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Take a look at:
http://www.history.navy.mil/nan/backissues/1940s/1948/feb48.pdf
page 7 (PDF page 9):
" ...As every naval avaiator knows the TBM was not designed as a dive bomber. It was designed as a torpedo and horizintal bomber. As a result the maximum permissable speeds and G forces are considerably less than those applicable to any other currently operated carrier aircraft..."
The article notes 48 fatal TBM accidents in 30 months, all apparently while doing practice bomb runs.
What are the esteemed members views of the Battle. I know it faired badly in France in 1940 yet if you look at its specs it does not seem to be such a bad single engined bomber, why the failure in France and does this put it amongst the worst bombers of the war?
Range Swordfish-546 miles, Vmax-138 mph
Range TBD-716 miles, Vmax-206 mph
It was an operator's choice NOT to operate the TBD at night, again the Swordfish had no unique feature (except the huevos of the pilot) that enabled it to be operated at night. It had desirable features that made it easier to land and take off from a carrier but outside of that everything else is null
I agree the wording of my statement was poor. Throughout this whole debate I have been very careful not to denigrate the TBD (because I dont think it deserves it) , or any other US type, Just to state the capabilities of the aircraft concerned. Thats not been the case with the American contributors to this debate. And it is very apparent that many of them "dont get it" about the Swordfish, because its range was limited, and its performance in terms of straight line speed was also poor.
The facts are these for the Swordfish. It had strengthsd that were subtle, but real enough, and that made it not only a good aircraft, it was a great aircraft as history well shows. The types' strengths were used to great advantage, because its operational usage was adapted to suit those strengths. That made its crews supremely confident and successful. The types hidden strengths and the crew confidence fed off each other, the result was a synergy that resulted in the sum of the parts being greater than the powers of each part individually.
You cannot say the same about the TBD. if anything, from an American perspective the TBD outperfomed the Swordfish, and its crews were probably as well trained as those in the FAA (just that they were not trained in certain areas). The TBDs superior performance was not enough to make any difference to its survivability (compared to the Swordfish). But that extra turn of speed still affected its accuracy as a weapon system (IMO, judging from the operational results) . Moreover, and most importantly, the owners of the TBD did not recognize the shortcomings of the type and failed to adapt its use to suit, because they believed the TBD was "good enough" to operate by day, which by 1940 it was not . So, all things brought together, the TBD wound up being basically a liability to the USN. Not due to any fault of the type....it was one of the better carrier borne torpedo bombers of the late 30's, but because its shortcomings were not recognized and the usage not adapted to suit those shortcomings.
Range Swordfish-546 miles, Vmax-138 mph
Range TBD-716 miles, Vmax-206 mph
The Biplane wasn't magic or else the Albacore would have had a better record. Apparently in an attempt to improve the Swordfish they designed out some of the very things that made the Swordfish so useful.
Kind of true, but not fully so. And in this case a half correct statement is as bad or worse than an incorrect statement. The shortcomings in performance of the Swordfish was realized prewar in the RN, and that, combined with the miserable allocation of pilots and pilot training for the FAA, convinced the RN that it had to adapt the force and the equipment to suit those limitations. They adapted the force so that it could operate at night. That is not something you can achieve in a short space of time. Sure a big part of that was training, but the aircraft themselves had to modified in a number of ways to optimise that capability. Things like flame damped exhausts, even the cockpit lighting was altered to assist the night capability. But the big change was the development of ASV radar. The FAA was a major sponsor of that development fopr the specific purpose of fitting them to their strike aircraft. There was never such ugency in the USN.
All of the capabilities were available as possibilities for the USN, that part of your statement is correct and I am certainly not saying that it wasnt possible to adapt US aircraft in the same or more ways as the Swordfish, but neither is it true to say the Swordfish was not modified to suit its night capability.
Lastly, dismissing (or suggesting as not that important) the great deck handling capabilities and low attrition rates is something I fundamentally disagree with. The USN found to its great cost that you cant just decide to put people and aircraft into the air at night without the propert equipment and training. They lost scores of aircraft hopelessly lost and poor deck performers, in many engagements that left aircraft airborne at night. Best example, look at what happened to the USN counterstrikes at the 1st mob flt June 1944.
The RN simply could not afford anything like that sort of atrition. They could not afford to lose even 5 or six pilots in a single engagement for avoidable reasons. For the whole of 1939, the FAA received the grand total of 16 additional pilots. Every single pilot counted, there was just no room for unnecessary attrition. The Swordfish delivered on that score.....it could operate at night, had such pleasant flying and deck handling characteristics as to ensure avoidable losses were minimised. There were many reasons why Swordfish crews loved their mounts, and their safety and reliability was one of them. And they certainly never thought of themselves as the "poor relations" of the TBD squadrons. And their operational results prove in spades that their quiet confidence in their equipment was more than justified.
Vmax @ SL speed with a torpedo. The Vmax sea level speed of the TBD was about 205 mph.The memo I posted earlier tells us the approximate Vmax @ SL speed of the TBD
You cannot say the same about the TBD. if anything, from an American perspective the TBD outperfomed the Swordfish, and its crews were probably as well trained as those in the FAA (just that they were not trained in certain areas). The TBDs superior performance was not enough to make any difference to its survivability (compared to the Swordfish). But that extra turn of speed still affected its accuracy as a weapon system (IMO, judging from the operational results) . Moreover, and most importantly, the owners of the TBD did not recognize the shortcomings of the type and failed to adapt its use to suit, because they believed the TBD was "good enough" to operate by day, which by 1940 it was not . So, all things brought together, the TBD wound up being basically a liability to the USN. Not due to any fault of the type....it was one of the better carrier borne torpedo bombers of the late 30's, but because its shortcomings were not recognized and the usage not adapted to suit those shortcomings.
The Swordfish had an internal fuel capacity of 168 Imperial gallons (IG) and the ability to accept an internal 60IG tank (used at Taranto) and/or an external 69 IG tank. The TBD had an internal capacity of 150IG (180USG).
Sorry, but no way did the TBD ever have more range than the Swordfish, and you are quoting ranges based upon two different sets of criteria, operational ranges for the Swordfish and theoretical ranges for a pre-war TBD.
The Albacore had 193 IG of internal fuel and could also accept an internal auxiliary fuel tank and/or an external 106IG tank for a total fuel capacity of nearly 400IG and had much better range than the TBD,
According to "The First Team", the Japanese position was not identified until 0552, 4 June at a good 200 miles away. Night time combat for torpedo bombers would not have been possible.If the USN had gone down the pathway of the RN they would have had several years to prepre their crews and equip their aircraft with the Swordfish. They would have gone into battle, with the most accurate torpedo squadrons in the worls, equipped with ASV radar and fully night capable. At Midway they would not have attacked by day, they would have been looking to launch their torpedo strikes by night, leaving the day strikes to the F4Fs and SBDs. They would not be using the slow and innaccurate Bliss Levitt torpedoes that they did, but the much faster and more accurate whitehead torpedoes.
I could only find 5 or 6 hitting out of 11 dropped and damaging or sinking three battleships or about 55% success. I could find no other ships hit by torpedos.To give you some idea of the potency of that combination, at taranto 13 totpedoes were launched......11 hit their target. Against the Bismarck 9 torpedoes were launched, either 2 or three hit their target, in pitch black conditions, flying in a heavy gale.
The Navy was not about to risk a night battle with the Japanese with 66% of their entire Pacific carrier force while torpedo planes were out looking for ships to hit. When on reconnaissance I don't think they carried torpedoes, at least they didn't when looking for the Bismarck. This was even more true at Midway.As an example, at Coral Sea, instead of retreating each day after night fall, the Americans might have been able to follow up their day strikes with deadly night torpedo attacks. Its an idea at least worth lookig at.
According to "At Dawn We Slept", eight battleships were damaged or sank at Pearl Harbor, not including the training ship Utah, however, at Pearl Harbor other ships were targeted and hit and several ships were hit more than once. All in all, according to the book, there were 19 torpedo strikes on targeted warships out of 36 torpedoes launched, or 53% success rate, or about the same as at Taranto.Possibly, though doubtful that they would be as accurate as the Swordfish. The Swordfish's apparent weakness (its slow speed) was also one of its greatest strengths. It was so slow, it could hardly miss. Almost as many Battleships were sunk or disabled at Taranto, with just 13 attack aircraft, as were sunk or disabled at pearl, where there were almost 5 times the number of torpoedoes fired. The Japanese had no problems with their torpedoes, and they were attacking in daylight, in a very low flak environment....yet could only manage a fraction of the accuracy the FAA crews achieved at Taranto. Your explanation of the Swordfish's success (being solely its torpedo) does not stack up when you look at all the facts.
A couple of errors seem to appear here. First, the first strike of Swordfish had one hit on the Bismarck out of nine dropped. The second strike had two hits out of an unknown number of drops. So, only if the second drop consisted of only two torpedoes will your 1/3 number be true. I suspect it is not. Second, while the weather was indeed terrible, it was not dead of night, being about 2100 hrs. Wikipedia shows a picture of a Swordfish returning to the Ark Royal and it is clearly not pitch dark.True for most types, but not the swordfish. Swordfish got 1/3 of their torpedoes launched into the bismarck, in the dead of night and to boot, in conditions that few other aircraft could fly. neither was this an isolated incident. literally tens of thousands of tons of Axis shipping was sunk by swordfish operating at night.
According to "The First Team", the Japanese position was not identified until 0552, 4 June at a good 200 miles away. Night time combat for torpedo bombers would not have been possible.
I could only find 5 or 6 hitting out of 11 dropped and damaging or sinking three battleships or about 55% success. I could find no other ships hit by torpedos.
The Navy was not about to risk a night battle with the Japanese with 66% of their entire Pacific carrier force while torpedo planes were out looking for ships to hit. When on reconnaissance I don't think they carried torpedoes, at least they didn't when looking for the Bismarck. This was even more true at Midway.
According to "At Dawn We Slept", eight battleships were damaged or sank at Pearl Harbor, not including the training ship Utah, however, at Pearl Harbor other ships were targeted and hit and several ships were hit more than once. All in all, according to the book, there were 19 torpedo strikes on targeted warships out of 36 torpedoes launched, or 53% success rate, or about the same as at Taranto.
[/QUOTE]A couple of errors seem to appear here. First, the first strike of Swordfish had one hit on the Bismarck out of nine dropped. The second strike had two hits out of an unknown number of drops. So, only if the second drop consisted of only two torpedoes will your 1/3 number be true. I suspect it is not. Second, while the weather was indeed terrible, it was not dead of night, being about 2100 hrs. Wikipedia shows a picture of a Swordfish returning to the Ark Royal and it is clearly not pitch dark.
German battleship Bismarck - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Can we look at the range thing a bit closer? That "internal 60IG tank (used at Taranto)" replaced the rear gunner did it not? The external 69 IG tank went where? under the fuselage in place of the torpedo?
I can see where they add some capability to the Swordfish but it's not all beer an sausages is it? to get the extra range you either carry no torpedo or you leave the rear gunner home and hope you don't get attacked. Makes the night attack thing even more understandable if you can't even shoot back at any attackers in daylight.
With all due respect, I think you are splitting hairs with me here. All I am saying is that Douglas's approach was different from Boeing's, and I am basing that from looking at what they designed and built. Douglas built some very good stuff, but they were much more prolific designers than Boeing. That is, they produced a larger number of new designs in the same amount of time. Designs that made it out the door in prototype and/or production examples. Boeing had a very short list by comparison, but everything Boeing considered to be a production machine was fairly well excellent for its time of manufacture. Even Boeing's prototypes that flew but did not receive production contracts, appear to be solid designs, such as the XF8B and XPBB. Douglas, on the other hand, delivered some disappointments along the way in addition to its successes. Now if you would like me to footnote and annotate everything I say, then. . . . . .