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This is what I see as important to the test. In 1939 the British were at war but their two front line fighters had not been tested apart from against each other. It seems completely logical to concentrate on areas where the Hawk was superior to the Spitfire and figure out if anything could be done about it. They had no real idea how a Bf109 performed but it was clear if France used Hawks one would fall into enemy hands.The longer heavier engine may affect how fast the plane starts to change pitch but pitch response has to be slower than roll response. Part of the H75 advantage in some of these early tests was that the Spitfire elevators were too light/sensitive and pilots used them with too much caution. This was changed later with either spring or bob weight? .
I am at a loss in this discussion, the RAF received 225 Hawks and considered them obsolete.
I see it a little differently, the tests were in November 1939, by the time the Hawk arrived diverted from French orders everything had already changed a lot, especially regarding props and fuels. As for V 12s being superior in the eyes of the RAF, they quite clearly were at that time, any radial engine plane had to beat what the RAF already had. The Spitfire in the test quoted was clearly much faster, so it wasn't even discussed. If such a prejudice existed it must have been well covered up, the Sea Fury had an air cooled radial engine that did not just appear from thin air. Long before any radial engine out performed the Spitfire the British had H and X type water cooled engines being developed in addition to air cooled radials. It is a simple fact that the Spitfire remained a top class front line fighter until the end of the war and the P-51 in a different role did too.I think one thing that's happening is that, 3/4 of a century after the fact, we're looking at a small subset that is part of a large amount of data, scattered over tens to thousand of reports, memoranda, in-person conversations, and phone calls, with no permanent record kept of the last two.
The RAF knew that the Hurricane was inferior to the Bf109 in many flight regimes, and, while the Spitfire was better, it wasn't enough better to have a comfortable margin of superiority. Here's a foreign aircraft, which shows some areas of superiority to the Spitfire, possibly mostly in the horizontal plane, but which can't demonstrate the sort of superiority that the RAF feels it needs to deal with the Bf109 or, most importantly, the partner the Bf109 is likely to have soon. It's also possible the RAF felt an immediate prejudice against that round motor in front: real fighters had V-12s, and that was considered a major point against the P-36. At this time, they couldn't yet know that fighters with round motors -- from Focke Wulf, Grumman, Vought, Lavochkin, Mitsubishi, and others -- would demonstrate that real fighters did have round motors.
As for the longitudinal weight distribution, it's not going to affect steady-state turns, just the pitch acceleration. It will become a serious problem later, with jet aircraft, where the relation longitudinal and lateral mass distribution can have critical repercussions, as occurred on the F-100.
This is becoming a circular argument, an additional 400HP at 21,000 ft is not in Curtiss domain, the USA was gearing up for 2000HP radials but officially war was not declared. The Wildcat was not a competitive fighter with RAF and LW land based fighters in 1940 neither was the P36.At low altitude the P36/H75 also outclimbed the Spitfire until the low altitude rated engine ran out of wind. I wonder, along with others, how well a continuing development of the P36/H75 would have done. 1000 hp instead of 600 at 21,000 feet, 860 instead of 515 at 25,000. Probably push the P36/H75 up closer to 340 mph. That might be close enough to be competitive.
And (cough cough) 100 octane fuel.The key question is where that extra 400hp is going to come from...and what changes does that force on the design? Bigger, more powerful engines typically weigh more and are thirstier, both in fuel and oil. All of that pushes the weight upwards before we consider armour plating or armament. If we increase weight without increasing wing area, we increase wing loading which impacts rate of climb, landing speed and, crucially, turn performance. There's no such thing as a free lunch. If the P-36 could be improved to the extent you identify, I'd imagine it would have happened in preference to the P-40.
I'd be interested to learn whether the P-36 could still outclimb the Spitfire once the MkV started entering service with constant-speed propellers. Bear in mind that at the time of the quoted test, the Spit was barely being delivered with 2-speed props and still had the some of the earliest variant Merlins. Could the P-36 be updated in time to beat the Spit MkV into service? I suspect not given the extent of the modifications required.
I'm going to retract the "P36 can get on Spitfire tail in 1 360 degree turn", I can't back that up and I think I am confusing another test.
On the other hand, I know the improved P36/H75 would gain a bit of weight. But, I think they could have built an improved P36 at around 6,600 pounds. 2 50's, 4 30's, 2 speed 2 stage engine, self sealing tanks. 1,000 hp at 21,000 feet rather than 600 and 860 hp at 25,000 vs 515 should improve performance dramatically. A 6,600 pound P36 should retain much more turning ability than an 8,000 pound P40. Even the Wildcat at the same weight beat the P40 in every category above 22,000
All the speed in the world matters little when Zeros and Betty's just fly above your ceiling.
How, in your opinion does the P40B stack up against the Spitfire II and early Me109?
I'd be interested to learn whether the P-36 could still outclimb the Spitfire once the MkV started entering service with constant-speed propellers. Bear in mind that at the time of the quoted test, the Spit was barely being delivered with 2-speed props and still had the some of the earliest variant Merlins. Could the P-36 be updated in time to beat the Spit MkV into service? I suspect not given the extent of the modifications required.
At low altitude the P36/H75 also outclimbed the Spitfire until the low altitude rated engine ran out of wind. I wonder, along with others, how well a continuing development of the P36/H75 would have done. 1000 hp instead of 600 at 21,000 feet, 860 instead of 515 at 25,000. Probably push the P36/H75 up closer to 340 mph. That might be close enough to be competitive.
The H75 the brits flew in 1939 test had armour, 6 light machineguns and weighed 6025 pounds during the test where it had no trouble out turning the Spitfire. (I read somewhere an H75 could be on the tail of a Spitfire in 1 360 degree turn) If the H75 jumped the Spitfire, the H75 stayed on him until the Spitfire could outrun him.
Now in addition to the technical details you have two production problems and a major timing problem. Unless you can magic up a brand new factory, with tooling and a work force every super P-36 you build will be one less P-40, Want 300 super P-36s in 1941? then you have 300 fewer P-40s. Unless you also drastically change P&W's development schedule and production schedule for late 1940 and 1941 you will also have 300 fewer F4F-3s with two stage engines.