The early Spitfires Hurricanes and 109's didn't have armor either but they absolutely did once the shooting started and long before the A6M entered the war.
The Zero's Maneuverability
- Thread starter MIflyer
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The early Spitfires Hurricanes and 109's didn't have armor either but they absolutely did once the shooting started and long before the A6M entered the war.
Thumpalumpacus
Major
I was asking more about the remarks about vertical maneuver, and looking for a link I could read for myself.
cherry blossom
Senior Airman
- 513
- Apr 23, 2007
I suspect that the poor manoeuvrability of the A6M at high speed was more because it was designed to be easy to land on a carrier than because of its light weight philosophy. Did the Ki-43 Hayabusa have the same problem with rolling at high speed? My problem is that I don't understand if the A6M's aileron balance tabs returned when the wing was strengthened and if not, why not.
The A6M was probably the easiest of the WW2 fighters to land. Its planned sucessor the A7M Reppu had a very large wing (about the same as a Hellcat but larger than an F4U or a P-47) and low wing loading which against prioritised landing on a carrier over high speed. In peace time or in a conflict like the war with China, landing accidents must have been the most serious threat and that seems to have influenced policy. The A6M was anyway superior in some ways to its contemporary the Fairey Fulmar.
The A6M was probably the easiest of the WW2 fighters to land. Its planned sucessor the A7M Reppu had a very large wing (about the same as a Hellcat but larger than an F4U or a P-47) and low wing loading which against prioritised landing on a carrier over high speed. In peace time or in a conflict like the war with China, landing accidents must have been the most serious threat and that seems to have influenced policy. The A6M was anyway superior in some ways to its contemporary the Fairey Fulmar.
Hawk 75 aka P-36 did well in 1939-40 against the Luftwaffe over France, and later over Finland
- Thread starter
- #25
MIflyer
1st Lieutenant
As I said, the Corky Myer article as well as the USN reports of the tests on the Koga Zero.
Ahhhh, you missed the point entirely. They WERE NOT in frontline service BECAUSE they did not have armor, self sealing tanks, etc. The AVG was going to have some CW-21's but they ran into a mountain along the way, which reduced their combat effectiveness considerably. Countries like Thailand, China, and Argentina adopted some lightweight fighters, including the export fixed gear version of the Hawk 75, but had little choice.
Thumpalumpacus
Major
This is what doesn't make sense to me. You report that he thought "Its best climb speed was 20 kts lower than the Hellcat and he was amazed that he could not only pull a tight loop but actually gain altitude in the process, even when starting the loop at only 120 kts. With a 120 kt entry speed the Zero could end the loop 1200 ft higher than it started. A Wildcat has a minimum loop entry speed off 160 kts and would lose several hundred feet by the end of the loop", but then you write "The Zero was nimble but at speeds over 220 Kts it was almost a sitting duck, neither able to roll into a turn quickly nor flip into a climb or a dive". Couldn't it climb or dive without "flipping into it"? And wouldn't that allow it to use its apparently excellent vertical performance?
Shortround6
Major General
As a general rule of the thumb US fighters that have a letter designation of "C" or lower (like P-39C) were judged NOT combat capable at some point in 1940 or early 1941. This made figuring out which planes were combat capable (or capable of over seas deployment) much easier as the people doing the counting didn't have to refer back to spec sheets all the time for each type of aircraft. However this didn't last long. By 1942 all of the older fighters had been transferred to flight schools or ground schools or shipped off to Panama. And the the newer planes (P-47 & P-51) were pretty much combat capable (not P-47Bs) right from the start.
The "protection" gets a lot of the blame. The American planes were built to higher strength standards to begin with. This did allow them to stand up to more damage (mostly).
1930s Navy planes had unlimited dive speed for instance. To be accepted the plane (fighter or dive bomber) had to sustain a "terminal veleocity dive" Plane was dived to a speed where the force of drag equaled the force of gravity and the plane would not go any faster. This got rather hard with low drag mono-planes and the F4U was either the first or one of the first that did not have to do this (they calculated how up they would have to start and how much room they would need to pull out and things started getting a little dicey).
And nobody wants to blame the sacred cow of American armament. The .50 cal machine gun. When you stick 2-3 times the weight of guns/ammo one 6000-7000lb plane that you do in another something (or several somethings) in the performance takes a hit.
Sure.
P-66 and A6M, both low wing mono planes with retracting gear, both radials with transparent canopies, Better than close enough for CGI/AI work
Hurricane and Mustang, both mono planes with retracting gear, both have pointy noses and transparent canopies. Better than close enough for CGI/AI work
MiTasol
1st Lieutenant
Oops - I should have said Hurricane and bubble canopy Mustang.
The P-66 was a razorback like the Hurricane and the A6Ms all had a framed bubble canopy. I guess the difference between a straight line from the top of the canopy to the tail versus a straight line from the engine to the tail with a camel hump canopy is close enough for CGI. We all know how distorted AI (assinine intelligence) depictions of aircraft are.
The P-66 was a razorback like the Hurricane and the A6Ms all had a framed bubble canopy. I guess the difference between a straight line from the top of the canopy to the tail versus a straight line from the engine to the tail with a camel hump canopy is close enough for CGI. We all know how distorted AI (assinine intelligence) depictions of aircraft are.
- Thread starter
- #29
MIflyer
1st Lieutenant
You can climb or dive without using the elevator by adding or removing power. Most light aircraft do it that way. But you cannot do a loop or dive onto a target without using a LOT of elevator. And if the elevator is "frozen in concrete" you ain't doing that.
Now, as I understand it, the Zero was designed so that if the pilot tried to exert too much force the controls stretched to keep him from breaking the structure. And I have only read of one Japanese fighter breaking up in a dive and that was an Oscar fighting with P-51A over Burma, so the Zero did not seem to come apart very easily.
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MiTasol
1st Lieutenant
Do not forget that in the RAAF combat trials between a Spitfire and a captured A6M it was the Spitfire that suffered structural damage - not the supposedly flimsy A6M.
- Thread starter
- #31
MIflyer
1st Lieutenant
The Hawk 75 and indeed all American fighter aircraft of the time with the possible exception of the Mustang Mk I seemed to have very good aileron control, at least as the RAF rated them. They were considered to be better than the Spitfire and Hurricane and since they were built stronger they could use those controls to full effect. What Corky's article points out is that maneuverability was limited by structural strength. Now the Zero had HUGE ailerons, comparable in size relative to the wing to light aircraft, including my Ercoupe. Those ailerons gave it a lot of capability but also meant you could break something, especially at higher speeds.
MiTasol
1st Lieutenant
I would agree on all the US fighters I worked on (P-38, 39, 40, 51) with one exception. The forward fuselage of the P-39 is a brick. The rear fuselage makes the Spitfire and A6M look like bricks. The longerons are a single narrow folded L section of alloy with about 1/3 the mass of the Spitfire longerons and to make it worse there are large access panels on both sides of the rear fuselage with no surrounding doubler section. Not that different to a Cessna 180 except the 180 has no access panels aft of the cabin bulkhead.
Thumpalumpacus
Major
My understanding is that while the ailerons locked up at high speed due to surface are, the A6M's elevators were not so big and thus not so hampered.
I don't know if or how the Zero's controls might have been limited by design. Do you have a source for that? How was this done? If the control wires stretched at extremes, wouldn't that leave them more slack and thus sloppier further inside the envelope?
SaparotRob
Unter Gemeine Geschwader Murmeltier XIII
There was a post about the stretchy control cables. I'm going nuts trying to remember the thread.
Same thing was found over Australia, the A6M's could easily loop over the top of the Spit V's we had but the MkV's used here used low boost Merlin 46's which did flatter the A6M's performance.
I call BS on that to be honest, I haven't found a single instance of a Spitfire bending its fuselage from dogfighting in any theatre of combat in any actual combat let alone a training one.
Thumpalumpacus
Major
That sounds vaguely filthy. Not sure I want to put my finger on it.
MiTasol
1st Lieutenant
Here is the report on the mock combat flight and separately I have the report on damage to the Spitfire from Flt Lt Wawn but I cannot find it at present. His son or grandson was on this forum recently so may have a copy as I think my copy came from him. I will keep looking for mine. And the damage was not fuselage but tailplane from memory.
Also attached is the pilots late war public comment on the Spit vs Hap and another RAAF report on the type
Attachments
Spitfires didn't suffer this damage in actual combat with A6M's so having it happen in a mock dog fight is highly doubtful, still calling it BS.
ThomasP
Senior Master Sergeant
The A6M's elevators became heavy at higher speeds but did not 'lock up' or otherwise become ineffective, and according to the Japanese test pilots the effectiveness of the elevators was acceptable. This was also as reported by the Japanese service pilots. If the elevators locked up when Meyers did the flying then the elevators were either damaged or sub-standard due to another cause.
According to Japanese test pilots and service pilots it was the A6M's ailerons that locked up at higher speeds. The relative ineffectiveness of the ailerons at high speed was primarily due to the large aileron surface area, which made the aerodynamic forces difficult to overcome by manually operated mechanisms. In order to meet good control requirements over the higher speed range of monoplane aircraft you often need to compromise control at one end of the range or the other. If you use longer lever arms to allow the pilot to deflect the ailerons more easily at higher speeds then you end up causing loss of control sensitivity at lower speeds. If you use shorter lever arms you increase the control sensitivity at low to medium speeds, but the ailerons tend to become heavier at high speeds. Although you can mess around a bit with the basics of mechanical advantage, there will be trade-offs in expense, weight, complexity, etc.
This is part of the same mechanical/aerodynamic reason the P-38 had a poor roll rate before the adoption of hydraulic boosted ailerons. This is also why the service P-47 models had a mediocre roll rate at low & medium speeds. The ailerons had to be large in area, and/or have large deflections, to get acceptable control at very high altitudes where the aircraft was designed to operate, while still being able to be moved at high speeds. The later P-38 got boosted ailerons and so was able to use the full(?) aileron travel, while the P-47 had its deflection angles reduced via a change in leverage which allowed the pilot to exert enough force to roll the plane acceptably at higher speeds.
FWIW
________________aileron______deflection_____ wing______ wing
_______________area (ea)______ angles_______ area______ span
A6M3*________ 10.10 ft2_____+27°/-21.5°___ 241 ft2_____36' 1" (from original Mitsubishi A6M3 drawings)
Hurricane______10.20 ft2_____+22°/-21°_____257 ft2_____40' 0" (from Hurricane Mk II manual)
Spitfire_________ 9.45 ft2_____+26°/-19°_____242 ft2____ 36'10" (from Spitfire Mk V manual)
P-38F_________12.72 ft2_____+23.5°/-8°____ 327 ft2_____52' 0" (from P-38L E&M manual)
P-47B(early)___ 13.16 ft2____+25.5°/-21.5°__ 300 ft2_____40' 9" (from P-47B-D E&M manual)
P-47B/C/D____ 13.16 ft2_____+16°/-12°_____300 ft2_____40' 9" (from P-47B-D E&M manual)
F4F____________6.60 ft2_____+19°/-15°_____260 ft2_____38' 0" (from F4F-3/-4 Detail Specifications)
F4U___________ 9.05 ft2_____+19°/-14°_____314 ft2_____41' 0" (from F4U-1 E&M manual and F4U-4 Detail Specifications)
P-39D_________ 7.37 ft2_____+26°/-10°_____213 ft2_____34' 0" (from P-39 E&M manual)
P-51D_________ 6.36 ft2_____+12°/-12°_____240 ft2_____37' 0" (from P-51D/K E&M manual)
* I could not find an authoritative reference for the area of the ailerons for the A6M2, but from drawings and photographs I think the area is around
11.2 ft2 each.
According to Japanese test pilots and service pilots it was the A6M's ailerons that locked up at higher speeds. The relative ineffectiveness of the ailerons at high speed was primarily due to the large aileron surface area, which made the aerodynamic forces difficult to overcome by manually operated mechanisms. In order to meet good control requirements over the higher speed range of monoplane aircraft you often need to compromise control at one end of the range or the other. If you use longer lever arms to allow the pilot to deflect the ailerons more easily at higher speeds then you end up causing loss of control sensitivity at lower speeds. If you use shorter lever arms you increase the control sensitivity at low to medium speeds, but the ailerons tend to become heavier at high speeds. Although you can mess around a bit with the basics of mechanical advantage, there will be trade-offs in expense, weight, complexity, etc.
This is part of the same mechanical/aerodynamic reason the P-38 had a poor roll rate before the adoption of hydraulic boosted ailerons. This is also why the service P-47 models had a mediocre roll rate at low & medium speeds. The ailerons had to be large in area, and/or have large deflections, to get acceptable control at very high altitudes where the aircraft was designed to operate, while still being able to be moved at high speeds. The later P-38 got boosted ailerons and so was able to use the full(?) aileron travel, while the P-47 had its deflection angles reduced via a change in leverage which allowed the pilot to exert enough force to roll the plane acceptably at higher speeds.
FWIW
________________aileron______deflection_____ wing______ wing
_______________area (ea)______ angles_______ area______ span
A6M3*________ 10.10 ft2_____+27°/-21.5°___ 241 ft2_____36' 1" (from original Mitsubishi A6M3 drawings)
Hurricane______10.20 ft2_____+22°/-21°_____257 ft2_____40' 0" (from Hurricane Mk II manual)
Spitfire_________ 9.45 ft2_____+26°/-19°_____242 ft2____ 36'10" (from Spitfire Mk V manual)
P-38F_________12.72 ft2_____+23.5°/-8°____ 327 ft2_____52' 0" (from P-38L E&M manual)
P-47B(early)___ 13.16 ft2____+25.5°/-21.5°__ 300 ft2_____40' 9" (from P-47B-D E&M manual)
P-47B/C/D____ 13.16 ft2_____+16°/-12°_____300 ft2_____40' 9" (from P-47B-D E&M manual)
F4F____________6.60 ft2_____+19°/-15°_____260 ft2_____38' 0" (from F4F-3/-4 Detail Specifications)
F4U___________ 9.05 ft2_____+19°/-14°_____314 ft2_____41' 0" (from F4U-1 E&M manual and F4U-4 Detail Specifications)
P-39D_________ 7.37 ft2_____+26°/-10°_____213 ft2_____34' 0" (from P-39 E&M manual)
P-51D_________ 6.36 ft2_____+12°/-12°_____240 ft2_____37' 0" (from P-51D/K E&M manual)
* I could not find an authoritative reference for the area of the ailerons for the A6M2, but from drawings and photographs I think the area is around
11.2 ft2 each.
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