Supermarine 224 production a help or a hindrance

[Koopernic]

How about a Buzzard powered version? Bulkier but lighter than the Dagger, at least excluding radiator weight (and radiator and header tank placement could at least be easier to manage CoG changes compared to the Goshawk).

I do wonder why the Buzzard was never employed on a fighter, even in prototype form, unless its development and limited production run had been discontinued before large enough fighters were even being considered. (Kawasaki resorted to using the even bulkier Ha-9 on the Ki-28 prototype)

That's interesting in that the Buzzard has a line of development that leads, via way of the "R type" Schneider Trophy engines, to the Griffon. Griffon Spitfires in 1940 maybe?

There is an interesting story relating to the development of the Heinkel He 112. The Luftwaffe fighter completion that produced the Me 109 had priorities in the order of speed, climb and then manouverabillity. When the He 112 V1 was tested it was found to be significantly slower than predicted. The Gunther Brothers investigated and found that the wing thickness they had used produced significantly more form drag (parasitic drag that does not produced lift) than tables predicted at the speeds used.

The wing was thinned down and enlarged (though the one that was forced to fly of against the Me 109 had its span reduced to increase speed since there was no time to make the new wing, it still had lower wing loading) and only the He 112B version ended up with the new wing.

Hence Heinkel/Gunthers and Mitchell were intuitively heading in the same direction: finer wings profiles to gain speed by reducing compressibility drag which starts becoming noticeable at 180mph.

I would say Mitchell had appreciated that the problems were fundamentally aerodynamic and decided to start again. There was an early form of the sound barrier to get through.

It's odd though that Rolls Royce privately funded development of the PV-12/Merlin (Private Venture 12) presumably because they saw more market for a smaller engine rather than one of the Buzzard/R-Type/Griffon swept volume.

 

[KiwiBiggles]

It might have been worse if Gloster was not instructed to build Hurricanes under licence - even more obsolete biplane fighters.

I doubt Gloster was "instructed to build Hurricanes under license". Gloster was wholly owned by Hawker at this time.

 

[kool kitty89]

That's interesting in that the Buzzard has a line of development that leads, via way of the "R type" Schneider Trophy engines, to the Griffon. Griffon Spitfires in 1940 maybe?

It wouldn't be the Griffon as such, likely lighter, lower powered, and somewhat bulkier (the Griffon shared bore and stroke with the R and Buzzard, but had numerous other changes making it more compact and able to cope with power levels close to that of the R on a mass production military use basis).

If the Buzzard has paralleled development of the Kestrel, it should have been managing over 1200 hp in the late 1930s and over 1500 hp around 1940 if it followed the Peregrine's advances over the Kestrel. (but, assuming the Buzzard line itself was similarly limited as the Kestrel, it probably wouldn't have managed beyond 1300 hp without structural redesign -so similar to WEP on the Merlin, but perhaps at lower boost pressure and RPM)

It's also possible that experience with the Rolls Royce R combined with continued development and (importantly) demand might have allowed further development to progress more smoothly than the Peregrine (let alone Vulture) and earlier than the Griffon. (but lacking the reduced frontal area the Griffon offered)

It seems like a developed Buzzard/R derivative could have filled the Vulture's planned role better than it did. (lower power but smaller, simpler and lighter and -in hindsight- possibly more power earlier than the vulture was reliably producing anyway)

And aside from Griffon powered spitfires earlier, there's the Hurricane to consider and the older buzzard. Pre-war, when lower octane fuels were still more the limiting factor, the Buzzard itself should have consistently out-performed the PV-12/Merlin and the Hurricane itself (being larger and more heavily built than the early Spitfire) could have made sense to adapt to that engine. It may not have helped Hurricane production much over the Merlin powered variants, but it should have helped pre-war and early ear performance (and with lower engine stresses than emergency power on the Merlin). A buzzard powered Hurricane might have been more significant for some foreign users like the Finnish than the British given their resource and fuel sourcing limitations.

Whether successes there would have placed priority of the Buzzard/Griffon over the Merlin, I'm not sure, and a bulkier Buzzard/R dimensioned engine would have been a tighter fit on the Spitfire than the Griffon already was (it may have been simpler in terms of weight, but installation may have been less of a problem than aerodynamic issues).

Hence Heinkel/Gunthers and Mitchell were intuitively heading in the same direction: finer wings profiles to gain speed by reducing compressibility drag which starts becoming noticeable at 180mph.

The Gunther brothers also seemed to move towards symmetrical (no chamber) airfoil designs where the Spitfire did not. (several others adopted 00xx series NACA symmetrical airfoils -like the P-39 and B-17, though I'm not entirely sure on the reasoning, but I'd assume at least part of it was the use of a lower lift/lower drag profile to allow for more internal wing volume -for structural reasons and/or internal store capacity)

The spitfire wing also ended up with an unusually high critical mach number thanks to its thinness, but it still had higher drag than several thicker wings, at least in the lower end of the transonic range. (plus the Spitfire had more trouble with control/stick forces at high speeds especially early on compared to the likes of the P-39, P-40, P-51, and Fw-190 -I think the P-47 and maybe P-38 as well, but they had separate problems related to center of lift shifting near critical mach rather than simply stiff control)

The Hurricane (and especially Typhoon given its later development) had especially thick wings along with using relatively high drag airfoils. (the Hurricane's compromises for overall simplicity and time to production are certainly understandable -including the use of the Clark-Y derived airfoil- but the Typhoon's design is a good bit more confusing)

It's odd though that Rolls Royce privately funded development of the PV-12/Merlin (Private Venture 12) presumably because they saw more market for a smaller engine rather than one of the Buzzard/R-Type/Griffon swept volume.

I suspect it's at least partially due to the general lack of demand for the Buzzard. But still, with the development going into the R series for racing, you'd think that applying that experience to a production engine of similar dimensions would have been at least somewhat simpler than doing such with the PV-12. (short of the later and more advanced Griffon)

But then, the Kestrel was the main focus during most of the 1930s, and Rolls Royce had the likes of the Goshawk, Peregrine, and Vulture diverting resources as well. Had there been more external support for the Buzard itself, further development might have taken precedent over some of the other projects, but that wasn't the case. (in hindsight, the Vulture and Peregrine probably should have been canceled outright in favor of the PV-12 and Buzard derived engines)



All that said, one final note on possibly interesting earlier Buzzard powered aircraft might have been a derivative of the Hawker Fury biplane in a similar vein to the Gauntlet to Gladiator development but slightly earlier. (perhaps preempting the very requirement that the Supermarine 224 later lost -the Fury actually has a smaller wing area than the Gladiator, Supermarine 224 and even the Hurricane itself)

 

[kool kitty89]

I should make an amendment to the topic of using large V-12s in fighters earlier. The Russians, British, and Germans may have avoided using their bulky, large displacement, 1930s era engines in fighters (Buzzard, BMW VI/IX, M17/AM34), but Kawasaki did so with the BMW IX derived Ha-9 in their Ki-10 and prototype Ki-28 fighter. (had the Type 224 with Buzzard engine managed performance remotely close to the Ki-28, it probably would have won the competition, though with that large wing area, it's somewhat doubtful)

Then again, the Ki-28 was more a Hurricane/Spitfire/Bf 109 vintage design, flying in 1936. And the Ki-10 itself was a bit more like the Gladiator time-wise. (perhaps more like a hypothetical Buzzard powered Hawker Fury in terms of engine/size)