Ad: This forum contains affiliate links to products on Amazon and eBay. More information in Terms and rules
Of the French "too late" fighters the Bloch M.B.-157 seems to have claimed the most impressive performance.
710 km/h ( 441 mph) at 26,000 ft.
The Arsenal VG series suffered from a lack of development potential.
The Airframe, while offering good performance for the engines it was tried with, might have been too small for any serious upgrading of engines, armament or range. A wing about 87-88% the size of a 109's wing doesn't over a lot of scope.
Why not? The VG-39bis was intended to recieve a 1600 hp Hipano.
Arsenal VG-33 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Didn't the russians succeed on fitting both VK-107 and ASh-82 FN on their Yak-3 airframes?
Regards
True, but if some pies were still in the sky, some others were already in plates.The French intended for a lot of things, some of which were pretty much pie in the sky.
So the time for the "Z" for being available, the airframe could have been redisigned several time.The "Z" series Hispano engines were several years away even if France had not been overrun.
Note also that the VG-33 was the sole french fighter, if not the sole fighter in the world to remind competitive with a 850/860 hp engine against a 1100 hp Me-109E or the 1030 hp Merlin Spitfire. And was able to remind so, even with some power and "strategical meterials" lack against them.Please note that the VG-39 with the Hispano 89ter engine lost the 20mm engine gun and was making do with 6 7.5mm mg in the wings. A 25% reduction in firepower compared to a Hurricane. Granted the "Z" series engines were supposed to use an engine mounted cannon.
I won't bet my arm, or other think it didn't have it. Last MS-406 had armor and protected (but not self-sealing) tanks. Sometimes added in operationnal units or retrofitted for early ones. You should apply it to others fighters of that time in the same way, even during BoB not all af them had such features.None of these planes had armor or self sealing tanks did they? or bullet proof windscreens.
More powerful engines mean higher fuel consumption.
No more than La-7 or Yak-9. Even the 9D variant, since extra wing tanks were always sealed and never used in order to save weight.Wasn't the standard YAK-3 criticized for short range?
Plane desigh was always a compromise, but if it's impossible to keep the firepower in that configuration, the only way is to reduce it...But the Yak-3 BTW did not kept, but increased it (first 200 serial planes had 1 ShVAK + 1 BS, the others 1 BS more). With classical old formula 1 ShVAK + 1 BS the difference would be about 20 kg...While the Russians did fit more powerful engines to the Yak-3 airframe the ASh-82 version only kept adequate firepower by using a new generation light weight 20mm cannon. Granted the radial was a bit heavier than V-12s.
There were obviously official specs problems. The plane in itself, was completly fulfilling them as the Fairey battle did for it' s own ones.Or see the armament fit on the Potez 630 fighter variants, two 20mm hispano cannon plus up to 6 7.5mm MGs on a 203 seat plane powered by a pair of 700hp engines and they thought it was equivalent to a Bf 110?
What if? There were a lot of romantic technofreaks elsewhere...
One of the main reasons the French anti-aircraft kept trying, and a few times successfully, to shoot them down.
Talk about a morale killer! Wow!French AAA guns shot everything they saw, as the chance for them to meet a french plane was so tiny...
French pilots also used to be captured and considered as spies when jumping off their plane.
Dassault Mirage F1 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Great performance when it entered service during 1973, five years ahead of the F16A. Why didn't European nations purchase it rather then opting for the U.S. built aircraft? The Mirage F1 could have been the first Eurofighter.
Not that this has anything to do with WWII.
The French are your neighbors. You've even got a rail tunnel connecting France to England. Why can't Britain cooperate with France to build a fighter aircraft?
When I was in southern France most people spoke at least some English. However I had the feeling they thought everyone really should be speaking French.