Out of the Big Three WW2 bombers (B-17, B-24, Lancaster), was the Flying Fortress the most redundant? (1 Viewer)

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Since photos could be faked and the Germans wouldn't have believed them, I used to wonder what would be the result if selected Luftwaffe pilots from North Africa, POWs in the US, could have been shown all the assembly lines across the country and then dropped into occupied France, if sensible heads in the military would realise early on how the war would end.
 
There was a wartime cartoon produced that I saw in a magazine and it was of some surrendered German soldiers watching a massed aircraft fly past that disappeared into the distance and a dude walks by and with a smirk on his face just gives a loooow, loooong whistle...
 
BiffF15 said:
I assume that is the Ford line. Any idea what's going on behind the upper turret?
Click to expand...
It was taken at the Consolidated Fort Worth Plant, usually credited to be sometime in 1943. The line on the left is aircraft in the USAAF sea scheme.

The same plant went on to build B-32 in 1945 then B-36 and today builds F-35.

The Joint Strike Fighters Program History - Aviation Humor

X-35 to F-35 Design iterations of Lockheed Martin’s X-35 Very early concept being designed under the ASTOVL (Advanced Short Take Off and Landing) program. The original subscale test model for the X-35 that shows a very different design from what the aircraft would eventually become. Model was...
aviationhumor.net

United States Air Force Plant 4 - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org
 

It is easy to caster the mains as well - all you have to do is disconnect the scissors link and use a turning bar. I suspect that was done and the track was used to pull the RH main gear as it lines up with that.
 

I think the problem was the insensible head at the top of the heap.
 

I was stationed directly across the runway at Carswell.

Even the boneyard at that place was great. Aside from the rotting -36, there was a B-29 hulk and several other types as well. They were putting out F-16s during my hitch.
 
Greg Boeser said:
The B-24 was much harder to fly, having a much higher accident rate.
Click to expand...

I spoke to a number of B-24 pilots in 71/72 when I was at Chino when the two D model fuselages arrived and they said the biggest killer of B-24s was being forced to fly in formation with the much slower B-17 as they were operating too close to stall to make defensive maneuvers and if they lost an outboard engine the safety margin was too narrow.
 
B-17 versus B-24, what the various reports say,

USAAF Statistical Digest,

While cost is not always the same as ease of production in 1944 the B-17 price was $204,370, the B-24 $215,516. Ford did a lot of tooling work to make production easier but the number of changes made it hard to recover the effort. Of course cost of an aircraft is much more than just the airframe.

Aircraft Unit costs, US Archives RG18 E 10 B 68, B-17
DateAirframeEnginesPropsGFEOrd.CommsTotal
28-Feb-43​
$111,443$ 34,287$ 3,400$ 45,606$ 4,595$ 9,040$208,371Costs based on weighted average of uncompleted contracts
31-Jul-44​
$157,484$ 37,480$ 11,755$ 48,939$ 5,999$ 10,305$271,962Costs are weighted average of all Army contracts from 1939 to date
31-Aug-44​
$129,150$ 35,521$ 11,247$ 47,425$ 5,966$ 9,040$238,349Costs based on uncompleted contracts
30-Nov-44​
$125,464$ 34,875$ 6,487$ 46,413$ 5,686$ 9,040$227,965Costs based on uncompleted contracts

B-24
28-Feb-43​
$115,338$ 32,659$ 4,220$ 49,781$ 3,205$ 8,474$213,677Costs based on weighted average of uncompleted contracts
31-Jul-44​
$169,452$ 36,539$ 12,899$ 49,034$ 4,726$ 9,752$282,402Costs are weighted average of all Army contracts from 1939 to date
31-Aug-44​
$138,585$ 33,363$ 13,004$ 47,956$ 4,520$ 8,474$245,902Costs based on uncompleted contracts
30-Nov-44​
$114,951$ 34,497$ 8,663$ 48,288$ 4,505$ 8,474$219,378Costs based on uncompleted contracts
GFE Government Furnished Equipment

USAAF Statistical digest, 1942 to 1945, accidents in continental US,
B-17 1,589 accidents, at 30 per 100,000 flying hours, 284 fatal accidents, 1,757 fatalities, 479 aircraft wrecked.
B-24 1,713 accidents, at 35 per 100,000 flying hours, 490 fatal accidents, 2,796 fatalities, 746 aircraft wrecked.
I read this as a higher chance of an accident in a B-24 but a much higher chance of fatalities and loss of aircraft. The B-24 crews in the 8th Air Force generally took higher casualties when shot down. Given safety generally improved during the war the yearly rates are instructive, B-17 versus B-24, were 1942 55 versus 75, 1943 39 all, 1944 25 versus 33, 1945 (January to August) 23 versus 29.

When it comes to accidents they include things like being hit while parked, the ground crew setting the aircraft on fire as well as things like take off accidents, collisions, etc. The USAAF usually classified the damage taken between 1, minor, and 5 salvaged/write off. As far as I can tell some level 3 and most level 4 damaged aircraft were scrapped. The USAAF B-17 accident list I know of has 4,021 accidents, 3,632 of which have a 1 to 5 damage level recorded, 27% level 4, 23% level 5. For the B-24 3,653 accidents, 3,288 of which have a damage level recorded, 35% level 5, 30.4% level 4. So 50% of B-17 accidents probably meant scrapping versus 65% of B-24 accidents.

The 8th Air Force says
B-17 losses 3,093 MIA, 1,025 category E, 126 missing, 180 war weary 386 non operational salvage, less 56 gains from previous losses is 4,754 losses.
B-24 losses 1,099 MIA, 551 category E, 36 missing, 213 war weary 221 non operational salvage, less 8 gains from previous losses is 2,112 losses.
So 24.15% of B-17 operational losses write offs, versus 32.68% of B-24, while the B-24 definitely tended to take more damage from crashes but it might have also been better at making it back to allied lines after taking damage.

B-17 in 1944, 297 operational accidents, at 0.22 per 100 take offs, 369 non operational accidents at 1.1 per 1,000 hours, total 666 accidents, 761 aircraft involved, 108 fatal accidents, 761 fatalities, 343 aircraft wrecked.
B-24 in 1944, 210 operational accidents, at 0.27 per 100 take offs, 181 non operational accidents at 0.96 per 1,000 hours, total 391 accidents, 440 aircraft involved, 103 fatal accidents, 765 fatalities, 255 aircraft wrecked.

The 15th Air force says

19.9% of airborne B-17 sorties were non effective due to weather, mechanical failure etc., versus 23.3% of B-24 sorties, of these 0.4% of B-17 and 0.7% of B-24 failures were due to lead ship problems, on average 77% of B-17 and 69% of B-24 were operational with 2% of B-17 and 4% of B-24 awaiting parts needed for repairs.

The USSBS Bombing Accuracy report says

8th Air Force B-17 147.2 tons dropped for each loss, average mission lifetime 58.9 sorties. (average bomb load 4,998 pounds)
8th Air Force B-24 149 tons dropped for each loss, average mission lifetime 49.9 sorties. (average bomb load 5,972 pounds)
15th Air Force B-17 192.6 tons dropped for each loss, average mission lifetime 77 sorties. (average bomb load 5,003 pounds)
15th Air Force B-24 106.5 tons dropped for each loss, average mission lifetime 35.5 sorties. (average bomb load 6,000 pounds)

Accuracy for the 8th Air force,
B-17 40.77% of bombs within 1,000 feet of aiming point from an average height of 21,542 feet, 6.64 aircraft average attack size from an average size box of 14 aircraft.
B-24 37.8% of bombs within 1,000 feet of aiming point from an average height of 19,880 feet, 6.23 aircraft average attack size from an average size box of 11 aircraft.

There is the story of the Luftwaffe fighter pilot shot down and captured on 1 January 1945 being taken to the US airfield he attacked, firstly to see the P-47s lost or damaged but then to see the replacements arrive a few hours later.
 

I'm reminded of the scene from Band of Brothers where Webster loses his cool and berates lines of marching, surrendered Germans as Easy Company heads deeper into Germany on its motorized forces:

"Say hello to Ford and General [redacted] Motors! . . . Look at you! You have horses! What were you thinking?"
 
IMO - the B-17 was 'redundant' in the Pacific and CBI after 1942. The ETO/MTO favored the B-17 unless and until the 8th AF decided to uniformly bomb at lower altitudes around 18-21K where the B-24 operated. Even so, the word 'redundant' can not apply as it took the 50+ BG-H between 8th and 15th to systematically attack German/Austrian and Romanian targets. Both types were required in the most dangerous region of Axis defenses.

Another factor discussed above - namely comparative loss rates. The B-24 in SWP and CBI never faced an equivalent fighter force to LW based in Germany. Loss rates per sortie due to enemy action was significantly lower. Another factor re: comparative loss rates is the threat environment in 1943 when B-24 number of BGs and sorties were far lower than B-17 - as well into Q1 and Q2 1944. At the time slice that the LW day fighter threat had largely been blunted prior to D-Day, only then were replacement Bomb Groups in ETO skewed toward new operational B-24 BGs.

From my perspective, when you take into account that the 4 ETO 8th AF B-24 BG were taken off ops to go to N.Africa and train for Tidal wave, the 1st and 3rd BG of B-17s were increasingly pressured - all the way though the second Schweinfurt mission on October 14th. Contrast that to Tidal Wave as the only significant loss incurred by 8th AF (on TDY to 12th for Ploesti) B-24s. The 2nd BD attacked only a few targets, took heavy losses August 1, 1943 but were basically unmolested afterwards until November 1943. They were still a small Division of 4 B-24BGs, were mostly flying diversions while they replaced Tidal Wave bombes and crews and IIRC first flew more than 4 BG strikes in 2BD in January 1944 when the four new B-24 BGs went operational.

My point is that the lions share of 2nd BD operations occurred from when Mustangs and Lightnings were getting numerous and very effective as escorts through the EOW. Even though the relative force ratio was high B-24/low (er) B-17 in 12th and 15th, the same dynamics existed for MTO ops. Namely smaller LW reaction forces in MTO for lower (but significant for major targets like Ploesti and Austria where strong fighter forces could be applied).

The B-24 in ETO typically flew as a Division at 18-22K, completely separate from 1st and 3rd BD B-17s because of their high altitude formation struggles and the fact that their cruise at 22K was typically 180mph TAS to B-17 150mph TAS at 25K.

Simple summary - B-24 basically faster, with larger bomb load for same mission target ranges. B-17. The B-17 was more survivable to battle damage, easier to fly. B-17 was in combat, in strength before B-24 contributions.
 
It is an idea but even if someone agreed to do it they would probably have been shot as soon as they said anything. The German military didn't take bad news well. The LW command maintained that the RAF were down to their last 50 planes until that was proved not to be the case, then they just changed the subject and moved on. There were a huge number of people who knew what was what but it made no difference. Think of all the pilots flying over the western and eastern fronts, they knew how many planes and tanks they were facing, they also knew that shooting them down (or up in the case of tanks) made no difference, there was always more the next day. Germany suffered its first 1,000 bomber raid in May1942 and that didn't change Adolf's thinking at all. In the end, with Berlin surrounded Adolf ended it by killing himself, others didnt kill him, although many tried to, a reasoned argument about the hopelessness of the situation didn't or couldn't get anywhere, because he was completely mad.
 
Service Ceiling at what weight?

I haven't looked at the B-24 but it was probably similar to the B-17 and other heavy bombers.
"Normal" gross weight was not only thousands of pounds under max gross weight it was almost 20,000lbs (???) Under max gross weight.
B-29's could fly a mission (short range and restricted bomb load) at under 100,000lbs.
Max gross weight was over 140,000lbs.
What is the service ceiling?
 
That actually applies for all USAAF heavy bomber raids in Europe and North America, given how end weighted the campaign was. It is correct the B-17 in the 8th air force flew a much higher percentage of the sorties before escorts became effective, but not so for the Mediterranean forces. The 8th air force had built up to 4 operational B-17 groups in October 1942 on the same day it had its first operational B-24 group, by early November it was down to 2 B-17 and 2 B-24, back up to 4 to 2 by mid November and basically stayed that way until mid May 1943 when 6 B-17 groups went operational by end of the month, then another 3 in June, 2 in July and 1 in August making the ratio 16 B-17 to 2 B-24.
Not quite. In December 1942 the 93rd Bomb Group was taken off operations and sent to the Mediterranean with the 12th Air Force, 23 days of operations, 13 December 1942 to 20 February 1943, 273 sorties, 224 effective sorties, 530.2 tons of bombs dropped, 4 aircraft MIA. In late June to early July 1943, the 8th Air Force 44th and 93rd Bomb Groups were taken off operations and sent to the Mediterranean, along with the still non operational 389th, 20 days of operations, 2 July to 21 August 1943, 989 sorties, 892 effective sorties, 2,428.2 tons of bombs dropped, 54 aircraft MIA of which 30 were on the 1 August 1943 Ploesti raid.. So in this deployment 24 aircraft lost on non Ploesti targets. (According to Richard Davis the Ploesti raid was officially a 9th Air Force operation, with a total of 54 aircraft lost and 182.8 tons of bombs dropped, while the 9th says its B-24 operations in the Mediterranean June 1942 to September 1943, were 5,963 sorties, 11,558 tons of bombs, 112 aircraft MIA, including 61 in August 1943, these figures include the 8th's groups, which flew on 15 missions)

Meantime on 1 August 1943 the 392nd Bomb Group arrived in Britain, first mission 9 September.

In mid September the same 3 groups returned to the Mediterranean, this time as part of the 12th Air Force, strikes included Wiener-Neustadt on 1 October, 4 days of operations, 21 September to 1 October 1943, 191 sorties, 172 effective sorties, 406.6 tons of bombs dropped, 11 aircraft MIA. So 69 B-24 MIA when in the Mediterranean, of which 30 were on the Ploesti raid. The Mediterranean operations overall cost over twice the Ploesti raid losses.

The deployments meant the 8th Air force flew no B-24 operations from England between 27 June and 7 September 1943 and while all 4 B-24 groups had flown a mission as of 9 September, it took until 4 October before all 4 had flown again as part of the 8th. By this stage there were 16 operational B-17 groups, defining operational as having flown at least 1 bombing mission and ignoring the usual temporary non operational status for things like runway maintenance, training etc.

By end November 1943 it was 17 B-17 to 4 B-24, end December 18 to 7, same end January 1944, end February 20 to 9, end March 20 to 10, end April 20 to 11, end May 21 to 17, with the final 2 B-24 groups flying their first missions on 2 and 6 June. Not sure about weighted averages of B-17 versus B-24 but the 8th Air force reports November 1943 to May 1944 it lost 588 B-24 and 1,372 B-17 on operations, or 2.33 B-17 to 1 B-24.

In terms of sorties credited with attacking, in January 1944 3,661 B-17 and 1,006 B-24, February 5,249 and 1,822, March 6,050 and 2,351, April 6,417 and 3,118, May 8,300 and 5,592, total 29,677 and 13,889, so sorties were 2.14 B-17 to 1 B-24. I do not have B-17 versus B-24 sorties for November and December 1943 which would increase the sortie ratio.

Turning to the 15th Air Force, it formed on 1 November 1943 with 4 B-17 and 2 B-24 groups, still that end December 1943, end January 1944 4 B-17 to 5 B-24, end February 4 to 8, end March 5 to 10, end April 6 to 13, end May 6 to 15. The Statistical Digest notes February 1944 was the peak loss to fighters, 106, with 105 in April, but losses June to August were 85, 94, 91, versus the 8th of 112, 80 and 61. Given the 15th was around half the size of the 8th it shows losses to enemy fighters was not driven down until September 1944, after the end of the Ploesti raids. The 15th formed with 3 P-38 and 1 P-47 groups, gained a P-51 group in April and another in May, converted its P-47 group to P-51 in May, then picked up a P-47 group in June, converting it to P-51. So in the end it was 7 fighter to 21 bomber groups, the 8th ended up with 15 fighter to 38 bomber after 1 bomber group was withdrawn in November 1944.
drgondog said:
The B-24 in ETO typically flew as a Division at 18-22K, completely separate from 1st and 3rd BD B-17s because of their high altitude formation struggles and the fact that their cruise at 22K was typically 180mph TAS to B-17 150mph TAS at 25K.
Click to expand...
True or indicated airspeed? At 150 mph the B-17 would take the best part of 4 hours to reach Berlin, a 7 to 8 hour round trip, plus assembly etc. Roger Freeman talks of the B-17F cruising at 150 to 160 IAS, the B-24D 170 to 175 IAS.
 
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