RAN carrier program and earlier RAAF expansion

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Graeme said:
1938 or 1940?....

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I was using the beginning of the order (contract signed with CC&F in Nov 1938), rather than the first flights, but we can go with your dates if you prefer. If Canada can begin a fighter program in 1938, I don't see why Australia has to wait until late 1941.

Of course we must consider the money and recognize that CC&F wasn't making Hurricanes for Canada, so British taxpayers were footing the bill, whilst an Australian fighter program would be making for the RAAF… though some clever negotiation might see Britain partially finance the program in order to have fighters for RAF stations in Malaya or North Africa.

Australia got screwed by Britain from the 1920s onwards. Why Australia allowed its best forces to be sent to North Africa under British command when the Japanese were tearing across SEA, including occupying FIC in Sept 1940 IDK. What did Australia get in return? And then Australia sends its green forces to defend Britain's Malayan territory, again under British command, this time terribly so. Surely there were signs in the mid 1930s that Britain didn't GAF for Australia's security and that the latter had better arm itself?
 
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Australia's #1 trading partner was the UK - she sent raw material e.g. grain, meat & wool and received finished goods e.g. toasters, tractors in return. The fact that Australian wages were higher, there wasn't the market for large economy of scale production & there wasn't the capital investment meant that it was cheaper to import finished goods than to develop the industry to manufacture them locally.

So, keeping the Suez canal open, which saves weeks of transport time, was critical to the Australian economy. If you can't get your produce to market timely your customer will look elsewhere e.g. Argentina. So, sending your troops to North Africa to ensure that trade route remains open is in Australia's best interest. If Roosevelt doesn't run for 3rd term and the succeeding president doesn't apply trade restrictions on Japan in mid-'41, you might not have Japan invading FIC and/or at PH in late-'41.

Note: Engaging in a trade war with Japan your #3 (almost #2) trading partner - initially over textiles, but expanding quickly - in middle of depression wasn't best more for Australia.
 
Shortround6 said:
The Australians were learning to walk before they tried running.

People seem to want them to come out of the gate sprinting.
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Exactly!
Admiral Beez said:
Australia could build the Boomerang when it suited them to start. But license building an existing type like the Curtiss P-36 or (hopefully not) the Seversky P-35 doesn't require the design and development work.
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It is easy to say this but one has to remember that the entire Australian aerospace industry (everything from tool making and tradesman training through to engine manufacture and aircraft design/manufacture) occurred in the 5 - 10yrs leading up to WWII, especially the last 5yrs. They were essentially going from scratch. Thus there was a reason to first focus on something such as the CAC Wirraway (NA-16). I highly recommend the Sir Lawrence Wackett autobiography on this subject: Aircraft Pioneer: an Autobiography
 
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I understand. But could Australia have started from scratch earlier? Did the end of the Anglo-Japan alliance in 1921, the massive reduction in the Royal Navy throughout the 1920 and 30s, and the rapid expansion of the IJN have the potential to get Canberra's attention?
 
GTX said:
I highly recommend the Sir Lawrence Wackett autobiography on this subject: Aircraft Pioneer: an Autobiography
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Wacketts Autobiography is interesting but some of the facts are changed to save face and cover his, and his mission members, failures.

His claim that the A6M is a perfect copy of a specific Vought fighter is total bull dust as is his claim that no one in Australia knew that Japan had an advanced aircraft industry.

The Wackett Mission included S/L Wackett and two or more other RAAF officers depending on where they were visiting. That mission, which resulted in the formation of CAC and the production of the Wirraway, visited Japan and two of the files that the National Archives of Australia (NAA) in Brighton (Melbourne) held until 1987 were approximately titled

Japanese aircraft under consideration for manufacture in Australia and

Negotiations with Sumitomo Metals on producing Japanese aluminium alloy in Australia

In 1987 I requested access to these files, and, because the documents were classified, the NAA sent them to the RAAF for declassification. A few weeks later I received a letter advising me that the RAAF had "lost" the files and wanted to know if I wanted to initiate a formal investigation. I went to the NAA and spoke to the letters author who asked if the contents could embarrass the RAAF. I told her yes and why - they would prove that senior members of the RAAF knew the Japanese had advanced aircraft and metals long before Pearl Harbor. Her reaction was to say that in that case the files would have been shredded and incinerated for certain and any investigation would be a waste of effort.
 
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Graeme said:
There was no sprinting.

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The reason the Demon was the front line fighter in Australia until March 1942 is the result of the Governments policies as formulated by the experts in the RAAF and enacted by parliament.

From page 7 of the attached file


You will note that the RAAF still only required two squadrons of Demons for defense 16 days after Pearl Harbor, and simultaneous invasion of the Philippines and 13 days after the sinking of the Prince of Wales and Repulse it had not yet sunk in that Japan had command of the seas to our north and were approaching at a lightning pace.

It took a further four weeks for the RAAF and war cabinet to realize that more fighters were required and to suggest an increase to 8 squadrons with no types recommended. Perhaps they were going to purchase the Demons NZ had.

Given these obvious failures by the RAAF and cabinet to react properly to the invasions of the Philippines and Malaya and other Japanese actions even after the sh-one-t hit the fan I doubt any of Hughes thoughts would have made a tangible difference.

You will note that the record referenced, dated 21 Jan 1942, expends far far more discussion and thought on getting a couple more Catalinas for anti submarine patrols than it does on fighters.
 

Attachments

  • RAAF programme 42-01-21 BC 31425936 .pdf
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If you start too early you wind up with outdated designs and tooling/machinery.
RAF didn't switch to all metal aircraft until the late 1920s, all metal referring to the structure/framework. Still fabric covered.
Kestrel was RR first cast block engine. It was first run in 1926 and first production was in 1927. Any prior RR V-12 used separate cylinders.
How soon to the colonies jump on the newest engine? or do they wait a bit and see how it turns out?

What was the population of Australia compared to Japan? roughly 1/10th?
Canada was about 11.5 million in 1941 or about 1.5 times Australia. Canada could get machine tools, materials (sheet steel, piping etc) from the US by truck or much more commonly rail.

A lot of times companies opened up "factories" in some countries to get around taxes/tariffs. Ford was good at this and opened up over 20 factories around the world before WW II.
However in some cases the "factory" was pretty much an assembly shop building cars/trucks from imported parts kits. Like in Europe there was Ford of Germany, Ford of England, Ford of France and a few others including Ford of Belgium. They weren't selling enough Fords in Europe to justify that number of full factories. But if Belgium demanded a high import tax/tariff on a complete car/truck then setting up a small assembly shop to "build" cars/trucks from imported kits might justify it's expense as the lower priced "Belgian" Fords would sell in higher numbers. What percentage of the car/truck could be imported and how much could be made locally might vary from country to country.
In the 1960s and 70s Japanese Pick-ups were quite popular in the US due to low price. There was something like a 20% import duty (?) on Japanese cars at the time but the pick-ups were shipped in without the pick up beds (complete drivable chassis) and were classified as parts at 10% or under. Factories in the US built beds for the Japanese Pick ups and the Beds were fitted in the US after the chassis arrived.

I would be very careful in trying to figure out if an Australian or Canadian company could actually produce certain items vrs assemble them from parts kits in the 20s and 30s.

Australia presents some differing abilities in 1940-42. With their low production Sentinel tank they made the largest cast hull to date (other cast hulls were made up of several pieces bolted together) anywhere in the world but had to use three Cadillac car engines on a common crankcase. Given the blueprints for the transmission used in the M3 Grant tank (and Sherman) they had to change from a synchronized gear set to unsynchronized due to a lack of gear cutting equipment/machinery. Perhaps such machinery was being used for aircraft engines?
 
Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Newfoundland and South Africa were Dominions NOT colonies.

Population of Japan in '35: ~70million; Australia: ~7 million, so 10:1 is about correct.

You should read up: Canada wanted to produce Sabres in late '30s not Merlins. They figured the RR V-12 wasn't going to powerful enough for next generation of aircraft and didn't want to tool up for an engine of limited potential (OK, Merlin had more life than they knew, but crystal ball didn't say that at time).

Canada also had a large number of companies in "Golden Horseshoe" producing all sorts of farm equipment from raw ore to finished product, selling to both domestic and international markets - tractors, seeders, plows, reapers, trashing machings - literally 1,000s of engines, sheetmetal, tires, etc. While they import some manufacturing equipment from UK and USA in about equal quantities, they make the majority themselves. There was reason UK was OK with Cdn gov't not sending troops but rather materiel.

What does it then say about the US ability when they had to use 2 Cadillac V-8s connected to a transfer case for the M5 Stuart or 5 Dodge truck engines around a central shaft to produce a 30 cylinder engine for the M4A4 Sherman tank or the twin Detroit Diesels in the M4A2?

You are aware that there are no more gears in a synchronized transmission than the equivalent un-synchronized one? What you are short is a couple blocking rings made out of brass (in time period in question), a couple springs and 6 baulks. So, if you're short on copper or zinc and can't make sufficient quantities of brass, you can skip the synchronizers. The operators just need to match revs when they shift. And it makes the transmission cheaper to produce Driving a car with a manual is still the common method outside of USA.
 
MiTasol said:
Wacketts Autobiography is interesting but some of the facts are changed to save face and cover his, and his mission members, failures.
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That may be so but the sections talking about the effort needed to set up the Australian aerospace industry is quite interesting and valid to this discussion.
 
I am not disputing that - or the post war stuff on housing (DAP also built kit homes post war and called them Beaufort homes) which I found very interesting.

It is only the stuff on the Japanese that is very clearly political bulldust. Written nearly thirty years after the war and still sticking to the line that we knew nothing and the Japs could only copy.

Those that have worked on the A6M know that the wings use the same British and Spitfire wooden technology (built up ribs) instead of American technology (pressed ribs) and even the strut inflators are straight British. The fuselage is purely Japanese with ideas that no one else had.
 
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It says that even the US couldn't build unlimited amounts of aircraft engines. The M-3 Stuarts using R-670 Continental radial engines. BTW the 5 dodge truck engine and the twin Detroit diesels were first used in M3A4 and M3A3 Tanks respectively as the Wright R-975 radial engine was expected to be in short supply, even with Continental doing license production.

The US had dozens of engine makers in 1939-40 making car, truck, bus, marine and industrial engines.
I am aware of the number of gears.

Your blocking ring.


Bit more too it than that.

I have driven fire trucks with non-synchromesh transmissions. Matching the revs is not as easy as it sounds and nobody was shooting at me.
If you missed a shift it was often necessary to bring the vehicle to a halt and start from a standing start.
You tried double clutching to try to match the revs. Rev engine up in gear (part throttle shifts are a pain in the butt), push clutch pedal in, pull gear lever out of gear and into neutral, let up on clutch pedal to get ALL the gears spinning (with the aid a blip on the throttle) then letting off the throttle, push in on the clutch pedal again while letting the engine revs fall and you are putting gentle pressure on the shift lever to get it to slide into the next higher gear when the gear speeds matched.

Unless you are very, very good you can forget trying to do 2nd to 4th shifts. Down shifting was no picnic either. Of course a fire truck with 500 gallons of water in the tank didn't want to loose speed very quickly either.
On the Old ladder truck it was easier, when accelerating, to shift without using the clutch. Wind the engine up against the governor, pull shift lever out of gear, take foot off throttle and as engine wound down (and a pause in neutral) gently pull or push shift lever to the next gear. If you hear grinding noises you are using too much force on the shift lever. When the speeds of the gears are about right the lever almost pops into place.
This is very similar to truck my dept had.

65ft stick.

The Pumper I described above had had an engine swap and the engine revs and truck speeds never seemed to line up. The re-bent shift linkage to fit around the new engine sure didn't help.
Comparing even a 1980s car with a manual transmission to these old beasts (vacuum power assist on the hydraulic brakes, engine stalled and your power assist on the brake pedal went away) is not very accurate.

The US internal combustion engine industry had 43 makers of Stock, Marine and Commercial vehicle engines in March of 1940 with 283 different model engines cataloged.
This does not include aircraft engine makers. There was some cross-over. Continental listed 21 different engines for sale/order from a 69 cu in 4 cylinder to a 501 cu in straight six.

This list does not include diesels.

When the US got auto makers involved in the manufacture of aircraft engines the auto companies were brought in for their expertise in mass production, not for their existing physical plants. The Auto management teams managed brand new factories with new tooling (mostly) to build aircraft engines by the hundreds per month.
And the US did not have unlimited supplies of machine tools. I believe it was at some point in 1941 that Allison was short over 800 of their desired amount of machine tools.
Allison had an A1A priority rating. Allison had the backing of GM. Or at least perhaps access to redundant GM machine tools? However the US government was keeping a pretty close watch on such things to prevent black marketeering.

Point of this ramble is that somewhat small countries without a large backup or depth of industry could take quite a while to get into production on some items. Many of those 43 engine makers bought their carbs, distributors/magnetos/electrical systems/parts or even valve springs and valves from outside suppliers rather than build their own making for a large tier of suppliers that could be tapped into to make aircraft engine parts/accessories.
 

Australia built ONE CL - Birmingham - to a design from 1911. As important parts including machinery had to be imported from Britain, the ship was completed in 1922 - dubbed HMAS "Long-Delayed". While Cockatoo built three Tribals, Whitley says that their engines still were imported from Britain. So I have my doubts that Australia had a more capable shipbuilding industry than Canada, although Canada was hampered by a lack of trained workers. The last four RCN Tribals were certainly built completely in Canada.

On another note, wouldn't Australian and Canadian ships have counted as British ships for treaty purposes as they were British dominions rather than sovereign nations? In that case, the question is at which time Britain would have been willing to disregard the treaty of 1936. I don't suppose Britain would have wanted to see Australian carrier plans in 1935.
 
Another thing that must be considered, apart from the Hughes in power option is that until post war Australia was totally at Britain's mercy for all foreign relations matters and many financial matters including purchasing aircraft and warships. Read that file I posted - Australia needed permission from Britain to purchase the Catalinas they wanted. The Wirraway was delayed going into production as CAC needed to redesign many parts to reduce the US content and make it Australian content. Some of those redesigns were as simple as changing metal spec (and part number), others slightly more complex like changing the cowl guns from Brownings to the Vickers that the RAF did not want because otherwise Australia had to pay import duty to Britain on the Brownings, even if built here.
 
Australia was going to buy Japanese aircraft as interim planes until England could supply Hurricanes or Spitfires, I believe that was around 1938-1940
 
I learned to drive on immediate post war two ton truck with no synchros - wasn't that bad and dad was sitting in passenger's critiquing. I'd almost have preferred someone shooting at me. When teaching my kids to drive, we did father/child projects, and 1st rebuild of transmission was done without synchros, to demonstrate the importance of that part. Lot of guys are impressed with my daughter's ability to drive manuals as a result. p.s. You should add a 2 speed rear axle to the mix which requires triple clutching.

If your vacuum cannister is any good, you get 3 brake applications before you're down to manual brakes.

As your picture shows, the blocking ring in a cast part - if it was really considered that critical, you machine the mold once and then "roll the rings out like bread loaves." If even USA does have ability to build the "perfect" tank engine in quantity, why pick on Australia for doing same thing??

Not having all the desired new machine tools for a recently redesigned assembly is still a problem in 2021 - thank goodness for CNC.

Cockatoo actually had better turbine shops than anywhere else in the Commonwealth - function of being on opposite side of world from England. And the Aussies had the ship building infrastructure to build destroyer (probably the most challenging hull short of the sheer size of a battleship). Over the course of the war, Canada was able to overtake Australia, I won't deny it helped to be right next door to USA, but in late 30s, Canada was in 4th place behind UK, Northern Ireland* and Australia

*Using current name, not name at the time.

Australia didn't have to ask England for permission to buy Catalina or to build P&W engines, but UK was Australia's #1 trading partner and they had just been through a devastating trade war with Japan. They certainly weren't going pick another over a batch of flying boats. So, making sure there won't be any ramifications for signing the contract isn't exactly asking permission.

While the LNT '36 retained the individual ship size restrictions e.g. BB @ 35k tons, it did away with restrictions on how many BBs signee could have in service. Which is why RAN started on the Tribal DDs - the LNT '30 restriction on total number of DDs was gone. Which is why I picked 1/Jan/'36 as keel laying date. It was clear going into the discussions that Japan wouldn't be resigning, so be ready to build the day after the old treaty expired.

What did UK have, a billion 0.303 rounds left over after WWI? Similar issue with the 2 pdr. When you have that much ammo available, it does make sense to require your guns to be chambered for it.
 
My 1963 Ford Galaxie had brass syncro rings in it's 3 speed manual trans. I drove a 1947 Federal Two and a half ton truck non syncro 4 speed and learned to double clutch easily, also start in second when with a light load, granny only needed when fully loaded. Double clutch knowledge came in handy with MGs.
 
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