NigG (#389),
...with checks about 84 conducting anti-submarine patrols when they were in Ceylon. In short... they weren't!...
Rather as I suspected - they were no more than simple reconnaissance sweeps (same with 110 at Karachi). I would think that it was a case of: "We've got these new aircraft. We've got to do something with them. This is something. Let's do it !.
...honing their dive bombing skills, either with live bombs on an unfortunate rock off the shore of Colombo,,,
With all due respect, why waste real bombs on an offshore rock (we were short of them in the Arakan in May '43 - or at least it was a case of deliveries "just in time"). Why not fit practice bomb racks (available), find a land range where practice bomb hits could be accurately plotted, and really learn dive bombing ?
...or dummy dives on Naval warships...
Good fun for everyone concerned, but of little training value (for us) IMHO. But it enables me to raise a question which has always stuck at at the back of my mind: how much time would a ship have to "dodge" a dive bomb ? We know that a VV would be at terminal velocity of some 300 mph on bomb release at a true 3,000 ft agl. If the bomb continued at that speed (400 ft/sec), it would hit in about 7 seconds. But, far more streamlined than the brick-like VV, the bomb would accelerate more under "G" (the old 32ft/sec/sec). I've long forgotten any differential calculus I ever learned....... Anybody ? (assume air resistance plays no further part).
Let's guess five seconds. How far can you turn a large ship in that time ? At Midway all four big Jap fleet carriers were hit (three fatally) in less than 20 minutes (I've read a figure of 7½ minutes) by a squadron of Douglas "Dauntless" (A-20).
...it was the smoke from a harbour chimney that was filling his nostrils! (p.105-6 in 'Vengeance' ...
At 30,000 ft, 30 miles out in the North Sea, I could smell the Teesside steelworks in a Vampire (people always blamed the pong on ICI !).
... By that time, word had got out that the Vengeance was a formidable aircraft well-suited to close air support of ground troops and the soldiers were very keen to learn how to employ it operationally...
Not "By that time". The VV couldn't even find the Japs in the field in the fluid fighting of '42/'43, which meant that we'd to go down to Akyab (miles from the land battle) for targets.
Next year all was different, the Army were pushing the Jap back south in the Arakan, he adopted the policy of digging-in at strongpoints to delay our advance, the VV came into its own as a bunker-buster, the Army was delighted with us and the plaudits flooded in. And the next year ? They pulled us out of the line when we could easily have done another dry season before Japan threw in the towel (we couldn't be seen to be successful, you see - it wasn't in accord with Official Policy).
... But for the destruction of enemy submarines, Danny, wouldn't the weapon of choice have been depth charges? And if so, wouldn't that have been outside the capabilities of the Vengeance?...
No reason why not. From Wiki I learn that the things were in the 5-600 lb range; Sunderlands and Catalinas used to carry them on ordinary 500 lb racks. Even if they were too fat to fit in our bomb bays, 500 lbs had been tried on the VV wing (the aircraft could barely get off the ground with a 2,000 lb load, but that's another matter !)
Danny.