Spits and Mossies only?
I don't own this space under my name. I should have leased it while I still could
On striping down and streamlining, how about the Wellington?
IIRC a Wellington achieved an altitude of 42,000ft. It wouldn't have been very fast but it would have made the Luftwaffe' s eyes water.
Two interesting versions were then developed, the Marks V and VI. Both were intended for high-altitude operations and had a completely redesigned forward fuselage with a pressurised compartment for the crew and small bubble canopy for the pilot. Both versions had engines fitted with superchargers (Hercules' and Merlins) to provide the additional performance required to achieve the higher altitudes, but neither was flown operationally, although a pair of Wellington VIs did join No 109 Squadron for a short time.
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Given that an all-Mosquito bomber fleet would have required more aircraft to deliver the same tonnage, that would mean training more pilots. Could we have produced enough of the right standard?
Prospective aircrew were streamed PNB (Pilot, Navigator or Bomb Aimer) or Wireless Operator/Air Gunner - some of the Bomb Aimers would have been capable of qualifying as pilots (it was their secondary duty in the event of the pilot being incapacitated) but was the available pool of talent sufficient to provide enough pilots?
Prospective aircrew were streamed PNB (Pilot, Navigator or Bomb Aimer) or Wireless Operator/Air Gunner - some of the Bomb Aimers would have been capable of qualifying as pilots (it was their secondary duty in the event of the pilot being incapacitated) but was the available pool of talent sufficient to provide enough pilots?
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layman,
Your #9: "Optional fuselage tank for longer-range Spit?......"
Ans:
[from The Aviationist (27 May 2015) ...]
"....Of course, the Spitfire was outfitted with quite a range of sizes of 'Slipper Tanks'. These were really only a glorified Ferry Tank, but could be dropped in extremis. They slowed the a/c and had to be dropped for any combat..."
[authority misplaced]
"The Spitfire XIV is a short range medium-high altitude fighter, armed with 2 x 20 mm cannon and 4 x .303 Browning guns in the wings. It is fitted with a Griffon 65 engine of approximately 2,000 h.p. Pick-up points are provided for carrying of 30 gallon, 45 gallon or 90 gallon drop tanks".
Cheers, Danny.
Your #9: "Optional fuselage tank for longer-range Spit?......"
Ans:
[from The Aviationist (27 May 2015) ...]
"....Of course, the Spitfire was outfitted with quite a range of sizes of 'Slipper Tanks'. These were really only a glorified Ferry Tank, but could be dropped in extremis. They slowed the a/c and had to be dropped for any combat..."
[authority misplaced]
"The Spitfire XIV is a short range medium-high altitude fighter, armed with 2 x 20 mm cannon and 4 x .303 Browning guns in the wings. It is fitted with a Griffon 65 engine of approximately 2,000 h.p. Pick-up points are provided for carrying of 30 gallon, 45 gallon or 90 gallon drop tanks".
Cheers, Danny.
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Just to add to Megan's link ... More cracking pics of Spitfire Mk1 P9374 during her recent installation outside the Treasury in London 
Spitfire 1/P9374 in London ~ 02Jul15 ? FighterControl ? Home to the Military Aviation Enthusiast
Image Credit : Brian A Marshall
Superb pictures
Spitfire 1/P9374 in London ~ 02Jul15 ? FighterControl ? Home to the Military Aviation Enthusiast
Image Credit : Brian A Marshall
Superb pictures
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CS,
Lovely pics ! Minor cavil: jemmy and terry clips which held it not on door.
Plus factor: one of the few early Spitfire pics which clearly show the little "u/c down and locked" finger sticking up on the wing panels both sides a foot or two out from fuselage.
Fantastic restoration job, looks better than new !
Now where can I lay my hands on £1.5 to £2m in a hurry ? (reckon I could still get it off the ground - putting it back might be more problematical, but would have a lot of fun in between !)
Danny.
Lovely pics ! Minor cavil: jemmy and terry clips which held it not on door.
Plus factor: one of the few early Spitfire pics which clearly show the little "u/c down and locked" finger sticking up on the wing panels both sides a foot or two out from fuselage.
Fantastic restoration job, looks better than new !
Now where can I lay my hands on £1.5 to £2m in a hurry ? (reckon I could still get it off the ground - putting it back might be more problematical, but would have a lot of fun in between !)
Danny.
I don't own this space under my name. I should have leased it while I still could
Innominate, what you say would be true for a steady state peacetime force, for example the Typhoon force requires half the number of aircrew compared to the Tornado force (simplistically).
Now assume 1500 Mosquitoes and 500 heavies or 500 Mosquitoes and 1000 heavies.
Now assume monthly attrition of 5% and 10% respectively.
In the first case you would lose 125 pilots. In the second you would lose the same.
Now consider engines. First would lose 350 engines compared with 450 in the latter.
Clearly in this simple scenario the Light bomber force is much more economical in aircrew and engine attrition and neutral for pilots. I would submit though that it would not have been an impossible force structure.
Now assume 1500 Mosquitoes and 500 heavies or 500 Mosquitoes and 1000 heavies.
Now assume monthly attrition of 5% and 10% respectively.
In the first case you would lose 125 pilots. In the second you would lose the same.
Now consider engines. First would lose 350 engines compared with 450 in the latter.
Clearly in this simple scenario the Light bomber force is much more economical in aircrew and engine attrition and neutral for pilots. I would submit though that it would not have been an impossible force structure.
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TBM-Legend,
Your #16: "The late Bill Warterton, RAAF, DFC, flew Mossies in the Med area and told me of several 'coming apart' in the air and he said that put the wind up the crews much more than the enemy..."
Didn't know that this trouble went further than India/Burma. Frightened us, too and killed a few - including (ca May 1944), the C.O. of one of the new Squadrons.
D.
Your #16: "The late Bill Warterton, RAAF, DFC, flew Mossies in the Med area and told me of several 'coming apart' in the air and he said that put the wind up the crews much more than the enemy..."
Didn't know that this trouble went further than India/Burma. Frightened us, too and killed a few - including (ca May 1944), the C.O. of one of the new Squadrons.
D.
Minor cavil: jemmy and terry clips which held it not on door.
Last edited by megan; 7th Jul 2015 at 03:51.
Rolling 20 wrote:
Does anyone know at what date the Allies positively identified what 'Schrage Musik' was, and did they come up with any tactics to counter the nightfighters so equipped?
Bomber doctrine ment that gunners and turrets would not be removed, as it was of great psychological value. Later in the war Dysons team interviewed evaders to get an idea of how they were shot down. The information they got was of limited value, they never saw a fighter, just a burst of cannon fire, then the bomber on fire around them. They had not realised that the bomber was a victim of Schrage Musik.
Not before the later half of 1944, that for sure as a JU-88 night-fighter landed by mistake at Woodbridge in July of that year and nothing in the intelligence report on the aircraft mentioned any thing about it (The aircraft wasn't fitted with it, but was fitted with the window (Chaff) resistant SN-2 Radar and the Flensburg homering system that allowed the aircraft to home on aircraft using the Monica tail warning Radar. The only active defensive measure would have been some form of ventral turret, which was fitted to some versions of the Lancaster and Halifax, but suffered from poor coverage and a very small field of view for the gunner. Ball turret was not an option as most of the bombers had the H2S scanner located in the only place it could have been put. The role of the gunners in the heavy bombers were just not to engage enemy fighters but also to give warning of their approach so that the pilot could initiate evasive maneuvers like the Corkscrew which was designed to take the bomber outside of the fixed field of view of the radar in the German Night fighters and was quite effective according to an article about gun turrets in RAF aircraft by Jeef Jefford in the RAF Historical Society Journal No. 45. In fact the said article covers most of the pros and cons of the turrets fitted all RAF aircraft from WWI through to the 1950s and is well worth a read.
http://www.raf.mod.uk/rafcms/mediafi...92D41C7406.pdf
http://www.raf.mod.uk/rafcms/mediafi...92D41C7406.pdf
Ventral turrets had been part of the equipment of pre war Wellingtons and Whitleys. They were rarely used as they affected performance.
Schrage Musik was first used on the Peenemunde Raid 17/18th Aug 43. There are reports in 1943 of crews claiming that they were being stalked from below by nightfighters. Analysis of damage done to bombers also revealed attack from below. (these attacks were usually fatal, so one wonders how many there were to analyse). As usual Bomber Command was slow to react. It has a history throughout the campaign of ignoring threats that came its way.
It was mainly the Canadians who continued with ventral defence , but at what benefit we have no real record of. Each Squadron tended to do its own thing, the addition of a downward firing machine gun, being fitted 'unofficially'.
Schrage Musik was first used on the Peenemunde Raid 17/18th Aug 43. There are reports in 1943 of crews claiming that they were being stalked from below by nightfighters. Analysis of damage done to bombers also revealed attack from below. (these attacks were usually fatal, so one wonders how many there were to analyse). As usual Bomber Command was slow to react. It has a history throughout the campaign of ignoring threats that came its way.
It was mainly the Canadians who continued with ventral defence , but at what benefit we have no real record of. Each Squadron tended to do its own thing, the addition of a downward firing machine gun, being fitted 'unofficially'.
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Counter to Schrage Musik...
467 Sqn at Waddington experimented with a .50 calibre under gun in Mid 1944. The gun was fitted into a ball mount similar to that in a tank, and a panel was removed in the floor of the Lancaster to give the gunner visibility. The installation was not a success however, and quite a few "under-gunners" listed in the ORB were killed as the No 8 in the crew. Amongst them was a high proportion of Squadron Gunnery Leaders who were carrying out the experiment. I believe that the practice ceased in Autumn 1944 (but don't quote me on that).
The Avro Manchester was originally fitted with a ventral turret, but this was deemed ineffective and was not manned after the early few operations. The turret was eventually removed to save weight - eventually to be replaced by a dorsal turret (similar to that in the Stirling) later in 1941. The prototype Lancaster, and some of the early production models, were also fitted with a ventral turret in addition to the dorsal - this fit did not last long into the war and the ventral turret was soon removed - weight being reserved for bombs and fuel. The photograph shows the second Lancaster prototype with its ventral turret.
467 Sqn at Waddington experimented with a .50 calibre under gun in Mid 1944. The gun was fitted into a ball mount similar to that in a tank, and a panel was removed in the floor of the Lancaster to give the gunner visibility. The installation was not a success however, and quite a few "under-gunners" listed in the ORB were killed as the No 8 in the crew. Amongst them was a high proportion of Squadron Gunnery Leaders who were carrying out the experiment. I believe that the practice ceased in Autumn 1944 (but don't quote me on that).
The Avro Manchester was originally fitted with a ventral turret, but this was deemed ineffective and was not manned after the early few operations. The turret was eventually removed to save weight - eventually to be replaced by a dorsal turret (similar to that in the Stirling) later in 1941. The prototype Lancaster, and some of the early production models, were also fitted with a ventral turret in addition to the dorsal - this fit did not last long into the war and the ventral turret was soon removed - weight being reserved for bombs and fuel. The photograph shows the second Lancaster prototype with its ventral turret.
What everyone apart from air pig has missed is that the RAF Command which did the most to prevent defeat and win the war was Coastal. Neither Spitfire nor Mosquito, fine as they were at their other roles, could have provided the range or endurance to cover the Atlantic Gap. The introduction of the true long-range aircraft (primarily Sunderland, Liberator, Catalina) turned the tables - in two months - in the Battle of the Atlantic.
Well of course it does - the B-17 was meant to a twin-engined bomber. It's just that Boeing decided to hang four engines on it
Quite the opposite - it went very well indeed until the Germans declared war on the two most powerful nations on Earth! At which point no amount of heavy bombers (or anything else) would have saved them.
Much more so the Heinkel He 177, of which more than 1000 were built and (eventually) entered large-scale service. Luckily the aircraft's usefulness was severely limited by the various teething troubles and then, by the time these were sorted out, the lack of fuel.
Bomb load and range compare pretty well with B-17s
I'm pretty sure the Germans tried to go down the 'tactical only' route. From memory that didn't go too well.
The Germans did try to develop 4 engine strategic bombers. Fortunately, military production had become a political football by 1942 and their procurement shenanigans make Wokka Mk3 and FRES look positively successful.
See Ju290 and the various "Amerika Bombers".
See Ju290 and the various "Amerika Bombers".
What everyone apart from air pig has missed is that the RAF Command which did the most to prevent defeat and win the war was Coastal. Neither Spitfire nor Mosquito, fine as they were at their other roles, could have provided the range or endurance to cover the Atlantic Gap. The introduction of the true long-range aircraft (primarily Sunderland, Liberator, Catalina) turned the tables - in two months - in the Battle of the Atlantic.
At the start of the war Coastal couldn't even defend home based convoys, that job was given to Fighter Command.
As the war progressed, the Convoy system improved with American help, technology got better, aircraft launched from merchantman, long range Liberators plugged the gap and intelligence in the form of the captured Enigma machine all played their part.
As Bomber Command crews would tell you re bombing of U Boat yards: 'prevention is better that cure!'
I think that is over simplifying it a bit.
At the start of the war Coastal couldn't even defend home based convoys, that job was given to Fighter Command.
As the war progressed, the Convoy system improved with American help, technology got better, aircraft launched from merchantman, long range Liberators plugged the gap and intelligence in the form of the captured Enigma machine all played their part.
As Bomber Command crews would tell you re bombing of U Boat yards: 'prevention is better that [sic] cure!'
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In early 1942, there was much argument between the Admiralty who wanted the new 4 engine heavies for Coastal and the U-boat war, and Harris who wanted his 4,000 strong Bomber force to attack Germany. Churchill favoured Harris as the greater task and therefore the majority of the heavies went to Bomber Command (although only to maintain a 1,000 bomber force). The upshot was the Augsburg raid on 17th April 42, when 12 Lancasters attacked the MAN U-boat engine factory in daylight in order to pacify the Admiralty. Despite being attacked by a squadron of BF-109s early in the transit over France, leading to the loss of 4 of the 6 Lancasters from the 44 Sqn formation, S/L John Nettleton elected to continue with the raid even though he was under instructions that he could return if he lost one of a vic of 3 aircraft. Continuing for a further 3 hours in daylight (Augsburg is near Munich), knowing that the Germans were aware of their existence, he attacked Augsburg at dusk: his wingman, John Garwell, was shot down by flak over the target leaving Nettleton's aircraft as the sole surviving Waddington aircraft. Of such things, Victoria Crosses are awarded. The physical results of the raid were small - politically they were huge.
Torque, Bomber Commands early loses were against German naval ships, bombing of the German mainland was forbidden.
Not sure what you are referring to re Spitfire and Mosquito.
If you read my last post I state Yards,not pens. As Wensleydale mentions the Augsburg raid, a substantial part of Bomber Commands war was directed at the industries associated with Uboat production and the prevention of their construction.
Not sure what you are referring to re Spitfire and Mosquito.
If you read my last post I state Yards,not pens. As Wensleydale mentions the Augsburg raid, a substantial part of Bomber Commands war was directed at the industries associated with Uboat production and the prevention of their construction.
Bomber Commands early loses were against German naval ships, bombing of the German mainland was forbidden.
Not sure what you are referring to re Spitfire and Mosquito.
If you read my last post I state Yards,not pens. As Wensleydale mentions the Augsburg raid, a substantial part of Bomber Commands war was directed at the industries associated with Uboat production and the prevention of their construction.