P-40 vs. Yak-1 vs. Hurricane

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Let's break it down...

Combat speed: Bf109 wins
Climb: Bf109 wins
Acceleration: Bf109 wins
Dive speed and controlability: P40 wins
Durability: P40 wins
Practical maneuverability: P40 wins (especially at high speed where the Bf109 stiffens up)

I agree with a lot that you said except Combat Speed. The Bf 109 control surfaces begin to
'harden' around 330 mph. The P-40's continue to excel with higher speeds.
 
I have been a little hesitant in buying the next book on 'my list to add to
my library', " P-40 Warhawk vs Bf 109: MTO 1942-44 (Duel) " mostly
because of all the other research material on my desk at this time. But
if I am forced to do so, so be it.
 
I do know for a fact at this time that the P-40 pilots in the African desert had a
hard way to go with the Bf 109. They dreaded the fact that the 109 had a healthy
height advantage, and that they had to wait for them to make the first move. After
the first pass the P-40 had a good chance if flown right.
 

In some ways the North African conflict was asymmetric. Although the Allies were at times on the offensive and then defensive then offensive again when were Bf109s charged with being fighter bombers or escorts for fighter bombers and how did they do?
 
pbehn said:
In some ways the North African conflict was asymmetric. Although the Allies were at times on the offensive and then defensive then offensive again when were Bf109s charged with being fighter bombers or escorts for fighter bombers and how did they do?
Click to expand...

They didn't the Me109 was normally used as a fighter not a GA aircraft and as a escort they did reasionably well as you might expect. Very well against P40s and less well against Spits.
 
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I know very well what happened in N Africa and the Med. I was making a point, which you failed to grasp - that is, that if the Bf109 had been flown with inferior tactics, it would have also fared poorly.

I recommend interested parties to buy and read the three part series A History of thee Mediterranean Air War by Shores.
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Contrary to popular opinion, it seems, the P40 had its fair share of kills. Including against Bf109s. You will not find a more complete and thorough history of mission outcomes than in that series above. In it you will find the Luftwaffe had the best of it, but they were certainly not immune to gunfire and the odd circumstance of being bounced... have fun reading.

By the way, don't forget Sicily and Italy.

Controlability refers to the incredible stiffness the Bf109's controls developed as it approached Vne. The aircraft took 50-60 lbs of lateral force to move the stick at high speeds with less than 2" elbow room in the cockpit. Something which I've rarely seen discussed here and which surely affected any kind of high speed maneuver with the aircraft. Well-balanced controls - yes. Light - no, and increasingly stiff at high speed. The P40 on the other hand, while requiring a lot of rudder at high speeds, was able to be controlled in roll and pitch relatively easily and well.

Not to mention, the Bf109 had an issue in a dive where the aircraft became increasingly nose pitch down as the speed increased. For this reason the manual for the a/c required up trim before starting a dive, at the risk of not being able to pull out.

As for USAAF philosophy, I will give some examples of what I mean:
- designing for long TBO service intervals (Allison TBO was meant to be double that of DB or Merlin, IIRC)
- restricting full power from engines (the v1710-39 Allison was not cleared for 56" manifold pressure until late in the P40E lifespan... yes, check the technical documents)
- long range from its aircraft (range on fully fueled, internal fuel only P40 had a range of nearly 700mi -- Allisons were known to run well at lean settings, something the Merlins could not do and which was not an option on the Db60x series)
- and others including regs for long distance navigation, radios, provisions for mounting long-range internal fuel tanks, provisions for self-sealing tanks, etc...

And the turbo-supercharger was never used successfully on any single engine water cooled fighter the USAAF produced. How can that be a "philosophy" is beyond me. However, a bureaucratic philosophy revolving around red tape and manifold service requirements counts...

BTW, P51 was possibly available in quantity sooner than P40F or other late 1943 models...

I realize some people don't want to hear this and want to have their favorite without looking at the full picture. Yes, I would also prefer to fight in a faster, smaller, better climbing aircraft with centerline guns. Especially if the fuel ran out so quick it meant I wouldn't have to stay in it too long.
 
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Glider said:
They didn't the Me109 was normally used as a fighter not a GA aircraft and as a escort they did reasionably well as you might expect. Very well against P40s and less well against Spits.
Click to expand...
What did they escort? I havnt read much on N Africa.
 
Of course they did. I think the first 109 shot down by the RAF was shot down by the gunner on a Battle which doesn't mean that the Battle was any good against a 109. To be fair the Luftwaffe had a Ju52 that was awarded two kills in the fighting for Norway but you wouldn't pick it for combat.
The point is that the P40 nearly always came out second best in combat against the Me109
 
Venturi said:
I know very well what happened in N Africa and the Med. I was making a point, which you failed to grasp - that is, that if the Bf109 had been flown with inferior tactics, it would have also fared poorly.
Click to expand...
I grasped the point but it is impossible to reply to such a post, discussing a situation that rarely if ever existed.
 

Do you have some documentation that the Allison was designed for double the TBO life of the Merlin or the DB???
It may have wound up with double the the life of the Merlin but back in the mid to late 30s when the initial production engines were being worked on this sounds more than a little dubious. For one thing I doubt very highly the USAAC or Allison had any idea of what the TBO of the DB engines were. They would have been very lucky to find out what the Merlin TBO was in the late 30s as the British were still figuring that out themselves.

We know that the USAAC/USAAF allowed "full" power late in 1942 And actually it was not "full power" but WEP or WER. the E standing for emergency. Use of which required notes in the aircraft maintenance logs, more frequent spark plug changes and shortening the time between overhauls depending on the number of times and for how long the "extra" boost was used.
Allison had changed how they manufactured crankshafts several times in the early years. Forget the 12 counterweight crank, that was later. Early cranks were plain steel, soon followed (date unknown?) by shot peened crankshafts which were followed by shot peened and nitrided crankshafts in the Spring of 1942. These crankshafts would stand up to about 33% more stress than the shot peened ones. The shot peened ones would stand up to over 28% more stress than the plain steel ones. Allison also changed the aluminium casting process for the crankcase over the winter/spring of 1942. There were literally thousands of V-1710-39 engines built with the older foundry technique blocks and non-nitrided crankshafts. Allowing them to run at 56" might be skating a bit close to the edge of engine failure. The -73 engines used in the P-40K had the strengthened parts.
Then you had the changing fuel situation. The -39 engine started on US 100 octane fuel, at some point they rated it on 100/125 fuel which may never have been used overseas. The US came to a common fuel specification with the British for 100/130 fuel but 100/130 went through several different specifications with increasing amounts of lead and other changes in allowable aromatics. Granted the last changes were in 1943 and outside this discussion but the early changes could very well affect allowable boost until experience was gained. Perhaps the USAAF was overly cautious, but needing to replace engines thousands of miles from the factories sooner than expected was a valid logistic concern. The USAAF did screw the pooch with the P-40F and the Merlin engines when they tried to go for only 20% spare engines. This resulted in two different solutions to correct. One was the British giving the Americans around 600 used Merlins to break down for spare parts for overhauling the P-40 Merlin engines, in North Africa. It also resulted in the P-40R models. These were P-40F and Ls that had their Merlins removed and Allison V-1710-73 engines installed. Sources differ widely in numbers actually converted.

Not sure where the idea that the Merlin could not be cruised at fairly good fuel consumption figures comes from. Not quite as good as the Allison is certainly believable but some pilots manuals give engine settings for long range cruise as low as 30 gals an hour (granted imperial gallons) if not a bit lower. The Merlin may very well have sounded rougher than the Allison but if such settings were either dangerous or damaging to the engine I doubt they would be in the pilots manuals. I will agree that the The Spitfire and Hurricane held less fuel than the P-40 but perhaps not as much as some people think. A Hurricane held 97 imp gallons of fuel. a P-40E held 123 imp gallons without drop tank.

I would note that the P-40 was supposed to hold even more fuel but the self sealing tanks the US used cut into the fuel capacity more than the system the British used. The US system may have been more effective/offered better protection?

I also think you are confusing pre-war US "philosophy" with mid war thinking. Self sealing tanks showed up real quick in 1940/41 and cut the fuel capacity of the P-40 from initially planed levels. The P-40 (and P-39) never got additional internal tankage. The P-38/ P-47 and P-51 did but not until the P-40 was already on the way out.

The P-38 was supposed to be the US premier fighter in late 1942. Which is why all the ones in England were re-assigned to North Africa for operation Torch and the the rest of the North African campaign. The P-47 not going into action for the first time until about 5 months after the Torch landings.

Philosophies change with time and what the USAAC was thinking or planing in the winter of 1938/spring 1939 was way different than what they were thinking/planning in late 1942/early 43.
 
The Desert Air Force was very slow in adopting tactics that would mitigate the shortcomings of its fighters vs the Luftwaffe. Nevertheless, the Germans seem to have taken such glee from shooting down the poorly flown fighters, that they forgot that it's the bombers that win campaigns.
 
The "fragile" V-1710-33 was run at 56" power levels for 80min with the only damage on break down being the crank web journals had a few cracks. I haven't heard of any block or crank failures due to high manifold pressure use, and doubt that outright block or crank failure would be the mode in any case from high boost levels. Hazen's letter still holds sway in my camp. However, we are now far off the beaten path.

BTW the loading plan of the P40E offered an additional overload tank which was optional, giving another two dozen gals of fuel or so. I posted the docs earlier here in another thread...
 
At least one Luftwaffe pilot thought that the P-40 was superior to the Hurricane.

"In the air we were superior to the British fighter aircraft [Hurricane] particularly in 1941. The Curtiss Tomahawks and Kittyhawks were much better aircraft, but the Bf 109 F had the better performance at altitude."
Ludwig Franzisket, 1./JG 27.

On the other hand a Hurricane pilot would back himself, despite this acknowledged inferiority to the Bf 109, as long as he saw an attack developing. The Bf 109 had superior performance at altitude, and of course the pilots knew it and used it.

"Regarding the aircraft we flew, I guess I felt as most Hurricane pilots felt, that they were more than a match for the Italian aircraft, i.e. the CR.42s, Fiat G.50s, Macchi 200s and Macchi 202s. On the other hand, in many respects they were not equal to the 109s used by the Germans. I cannot think of one occasion when we encountered 109s and were above them. They were invariably on top of us every time we met. They seemed to be faster, had a better climb and much better altitude performance. Notwithstanding this, the old 'Hurri' proved a comfort in its ruggedness and extreme manoeuvrability. I certainly had the feeling that with this ruggedness and manoeuvrability no one could get me as long as I could see him coming."
George Keefer, 274 Squadron.

What all the allied pilots wanted was a Spitfire, and the P-40 certainly didn't do well in that comparison.

"Before arriving in the desert I flew the first Spitfire Vs to go into service, with 92 Squadron (early in 1941), at the time these being the latest equipment. To have to start flying the Curtiss Tomahawk was something of a change, not for the better as far as performance and fire power were concerned. The aircraft was very robust and was more sophisticated than contemporary British fighters, but as a result, was heavier and consequently not so manoeuvrable or fast climbing. The armament of the Tomahawk was not heavy but a large supply of ammunition was carried and the nose-mounted .50in machine guns were conveniently situated for stoppages to be cleared from within the cockpit. The old fashioned ring and bead sight which was fitted in addition to the reflector sight could sometimes be used to advantage also. The armament of six .50in guns carried in the wings of the Kittyhawk was an improvement, but I sometimes removed two of them and carried a reduced load of ammunition in the interests of weight saving and resulting improved performance. Neither of these aircraft could really cope with the Bf 109 in speed or climb, or in the initial stages of a dive, but in a sustained dive could catch or get away from the German fighter."
Neville Duke, 112 Squadron.

Duke raises a few practical points that nobody here has raised.

Opinions are just opinions, but these are the men who flew these aircraft and who depended on them to survive.

Cheers

Steve
 

And "official" WEP ratings called for the engine to be run at the WEP setting for 7 1/2 hours or 450 minutes in 5 minute periods with 5 minutes in between at a lower power setting. Having cracks show-up in 80 minutes would be a fail. The -33 did have a tendency to fail after using high boost settings, often on a subsequent flight to the one the high boost was used on.

The P-40E had 3 internal fuel tanks. The Army (and Navy) often played games with the weight/s. The loading chart for the P-40D & E in the 1941 manual lists 120 gallons of fuel in the "normal' load. However the rear fuselage tank would hold much more than the 37 gallons listed. When required it could be filled with another 25.5 gallons of fuel. there was no 4th tank inside the airplane Center of gravity considerations may play into this. As the P-40 evolved the fuel tanks stayed pretty much the same size and location but the order of use changed as well as the location of the oil tank to help with the CG location. The P-40F with the heavier Merlin engine was supposed to be flown with about 35 gallons in the rear tank as a reserve (and counter weight) as opposed to the P-40E using the forward wing tank as the reserve. Please note that the French (and British?) lost a number of Hawk 75s with the same tank set up trying to fly combat style maneuvers with the rear tank full. Pretty much the same tank set up but the US rated the P-36 at normal gross weight with the rear tank empty. It was a ferry tank.
 
The P-40 is probably the poster child for under-valued aircraft: it was much better than its post-war press, and, if you compare its overall performance with the contemporary Bf109 variants, it's probably roughly equal, especially at lower altitudes.
 
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