Worst aircraft of WW2?

All things consider, I think that I would vote for the Roc to be the worst fighter aircraft of WW2...


Kris

Am I the only one that thinks an aircraft is bad if it can't fly?

airboiy said:

Am I the only one that thinks an aircraft is bad if it can't fly?

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Why would you be the only one to think that? I think you might be missing the point of the thread.

B-17engineer:The Roc Blackburn was pretty bad.... no forward armament. What was with this plane and the Boulton Paul Defiant? No foward armament just, huge turrets ?

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Both the Defiant and the Roc were designed in the belief that they would not face fighter opposition; their sole purpose was to shoot down bombers by positioning themselves on the flanks or underneath bomber formations. Part of the specifications for the Defiant reads:

The speed of modern bombers is so great that it is only worthwhile to attack them under conditions which allow no relative motion between the fighter and its target. The fixed-gun fighter with guns firing ahead can only realise these conditions by attacking the bomber from dead astern...

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When the Defiant did encounter Bf 109s this flawed concept cost lives. Boulton Paul did experiment with turning the prototype Defiant into a single-seat fighter without turret, and with wing bays for twelve .303 Brownings. This, the P.94, had a top speed of 360 mph and might have developed into a reasonable fighter.

As for the Roc?

Has anyone mentioned the Bristol Buckingham? Although it did not reach operational service it would seem that this was fortunate. The Air Ministry canned the design for its poor cockpit layout (shades of the Blenheim), weak armament and the bomb aimer's position which was in a gondola under the fuselage. By the time the prototype flew it was outmoded by the Mosquito which was faster, far more manoeuverable and had a higher operational ceiling. Even as a fighter-bomber, the Mosquito could carry a heavier bomb load. Possibly the Buckingham was not THE worst aircraft of WW2, but it was a clunker nevertheless.

Its cousin, the Brigand, was later noted for its ability to shoot itself down, propellers which fell apart, dive brakes which failed and, finally, corroded wing spars which led to a couple of wings falling off. After the corroded spars were discovered the RAF cut its losses and relegated the Brigand to scrapyards or sold them to Pakistan.

NZTyphoon said:

Has anyone mentioned the Bristol Buckingham? Although it did not reach operational service it would seem that this was fortunate. The Air Ministry canned the design for its poor cockpit layout (shades of the Blenheim), weak armament and the bomb aimer's position which was in a gondola under the fuselage. By the time the prototype flew it was outmoded by the Mosquito which was faster, far more manoeuverable and had a higher operational ceiling. Even as a fighter-bomber, the Mosquito could carry a heavier bomb load. Possibly the Buckingham was not THE worst aircraft of WW2, but it was a clunker nevertheless.

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Gee, sounds like the Bristol Buckingham was Kind of a Drag.

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D sorry folks, just couldn't pass that one up )




Elvis

IIRC it had 10 MGs and a range of over 5000 km !

And on the Roc ... which bombers were slow enough for it to intercept ? The Gotha B.IV of WW1 ?
Kris

Hello Cris
Roc, IMHO awful plane, might have been able to catch Do 18, probably the plane, a flying boat, it was designed to fight against. I believed a long time that Rocs never entered into aerial combat but some years ago read an article, in which a pilot or gunner, have forgot which, tells how he fought an unconclusive combat with a He 115. And in last year read from another article that a Roc, flying with 2 Skuas, claimed a Ju 88 off Dunkirk during the evacuation.

Juha

Vitamin J said:

I'd have to say the Primary British Fighter that was used in Japan along with the P-40 Tomahawk,The Brewster Buffalo. They were useless agaist the Japanese. cause it was just like the Japanese planes, no armor.... 5 shots with .30 Calibur and PLOP! Fallin like a lead brick....I pray I don't get reincarnated in the past as a British pilot in Japan. I would never man one of those flying piece of sh**s
I've seen pictures of P-40's still flying with 70-80 bullet holes.

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Sorry it's a little late... What i meant to say was that the P-40 was stationed with the brewster in burma...

Vitamin J said:

I'd have to say the Primary British Fighter that was used in Japan along with the P-40 Tomahawk,The Brewster Buffalo. They were useless agaist the Japanese. cause it was just like the Japanese planes, no armor.... 5 shots with .30 Calibur and PLOP! Fallin like a lead brick....I pray I don't get reincarnated in the past as a British pilot in Japan. I would never man one of those flying piece of sh**s
I've seen pictures of P-40's still flying with 70-80 bullet holes.

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Read "Bloody Shambles." British Buffaloes did not do as bad any many thought and were defeated maily because of the numbers they had to fight aganist.

Well, I guess I should blame the pilots, a change in armor, engine or armament
cause the buffalo did do decent in the hands of the finnish against the russians. (DECENT?!?! ARE YOU SMOKIN' SOMETHIN' SONNY? THEY HAD THE BEST KILL TO LOSS RATIO IN THE WAR!)
Grammy stay out of this!:agrue:
Did the engine, armament or the armor change when they where handed over to the finnish?

Vitamin J said:

Did the engine, armament or the armor change when they where handed over to the finnish?

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All of the above.

Except the changes came after the Finns got their planes

The Finns got 42-43 out of the first 50 built. Everybody else got the newer but heavier versions. Some with questionable, rebuilt engines according to some accounts, or that certain model Cyclone engines had cooling troubles in tropical climates.

They did better than popular legend has it but they did have a number of problems that made them a second best choice to the Wildcat. Short of a total redesign there was no way to fix ALL the problems.

The engine change happened because of the sale to Finland.
Brewster had convinced the U.S. Government that the next version of the Buffalo (what became the F2A-2) was going to be much better than the F2A-1's, and so were allowed to sell the remaining unassembled B-239's, along with the Navy's inventory of F2A-1's to Finland, who had been in contact with Brewster about a possible sale of Buffalo's to them.
Brewster, looking at furthering their business, began to shop for overseas contracts at that time, which is how their end of the deal with the Finns started in the first place.
As part of the agreement, those aircraft that were already in the USN's inventory were "de-navalized" and the engine was replaced with an export version of the R-1820 that Wright was already selling overseas.
Those 3-5 paritally completed planes still sitting at the Brewster factory were simply completed as export aircraft and boxed up for the journey to Norway.
As Shortround mentioned, there is some speculation that some of these engines were originally fitted to C-47's and were refurnbed before installation into the Buffalo's (in turn, the C-47's got the new, updated version of the R-1820's that they had been fitted with, prior to the engine swap).
IIRC, a total of 44 B-239's were sent to Finland.
None of the B-239 / F2A-1's were armoured.
Armour, self sealing tanks, more guns and extra fuel capacity were the stuff of 339's and 439's. (-2's and -3's).


Elvis

Armour, self sealing tanks, more guns and extra fuel capacity were the stuff of 339's and 439's. (-2's and -3's).

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Ironically, denavalization and being stripped bare of those accessories was what made perform better.

The Planes supplied to the Finns never had armour, self-sealing tanks or extra tankage. As built they had one cowl .30 and one cowl .50 with a .50 in each wing. Finns may have changed to four .50s. Later palnes were burdened with haigher ammo capacities.
The planes supplied to the Finns also had lower powered engines than most of the later planes. The first order for Buffaloes was in June of 1938 with the last US Navy order in January 1941. 2 1/2 years later.

Clay_Allison said:

Ironically, denavalization and being stripped bare of those accessories was what made perform better.

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Don't mean to sound as if I'm jumpin' all over ya', but that's kinda like sayin' a Playboy centerfold would look better if she were stipped bare.
( )
To put it another way, "denavalization" and "stipped bare" were kinda one in the same thing, in this case.
The arrester hook was removed. The survival gear was removed. The US Navy's telescopic gun sight was replaced by an older type ring-and-bead sight (which the Finns turned around and removed, then put their own telescopic gun sight on). There was a change with the radio antenna and possibly the radio, too, although I don't remember exactly what the change was.
No Armour on the F2A-1. That's why it handled so well. It was quite light. I think the loaded weight was just under 5100lbs (and something like 3800lbs. empty).
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Shortround6 said:

The planes supplied to the Finns also had lower powered engines than most of the later planes.

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Actually, that engine was lower powered than ALL oif the later versions.
The R-1820-G5 was simply an export version of the R-1820-34 that the F2A-1 was already supplied with.
Both engines were listed at 950HP.
The -34 gave way to the -40, I believe, which made 1200HP.
The -G5 was improved via the -G105 (1100HP) and later, the -G205 (1200HP).
Only the -G5 was ever fitted to the Buff, however.
I think the difference between the export engines and the American engines was in that the export engines used an older style cylinder head.
If there were other changes, I'm not aware of them.



Elvis

I bought "America's Hundred-Thousand" last week.

I would highly recomend it to anybody interested in WW II warbirds. Granted it is a single source but on the Buffalo (a 33 page chapter) there is a lot of information.

The book goes into considerable detail on weights of ALL US fighters. THE weight difference between A F2A-1 and a Finnish 239 was about 40lbs in favor of the 239. I would guess for the reasons that Elvis has stated.

The "Improved" F2A-2 jumps the empty weight (no guns, radios etc) from around 3,785 for the -1 to about 4150lbs. Primarily due to the new, higher powered engine. Elvis is also correct in the G-5 model of the engine fitted to the F2A-1 and the Finnish 239s. It had a two speed supercharger but was a direct drive engine (no reduction gear) that swung a 9 ft propeller. The F2A-2 switched to the -40 as Elvis said but the -40 was a geared engine and swung a 10'3" propeller. The weight of the reduction gear and the larger propeller make up a good amount of the weight difference. THE F2A-2 were built without armor although it was added later.

THe Belgian, Dutch and British planes used R-1820-G105A engines which used a different reduction gear ratio than the -40 engine and slightly different propellers, ( British used a Hamilton Standard instead of Curtiss). In these planes armor and some crude fuel tank protection began to be added.

THe F2A-3 was the real porker of the bunch. Because of the fuel tank construction, the fuel tanks were built intergral with the wing torsion box, it proved very difficult if not impossiable to fit them with self sealing fuel tank liners. This lead to the US Navy and Brewster fitting a 20gal protected tank in each wing and a 40gal protected tank in the fuselage to replace the capacity of the left wing tank. THe left tank stayed, after all it was little more than a few fittings, it was to be used only for ferry flights and other extreme circumstances. The right fuel tank stayed in operation becasue it was fitted with the reserve fuel tap system. Extra ammo was also provided in this model for the guns. About 500rds of .50 cal ammo over the earlier models. A larger, heavier communications suite (by about 35-50lbs) didn't help things either.

THere were a number of other reasons, some rather minor/some not, why the Brewster was less suitable for combat than some other fighters. putting them all together ment that unless the Brewster had a major redesign it ws better to put it on the shelf and go with something else.

Shortround6 said:

I bought "America's Hundred-Thousand" last week.

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Great book. I too would recommend it to anyone. I bought a year ago to use as a reference for an Embry-Riddle term paper I was writing.

With regard to the RAAF Buffaloes, I do know efforts were made to improve the performance of the type. They did this by attempts to reduce weight, principally reducing the armament, removing the armour and radios, and even flying with reduced fuel. There was some improvement in performance as a result of this, but the reports received back from the front line units was that the type was nearly useless against the front line types.

The Japanese gained air superiority over Malaya with just 25 Zeroes, and a similar number of Oscars. I forget how many Nates were involved, but many of these were transferred to Burma after December 23rd. Post war allies revionist histories have tried to portray the Japanese as heavily outnumbering the Allies. This might be true in terms of the overall numbers, but in terms of the critical fighter numbers, the Japanese achieved enormous things with just a handful of aircraft. A big part of that success was the near total failure of the Buffalo to achieve anything meaningful at all. this might be an affront to American sensibilities, but it is the cold hard truth I am afraid.

To put it another way, "denavalization" and "stipped bare" were kinda one in the same thing, in this case.
The arrester hook was removed. The survival gear was removed. The US Navy's telescopic gun sight was replaced by an older type ring-and-bead sight (which the Finns turned around and removed, then put their own telescopic gun sight on). There was a change with the radio antenna and possibly the radio, too, although I don't remember exactly what the change was.
No Armour on the F2A-1. That's why it handled so well. It was quite light. I think the loaded weight was just under 5100lbs (and something like 3800lbs. empty).

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By "stripped bare of those accessories" I mean extra guns, all armor, and self-sealing tanks. I realize that they might have been "already bare" of most of those things.

parsifal said:

With regard to the RAAF Buffaloes, I do know efforts were made to improve the performance of the type. They did this by attempts to reduce weight, principally reducing the armament, removing the armour and radios, and even flying with reduced fuel. There was some improvement in performance as a result of this, but the reports received back from the front line units was that the type was nearly useless against the front line types.

The Japanese gained air superiority over Malaya with just 25 Zeroes, and a similar number of Oscars. I forget how many Nates were involved, but many of these were transferred to Burma after December 23rd. Post war allies revionist histories have tried to portray the Japanese as heavily outnumbering the Allies. This might be true in terms of the overall numbers, but in terms of the critical fighter numbers, the Japanese achieved enormous things with just a handful of aircraft. A big part of that success was the near total failure of the Buffalo to achieve anything meaningful at all. this might be an affront to American sensibilities, but it is the cold hard truth I am afraid.

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With 50 "fighters" of both Zero and Oscars along with the Nates deployed, the Japanese still outnumbered the RAAF and Dutch fighters in most given battles. I believe this was mentioned in "Bloody Shambles" and JoeB has given details of some of these airbattles. There is no doubt the Buffalo was outclassed by its opposition, there were a small handful of pilots who did achieve some success, this with American sensibilities aside.