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In some cases Zeroes definitely dropped their tanks, as in early war operations when the tanks were seen on the ground by the Allies. In the early missions of Tainan Air Group from Rabaul to Guadalcanal they apparently didn't, not sure why, shortage? USN F6F's sometimes didn't drop their tanks in air combat either, in that case it was limited supply of them on a carrier.I think that I have read that it was even worse for the IJN in that the Zeros had to (or chose to) retain their drop tanks for combat over Guadalcanal.
In the particular case mentioned above, during the strike on Tulagi May 4 1942, one of the targets of strafing was a real DD, Yuzuki, whose physical damage is variously described as heavy (in Lundstrom) or light (some Japanese sources) but the CO was killed along with 9 others by all accounts. The ship didn't run aground and survived. Her sister Kikuzuki was struck by a TBD's torpedo and beached (mostly picked away by scrap scavengers over the decades but some of it is still visible today), and strafing by F4F's also caused the smaller vessel Tama Maru (confusion exists as to its exact type) to be beached, sank later, wreck is within recreational diving depth.Rich, that was a good post and really enjoyed. Much of it was reflected in Lundstrom, "The First Team." Interesting to hear the pilot relate effectiveness of 50 BMGs on DDs. That was also reflected in Lundstrom and was debunked by some "experts" on this forum during a discussion on AC armament. Sometimes all pilots were not really adept at identifying ships so the "DD" might have been a lesser ship, but the 50 cal can do a lot.
.50s are cheap, easy to maintain, and on modern Navy ships their mission is still to provide protection against suicide bombing, not by kamikaze pilots, but boats like the USS Cole.Joe B, one can always rely on you to come up with informative posts. Very many thanks. Hope the skeptics about the 50 BMG read your post. When I said that the Wildcats disabled some IJN ships by strafing, there was scoffing. The fact is that I don't believe that DDs of any description had much armor plate anywhere. An interesting point is that after being on board the BB, Alabama, I observed single mount 20 mm Oerlikons almost everywhere on deck that was unobstructed, yet modern light USN vessels don't seem to mount any 20 mms at all except in the CIWSs. There are always 50 bmgs though. Saw a picture of a vessel just launched the other day, of which this was the first of many. This ship looks like a combination of a stealth AC and the USS Moniter and is to operate in the littoral. The only guns visible were a 57mm in a gun house near the bow and two single 50 BMGs on the stern. Wonder why the 50s rather than 20 mms as they are about the same size?
Another factor to consider when discussing the range of WW2 fighters is that essentially the combat radius was determined by the amount of internal fuel carried. No matter how much external fuel could be carried the fighter had to perform ACM and return to base on the internal fuel, since few pilots wanted to start combat with external drop tanks attached. One of the weaknesses of the P39 was that it could carry only 120 gallons of internal fuel, which essentially determined the combat radius. It had a 1710 CI, 12 cylinder engine which burned fuel quickly, especially at military power. My brother has a 300 HP Saratoga that carries 100 gallons of internal fuel. Imagine the difference. The F4U4 could carry two 150 gallon drop tanks but when entering combat, it had to rely on the 234 gallons in the fuselage tank to fight on and then go home. Another factor involved was in, for instance, the Merlin P51s there was an 85 gallon internal fuel tank that sat behind the pilot, well aft of the CG. Violent maneuvers were not a good idea with that tank full so it needed to be empty or nearly so before combat which meant the P51 had to fight and go home on the other internal fuel which was around 185 gallons, even though it too could carry 300 gallons of external fuel.