Ad: This forum contains affiliate links to products on Amazon and eBay. More information in Terms and rules
That's exactly my point, no one foresaw that, heck not even the Germans expected France to fall as quickly as it did. Their hubris over it and subsequent invasions of Norway led them to belive their own hype and launch a failed attempt at subduing Britain. Without all this, perhaps British military planners might not have discovered the weakness we can so obviously see with the lens of hindsight.It was the fall of France that poked the unforeseen hole in the perfectly reasonable logic. France was to be the principal counter to Italian activity and who would have expected the Germans to be able to operate out of airfields in western and southern France? Let alone Italy with no French support, but rather French bases in Syria being used by the Luftwaffe and French bombers bombIng Gibraltar.
Problem with an 18 cylinder W engine is that they are somewhat on the heavy side.Possibly, the best engine for an Italian carrier capable TSR/TB/Strike aircraft would be a variant of the Isotta-Fraschini W18-cylinder Asso series. By the late-1930s the engine was developing upto 1200 BHP. From what I have read it was a reliable and maintainable engine. In the early-1930s the 750 BHP variant was used in the S.55 flying boat and in the Ca.111 reconnaissance plane, while the 1000 BHP variant was used to power the Ca.90 bomber.
Continuing my vendetta against drop tanks:
In early 30s, refineries were producing about 25% of what they would call gasoline via 1st run distillation. and that "gasoline" would have had an "octane" rating between 55 and 70. This "natural" gasoline would have been about 30% isopentane aka methylbutane. Isopentane is actually a pretty good fuel - octane rating of about 92 and thanks to the one triple carbon bond good energy density.
So, in WWI when we pour this natural gasoline into the upper wing tank and let gravity feed the carburetor, the engine runs fine up to the ~14k' level that humans without pressurization/oxygen can function at. Even during inter war period, when we move to fuselage fuel tanks feeding via gravity to an engine mounted pump, everything works pretty good. (Technically, it worked so well that automobiles into the 70s used this method).
But isopentane has one drawback - it boils at approximately 30°C at sea level. And that temperature decreases as you increase altitude (air pressure).
So, when you put a drop tank at end of a long pipe on the wing, and attempting to suck (lower pressure to initiate flow) petrol from the tank to the engine, the isopentane in the fuel vaporizes and you get nothing but a few vapours/ Worse, your fuel pump wasn't designed to be self priming so even when you switch back to the main tank the engine doesn't get fuel and restart. The idea is shelved as impractical.
Fast forward to very late 30s and refineries are no longer able to meet demands for gasoline with just 1st run distillation. And consumers are much fussier about the product they are receiving - they want 87 octane or better, they want their airplanes to be able to fly to 25k' or more without fuel boiling off and have fancy measuring equipment to ensure they are getting what they pay for. So, the refineries are using catalyst cracking process to make octane - specifically the 2,2,4 - trimethylpentane molecule which has a boiling point of 100°C for 90% of the product and very little of anything else for the remainder of the fuel.
Our engines are also now supercharged, so we can bleed a little compressed air off (or just add an air pump or steal some pressurized exhaust gas) and run a second line to our fuel tank(s) and keep the gasoline from boiling. (Pressurized air is also used to keep magnetos from shorting out).
Someone revisits the technology of drop tank and what 5 years before didn't work at all, now works like a charm. And there is stampede to equip planes, especially fighter with this new feature (despite it not being the perfect solution - but very little in engineer doesn't have some trade off).
So, it isn't an expensive bathtub toy versus expensive tanks, it's a viable technology to science fiction one in early/mid 30s when RM should have been building a CV.
The invasion of Norway was 9th April, the invasion of France didn't start for another month on 10th May.That's exactly my point, no one foresaw that, heck not even the Germans expected France to fall as quickly as it did. Their hubris over it and subsequent invasions of Norway led them to belive their own hype and launch a failed attempt at subduing Britain. Without all this, perhaps British military planners might not have discovered the weakness we can so obviously see with the lens of hindsight.
The invasion of Norway was 9th April, the invasion of France didn't start for another month on 10th May.
A bit of text regarding the plans to build a carrier-capable Fiat G.55, designated the G.55N,
A bit of text regarding the plans to build a carrier-capable Fiat G.55, designated the G.55N,
"The Rome Organisation, as the plan to build an Italian aircraft carrier was codenamed, led to the evaluation and testing of various aircraft types. On 28 October 1942 engineer Giovanni Pegna, who was put in charge of the ship's aeronautical installations on account of his double experience in naval and aviation design, asked Gabrielli (who had worked under him at Piaggio) to build 'a few batches' of G.55s 'suitable for carrier use'. Gabrielli replied that it would be possible to equip them with folding wings and adapt them to carry torpedoes or other launchable weapons. On 2nd November the answer was forwarded to Gen. Alberto Briganti, head of the naval aviation office, adding that a prototype would become available after the 101st production G.55. In January 1943 Pegna informed Gabrielli that after overcoming the initial opposition of Gen. Eraldo Ilari and the Air Armament Staff - the air force had selected the Re.2005 and the G.55 as a second-generation carrier aircraft. Upon receiving the necessary torpedo data, in March Gabrielli set to studying the naval G.55. The project did not go very far and whatever work was carried out was probably used for the subsequent G.55S."
The latter was a (land-based) torpedo-carrying G.55, which did not bear fruit until early 1945, but the single prototype was converted back to standard configuration after the war's end, although handling trials were carried out.
From Fiat G.55 by Piero Vergnano and Gregory Alegi (1998, Ali D'Italia)