Most innovative aircraft of WW2 ?

[michaelmaltby]

"... The control surfaces were electric?"
No, I don't believe so but the landing gear, prop pitch control and other systems were electric.

 

[bada]

As for what a War fighter airplane should be=
-Ergonomics>cockpit layout> the first one have each function in distinctive place with an easy access: HOTAS 'daddy.
-High G capability for airframe AND pilot (1st one for the pilot?)
-Ease of maintenance (sub-structures )-> the first one to been designed like that.
-Good Firepower->one of the best till end war
-The only one to have that feature in WW2 : Total ease of engine management: One throttle for all engine functions:

FW-190.

 

[vikingBerserker]

For innovation, I would go with the Ar 232, it really redefined the true cargo aircraft.

 

[Shortround6]

AR 232 rather ignores the multitude of American cargo aircraft of not much difference in timing. Not enough to say the US copied the AR 232 in any case.
granted the actual aircraft were a bit below being great (or even good/acceptable) in some cases) but the ideas were there.
Curtiss C-76

Nose would swing to the side for loading.
Budd Conestoga

Fairchild C-82

While it didn't fly until Sept of 1945 the C-74 was rather innovative
including an elevator.

Using aircraft as "tactical" transports to move cargo/men into even "warm zones" on unimproved strips sounds a lot better in theory than in practice.
Transports are expensive and there are never enough of them. Getting them shot up by rifles, lmgs and small mortars is a luxury few nations can afford.

 

[swampyankee]

"Innovative" doesn't necessarily result in "great"; greatness comes from good detail design preceded by a well-thought out, coherent spec. The P-51 wasn't particularly innovative, but it was very well designed.

The P-39 was innovative, and gets a gentleman's "C." The B-29 was quite innovative, even though its configuration was generally conventional; it was certainly the best heavy bomber to see service in WW2.

 

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

"Innovative" doesn't necessarily result in "great"; greatness comes from good detail design preceded by a well-thought out, coherent spec. The P-51 wasn't particularly innovative, but it was very well designed.

The P-39 was innovative, and gets a gentleman's "C." The B-29 was quite innovative, even though its configuration was generally conventional; it was certainly the best heavy bomber to see service in WW2.

I agree with you, but man I do remember some of these debates with the Brits on this forum. Hundreds of pages of the B-29 vs. Lancaster, and what was the best heavy bomber. Good times...

 

[Dimlee]

Let's check this against the earlier Polikarpov I-16:
-true semi-monocoque structure: check (although wooden)
-retractable undercarriage: check
-landing flaps: check
-enclosed canopy: no
-variable incidence trimmable tailplane:no (although other manufacturers did not see any advantage until the jet age)
-variable pitch propeller: check
-cannon armament: check (earlier and with better cannon than MG-FF)
-leading edge slats: no (again other manufacturers (apart from Lavochkin) did not see any particular advantage)
What the I-16 had earlier than the Bf109:
-Pilot seat armour
-Self-sealing fuel tank

Enclosed canopy: yes - on type 4 and probably early production of type 5.

 

[Milosh]

Halifax, Lancaster, B-17 and B-24 were classed as heavy bombers. The B-29 was classed as a very heavy bomber.

 

[ktank]

B-29.

B-29 Superfortress changed the game of air power strategy up until this day. B-52 is a direct descendant of the B-29 and is still in service. For a basic heavy bomber concept that has had a 60+ year service life...well...what can you say?

For fighters, I'd say the Me-262. You can see the lines of the F-80/6 and MiG-15 if you squint at the Me-262.

I've often thought that if you combine the pressurised fuselage of the B-29 with the swept wings, underslung jet engines, and swept tail surfaces of the Me262 you pretty much have the blueprint for every modern airliner.

 

[Gemhorse]

That was what progress inevitably created...

My beef with it was, but sure, the B.29 could carry lots of bombs, or two tallboys, or the nukes, but it's original format was to be a ''very high altitude big bomber'' - it was a long & expensive bitch to get it into service, with it's engine-fires and one thing or another & then when it did get going they discovered the jetstream which blew it & bombs off-course but luckily they had captured the Marianas by then and after Curtis Le May got posted-in to run them, he had all the extra weight & guns taken out, painted them black underneath and basically copied the Brits Bomber Command of going in at night at 15-20,000 ft and dropping heaps of incendiaries and some 250-500 lb-er's on the Japs' wood & paper cities and another 6 months of that, they wouldn't have needed the nukes - But oh no, Truman figured he now had the 'big stick' and he had to let Old Joe know but Joe already knew and the rest is History - After he karked it in 1953 and the following leaders blew-out the bank playing big-bomb-building, there was a chance with Gorbachev to finally end the Cold War & have some real peace & real growth ~

This last 70-odd years of NATO and bullshit little wars that Eisenhower warned us about if you let the Military Industrial Complex run amuck with the politicians, has not advanced mankind at all, we are still caught up with pithy, greedy, vicious people-in-power who can't see past their own collective self-interests, namely money & power, mankind's two greatest addictions ~

God Help Us

 

[BiffF15]

That was what progress inevitably created...

My beef with it was, but sure, the B.29 could carry lots of bombs, or two tallboys, or the nukes, but it's original format was to be a ''very high altitude big bomber'' - it was a long & expensive bitch to get it into service, with it's engine-fires and one thing or another & then when it did get going they discovered the jetstream which blew it & bombs off-course but luckily they had captured the Marianas by then and after Curtis Le May got posted-in to run them, he had all the extra weight & guns taken out, painted them black underneath and basically copied the Brits Bomber Command of going in at night at 15-20,000 ft and dropping heaps of incendiaries and some 250-500 lb-er's on the Japs' wood & paper cities and another 6 months of that, they wouldn't have needed the nukes - But oh no, Truman figured he now had the 'big stick' and he had to let Old Joe know but Joe already knew and the rest is History - After he karked it in 1953 and the following leaders blew-out the bank playing big-bomb-building, there was a chance with Gorbachev to finally end the Cold War & have some real peace & real growth ~

This last 70-odd years of NATO and bullshit little wars that Eisenhower warned us about if you let the Military Industrial Complex run amuck with the politicians, has not advanced mankind at all, we are still caught up with pithy, greedy, vicious people-in-power who can't see past their own collective self-interests, namely money & power, mankind's two greatest addictions ~

God Help Us

Gemhorse,

I thought the "bomb" was dropped after serious consideration to how long the Japanese could / would last, and how many more soldiers / people would die if there was an invasion? It's easy in todays infomercial world to think one understands things, but it's entirely different to immerse oneself in the mentality, attitude of the time after years of War. It would take quite a bit of info to the contrary to paint a believable picture that the Bomb was dropped to show who had the biggest Johnson.

Cheers,
Biff

 

[Gemhorse]

Thanks Biff for your considered reply,
I have immersed myself in war reading for years and when the Allies moved into the Japanese homeland after the surrender, the Japanese were totally stuffed. Not just in Hiroshima & Nagasaki but almost everywhere. Not unlike Berlin. They too had suffered a political govt. that ground the people and every bit of food & supply for them to near starvation. 'Warrior Nations' - I have seen the photos, spoken with relatives & others that arrived with the J-Force. I just feel that if they had stayed the order to use the bomb and waited them out or continued the night fire raids, they would have capitulated. As history shows, Russia had started it's invasion of Manchuria and nothing freaked-out the Japanese more than the ''Russians are coming !'' The massive losses up to Okinawa absorbed by the US forces were indeed a point of serious consideration. I often wonder why the US Air Force didn't borrow a few Tallboys off the Brits and use them against, say, Iwo Jima, these earthquake bombs would have saved some US lives. But it still seems that the Japanese may have surrendered if the US had hung back and just continued to firebomb, as this was working and I don't think that after the way things had gone with the Allies & Russia at Berlin, the US was going to let Russia land-grab some more in Manchuria and continue nibbling on into Japan, as they were already in the Kuril Isands up north. I feel that was perhaps why the US dropped it's Johnson when it did... -No offense intended. Around that time, Russia used 3 B-29's that landed off-course in Russia and started making their own copies of them, as they were a nuclear delivery aircraft. It all was really a matter of timing. and you may be right that I could have it all wrong, but there was a tight game going on back then and to me, unfortunately Pandora's Box was opened and here we are today still sabre-rattling with nukes... In this respect, mankind has not really moved forward past the threat of total global destruction....so...
[Down here in Aotearoa [NZ] it's 3.30am & my minds getting mushy-}

Regards Biff, I hope you can see what I'm trying to say ...
Cheers ~

 

[GrauGeist]

Gemhorse, you do realize that the firebombing of Tokyo killed, wounded and displaced more people than Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined, right?

The Japanese people were not ready to quit the fight, had pooled all their best pilots, fighters and troops in the home islands. They had developed a heavy tank specifically for homeland defense and had amassed stockpiles of ammunition, fuel and supplies. The population was ready to meet Allied troops armed with literally sharp sticks if that's what it came down to.

If the Allies thought that just a few more months of fire bombing their cities would do the trick (Soviets or no Soviets), then they wouldn't have started massing and staging naval assets, tens of thousands of troops (bolstered by seasoned ETO troops) and thousands of fighters and bombers.

 

[vikingBerserker]

AR 232 rather ignores the multitude of American cargo aircraft of not much difference in timing. Not enough to say the US copied the AR 232 in any case.
granted the actual aircraft were a bit below being great (or even good/acceptable) in some cases) but the ideas were there.
Curtiss C-76

Nose would swing to the side for loading.
Budd Conestoga

Fairchild C-82

While it didn't fly until Sept of 1945 the C-74 was rather innovative
including an elevator.


Using aircraft as "tactical" transports to move cargo/men into even "warm zones" on unimproved strips sounds a lot better in theory than in practice.
Transports are expensive and there are never enough of them. Getting them shot up by rifles, lmgs and small mortars is a luxury few nations can afford.

I have to disagree, the design of those aircraft occurred after the Ar 232's first flight (06/41). Those aircraft did not take flight until 1943/44.

 

[pbehn]

I always thought the Catalina had a fantastic and elegant solution of a sea plane being able to operate on land and get the wing floats out of the way after take off.

 

[Shortround6]

I have to disagree, the design of those aircraft occurred after the Ar 232's first flight (06/41). Those aircraft did not take flight until 1943/44.

The AR 232 may have been the "first" but unless it was known to the American designers it had little or no influence on the choices they made.
Initial design work on the C-76 & C-82 starting in 1941 and the Conestoga in 1942.
Give a number of design groups similar or identical specifications to meet and you are going to wind up with some of proposals being somewhat close to each other.
If the aircraft specification calls for loading/unloading a vehicle then, unless the aircraft is very large, you have to have either a nose door/s or a rear door/s and ramps to go with it. Or large door/ramp.

 

[Glider]

I agree with you, but man I do remember some of these debates with the Brits on this forum. Hundreds of pages of the B-29 vs. Lancaster, and what was the best heavy bomber. Good times...

Make that some of the Brits, this one will acknowledge that the B29 was the best but the Lanc was second best

 

[GrauGeist]

To be honest, the C-76 wasn't really impressive in spite of it's swing-away nose.

The Me323 on the otherhand, weighs in as perhaps the first true heavy-lift, complete with it's front loading capability and 43 ton capacity.

 

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

Make that some of the Brits, this one will acknowledge that the B29 was the best but the Lanc was second best

Yeah it was mostly CC and Lanc...

 

[Shortround6]

To be honest, the C-76 wasn't really impressive in spite of it's swing-away nose.

The Me323 on the otherhand, weighs in as perhaps the first true heavy-lift, complete with it's front loading capability and 43 ton capacity.

Not trying to claim that the C-76 was even mediocre, let alone good. Neither was the Conestoga to be honest, but the idea that the AR 232 was somehow the father of all modern cargo transports needs a rethink no matter how many websites repeat it.
However "modern" cargo transports needed engines of a certain size ( a pair of R-1830s was not it as the US found out) to go with the nose or tail doors so it wasn't going to show up until you had two good sized engines or 3-4 smaller ones (or six).
Similar requirements are going to generate similar results, subject to availability of materials and mechanical items (engines, etc) and production priorities.
US had C-47s, C-46s and C-54s making another cargo plane a bit lower on the priority list.