Mr. Dill makes some quite proper points, but like most pilots, is prejudiced by what he flew first. The loss of 'thousands of pilots' by the USN is, of course, a wild exageration. Ref. straffing by P47s, odd that the 56thFG had no problems doing low level straffing of Luft air bases in Germany. It was a heavier a/c. Likely the new pilots who weren't used to them were paniced by the difference. The trick of cooling the R2800 with raw fuel was, by the way, how Rbt. Johnson kept one running for 45 minutes with two cylenters shot out and ZERO oil pressure. How long would a Merlin run in that condition?? Like five seconds if you were lucky!! His opinions might have been somewhat different if he'd taken a radiator or cooling jacket hit (as hundreds of Spitfire and Mustang pilots did) and spent 12 or 18 months in a POW camp. By the way, you are aware that the operational loss rate in the FAA for SeaFires was nearly three times that of Hellcats?

To AE The P47 needed supercharger intercoolers for its turbo. The other R2800 types used the same sort of mechanical blower as the Merlin. Also, while repairing the intercooler could be a problem, one hit just lost you a little pressure, it didn't seize up the engine as a coolant hit would. Both liquid and air cooled needed oil coolers. I was talking about the differences between the two types. Also, the raiators were much larger, and therefore more likely to be hit than the oil coolers. The Zero and Ki43 were both built with a design philosophy similar to the original Mitchell Spitfire: lightest possible a/c for low wing loading. Even the G4M bomber was built to similar standards, reducing weight for more fuel(this was a medium bomber with a range of well over 3000 miles). The lack of armor plate and self sealing tanks made them even more vulnerable. In the later Japanese a/c including the George, and the Mitsubishi J2M (Jack) the structure was heavier, and there was adequate armor as well as proper self sealing tanks. They had learned from their experiences and these were entirely new designs. While some useful changes were made in the MkVIII rededign, the basic structural concept hadn't changed. As for armament, the type 99 model 2 cannon was a serious improvement over the original model 1 from the early Zeros.

To AE Self sealing tank wasn't a 'coating', except maybe on the nearly worthless tanks in the BoB period Spits and Hurris. It was an internal bladder needed to prevent the mixing of air and fuel vapors, and it seriously reduced the capacity of the tank. Note that the 17 gal. units in the leading edges on the MkVIII pretty well filled the space indicated. They went in for the expressed purpose of increasing the range. If they could have put in larger, they presumably would have.

To AE. You were comparing hp output with engine weight. For a proper comparison you would HAVE to include the weight of radiator and coolant. Radiators aren't particularly heavy items, but those for WW2 a/c were quite large. Would only be guessing, but I'd be surprised if we weren't talking well over 150 kg. The wieght of the coolant supply would probably be even more than the radiators themselves, and the plumbing in between would add at least a little. I stand by my claim that for a/c of comperable performance, radial engine a/c were less heavy and took up less deck space.

As to agility. We seem to be playing 'musical definitions' here. A few hundred entries ago, I made the point that there was a difference between agility and horizontal turn rate, claiming that the ability to transition from one maneuver to another was at least as important as the turn rate, and that was a product of the a/c's roll and pitch rates. I took the position (and still do) that simple turn rate is almost entirely a DEFENSIVE capability). I pointed out that the P47s roll rate was well above that of the Spitfire, and that the pitch rate of the P38 exceeded both the others, makeing both a/c unusually agile, and was basically told that it was 'in the dogfight (presumably from the contex, a turning contest) that the true qualities of a fighter showed themselves'.

Whoops got a figure wrong earlier. Merlin 65,66,67, Packard 68 & V-1650-7: 2,040hp @ 25lbs boost, 400mph ram air effect, 150 octane fuel. All these engines could be boosted to 28lbs, at which level the power was just under 2,200hp (2,000 @ 12,000 feet). Given that this was a field modification it makes you wonder how many were boosted up a bit more, "just tweak it up a bit more laddie, the huns are a bit fierce out there". Source: http://www.spitfireperformance.com/merlin66hpchart.jpg

I never suggested that type of tank, why do you think I've always been saying integral tank. If the tank is pressurised with exhaust gas, the limited self sealing I suggested and with armour plating behind it, it would be safe enough. When there is 250 pounds of high explosive and cordite in the wing, a slightly more dangerous fuel tank wouldn't be much of an issue. At high altitude self sealing of any kind wasn't really effective anyway because of the need to pressurise the fuel tanks. It's probably part of the reason for ditching self sealing tanks after the war, intergral tanks were just better value. There is about 4.5 cubic feet in the space I indicated, thats about 28 imp gal. Of course it would have to be less than that due to the internal structure taking up some of the space. But even conservtively you could fit the 23 gal I suggested (10 more than the 13 gals that was actually used). They could put larger tanks in the wings and they did. The PR spits wings with the 55-66 gal leading edge tanks were not structurally significantly different from the the fighter wings.

The P-47 doesn't roll faster than the spit, check out the graph from the NACA roll tests and I've never heard of the P-38 having an unusually high pitch rate. Since when have either P-47 or P-38 been considered exceptionally agile. They didn't have the combination of elements that made aircraft like the Bf-109, Fw-190 and Spitfire agile. They didn't roll very fast, nor did they have exceptional turn rates (the P-38 could make very tight turns but they were slow turns), the climb rate of the P-47 was a serious hinderance (the P-38 had a quite acceptable climb rate) and possibly one of the most important factors, acceration. Both P-38 and P-47 were heavy underpowered fighters, relitively speaking. Once a spit, bf-109 or Fw-190 has expended energy it can gain it back much faster. This means that they can do a series of maneuvers much faster than the slower accelerating fighters. This was one of the principle reasons why the Fw-190 was so deadly early on. It's power to weight ratio was much higher than the spit V and Bf-109F so it could pull high g's even though it would loose a lot of speed due to it's high wingloading and then rapidly gain the speed back because of it's high acceleration.

Where did you get the spit diagram from (very effective by the way, makes it very clear that a fair amount more fuel could be carried there). Going through the history by the way, the quest for a long range Spit started before the war. Dowding was pressing hard and there were some interesting experiments and prototypes. After he was booted out the 'bomber mafia' lost all interest. Actually it was worse than loss of interest, Portal (head of RAF), along with the rest of the top brass, was convinced it was impossible (and famously said so to Churchill). With total disinterest (even obstruction) from the top there was no chance of anything going into production. Then came the Mustang! However the RAF hobbled their Mustangs by removing the rear tank! The bomber boys (British & US) had this amazing dogma that escorts were unnecessary, despite the experience of the BOB! Experience taught them otherwise, but not until they both suffered crippling losses. "Never underestimate human stupidity".

It's from "Great Aircraft of WWII" by Alfred Price and Mike Spick, it's a very handy little book I bought a while ago now. It covers in reasonable detail the Spitfire, Lancaster, Bf-109, Mustang and B-17. The greatest attention is devoted to the Spitfire and Lancaster however. Some of the information of the Lancaster and the development of bombing techniques is quite interesting.