P-80 escort

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Re: P-80 in the escort role:

The high performance recips seem to have remained at least somewhat competitive with the early jets (to some extent, even into the Korean War era) so beyond the air superiority or interceptor missions, I don't see the first generation of jets filling a role for the last (or worse, next to last) generation of recip powered bombers. To exaggerate the point, it seems a little like assigning a Stryker to escort John Wayne's war wagon.

OTOH, there were potential alternative options in roughly contemporary development including the hybrids Ryan FR-1 (1st flt: 6/25/44) and Ryan XF2R (1st flt: 11/46) and Curtiss XF-15C (1st Flt: 2/27/45), none of which, AFAIK, demonstrated performance superior to the last generation of recip. fighters.

Late entry: The Consolidated Vultee XP-81, (first flight 2/11/45) may have fit the bill, similar to the Ryan XF2R, apparently having good range and a top speed in the realm of the most advanced recips.
 
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The P-80A cruised at 410 mph and had a range about 1300 miles (I believe without drop tanks). In comparison the P-51 cruised at 325 and had a 2000 mile range with drop tanks. Depending where you're operating and what you're escorting I don't see this as a great issue.
 
Specification of the P-80A:

Engine: One General Electric J33-GE-11 or Allison J33-A-9 turbojet, rated at 3850 lb.s.t. Later production blocks powered by 4000 lb.s.t. Allison J33-A-17. Dimensions: wingspan 38 feet 10 1/2 inches (without wingtip tanks), length 34 feet 6 inches, height 11 feet 4 inches, and wing area 237.6 square feet Weights were 7920 pounds empty, 11,700 pounds gross, and 14,000 pounds maximum takeoff. Fuel load: 425 US gallons normal, 885 US gallons maximum. Performance: Maximum speed was 558 mph at sea level and 492 mph at 40,000 feet. Initial climb rate was 4580 feet/minute, and an altitude of 20,000 feet could be attained in 5.5 minutes. Service ceiling was 45,000 feet. Normal range was 780 miles, and maximum range was 1440 miles. Armament: Six 0.50-inch machine guns.

Lockheed P-80A Shooting Star
 
The Manual for a P80A is here:

http://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/at...al-p-80a-manual-search-manual-online.com-.pdf

Range varies from 750 miles at 35,000ft (or 435miles at 10,000ft) at max range setting with 50 gals reserve ( a bit over 8 minutes at 10,000ft) after deducting for take-off and climb on internal fuel.

Range at altitude after dropping the tanks was 1175 miles at 35,000ft and 1350 miles at 40,000ft (untested?)

It could fly 1150 miles at 30,000ft with an indicated speed of 285mph with drop tanks after take-off and climb with a 100 gallon reserve. It takes 25 gallons just to do the recommended decent from 30,000ft (covering 35 miles)
 
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Wow! Someone finally read a flight manual before guessing or citing some unofficial source, Kudos!!!!
 
I knew I saw that somewhere … This is from Wiki,

"The wings were swept back at 40° and were mounted in the mid-fuselage position. The wings appear to be mounted very far forward compared with most designs, a side-effect of attempting to keep the center of pressure (CoP) of the wing as a whole as close to the middle of the fuselage as possible. Reflecting the dilemma of a shortage of strategic materials, the first option of using aluminum in the construction of the main spar consisting of two tapered I-beams attached together on the top and bottom with thin steel sheeting, led to a reappraisal. Multhopp chose to use wood instead of metal throughout the wing structure with wooden ribs were attached to the front and back of the I-beams to give the wing its overall shape, and then covered with plywood. The box-like structure contained six fuel cells, giving the aircraft a total fuel load of 1,565 l (413 US gal).

The original design used a T-tail, with a notably long vertical stabilizer and a seemingly undersized horizontal stabilizer. The vertical tail was swept back at 60°, and the horizontal tail was V-shaped and dihedralled. The horizontal surface was used only for trimming, the main pitching force being provided by the ailerons, which were well behind the center of gravity and thus could provide both pitch and roll control, functioning as elevon control surfaces, as Messerschmittt's Me 163 Komet rocket fighter already did. Many problems beset the project, including the chance of a Dutch roll. Work therefore concentrated on the much less problematical Focke-Wulf Project VII. However, when the RLM eventually rejected that design, Huckebein was again brought to the fore."

Note the horizontal was used only for trimming. not for for pitch.

1.^ Luft'46 Focke-Wulf Volksjäger
2.^ Hans Huckebein

It's only Wiki and could be wrong, but I know I have seen it elsewhere, too, that the horizontal surtface was only for trimming and it was basically a flying wing.

I don't think I remembered wrong, I think it will open up a new thing to look into again. I don't think Luft 46 is a great source, being a fantasy website, but don't know about Hans Huckebein ... might have to look into that. On the other hand, the thing was never built, so maybe not.
 
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Solved. Just question of the US have enough P-80s.
 
That's not in question. We know operational P-80A units won't make it to Europe in quantity before late 1945. I'll hazard a guess He-162C would be in European service before P-80A.

He-162C advantage over P-80A is as great as He-162A advantage over P-51. Allies need something better than P-80 series if they want to catch up with German fighter aircraft performance.

Lockheed P-80 Shooting Star - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The initial production order was for 344 P-80As after USAAF acceptance in February 1945. A total of 83 P-80s had been delivered by the end of July 1945
 
davebender said:
That's not in question. We know operational P-80A units won't make it to Europe in quantity before late 1945. I'll hazard a guess He-162C would be in European service before P-80A.
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There were two chances of the He-162C beating the F-80 into service. Slim and none and Slim had already left town.

You are confusing the orders. Lockheed had received a letter contract ( or letter of intent) for 1000 aircraft on April 4th 1944. 344 or 345 of them were to be the A-1-LO version, the next 218 were to be the A-5-LO, the exact break in production between the A-1-LO and the A-5-LO may not nave been decided until Feb 1945 but the USAAF had every intention of having large numbers of P-80s as soon as they could get them, North American got a contract on 19 Jan 1945 for 1000 P-80Ns to be built at their Dallas plant, the contract was canceled after VJ day. Lockheed has also received a further contract in June of 1945 for 2500 P-80s, this contract was also canceled after VJ day and the original contract cut from 1000 to 917.
The FIRST PRODUCTION P-80 was accepted by the Air Force in Feb 1945. At which time the HE 162B existed ONLY on paper let alone the He 162C and the HeS 011A engine never flew an aircraft of any type under it's sole power by the end of the war in Europe. In Fact Junkers had been instructed to build an engine of the HeS 011A's class because the RLM doubted Heinkel's ability to get the engine to production standard even by 1946.
 
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Wrong drawing milosch, tail's moving surfaces are much smaller than on yours. Was used as trim, the control beeing made by elevons.

Anyway, a f-80c would have much chances to meet a 262HGII or HGIII in the air than the huckebein.
 
davebender said:
That's not in question. We know operational P-80A units won't make it to Europe in quantity before late 1945. I'll hazard a guess He-162C would be in European service before P-80A.
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There were several hundred P-80As produced by VJ day AFAIK. There were two final assembly lines at Burbank and a thrid one opening at Van Nuys Airport about 10 miles away (not to mentioned the sub-contracted production lines). if engine production could keep up with airframe production, there "would have" been plenty of P-80s to go awound by late 1945.
 
The Luft46 site has a number of projects that are not fantasy although the art work often is ( but so is the art work in a lot of sales brochures).

IMHO the fantasy part comes in when readers of the web site take the "design estimates" as gospel truth and run with them.

There is no RAF 46 web site or USAAC 46 web site. I am sure that company archives could provide a host of drawings and estimates from projects that never left the drawing board. Some of them as bizarre looking as the Luft 46 stuff.

There are drawings of at least 6 different P-38 configurations including engines in the fuselage driving propellers on the wings using drive shafts and multiple gear boxes.

As far as "estimates" go see the XP-54, XP-55, XP-56 and the all to often forgotten Douglas XP-48 from 1940, A war winner that the US Army canceled way too soon



estimates as high as 525mph from a 525hp Ranger engine , fast enough to catch jets

And this was in 1939/40, just think what a few years development would do!
 
In my perusal of Luft46, I can see the artwork is fantasy. But they don't really distinguish very well between aircraft that were built and tested and aircraft that were paper projects, were never built and never tested, possibly even as wind-tunnel models.

I call that fantasy. I alread HAVE data for the planes that were actually built. Some of these, though built, were never flown ... but at least they were completed and had good performance estimates generated. The paper projects usually never got to that point as should be clearly labeled as projected aircraft with projected best-case performance figures.

I'll not argue about Luft46, but would not quote it myself as an authoritative souce for any reason. I do not ask anyone else to accept or reject Luft46.

It's a personal choice to like Luft46 or not. I love their artwork ...

Regarding the XP-48 ... considering the number of 2,000+ HP planes that tried valiantly to reach 500 mph and failed, I do not believe the predicited performance. Since it was cancelled, it looks like the USAAF didn't either.

Let's just say that at Reno, at the US National Championship Air Races, there is a Super Sport racing class. The front runners are carefully computer optimized and even the Jon Sharp Nemesis NXT running a 750+ HP Lycoming doesn't make 500 mph much less 525. The Bugatti R-100 of 1937 was also supposed to go 500 mph ... but it never flew. It had 900 total HP.

Methinks the XP-48 performance predictions were, shall we say, rather optimistic. Your results in the real world and real air may have varied somewhat.
 
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Warren Bodies P-38 book stated that 108 were accepted by the AAF by the end of August. 236 for the whole of 1945.
 
syscom3 said:
Warren Bodies P-38 book stated that 108 were accepted by the AAF by the end of August. 236 for the whole of 1945.
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I believe there were 50 more sitting on the tarmac and at least two hundred more on the production lines in various stages of build. Depending on engine availability, IIRC Lockheed was able to pump between 40 - 60 a month.
 
From the Aircraft Guide you mentioned.


Wheels
 

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FLYBOYJ said:
I believe there were 50 more sitting on the tarmac and at least two hundred more on the production lines in various stages of build. Depending on engine availability, IIRC Lockheed was able to pump between 40 - 60 a month.
Click to expand...

I bet the airframes were built, but no engines were available.
 
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