Which is the better fighter, P-40F or Typhoon?

[Schweik]

Personally its this kind of comment which I find at best borderline. There is no evidence that Shores is either pro or anti anybody. There is an overwhelming body of evidence that he is a very detailed researcher, proven across many books and highly respected in his field. Is he or anyone perfect, of course not, but because he doesn't tally with something you like or agree with he suddenly doesn't like Americans.
Because I disagree with a number of your posting you have at times implied that I am a hater of the P40. Never directly of course but its there. Does it worry me, no, your wrong in that and I only mention this as you have a repeating patter of behaviour.

If I had to put money on who is the more accurate researcher, you or Shores I know where my money will go.

I have no doubt. My only serious point about Shores is that he had staked out positions (on quite limited data) which whether he intended it or not were aligned with one particular 'camp' that was revisionist in support of Axis (German) superiority and he had to contradict himself in his later books, which he sometimes does with a certain obvious reluctance. But you can put his 1969 book against his more modern ones and it's pretty clear which ones are more accurate there, right?

I believe in that passage you quoted I was responding to another post complaining about American point of view and claiming that Shores was American.

As to his attitude toward Americans I was really kind of kidding and shouldn't have even mentioned that. I agree he is a good researcher. A good researcher will rise above any bias they do have.

 

[BiffF15]

While off-topic, I figured I'd respond to this first because when I attempted to reply to everything it said that I went over the 20,000 character limit (that and Fubar57 would be sure to go apoplectic...)

The P-38's roll rate was either poor or average depending on speed until the P-38J came along.

BiffF15 ,

1. F-15 vs F-18: Honestly I was surprised that the F-15 would out-accelerate and out-sustain the F-18 in turns. What variant of F-15 and F-18 out of curiosity?

2. G-Loads: I remember hearing somewhere that the normal rated loads for the F-15 were 7.33 or so and later increased to 9g. It wouldn't be the first time I was wrong, but there was a documentary in which a pilot said he pulled 12g and managed to avoid coming unglued (his name was Larry Pitts if I recall), which is within the 9g normal load-factor.

Zipper,

The Hornet is very agile but a slow accelerator for several reasons. Bottom line use thrust to weight to help figure out how the various modern fighters accelerate compared to one another.

The A/B model Eagle initially was a 7.3G jet but eventually it was produced with the Overload Warning System, or OWS (pronounced Owls) which allowed up to 9.0 under certain conditions (straight pull, speed, altitude, weight). All late A/Bs and beyond came with the system installed and it was retrofitted to the earlier birds.

I flew the A-D models with both the F100-100 and -220 engines. Mostly the latter motor. It offered enhanced reliability, throttle response, and thrust with I believe a very slight improvement in fuel burn. In either the -100 or -220 jets it was easy to out rate, out accel or out power the Hornet (all models).

Was Larry a Tyndall AFB IP and what was his call sign?

Cheers,
Biff

 

[Schweik]

I also want to be clear about one thing - I have the utmost respect for the British*, Australian, New Zealander, South African, Indian, Canadian, and all other Commonwealth pilots and other combat veterans. Guys like Billy Drake, Paddy Finucane, Clive Caldwell, George Beurling, Neville Duke, William Vale, Robert Tuck, James Edwards, Bobby Gibbes, Nicky Barr, Roald Dahl, and Adrian Warburton are all heroes of mine. Nor did I forget the Polish and Czech pilots who fought for and with the RAF. I also have the utmost respect for British aircraft of that era. The Rolls Royce merlin was the best in-line piston engine of the war IMO. The Spitfire, Mosquito and Beaufighter were three of my favorite aircraft of the war.

And the American pilots too of course though to be honest I've read more biographies of the Commonwealth ones so far. Some of my favorite US aces include Pappy Boyington, Ira Kepford, Robert Baseler, Robert De Haven, Benjamin O Davis, Levi Chase, and Swede Vejtasa. I also respect the Soviet Aces who I know mostly through interview transcripts. Their bravery was beyond the pale.

And yes I have a great deal of respect for the Axis aces including the Japanese, Germans, Italians, Finns, Romanians, Croats and so on. I read the biographies of Saburo Sakai, and Galland and etc. Gunther Ralls seems really likeable in interviews and is now friends with several Anglo-American pilots. I don't laud the cause but I respect the pilots and their machines too.

But part of what makes WW2 interesting to me, and WW2 air combat specifically are not just the great victories and successes but also the failures and mistakes. Every nation, every Air Force and every squadron had them, and quite often they were devastating. It is something to learn from.

Sometimes in here when I offhandedly commented on flaws of the American, Soviet, German, Japanese and British Commonwealth systems, it's only the latter - the British Commonwealth- that certain people seem to notice. Is there some rule you can't say ill of a British plane unless you are British?

S


* including but not limited to English, Scottish, Welsh, Northern Irish, Cornish, those from the Isle of Man and the Shetlands, Bermuda, Trinidad and anywhere else I forgot to think of.

 

[Ivan1GFP]

Totally disagree. Rolling and turning are different things. You can roll without losing speed. Rolling (and turning, slightly) allows the attacking fighter to keep targets lined up.

Think of the good (i.e. successful) BnZ fighters:

Fw 190 - fastest roll rate in the war basically
P-51 - excellent roll rate
P-47 - good roll rate
F4U Corsair - excellent roll rate
Ki-44 - (I just learned this) excellent roll rate

and in the early war -I-16 (excellent roll rate)

Hello Gentlemen,
I had missed this post because it was in 20-something pages that I skipped when I first found this thread.
This summary is not terribly accurate and also not a fair comparison in my opinion.
Roll rate tends to be very speed dependent.
The FW 190A/F/G series had a very very good roll rate but at certain speeds other aircraft rolled faster.
At some speeds, a clipped wing Spitfire would roll faster and in many places was quite comparable though the earlier model Spitfires were not even close.
At high speeds, a P-51 would actually roll faster even though at lower airspeeds, the Mustang had a pretty mediocre roll rate.
The P-40 series had a roll rate that ranged from excellent to very good depending on the particular model.
At low airspeeds, the A6M and Ki 43 had extremely fast roll rates though the A6M lost a lot of that roll rate at higher speeds.
The Wildcat and Hellcat also had somewhat average roll rates though they didn't lose as much of that performance at higher airspeeds as the A6M did.
The spring tab ailerons used on the F6F-5 Hellcat significantly improved high speed roll rate at the expense of low speed roll rate as compared to the F6F-3.
The P-47 had at best a mediocre roll rate.
Without boosted ailerons, the P-38 had a poor roll rate but even with boosted aileron, although the roll rate was high, the response was very slow; There was a relatively long lag between control input and aircraft's response.

In addition to the roll rate at 1G, most aircraft lost some fairly substantial amount of their rolling performance under G load.
From descriptions I have seen, this is probably where the P-47 showed some advantage by not losing as much roll performance as some other aircraft.

The point is that a simple one word description is not really sufficient to account for differences in rolling performance.

Regarding BnZ fighting: It is really a matter of having better level speed and zoom climb performance than your opponent. Even the A6M Type Zero was used as a Boom and Zoom fighter against the slower opposition it encountered at its debut in China.

- Ivan.

 

[Schweik]

So what do you think about the Typhoon? Good or bad Roll? Good or bad at BnZ? As a fighter in general

I thought the P-47 was good at rolling at high altitude though I could be wrong.

 

[Milosh]

Without boosted ailerons, the P-38 had a poor roll rate but even with boosted aileron, although the roll rate was high, the response was very slow; There was a relatively long lag between control input and aircraft's response.

Very good observation which many people forget or ignore.

 

[Zipper730]

Was Larry a Tyndall AFB IP and what was his call sign?

No idea. It was mentioned in a show on History Channel called "Dogfights".

 

[Clayton Magnet]

So what do you think about the Typhoon? Good or bad Roll? Good or bad at BnZ? As a fighter in general

CERTAINLY better than a P-40F

 

[Kevin J]

CERTAINLY better than a P-40F

Just to put any comparison into perspective.

By the end of 1942, 1312 P-40F's had been produced, Britain had produced 28 Typhoons in 1941 and 686 in 1942. Subsequent production figures were 700 P-40L's from late '42 and for the Typhoon 1943(1137), 1944(1165) and 1945(299). From June 1943, only one third of the squadrons were assigned to ADGB, the rest to the 2nd TAF for ground attack duties. So we are looking at roughly half the number of Typhoons available in 1942/43 compared to the P-40F/L and unlike the latter are available until V-E Day. MTO Warhawk victories, 592 over 2 years, Typhoon ETO victories, 246 over 3 years. So 2012 P-40F/L's over 2 years destroy over twice the number of Axis aircraft as perhaps a similar number of Typhoons over a 3 year period employed as interceptors.

As, I said, just to put the comparison into perspective.

 

[Zipper730]

I remember reading though this that they measured the aircraft's roll rate by applying 1/4 aileron over the course of a second going left; then doing the same going right or something. Why would 1/4 aileron be used as a measurement instead of 50% or full aileron? Also why apply it over the course of 1-second instead of a faster rate of speed (I did see that done in one case)?

 

[wuzak]

Without boosted ailerons, the P-38 had a poor roll rate but even with boosted aileron, although the roll rate was high, the response was very slow; There was a relatively long lag between control input and aircraft's response.

Inertia. What a bitch!

 

[Zipper730]

"The Hurricane could turn very sharply but it couldn't roll and it couldn't dive. That is why it couldn't compete after 1941. " The Hurricane could only compete over its own island in 1940 with the help of RADAR.

Actually the roll-rate was kind of an interesting thing on the Hawker Hurricane.

The ailerons were often mis-rigged, which proved to greatly reduce the roll-rate. There were also issues involving lubricant and temperature conditions.

The Maryland and the Baltimore - critical to the English war effort in the early years of the war in the Med

I've heard very little about these two aircraft. Supposedly the Maryland could dive to high speeds.

Wow that is interesting and a bit counter-intuitive. Do you know why thinner air or higher altitude made G more risky / damaging for the airframe? Is that just a matter of the TAS?

It doesn't, you don't have enough lift to be able to pull those loads.

Basically at stall speed, in order to pull 1g, results in you reaching the critical AoA; you can fly below the stall speed and not stall (you'd admittedly be doing a ballistic arc), and stall well above it. If the aircraft was to double, the stall speed would increase by the square root of two, and likewise if you were to pull 2g, you would see the stall speed increase by the same number (1.414 about). If you are only flying at 1.414 x Vs, which for the sake of this I'll assume is around 100 mph, you only have enough lift to pull 2g which requires the stick to be pulled all the way back. At 4g you'd have to fly at 200 mph, and if the A/C was rated for 8g, you would need around 282.8 mph to have enough lift to achieve the normal rated load. If you pull the stick all the way back you risk damaging the airplane and by 12g, you'd need 346.4 mph and snap the plane in half.

 

[Zipper730]

I would consider several factors for evaluating performance comparisons. These would include the aircraft's performance, the condition of the aircraft, and human factors variables.

Performance

One thing that seems to be an issue in some of the comparisons is the weight of the aircraft, and it has a substantial affect on climb and acceleration. Some of the figures that are listed for performance tests don't seem to be consistent with the typical loads.

Since performance would be best in the air-to-air configuration, that's a good starting point (though performance in the air-to-ground configuration could be good to know as both aircraft were used in the fighter-bomber role). I don't know how to calculate climb-performance as it requires the ability to calculate thrust based on

• The propeller thrust at specific RPM, propeller pitch settings, and speed
• The exhaust stack thrust based on engine boost, altitude, and both TAS/IAS
• Cooling drag, which is likely based on mach number, IAS (ie AoA which is a function of weight), engine temperature/air-temperature (AoA is a function of weight and speed).

Another is the engine power settings: I'm curious whether typical P-40F and Typhoon IB pilots pushed their engines (early on) above the listed boost settings (either by simply shoving the throttle as far forward as they dared, or by convincing the engine mechanic to manipulate the boost control).

A/C Condition

This involved a number of things such as

• Whether the engine was equipped with or without (a variety) of filters
• Whether it was carrying bomb-racks on it.
• Even the presence of fuel-tanks, even if jettisoned have a considerable effect on performance (while some fuel is burned warming up on the ground and the initial climb-phase, the drop-tanks being used from that point until the start of combat means that you'd have a higher internal fuel load than if you had no tanks); then there's paint-job: While I cannot vouch for the unimpeachable painting skills of those in the USAAF, the RAF often complained about the effects of the paint used on their aircraft.

So comparisons could be made either on the typical condition the aircraft were in when they were in combat, or one could also compare a P-40F/L and Typhoon IB in similar conditions (i.e. filter or no filter, with a good or bad paint-job, with/without racks -- and the possible bomb-load/drop-tanks).

Human Factors

This has to do with things like the cockpit configuration, everything being in the right place, and things that affect the pilot. I'm not sure how the two cockpit layouts compared and things of that sort. The fact that most British A/C had automatic boost-control, it made it easier to operate as you were less likely to wreck the engine.

The issues with carbon monoxide leakage in the Hurricane's cockpit would definitely be a strike against it as gassing the pilot removes the human factor -- which turns out to be needed in this case. Drones work fine without people -- but boy a manned aircraft gets all interesting when the pilot dies.

 

[Dan Fahey]

Quick question here on the P40 and P51A.
In combat conditions the Mechanics figured out they could increase performance increasing the Boost a good bit.
The US in peacetime used a lower rating with the 100 octane.
Wartime the British tuned the Allison P51 and P40 using their 100/130 octane.
They tuned the planes for more boost and performance.

MTO...did the Allies use US 100 octane or the British 100/130 octane fuel?
If they used the British fuel what percentage improvement did it offer?
Any documentation out there?

Not sure they used 130/150 in the P40 or Allison Mustang.

 

[Shortround6]

I don't know how to calculate climb-performance as it requires the ability to calculate thrust based on

• The propeller thrust at specific RPM, propeller pitch settings, and speed
• The exhaust stack thrust based on engine boost, altitude, and both TAS/IAS
• Cooling drag, which is likely based on mach number, IAS (ie AoA which is a function of weight), engine temperature/air-temperature (AoA is a function of weight and speed).

You are over complicating things. especially #3
Most props (once you get rid of the fixed pitch and two pitch things) are just about 80% efficient give or take (mostly take) a couple of points. That was the whole idea of the constant speed propeller.
Since the conversion of engine thrust to power varies with the speed of the aircraft there is a considerable reduction in "power" at climb speeds compared to max level speeds.

We don't need to know cooling drag, that goes right in with over all drag. yes a plane in climb mode (cooling flaps and doors open and hanging in the breeze) is very dirty compared to one closed up for high speed but then instantaneous drag goes up with the square of the speed. Power needed goes up with cube of the speed.
early P-40 could do 352 mph at 15,000ft with 1090hp. it could do 236mph on 400hp. 37% of the power gave you 67% of the speed.
Once you are down to best climb speeds the difference in drag between all buttoned up and cooling flaps open isn't that big a deal for most planes. Best Climbing speed for an early P-40 was about 140mph (IAS?)

Want to check your "thrust" calculations at 140-160mph climbing speed?

 

[Shortround6]

Wartime the British tuned the Allison P51 and P40 using their 100/130 octane.
They tuned the planes for more boost and performance.

This stuff about 'tuning the engines" is a pet peeve of mine.
Just what the heck did they do to "tune' the engines?
The ignition timing is fixed. The valve timing is fixed. the intake track is fixed, you have very very limited options on the exhaust stacks.

You can change the jet size in the carburetor/injector but most aviation fuel (at least from the same country) had pretty much the same BTUs per gallon/pound so screwing around with the mixture isn't going to get you much.

That leaves messing around with the boost control, which really isn't "tuning" an engine in the conventional sense.

US 100 octane used 2% or less aromatic compounds and the rich response of the fuel didn't change much from the lean response. It was sort of 100/98-102 fuel.
British BoB fuel was 100/115-20 and had no less than 20% aromatic compounds.
The high aromatic compound fuel would dissolve certain rubber parts in the fuel system and degrade early self sealing tank liners so the number of early US fighters that used the two different fuels is limited. US agreed to go to the high aromatic fuel even before Pearl Harbor so fuel incompatibility wasn't really a problem. Neither was "tuning" the engines once they left the United States,

 

[Schweik]

So did they use 100 / 130 gas in the middle East or no? Did they ever work out how to handle the corrosive qualities?

 

[Ivan1GFP]

So what do you think about the Typhoon? Good or bad Roll? Good or bad at BnZ? As a fighter in general

I thought the P-47 was good at rolling at high altitude though I could be wrong.

Hello Schweik,
Typhoon roll rate? Pretty poor.

We discussed this back at Post #866
Which is the better fighter, P-40F or Typhoon?

With the information that was presented at the time, the estimate was that Roll Rate was around 60 degrees / second.
Instead of just using the same ESTIMATE as before, I figured I would look for some conclusive information.
Attached is a graph of comparative Roll Rates from RAE report 1231.
Turns out it is a bit worse than the estimate.

This graph is also a pretty good illustration of what I was describing about how airspeed has a pretty great influence on roll performance.

My own opinion is that the acceleration and straight line performance of the Typhoon was pretty good but the general agility was fairly poor. I had been hoping to find the comparative tactical evaluation of the Typhoon versus other fighters before making such a statement which sure to draw some angry replies.

Regarding P-47 Roll Rates:
The peak roll rate was around 85 degrees / second at 225 MPH IAS according to my reading of a graph from AHT.
This is consistent with what I have seen from other sources.
As for Altitude Performance, from observation, the P-47 series seemed to have more propeller than needed for low altitude operation but the bigger propeller was more effective as the air got thinner at high altitudes.

- Ivan.

 

[Greyman]

As I posted earlier, I think the RAE and NACA graph we all use as gospel may not be giving the full picture for one reason or another re: the Typhoon roll.

(re: my earlier posts here)
Which is the better fighter, P-40F or Typhoon?
Which is the better fighter, P-40F or Typhoon?

In service, if the Typhoon's roll rate over 250 IAS compared best with a Spitfire with fabric ailerons (and a lot worse under that) than any other fighter -- you'd think this wouldn't escape constant mention.

 

[Stig1207]

I only make provisional conclusions based on the available data. Everything we can say about a war from 70 years ago is an educated guess at best. But you can describe what you know at a given point. I don't think your implicit contention about the Air Force journal is compelling for reasons I have already stated several times. If you really thought there was an issue worth exploring there, I would think that you would go try to find more data, such as day by day loss records or loss records by aircraft subtype. But perhaps it's better to keep it vague?

This has nothing to do with the record of the Typhoon by the way, it has to do with the record of the Luftwaffe and JG 27 and so on.

Well, your conclusions do come across as being very definite, with little room for doubt; though it may just be your style that gives that impression, I suppose. As for the Statistical Digest, I have tried to find more data, but I haven't found anything that can explain why there are differences between it and MAW IV or unit records; but it does underline how uncertain and confusing WWII data can be.