Napier's best possible contribution for the UK war effort?

[Howard Gibson]

You may need to come up with a reference for that, sounds unlikely to me. One monoplane that the Swordfish biplane might be able to outrun would be the Fieseler Storch, or the L-4 Cub maybe?

Definitely, the Swordfish was faster if they all carried torpedoes.

 

[Howard Gibson]

You left out that other wonderful Merlin success story - the Fairey Battle

I think this is closer to an important problem. The Fairey Battle, the Fairey Fulmar and the Fairey Barracuda needed bigger engines.

Both Great Britain and the USA developed aircraft engines that put out 2000HP+ in the thirties. Nobody else did. Because of the Fw190s, the Typhoons were thrown into service before everything was debugged. Once they fixed the Napier Sabre, it became an awesome engine.

Lots of these high powered engines were dead ends, definitely including the Rolls Royce Vultures. I am sure that radial engine fans wonder why they did not work harder on the Bristol Centaurus. Both the British and the Americans were able to build big, rugged, heavily armed and fast aircraft. The Germans and Japanese had to cope with lower powered engines, and accept lower performance and lower firepower and ruggedness.

One of the reasons the Bristol Centaurus did not appear earlier is that the British wanted lots of Bristol Hercules engines. These were used on just about everything except single-engined aircraft.

I see that the Nakajima Homare engine was rated at around 2000HP, in spite of its 36_litre displacement. This was small by WWII radial engine standards. The R2800 was 46_litres. I suspect that Nakajima was quoting emergency power, with the water methanol injection activated.

 

[Ovod]

According to Eric Browns "Wings of the Navy" the Swordfish maximum cruise speed was 128 mph. Its econ cruise was 104 mph at 5,000 feet (with 1,500 lb bomb load)
According to Lundstrom in "The First Team" "The Devastators at cruised at 105 knots." This was on their way to attack the Japanese at Midway. Note that the way the Devastator carried a torpedo was extremely unaerodynamic.
Basically the Swordfish and the Devastator were in the same ballpark.

The Devastators at cruised at 105 knots

But which cruising speed are you quoting for the Devastator - surely it has, like most aircraft that ever existed, various cruising speeds to choose from - as you more or less emphasised in your post (the Swordfish maximum cruise speed was 128 mph)?

 

[Ovod]

the Swordfish maximum cruise speed was 128 mph. Its econ cruise was 104 mph at 5,000 feet (with 1,500 lb bomb load)

104 mph is equal to 90 knots - somewhat less than than the TBD's cruising speed of 105 knots?

Swordfish speeds discussed in this thread question: Speed of Swordfish?

 

[MiTasol]

The Devastators at cruised at 105 knots

But which cruising speed are you quoting for the Devastator - surely it has, like most aircraft that ever existed, various cruising speeds to choose from - as you more or less emphasised in your post (the Swordfish maximum cruise speed was 128 mph)?

A valid question with all aircraft and especially with the Devastator I would expect. As has been noted that torpedo installation is going to produce a massive difference between clean and dirty cruise. Add to that economy cruise, high speed cruise and others that the operator wants for that type of aircraft, loiter for example, and the options are going probably going to provide some interesting numbers