Other countries' Dauntless?

A very much loved aircraft, SBD was a crucial tool in the USN arsenal during their many operations, both against the naval and ground targets. So let's 'give' the SBD to the other countries, too, in a shape of a cantilever monoplane A/C, with a retractable U/C, a ~1000 HP radial engine in the nose, crew of two, capable of steep and accurate dive bombing, well streamlined for a bomber with a 9 cyl radial in the nose (for 240-250 mph).
For the sake of discussion, the SBDs around the world are starting the service some time of early/mid 1939 (so it matters in Europe from the get go), with starting bomb load of, lets' say, 500 kg/1100 lb, growing fast towards 1000 kg/2200 (edited 750 kg/1600 lb when the shooting starts. Obviously, something will need to be axed so the shiny new light bomber can be had.

USAAC gets their A-24s as it was the case historically.

Preferred radial is a 9 cyl type as available (Germans can use the Bramo 323, British and Polish can use the Pegasus), or a 14 cyl type if there is no suitable 9 cyl of about 1000 HP (French, Italians, Romanians, Japanese? etc).

tomo pauk said:

lets' say, 500 kg/1100 lb, growing fast towards 1000 kg/2200 lb when the shooting starts.

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tomo pauk said:

Preferred radial is a 9 cyl type as available (Germans can use the Bramo 323, British and Polish can use the Pegasus), or a 14 cyl type if there is no suitable 9 cyl of about 1000 HP (French, Italians, Romanians, Japanese? etc).

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They are not compatible.

The Ju-87D got a 1400hp engine to help handle the 1000kg/2200lb bomb load.
The SBD is often listed as carrying 2200lbs but it is one of those fictional US specifications.
No record of an SBD ever carrying a 1600lb under the fuselage in combat.
The 2200lb load depends on using 325lbs under each wing and the only 325lb ordinance in Navy stocks was a depth charge which has rather different aerodynamics (point of impact) than either a 1600lb AP bomb or a 1000lb GP bomb.



500kg/1100lbs is probable the best you can do and you either need a big airplane or very short range.

Shortround6 said:

The Ju-87D got a 1400hp engine to help handle the 1000kg/2200lb bomb load.

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Ju 87B was powered by a 1000 HP Jumo 211A, and was still uprated for the 2200lb carriage (and the equivalent 87R was also rated for 1000 kg + drop tanks).
Ju 87D was rated for 1800 kg bomb (almost 4000 lb).

Shortround6 said:

500kg/1100lbs is probable the best you can do and you either need a big airplane or very short range.

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Between the two extremes, I'll settle for 750 kg/~1600 lbs once the wars were declared, and will edit the 1st post accordingly.

For the British I would be happy to see them with a 1000lb bomb on dive bomber

Now they just need a 1000lb bomb on anything in 1939-40.

France is doable, just needs some major butt kicking. They had a few almosts doing test hops, (flights might be generous).

Italy? engine problems?

Well, i guess the romanians would have been better off designing the IAR-47 as an all metal divebomber from the start, rather than adapting the IAR-81 for that role. The engine is there, 1000 HP IAR K-14, but in a perfect world Jumo-211 would have been better. MIGHT possibly be able to carry a 500Kg bomb for short distances with the IAR engine. But i can't realy see this IAR-47 being ready before mid-war at the earliest, so maybe 1942. Still, would have been a useful addition to ARR, as long as it's accuracy is not much below the Ju-87.

Italians yeah, it boggles the mind they wasted all that effort to build the pathetic SM.85 and 86, and others. Instead of that a 1000 HP Piaggio powered single engine plane could have been designed, and actually be available by 1939. But a lot of things need to be fixed for this to happen and to create a decent aircraft (see the Ba.88 failure). For some reason they kept insisting on a single pilot for SM.85/86, Ca.355, Ba.201 etc. so that needs to change.

IJAAF could have asked the Ki-51 to be a divebomber, maybe with a Kinsei/Ha-112 engine. Probably could have been made to carry a 500 kg bomb for short distances, though a 250kg one and 2x 50 kg would have been more common imo.
IJNAF of course had the superb D4Y, only needs a Kinsei radial and be ready earlier, say 1942, even earlier would have been fantastic. Could carry a 500kg bomb, and latter variants even a 800kg one.
I never quite understood while the D3A wasn't made to carry a 500kg from carriers even with reduced range. It had actually a bit more power than most SBDs, 1070 HP for D3A1 vs 1000 for SBD-3 and 1300 HP for D3A2 of 1942 vs 1200 HP for the later SBD-5 of 1943. As a compromise my TL is to have it able to carry a 370-400 kg bomb (since aiui it could carry 1x250kg and 2x60 kg), though that means adding another bomb size to the inventory.

The British could stress the Fairey Battle for dive bombing. Would the resulting massacre be due to the liquid cooled Merlin engine, or to the lack of air superiority over France in 1940?

If they borrowed Blackburn Skuas from the Royal Navy, at least the Merlins could not be held responsible for the outcome.

The problem is not just fighters. The faster your aircraft is, the less time ground fire has to see and hit you. Forget about forming directly above your victim and doing a vertical dive bomb. In 1944 in western Europe, tactical bombing was done by fighter bombers, all of which could grossly exceed 300mph at low altitude.

In the late thirties, given the 2020 vision of hindsight, the smart thing would have been to build a very small bomber with twin 1000hp engines, sort of like the Hs129 discussed in the other thread. Leaving out the defensive gunner is a lot to ask early in the war, but it would have turned out to be a good idea, possibly making the thing into a good fighter, like a Lockeeed P38, a Grumman XF5F, or a Westland Whirlwind.

Howard Gibson said:

The British could stress the Fairey Battle for dive bombing. Would the resulting massacre be due to the liquid cooled Merlin engine, or to the lack of air superiority over France in 1940?

If they borrowed Blackburn Skuas from the Royal Navy, at least the Merlins could not be held responsible for the outcome.

The problem is not just fighters. The faster your aircraft is, the less time ground fire has to see and hit you. Forget about forming directly above your victim and doing a vertical dive bomb. In 1944 in western Europe, tactical bombing was done by fighter bombers, all of which could grossly exceed 300mph at low altitude.

In the late thirties, given the 2020 vision of hindsight, the smart thing would have been to build a very small bomber with twin 1000hp engines, sort of like the Hs129 discussed in the other thread. Leaving out the defensive gunner is a lot to ask early in the war, but it would have turned out to be a good idea, possibly making the thing into a good fighter, like a Lockeeed P38, a Grumman XF5F, or a Westland Whirlwind.

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The Fairey Battle had the ability to extend the bomb cell bomb mounts outside the cells as a dive brake for this task.

Shortround6 said:

For the British I would be happy to see them with a 1000lb bomb on dive bomber

Now they just need a 1000lb bomb on anything in 1939-40.

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Albacore was in the ballpark, so was the Battle (80 deg dive bombing was allowed).
It is not a 1000 lb bomb - 4x 250 also works.

Shortround6 said:

France is doable, just needs some major butt kicking. They had a few almosts doing test hops, (flights might be generous).

Italy? engine problems?

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Both countries have had the 14 cyl 1000 HP engines.

Howard Gibson said:

The British could stress the Fairey Battle for dive bombing. Would the resulting massacre be due to the liquid cooled Merlin engine, or to the lack of air superiority over France in 1940?

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Battle was already stressed for dive bombing, 80 deg per manual. Battles can have their massacres as-is.

A 'British SBD' would've probably been an actually useful combat - have Blackburn make these instead of the Bothas?

Howard Gibson said:

If they borrowed Blackburn Skuas from the Royal Navy, at least the Merlins could not be held responsible for the outcome.

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Merlin was not responsible for (Battle's?) outcome in 1940.
A 'Skua +' is at my liking.

Howard Gibson said:

In the late thirties, given the 2020 vision of hindsight, the smart thing would have been to build a very small bomber with twin 1000hp engines, sort of like the Hs129 discussed in the other thread. Leaving out the defensive gunner is a lot to ask early in the war, but it would have turned out to be a good idea, possibly making the thing into a good fighter, like a Lockeeed P38, a Grumman XF5F, or a Westland Whirlwind.

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The alternative 2-engined attackers/bombers could use a separate thread.

mack8 said:

Ki-51 to be a divebomber

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We do have quite a span of aircraft.
A Ki-51 as built was as heavy loaded as an SBD or Battle was empty.
In fact the Battle may have been around 1000lbs heavier than the SBD. SBD was given quite a bit of "overload" weight, partially because of the 1200hp engine.
we are going from a little over 6,000lbs to 10,700-10,800lb aircraft.

tomo pauk said:

It is not a 1000 lb bomb - 4x 250 also works.

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Depends on the target/s. 250lb bombs do not work on large bridges, even with multiple hits. They don't work really well on large stone/masonry buildings. They don't work quite as well on ships. Depends on the ship. Near miss by 1000lb HE bomb acts like a mine or torpedo and caves in the side. Multiple 250lb bombs generate several closely spaced shock waves and not one big one. Granted the near miss distance in measured in feet not much greater than 20ft (7m?) if you really want a good effect.

tomo pauk said:

Both countries have had the 14 cyl 1000 HP engines.

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No problem there. Only the US had a really good 9 cylinder. or fuel that didn't require water injection for take-off. 14 cylinders engines work just fine.

tomo pauk said:

Battle was already stressed for dive bombing, 80 deg per manual. Battles can have their massacres as-is.

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Battle massacres had several sources. Compare to Ju-87s. Unescorted Ju-87s over the Channel were know as "Stuka parties". British and French bomber escorting sucked in 1940.
Battles had very limited protection, neither armor or protection on the fuel tanks or not much.
Battles were not often used for actual battle field support (bombing German troops that were shooting at British troops). Their "support" was much more often interdiction. Bombing supply routes (or bridges) that were 100-200 miles behind the lines, the bridges often had a large amount of AA. Flying a damaged Battle home in German air space for 1/2-1 hour did not help the survival rates. A Battle was only good for 210mph at sea level at full throttle, forget the 257mph at 15,000ft stuff.

tomo pauk said:

A 'Skua +' is at my liking.

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+

Shortround6 said:

Snip ..

Italy? engine problems?

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Here is a dive bomber with an Italian engine that might have had an effect had it been available to fly from Sicily from June 1940

Albacore was stressed for dive bombing, and as built was capable of carrying 4x 500 lb bombs underwing. It was also designed to be able to carry the Admiralty 1500 AP lb on centerline for use either in dive bombing or level bombing, though in service it never carried any bombs larger than 500 lbs as far as I know.

tomo pauk said:

Albacore was in the ballpark, so was the Battle (80 deg dive bombing was allowed).
It is not a 1000 lb bomb - 4x 250 also works.

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In the case of the Albacore 4x500lb.

ThomasP said:

Albacore was stressed for dive bombing, and as built was capable of carrying 4x 500 lb bombs underwing. It was also designed to be able to carry the Admiralty 1500 AP lb on centerline for use either in dive bombing or level bombing, though in service it never carried any bombs larger than 500 lbs as far as I know.

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Do you have a reference for the Albacore and the 1,500lb AP bomb?

While the Admiralty developed such a weapon from 1925-31 procurement would have been in the hands of the RAF and AFAIK it never happened.

In the late 1930s the RAF went on to develop the 2,000lb AP bomb.

Looking at the information on the various 1936 specs that led to the Albacore (The British Aircraft Specifications File published by Air Britain) the largest bomb mentioned is the 500lb in either SAP or GP form. Plus of course the 1,500-1,550lb torpedo. The Barracuda was the same. Then add to that that the British carriers designed in the 1930s (Ark Royal and the Illustrious/Implacable classes) were designed with bomb magazines to accommodate nothing larger than 500lb weapons.

It was early 1944 before the RN got hold of anything larger. It came in the shape of limited numbers of the US 1,600lb AP bomb, and the Barracudas had to be specially modified to carry it on the fuselage centreline in place of the torpedo.

And this includes Bulgarian DAR 10.
Unfortunately or fortunately, the Bulgarian VVS took the German Ju 87, so the production did not proceed. With 950 hp, 410 km/h and 500 kg of bombs, it is right up there with the SBD.

The French did have the Loire-Neuport LN.40 series which had potential.

In regards to the USAAF's A-24, *if* they set aside the Army/Navy rivalry and allowed their crews to train under Navy doctrine, the A-24 would have been a potent tool in their inventory.

Hey EwanS,

re "Do you have a reference for the Albacore and the 1,500lb AP bomb?"

Unfortunately I do not have the copies of the actual source documents . I ran across the various bits re the Shark, Swordfish, Albacore, and Barracuda, being able to carry a large bomb on the centerline in several different places over the years, all(?) before I started posting/planned to post on this forum. So all I can say is that:

One reference said the reason the 1500 lb AP bomb was kept to that specific weight was to allow the carriage of the bomb by any aircraft capable of carrying a 1500 lb torpedo. The reference said something like 'there was no point in developing an AP bomb larger than 1500 lbs for the RN as they had no aircraft capable of carrying a heavier weapon'. This statement was specific to the 1500 lb AP bomb development after they realized that it was not large enough to accomplish the original requirement as mentioned in the link you provided above.

I ran across an original early-1930s sourced reference that said 'all subsequent RN torpedo bomber aircraft design requirements included the ability to carry a large bomb on the centerline' which was in response to the potential availability of the 1500 lb AP bomb (or similar). It was to be carried in place of the torpedo on suitable bomb hanger gear.

I ran across a drawing from one of the AM aircraft ordnance(?) manuals a number of years ago that illustrated the centerline large bomb gear arrangements as fitted to the Swordfish. It also mentioned the ability to use the same gear on the Shark and Albacore. I may have a jpeg of the drawing (it is the type of thing I would have downloaded if possible) and I will look for it, but it may have been on my laptop that crapped out on me a few years ago.

I assume you are aware that on occasion the Swordfish and Albacore delivered the 1500 lb air laid sea mine operationally, as well as the torpedo.

The Barracuda was tested with the 2000 lb AP bomb during trials - and was considered able to carry/employ the weapon. I believe this is referenced elsewhere online as from the Barracuda RAE/A&AEE test documents. But AFIK and as you mention above, the largest AP bomb carried by the Barracuda operationally was the USN 1600 lb AP.

AFIK the largest bomb carried on centerline operationally by the Swordfish was the 500 lb HE.

I have read that the Albacore carried 1000 lb HE bombs on centerline to a degree in the southern Europe/MTO, but the source was not an official AM/Sqn history document so do not know if accurate.

In one of his books/articles D.K.Brown mentions the requirement of the RN torpedo bombers to have provision to carry large bombs on the centerline, but commented that only the Barracuda ever employed the option.

Just an observation, but rearranging the stowage on the RN carriers to accommodate a 1500 lb AP bomb would not have been any particular problem. The bomb lifts were large enough to fit & lift them to the hangar deck at least, and to the flight deck on most(all?) of the fleet carriers. Plus they could have used the torpedo lifts and/or aircraft lifts if necessary.

Apologies for not having more thoroughly sourced references, but (as I mentioned above) the majority of my information & notes are from before I ever planned to post online. It was more for war gaming and historical/operational/technical interest, which have been my main hobby for the last 50 years or so. I currently have about 9 boxes of college ruled notebooks full of notes plus several boxes of downloaded hardcopy jpegs. Add in another 30+ boxes of relatively high quality reference books and manuals.

ThomasP - thanks for the above.

Re air dropped mines, as you are probably aware but others might not be, the earliest British model was the A Mk.I (18" diameter, 10ft long, 1,500lb) developed in 1939/40 was designed to be dropped from the then standard torpedo gear for the 1,500lb, Mk.XI torpedo (which had entered service in 1936. The Mk.XII was an improved 1937 version weighing 1,548lb. Length 16ft). They had to be modified before they could be dropped firstly from the bomb racks of the Hampden and then, from early 1942, other Bomber Command aircraft. But Bomber Command was initially reluctant to deploy its aircraft on "Gardening" work so much of the early mining effort from April 1940 was carried out by RAF Coastal Command Beauforts augmented by the few available shore based FAA Swordfish and Albacore squadrons.

The RAF 2,000lb AP bomb had an overall length of 113" (80" in the body and 35" in the light alloy tail section which overlapped the main body for securing) and a diameter of only 13.5". It was suspended from the aircraft by 2 suspension bands. Torpedoes IIRC had single point suspension with crutches to hold them steady under the aircraft.

tomo pauk said:

A very much loved aircraft, SBD was a crucial tool in the USN arsenal during their many operations, both against the naval and ground targets. So let's 'give' the SBD to the other countries, too, in a shape of a cantilever monoplane A/C, with a retractable U/C, a ~1000 HP radial engine in the nose, crew of two, capable of steep and accurate dive bombing, well streamlined for a bomber with a 9 cyl radial in the nose (for 240-250 mph).
For the sake of discussion, the SBDs around the world are starting the service some time of early/mid 1939 (so it matters in Europe from the get go), with starting bomb load of, lets' say, 500 kg/1100 lb, growing fast towards 1000 kg/2200 (edited 750 kg/1600 lb when the shooting starts. Obviously, something will need to be axed so the shiny new light bomber can be had.

USAAC gets their A-24s as it was the case historically.

Preferred radial is a 9 cyl type as available (Germans can use the Bramo 323, British and Polish can use the Pegasus), or a 14 cyl type if there is no suitable 9 cyl of about 1000 HP (French, Italians, Romanians, Japanese? etc).

Click to expand...

Nobody really knew just how devastating the SBD would be until they destroyed 4 IJN fleet aircraft carriers at Midway in June 1942.