<<Conceivably, the Lancaster could carry several "Little Boy" weapons. Given the size of 120" x 28" and a weight of 9,000lbs you could get a couple in a standard BIII with the doors closed, and be at a comfortable 18,000lbs. What's your point?
There was no point. It was a silly argument just like many others here. But you are very wrong about the Lanc being able to carry two LBs. They were as you point out 28" wide the lanc bomb bay was not 2X28=56"wide! Plus the inter bomb space when the Lanc was barely wide enough to carry the GS WO the doors! Right. The B-17's bomb bay was wider than the Lancaster's bay.>>
it amazes me how you twist facts, why would you load them side by side when you had the length of the bay? Because of weight and balance factors, it is not possible to carry two ~9000 pound bombs end to end in the Lancaster or any other plane but the B-29 at the time. Bombs heavier than 4000 pounds could only be carried at one location in the very long, but narrow bay. The bomb's center of mass must be at that location, regardless of their weight. If you wanted to load 2000 pounders, then you were restricted to the part of the bay centered near the 25% MAC. This is because if the maximum bomb load that might fit was loaded and one at the back hung up, failed to release as you proper english say, the plane would crash because the CoG limits were exceeded in a big, 2000 pound way!
As the lanc often carried 2000lbs at each end of the bays I will ask for evidence of this, whilst it is a pointless argument anyway as exactly how many liitle men were actually made? I will agree however that such a bomb load would make it extreamly dangerous to fly It is certainly possible to load it, and as a B17 could not take a single little man I dont think it a relavent argument anyway.
<Whoops, wrong again! Mission planning has everything to do with the physical capacity of the plane.
You can not schedual a target that is beyond the planes range, or with more bombs than the plane can carry to that range, or altitude.
so that the average for all missions was ~4,500 pounds for the B-17s and ~7,800 pounds for the Lancaster.
If their rolls would have been reversed, the AVERAGE bomb loads would have also been reversed!>>
as pointed out on other sites where you tried this rubbish that the Lanc bomb load was bombs, incendaries were NOT included in this total, and they often amounted to 3/4 of the loadNot true! Incendaries were counted!
No they wern't and just saying they were does not change that factare you aware that the maximum internal bomb load of the B17 was 8000lbs? That was a choice made at command level to meet mission requirements. The two bays had room for two ~4,000 pounders, one over the other, ~16,000 pounds total. It could also carry four 2,000 pound GP bombs on each side, also ~16,000 pounds internal. It was also possible to carry 34 X 440 pound incendaries bombs internally, not that they ever did. But that was a choice they made to ensure that the mission was flown at higher altitude to avoid flack and limit Nazi fighter access.
According to official US figures the MAXIMUM bomb load carried by a combat mission in europe was 8000lbs, figures for the B17 state that MAXIMUM internal load was 8000lbs, the Bomb bay only had room for 4x 2000lbs so how do you think they fitted 4x4000lbs? (oh and the shackels were only rated to 2000lbs and they only had 4 of these ) so this is pure bunkham
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it would seem that this is incorrect, the B17 was only capable of carrying 2x2000lbs (although it could squeeze in a a pair of 1000lbs as well)
the 4000lbs were external only and limited to 2
B-17 bomb bay
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In addition the 4000lbs would not physically fit in the bay, it was not rated as a bomb that was availible for internal use on the B17 and thier is no record of it ever having beeing used (either internally or externally) despite intelligence that the US bombs were ineffective against factories
You are right and what it could carry to the ranges and altitudes required was about 7,800 pounds per mission. But if it had been required to operate in day light for 100% of it's missions, that would have been reduced to something much less. You tell me how much less.
On the other hand, if the B-17 had to fly 100% of it's missio
ns at night, how much more could it have carried sans armor, guns, ammo and three crew and their supplies?>>
well without external load I would say 8000lbs as this was the max capacity of its internal bomb bay, 8x 1000lbs or 4x 2000lbs or 16 500lbs were the options so even with weight to spare it would be 8000lbs unless you were going to toss them out of the back door
The bomb bay had 42 shackle positions. If the bomb was small enough in diameter, all of them could be used. I have pictures someplace of a bunch of B-17s dropping 34 X 440 pound incendiaries each. You can count each individual bomb! Bomb loads less than these weights were a consideration of mission planning to meet altitude and range goals.
Rubbish the shackles were different for different bombs and only a few could be used at any time as the bomb bay was SMALL, show me the picture of 34x440 because I call moopoo as USAAF own figures show that this was over 6000lbs more then they claim was the maximum load carried, although going by your previous record I bet that the picture in question (if it ever existed) is of a B29 or even, knowing you a B52.
I remember your claim that a B17 could and did carry two tallboys, so your credibility is non existant