and engine power being the limiting factor. he is absolutely right to make that point, and nowhere is it more apparent than with the unhappy Manchester. Its Vulture engines were designed to deliver an impressive 1760 HP. if the engines had delivered that amount of power, the manchester would easily have attained a cruising speed of 300mph. Specification 13/36 had specified a cruising speed of 275mp, but with the company forced to downrate the engines because of reliability issues with this engine to a little over 1400HP, the performance of the Manchester suffered greatly. Instead of the promised performance, it delivered an aircraft with a maximum speed of 265mph and a cruising speed loaded of just 185mph, and then only when operating at 15000 feet or below.

If the Vulture had delivered the engine power that had been promised for it, the Manchester would have had a top speed in excess of 300 mph and a cruising speed loaded of around 245 mph. A little bit of lightening up and refinement of the aircraft aerodynamics could conceivably have delivered an aircraft with a cruising speed loaded of around 265mph, carrying a bombload of around 10000lbs. It was never to achieve that outcome
 
Out of curiosity, what should be weights dimensions of a Vulture-powered, 2-engined fast bomber (we'd put the reliability issues to the side for the time being)?

Code:
                 HP HSB             Manchester I          HP HP.56
Span           88'6"/27.0m          90'1"/27.5m         85'0"/25.9m
Length         71'6"/21.8m         68'10"/21.0m         66'6"/20.3m
Wing Area     988ft²/91.9m²       1131ft²/105.2m²      975ft²/90.7m²
Max weight  36,500lb/11,162kg    50,000lb/22,680kg   39,000lb/17,690kmh
Engines        2 x Vulture          2 x vulture         2 x Vulture
Max Speed     380mph/611km/h       265mph/426kmh       320mph/515kmh

HP.56 was the predecessor to the Halifax (HP.57).
 
This is a situation where SRs point about technology and engine power being the limiting factor. he is absolutely right to make that point, and nowhere is it more apparent than with the unhappy Manchester. Its Vulture engines were designed to deliver an impressive 1760 HP. if the engines had delivered that amount of power, the manchester would easily have attained a cruising speed of 300mph. Specification 13/36 had specified a cruising speed of 275mp, but with the company forced to downrate the engines because of reliability issues with this engine to a little over 1400HP, the performance of the Manchester suffered greatly. Instead of the promised performance, it delivered an aircraft with a maximum speed of 265mph and a cruising speed loaded of just 185mph, and then only when operating at 15000 feet or below.

Thank you, The point in time that the decision has to made as to which way to go is critical. Tomo posted a graph in P-39 thread than had the different Merlin engines in color bands. While it did not have the Merlin X and Merlin XX engines they are just two speed versions of the Merlin III and Merlin 45. The Merlin XX and 45 have the supercharger as modified by Hooker. At between 17,500 ft and 18500 ft the Merlin XX gives about 100-120hp more than the Merlin X (my previous estimate was in error). More importantly for a fast bomber is that one reference gives a cruise rating of 865hp at 2600rpm at 13,000ft to the Merlin X and and 1040hp at 2650rpm at 16,000ft for the Merlin XX engine. Adjusting at 2% per 1000ft for height the Merlin XX will have over a 200hp advantage or almost 28% more power at 16,000ft in cruise.
When did R-R tell the air ministry or the air frame makers about the Merlin XX?

Please note that ALL engines available to the air frame makers had superchargers about on a par with the one in Merlin III/X in 1938 and 1939 (American turbo charged engines excepted and they were having problems). Since the Merlin XX went into production in the summer of 1940 we can assume that it passed it's tests a bit earlier than that and that design work had started even earlier. Very late 1938 or some time in 1939?

If you are trying to make a high speed bomber in 1938 without the Merlin XX your engines are going to max out at around 15,000-16,000ft. Even with Ram top speed and top cruising speed are going to be couple of thousand feet under 20,000ft, top cruise may be at 15,000ft. This gives away a little too much altitude to intercepting fighters to climb above and dive down. The Vulture was rated at 1710hp at 3000rpm at 15,000ft but the same book claims 1460hp at 2600rpm at 12,500ft in cruise (or 1360hp at 16,000ft ?). This is without the down rating.
With the power available can you make a fast enough airplane that can carry a worth while bomb load?

We know what the Mosquito did with the Merlin XX, the question is what using Merlin X engines would have done to the performance. Not just level speed but climb and take-off? would it have required either less fuel or a lighter bomb load?

The Merlin XX was a game changer for the British. Once they know it is coming the idea of a fast bomber gets a lot more attractive.

American equivalents might be the A-20 and B-25 without turrets, 1600-1700 hp engines for take off but they don't have the needed speed at altitude.

Even a 4 engine version isn't going to change the operating altitudes much.
 
Data on the Rolls-Royce Vulture from the RRHT:

Vulture II - takeoff power 1800hp @ 3200rpm, +6psi boost - max 3 minutes
Vulture IV/V - takeoff power 1955hp @ 3200rpm, +9psi boost - max 3 minutes

Operating limits for all marks:
Max climb - 30 minutes at 2850rpm, +6psi boost (also max one engine out for Manchester)
Cruise in auto weak - continuous at 2600rpm, +2psi boost

The full throttle heights for the Vulture were 4000ft in Moderate Supercharge (MS) gear and 13,500ft in Full Supercharge (FS) gear.

Vulture II
(MS gear):
Max t/o (SL) - 1800bhp, 3200rpm, 6lb boost, 162gph;
Max climb - 1700bhp, 2850rpm, 6lb boost, 142.5gph;
Max cruise - 1480bhp, 2600rpm, 5lb boost, 0.61 pt/bhp/hr
(FS gear):
Max climb - 1455bhp, 2850rpm, 6lb boost, 134.5gph;
Max cruise - 1290bhp, 2600rpm, 5lb boost, 0.66 pt/bhp/hr

Note that the Vulture supercharger was before Hooker as well, so had it continued it would have benefitted from the same improvements as the Merlin XX/45.
 
I think for a high speed bomber carrying a load greater than 4000lb will need a pair of Vultures (or Sabres). I'm not sure that a 4 engined fast bomber is the solution - unless it is fast enough that it can fly in straight lines all the time (like the Republic XF-12 Rainbow).
 
with the Manchester, disregarding the reliability, but assuming a return of 1450HP instead of 1760HP, then the solution to making it a viable bomber is simple. There was nothing wrong with the airframe, in fact it was an advanced design.....what had to hapopen however once the power outputs of the engines was lost, was a reduction in airframe weight. The least importahnt element of the design, by miles, aree its defensive guns. Ditch them, and clean up the aerodynamics a bit and I will bet you boffins will calculate a top speed of around 280-300mph. It might also take a reduction in bombload....so instead of carrying 8-10000 lbs of ordinance we have a bomber carrying 6-8000 lbs.

Im not sure if the manchester was armoured or not, but the Lanc was (I think....but only around the pilot....will stand corrected if I am wrong), so should be able to assume armouring on a similar scale for the Manchester. So which is the better proposition....a Manchester powered by a problematic engine, unarmed, carrying 8000lbs of bombs able to cruise at say 300mph at 15000 ft, but with bombload a cruise speed of 220 mph, or, an Albatrross, probably unarmoured, but with three defensive weapoins, able to cruise at about 300 mph, and by rough extrapolation from the mossie, its nearest relative, a cruising speed with bombs of about 260 mph, and carrying about 5000 lbs of bombs, at an altitude of about 11-12000 feet. Unit costs and ramp up in production for the Albatross would be slightly easier.

so which is the better alternative...
 
Data on the Rolls-Royce Vulture from the RRHT:

Vulture II - takeoff power 1800hp @ 3200rpm, +6psi boost - max 3 minutes
Vulture IV/V - takeoff power 1955hp @ 3200rpm, +9psi boost - max 3 minutes

Operating limits for all marks:
Max climb - 30 minutes at 2850rpm, +6psi boost (also max one engine out for Manchester)
Cruise in auto weak - continuous at 2600rpm, +2psi boost

The full throttle heights for the Vulture were 4000ft in Moderate Supercharge (MS) gear and 13,500ft in Full Supercharge (FS) gear.

Vulture II
(MS gear):
Max t/o (SL) - 1800bhp, 3200rpm, 6lb boost, 162gph;
Max climb - 1700bhp, 2850rpm, 6lb boost, 142.5gph;
Max cruise - 1480bhp, 2600rpm, 5lb boost, 0.61 pt/bhp/hr
(FS gear):
Max climb - 1455bhp, 2850rpm, 6lb boost, 134.5gph;
Max cruise - 1290bhp, 2600rpm, 5lb boost, 0.66 pt/bhp/hr

Note that the Vulture supercharger was before Hooker as well, so had it continued it would have benefitted from the same improvements as the Merlin XX/45.

Quoted from 'It was fun', by Tony Rudd (ex Rolls Royce, ex BRM, ex Lotus) :
p 34

"[ about Rolls Royce entering the civilian market after the war ] ...
Rolls Royce realized that their image suffered, unfairly, from the
Avro Manchester debacle, they determined not to let it happen again.
Wartime aviation books tell future generations that the Manchester was
nearly a good aircraft, ruined by the dreadful Rolls Royce Vulture. It
is just not true. The Vulture was not a world beater like the Merlin;
it lacked the elegant simplicity of the Merlin, which had Sir Henry Royce
written all over it, and not an ounce of surplus metal anywhere. The
Vulture (42 litres of it) was two Peregrines on a common crankcase -
workmanlike but not inspired. However, it did give its designed 1780hp
but it had to work much harder than anticipated to propel an aeroplane
30% overweight and 22% up on aerodynamic drag. It suffered from cooling
problems, mainly because of the aircraft installation, and the propellers
were prone to run away. The unfortunate pilot saw all these just as
Vulture engine failures. Rolls Royce, with lofty disdain for publicity,
never bothered to tell him that the engines were working some 45% harder
than they were designed to do. If the Vulture had been given two-piece
blocks and a central entry blower as was the Merlin, it could have coped.
'Hs' [ E.W. Hives, Director and Works Manager] and his advisors realised
that this was a waste, finding more power to bring an inefficient aircraft
back to specification. The same factories and labour could produce many
more engines and specific horsepower by concentrating on Merlins to the
exclusion of all else. This was taken by some aircrews and sloppy
historians as an admission by Rolls Royce that the Vulture was a failure.


Avros - certainly their chief designed, Roy Chadwick - were fully aware
of the Manchester's shortcomings and the reasons why. They made sure
that when the Lancaster went into service it was down to its design
weight and surpassed its aerodynamic performance targets, with a contrib-
ution by Witold Challier, the Rolls Royce aerodynamicist..."

There supposedly also was an issue with the big end bearings (where the 4 con
rods connect onto the cranshaft) not being big enough for greater sustained
power levels. (I believe Vulture didn't have a king rod, just 4 forked conrods)

The Giffon was soon enough, 1942, producing 1850hp on the Spitfire XII.

One problem that Junkers experienced with the Jumo 222, which was an
extremely compact and powerfull engine, was the orbital forces on the bigend
bearing 'squeezed' out the lubrication, a problem seen on radials and V12
but not to such an extent as the compact Jumo 222.

Clearly the Lancaster opperated with 4 x 1280hp (5120 hp) which is a
lot more than the 4000hp the Vulture could provide; the vulture would
need to opperate at somewhere between 15psi and 18psi to achieve
that total, something the Merlin didn't seem to achieve till late 42 or early 43.
 
The Vulture used a master rod with 3 articulated rods attached.

A central entry supercharger would have helped both altitude performance and even peak power ratings, it would have done nothing for rod failures. in fact it might have made them worse. Think about it. If you are having rod failures on a race car why would putting a bigger carburetor on the engine, that lets it make more power, fix the rod problem?

Rolls- Royce claims to have fixed the rod problem but the fix had nothing to do with either the supercharger or the 2 piece cylinder block.
 
The reason I was asking for supposed figures about 2-Vulture, unarmed bomber, is in this time line:
-RAF issues RFP for unarmed bomber
-Avro, or HP, or both, develop their planes
-as soon as issues with Vulture are known, one/both companies develop 4-Merlin XX versions of their planes

So, we start with something akin to HP HSB, ending with it's 4 engined variant that can do anything as Lanc or Hallibag were up to, but also able to out-pace LW NFs, while making German 88/L56s obsolete.
 
Since a big part of the night bomber campaign would be the use of incendiary devices i might expand on a medium to large sized bomber like the Lanc, focusing on
the bombbay compartment to hold a max load and increase in spread. Probably something similar to how they converted post war B-25s and 26s to firefighter aircraft.

A new plane similar to a C-130 could be possible.
200px-YC-130s_formation_usaf.jpg

A large cargo bay that could hold a larger load of incendiary sticks.
The more you can carry the less bombers you'd need.
With less flak to worry about at night i don't see a light armored cargo ship being more than effective in this roll.
Rather than relying on 10 Lancs, you might only require 3 or 4 of these to do the incendiary part.



ahhh, here they are.

C-54

converted for bomber use primarily for dropping incendiary sticks.

300px-C-54-skymaster.jpg
 
You don't gain much, if anything, with C-54. Max speed 274mph at 14,000ft. Maximum cruising speed ( max cruising power) 239mph at 15,200ft. more importantly, range with 16,500lbs of cargo is 1500 miles at 220mph at 10,000ft. Please note that this is not flying in formation. Service ceiling is 22,500ft There are no self sealing tanks. After the fuselage is chopped up to put in bomb bay doors and the floor is modified to get bomb bay space a little of the cargo weight may go away. max take-off weight is 65,000lbs.
 
You don't gain much, if anything, with C-54. Max speed 274mph at 14,000ft. Maximum cruising speed ( max cruising power) 239mph at 15,200ft. more importantly, range with 16,500lbs of cargo is 1500 miles at 220mph at 10,000ft. Please note that this is not flying in formation. Service ceiling is 22,500ft There are no self sealing tanks. After the fuselage is chopped up to put in bomb bay doors and the floor is modified to get bomb bay space a little of the cargo weight may go away. max take-off weight is 65,000lbs.
watch the end of this 30 sec vid c54 bombing
http://www.youtube.com/results?sear...usters&spell=1&suggested_categories=24,1&sa=X
 
In the original thread, the discussion was about an ideal night bomber; how would we have done it, so traditional theories of what constituted a successful bomber don't necessarily apply; after all, with combat experience, both the British and Americans - and the Germans realised that what they had been doing wasn't necessarily the best way to do the job. Both the Brits and Americans initially thought going bigger was better; the Brits proposed their '100 Ton Bomber'; the Bristol Brabazon transport was the aerodynamic equivalent to Bristol's version of what this was to be in their eyes. The Americans followed this philosophy with the B-36. The Germans went on to guided missiles, as well as maintaining a force of night bombers to pepper away at the British Isles, which they continuously did throughout the war.

As its core the Manchester was an excellent design failed by poor engines, so despite faults in the electrical systems and other things, its basic concept (minus the ground catapult aspect of the specification - thank heaven) went throughout the war in the Lancaster. Handley Page's approach, after clearing up the considerable mess that the Halifax had originally been - it was a disaster to begin with; many faults that required rectifying, there was a proposal to use the cleaned up fuselage of the Mk.III with a clean, high aspect ratio wing very similar to the Davis wing fitted to the B-24. This would have bestowed considerably better performance on the beleagured Halifax.

Another concept that was worthy of further development was W.E.W 'Teddy' Petter's 'A-1 Bomber' project, which he was working on with Westland, but after his departure, of course this was modified and refined into the English Electric Canberra. Essentially the A-1 looked like a Canberra, but with its engines buried in the fuselage.

So, a theoretical 'ideal' British night bomber would be something like a cross between a Mosquito, a Lancaster and perhaps a Canberra - jets, anyone? In reality, this was the way it was heading anyways, so why not? A clean aerodynamic fuselage without defensive armament (remember this is my ideal bomber:)), high cruise speed, good endurance, not to mention an extensive avionics suite - we always forget about the avionics - without them British bombers were swanning about at night bombing cows and river beds miles from their target areas. The aircraft needs Gee or Oboe and H2S, to begin with.

Bombing avionics was what really changed the night bombing arena, not necessarily bigger bombers with better defensive armament, or even jet engines - the reason why the V Bombers had no defensive armament was because they were equipped with jamming equipment that could blind any search radar that existed at the time. Developing effective night bombing aids was initially led by the very clever Germans and their X-gerat sets being based in the same boxes as the Lorenz blind landing equipment, concealed so British intelligence wouldn't find them when they crashed. In 1940 the Germans had the most accurate bombing force in the world and held that lead for another two years after - at least.

Powerplant - lets go with a jet powered version and a piston as insurance. Piston, probably Merlin 100 series, jet, would have to be what was available - Power Jets W1 or RR Welland, maybe Halford H.1 (someone hurry up and develop an effective axial flow gas turbine... Metrovick), bomb load up to 10,000 lb as an ideal figure, probably at the lower end of the scale - this is beginning to sound like this theoretical four engined Mossie.

An interesting proposition was raised in Leo McKinstry's excellent book on the Lancaster; he stated that there were those in the British Air Staff that were in favour of scrapping big bomber production in favour of producing more Mosquitoes and equipping all the heavy bomber squadrons with them. Good idea? Personnel losses would be far lower for a start... Sounds like a great thread idea...
 
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