Most Overrated aircraft of WWII.....?

[FLYBOYJ]

If I remember right, you're the one who coined the term...

Yeah, but you just defined it!

 

[GrauGeist]

Yeah, but you just defined it!

Ahh...gotcha!
Nothing like teamwork, eh?

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

The Brewster company was badly mismanaged according to all the historical reports available. But they did create a viable aircraft that for it's time was a decent performer. If this same design had come out of one of the more experienced aircraft companies, lets take Grumman or Seversky/ Republic as examples, it might have had a more successful career.

My reading is that their QC was bad enough that the few hundred Corsairs they built were relegated to training due to quality issues. Happy to be corrected if my memory is off.

 

[GrauGeist]

My reading is that their QC was bad enough that the few hundred Corsairs they built were relegated to training due to quality issues. Happy to be corrected if my memory is off.

Brewster had several things going wrong.
First if all, their factory was antiquated and confined, being originally for carriages and then automobile manufacturing.
They also had considerable problems with their workforce, who were always trying to demand higher wages and threatening strikes. When this didn't work and the USN seized the company the quality control went down the drain, even to the point where several aircraft were found to be sabotaged.
So because of that, the F3A (corsair) suffered fit and finish issues that prevented them from seeing combat, being relegated to training instead.
The SB2A was even worse and many went directly from the assembly line to the scrapper.

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

Brewster had several things going wrong.
First if all, their factory was antiquated and confined, being originally for carriages and then automobile manufacturing.
They also had considerable problems with their workforce, who were always trying to demand higher wages and threatening strikes. When this didn't work and the USN seized the company the quality control went down the drain, even to the point where several aircraft were found to be sabotaged.
So because of that, the F3A (corsair) suffered fit and finish issues that prevented them from seeing combat, being relegated to training instead.
The SB2A was even worse and many went directly from the assembly line to the scrapper.

I suspect the fact that they weren't situated next to a runway had some influence on their QC as well.

At Carswell, General Dynamics was (at the time) on the other side of Runway 35/17, and as each F-16 came off the line -- one about every ten days -- it got put through the motions for about fifteen minutes. Free airshow for us dorm-rats.

I know little about their labor issues, but I bet Brewster's factory not having a runway with immediate access probably played a role in their QC issues. That would aid finding and fixing problems much more quickly, I'd think.

 

[FLYBOYJ]

My uncle briefly worked for Brewster before he got drafted. IIRC he said the place was a sweatshop and there were always union issues. I think he worked on the Buffalo but not for that long

 

[Akuma]

Akuma, the serial numbers are online, Joe Baugher's Home Page

Great. Thank you for the link. Nice to know the information I had was confirmed by this site.

 

[GrauGeist]

I suspect the fact that they weren't situated next to a runway had some influence on their QC as well.

At Carswell, General Dynamics was (at the time) on the other side of Runway 35/17, and as each F-16 came off the line -- one about every ten days -- it got put through the motions for about fifteen minutes. Free airshow for us dorm-rats.

I know little about their labor issues, but I bet Brewster's factory not having a runway with immediate access probably played a role in their QC issues. That would aid finding and fixing problems much more quickly, I'd think.

If you look at Brewster's manufacturing plant (it still stands and is owned by Jet Blue), it's a multi-storey building that was ideal for manufacturing carriages and automobiles, but not aircraft.
It did not have facilities for a complete aircraft to be fully assembled on an assembly line and rolled out.
Various components were assembled on various floors and then brought together and put together like something bought from Ikea, before going out the door.

 

[FLYBOYJ]

 

[GrauGeist]

Fantastic post, Joe!

And there's the building I was referring to earlier, too.

 

[FLYBOYJ]

Facility in Penn

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

If you look at Brewster's manufacturing plant (it still stands and is owned by Jet Blue), it's a multi-storey building that was ideal for manufacturing carriages and automobiles, but not aircraft.
It did not have facilities for a complete aircraft to be fully assembled on an assembly line and rolled out.
Various components were assembled on various floors and then brought together and put together like something bought from Ikea, before going out the door.

I'd gathered that, reading both here and elsewhere. It just doesn't sound like a good setup, but I'm no industrialist.

 

[SaparotRob]

Neither was Brewster.

 

[buffnut453]

I'd gathered that, reading both here and elsewhere. It just doesn't sound like a good setup, but I'm no industrialist.

It was probably ok for the low-rate production that was the common practice pre-1940. The USN, in particular, didn't buy large numbers of anything prior to that time and so a small factory operating across multiple floors wasn't a significant detractor (although, clearly, there are more efficient ways to build aeroplanes).

The lack of an adjacent airfield was a problem as it meant completed aircraft had to be dismantled, shipped, and reassembled, which resulted in entirely unnecessary additional cost.

One other factor to be considered is that there wasn't an established aviation industry in the area where Brewster set up their factory. Thus, when orders started arriving, they hired all sorts of workers who, frankly, weren't up to the task of producing (relatively) high-tech aircraft. Jim Maas tells a story of one chap who'd had a model aircraft design published in a magazine, and he was hired into the design shop. Hardly inspiring!

 

[P-39 Expert]

My uncle briefly worked for Brewster before he got drafted. IIRC he said the place was a sweatshop and there were always union issues. I think he worked on the Buffalo but not for that long

My mother (before she married my dad) worked at the Consolidated plant during WW2 in Fort Worth by the Carswell runway. She started in manufacturing and then moved to a secretarial position. Consolidated became Convair then General Dynamics and then Lockheed. They were making the B-24 and B-36. She said the building was a mile long and there were bicycles to get around.

Mom and her sister were sitting on the front porch of their house in Rayville, La. when a man from Consolidated Aircraft pulled up and asked them if they would like a job in the bomber plant in Fort Worth. They packed their bags and left with him. Apparently life in Rayville left something to be desired.

 

[P-39 Expert]

In the first months of the war all allied pilots were advised to "Run" when encountering the Zero. Later on, posters appeared in pilots crew quarters basically saying "If you meet a Zero at medium speed and medium altitude, run, you are outnumbered" while other posters said "Don't Dogfight The Zero!" I guess fear can be referred to as a form of respect. The Akutan zero (Koga's Zero) was captured practically intact in July 1942 while the Liuchow Peninsula Zero (Inoue's Zero) was captured on November 26, 1941 in flyable and intact condition. Apparently capturing a Zero was not important enough for some serious 'forget about proper channels, Let's get the thing' attitudes. Inoue's Zero was finally gotten ahold of by Chennault who had Gerhard Neumann put the machine back in flyable condition (it had been damaged in transport). It was this Zero that was first flown and evaluated by US pilots. Also there was a fairly detailed report on the Zero submitted to the war department by a US Naval Attache who was stationed in Japan before the war. To get an idea of how many western historians have written in the past about the Zero as well as what the Japanese currently think of it, take a look at the Japanese film 'The Eternal Zero' or the book on which the film is based. There is another animated film 'The Wind Rises' which is a highly fictionalized, romanticized story that revolves around Jiro Horikoshi and how he came to design 'the worlds best fighter'. Until the the full evaluation of Koga's Zero, after it had been rebuilt and thoroughly tested, the US fighter pilot tactical training emphasized dogfighting as the proper method in meeting engagements. However there were isolated cases where US Army and Navy pilots were 'spreading the word from Chennault' about the best way to take on Japanese fighters including the Zero. It was only towards the end that US fighter pilots were being trained in 'Boom and Zoom' tactics. Saburo Sakai reported that the top speed of the Zero in level flight was right around 310 mph. while it's max diving speed was 350 mph. Above 350 the aluminum skin on the wings and fuselage would deform and ripple. At speeds above 370 there were cases of pilots losing sections of the Airframe including the occasional wing. The most accurate tests performed on the Zero towards the end of and after the war bear out what Sakai reported. Within it's limits the Zero was a good sturdy aircraft capable of handling the flight loads and G forces that all airplanes must withstand. It's light but sturdy construction came at the cost of not being able to sustain even relatively light amounts of damage. As far as self sealing fuel tanks is concerned, at the beginning of the war everybody did not have them. When they came into use it was at the cost of increased weight and decreased fuel capacity. The very word 'Armor' is not correctly applied in reference to aircraft. People think of armor as the armor on a tank or warship or a knight. Those types of armor are more akin to a shield that can be used to advance against the enemy while warding off his blows. The best way to think of armor on an airplane is in the same vein as a parachute; a last chance to keep the pilot alive so that he can get out of the situation in relative safety. Later model Zeros were equipped with armor and self sealing fuel tanks at a slight cost to maneuverability and to a greater cost in range.

A chart if IJN aircraft provided by Tomo (I believe) showed the A6M2 to have a top speed of 316mph (275knots) at 5000 meters which is in line with Sakai's statement. This chart according to Tomo was translated from Japanese indicating the performance figures were from IJN tests. Not really a fast airplane even by early WW2 standards and reportedly the controls got really stiff at diving speeds. Not a boom and zoomer.

 

[Akuma]

A chart if IJN aircraft provided by Tomo (I believe) showed the A6M2 to have a top speed of 316mph (275knots) at 5000 meters which is in line with Sakai's statement. This chart according to Tomo was translated from Japanese indicating the performance figures were from IJN tests. Not really a fast airplane even by early WW2 standards and reportedly the controls got really stiff at diving speeds. Not a boom and zoomer.

Jiro Horikoshi, the chief designer of the Zero, wrote a book whose title is 'The Eagles of Mitsubishi'. He describes how the IJN specifications insisted on a long range aircraft that was capable of dogfighting at low altitudes. The reason they gave for having cannon in the wings instead of machineguns was that they would additionally have liked to use the aircraft in a ground support role. Their thinking was that the two nose mounted .30 cal. guns were sufficient for air to air combat especially since the similarly armed A5M (Claude) had been so successful in downing the various aircraft used by the Chinese during the Second Sino-Japanese War. It was only after the initial victories, when they began encountering US aircraft at high altitudes and high speeds that the Zero's control heaviness and lack of authority at altitude became an issue. Mr. Horikoshi goes on to describe some of the solutions they tried to come up with to cure these issues. Apparently they were never satisfactorily solved. He believed that only the second generation of aircraft designs they were working on could have helped but that the Japanese air industry simply lacked the capacity of research and development to compete against the US. At least after the war he joined those in Japan who had said it was a bad idea go to war with the US. Just an additional thought. The general rule of thumb is the lighter the wing loading the more maneuverable a plane is. The Zero (to the best of my knowledge) had the lightest wing loading of any aircraft of it's type in that era. The opposite of this is generally the heavier the wing loading the faster the airplane can dive. Given the strength of materials available at that time the Zero's control surfaces needed to be strong and light but not so strong that over control by the pilot could cause damage to the structure. The ratio of the control surface to wing area was small for the Zero to prevent such damage which meant that at high speed and altitude control authority would be lost. Note: Thanks for the Tomo reference. Yes he's got a PDF listing all performance figures from the IJN.

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

She said the building was a mile long and there were bicycles to get around.

It is that long. I've only been in it once, because they had and have their own fire department with us providing mutual-aid support if needed. It's freakin' huge, the biggest building I've ever been in, in terms of acreage.

I wonder if they still have the boneyard there. BRB, off to look it up.

ETA: Google Earth shows it has been removed ... bummer. When I was there it had a motley mix of aircraft, including a dilapidated hulk of a B-36 missing a lot of metal.

On the bright side, I see that Forth Worth Air Museum is open again. The next time I visit my cousin in Carrollton, I'll have to hit it up.

 

[swampyankee]

Brewster had several things going wrong.
First if all, their factory was antiquated and confined, being originally for carriages and then automobile manufacturing.
They also had considerable problems with their workforce, who were always trying to demand higher wages and threatening strikes. When this didn't work and the USN seized the company the quality control went down the drain, even to the point where several aircraft were found to be sabotaged.
So because of that, the F3A (corsair) suffered fit and finish issues that prevented them from seeing combat, being relegated to training instead.
The SB2A was even worse and many went directly from the assembly line to the scrapper.

Companies don't "just have problems" with their work forces; they have problems with their management AND work force.

 

[GrauGeist]

There's no question that Brewster was doomed from the top to the bottom.

The management was inept across the board, the sales staff was shady as hell and the workforce was unskilled and unmotivated (which leads directly back to management).

If this were all translated to a flow chart, it would look like a map of the Los Angeles area freeway system...