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Subject: Best All-Around Fighter of World War II
sentinel28a    10/13/2009 3:38:03 PM
Let's try a non-controversial topic, shall we? (Heh heh.) I'll submit the P-51 for consideration. BW and FS, if you come on here and say that the Rafale was the best fighter of WWII, I am going to fly over to France and personally beat you senseless with Obama's ego. (However, feel free to talk about the D.520.)
 
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45-Shooter       2/18/2013 5:04:37 PM

Furthermore, losses per ton of bombs dropped on target seems to show, at least according to the two previous posts, that night time bombing was a looser.
No thats just you making thing up again the facts do not support this
How does that argue? Acording to the RAF, more than half of the bombs they dropped, even on cities, missed the targets! So for half a million tons of bombs the RAF took over 4,000 planes lost. The USAAF, by the exact same standards, IE "bomb tonnage inside the city limits" the USAAF dropped 1.4 millions tons of bombs for less than 10,000 planes lost! Again in the broadest terms, the RAF dropped less bombs inside the city limmits for about three times the casualties per ton of bombs.
agains failing to understand what the numbers represent
  How have I "failed to understand" the fact that the RAF/Lanc dropped fewer bombs for more caualties per ton of bombs?

 

 to include links to the source material
I was reading up on the B17 afters shooters complete bull and found this further info
the B17 engines were actually very unreliable especially the turbo units Then how do you account for the fact that the USAAF flew more missions in less time than the RAF BC?
More aircraft? True! huge supply of spares? Also true, but less realivant because the radial engine was both more durrable and more reliable.   but no thier can be only oe reason even if that reason goes against known facts
  You are the one making these points, not me. I just pointed out the facvts that they would have been better served by planes with air cooled radial engines bombing from higher altitudes in day time with fighter escort.

because that played right into the turrets strong point it was for most practical purposes a fixed read mount, it was a bodge as the tail of the B17 had never been designed to take a turret.  the most critical defensive postion and the B17 was designed with out it         
And this applies to the B-17 E-F-G?
the Read project would have fixed these issues but was canned, I was also suprised on how sensitive the B17 was to change in CoG
Given the huge differances in control athority between the B-17 and Lancaster, in the B-17's favor, I mean just look at the differances in tail plane size to know the lie this is, How can you make this canard?

Where on earth did you get this idea? I mean I raised it as a very real problem with the Lanc's long bomb bay and now you bring it up out of the blue? Why? What are your sources?
wow, I bring up a documented issue and you retort with fiction nice, I have a source and can even show it
  What sources? What documents? Exactly what issues?
B17 The story......by Roger Anthony Freeman  I just ordered it! Will see what it states. Can you list a page number for your claims above? In total 364,514 operational sorties were flown by the RAF, 1,030,500 tons of bombs were dropped and 8,325 aircraft lost in action. From American Combat aircraft by Wagner on page 133 the USAAF flew 762,462 sorties and dropped 1,396,816 tons of bombs for only 9,937 aircraft lost in European combat! How can you make lite of these figures?
I dont 
But you should! Larger populations make better statistics! 




Please list the pages in your sources, like I have, then we can talk rationally? Maybe?

 
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45-Shooter       2/18/2013 5:10:20 PM

What ejector seats? nice to have but not likely  The Heinkel one with the mortar charge under it? What he can do, Avro can do.
    Heinkle was only one of three to address this problem, but they were all designed after the Lanc, so are irealivant!     

2. 1943 They don't have time to waltz around. The Lancaster is the bomber that carries the air war on its back. It fortunately is not as bad a design as the B-17 for what we want, so we can work with it.
      How is it nearly as bad as the B-17 and in what way?
 


Details would be nice?

 
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45-Shooter       2/18/2013 5:21:57 PM

In comparing heavy bombers in WWII, and attempting to determine the best, it probably would be more accurate to decide which is the best of the worst.  Performance standards for British and American designs used in the European theater were very close. True! The B-17 is easily the most damage resistant,True! but it could not Did not, is different than could not. carry the massive bomb-load of the Lancaster, so their relative survivability is a wash, Not true at all. In either casualties per ton or planes lost per ton, the Lanc comes off poorly copm'd to the B-17! since the Lanc can do the same job with half the planes or missions using the same number of planes, But only if you do not count losses. thus putting the Lancaster at risk for (roughly) half the time. But it was much less than half as durrable. Both were better than the Liberator, as far as survivability is concerned, No, the B-24 was slightly better than the lanc in losses per sortie and slightly worse in losses per ton. (And the Lanc had vulnerable LC engines) but all marks did their job just fine. ??? None of the bombers of the day could survive in daylight without bomber escort by long range fighters, so the relative armament of a bomber, beyond rating the tail-gun, is like discussing which prey animal (The Springbok or the Gnu, for example) had the best horns when confronting a lion. General Curtis Lemay realized that sending a B-29 over Japan only required a tail gunner, and the savings in weight that could be dedicated to fuel and bombs (and maybe some more ammo for the lone tail-gunner) more than made up for the ability to shoot in every direction, and losses did not go up as a result of his epiphany that the concept of the flying battleship was a myth.  (Why he revised the myth, post-war, with the B-36 is anybody's guess... Fighter could not and still can not fly intercontinental distances.) Heavy, strategic bombers were, as a rule, designed, built and deployed under a number of wrong assumptions as to their effectiveness as weapons. True. They did their job as bomb trucks, but they won, not because they were great, but because (When you compare the relative industrial capacity of Axis and Allied powers.) there was an endless supply of them to throw at the enemy.  To understand the heavy bomber is to understand the game Space Invaders from the point of view of the Invader.  Your job is not to defeat the enemy, but to wear that enemy down until he defeats himself.  (Game Over) As far as heavy bombers in the European theater is concerned, I can't really pick a clear winner, but if I had to pick an overall "best of the worst" in the heavy bomber category, I would have to give it to the B-29, because it was the pinnacle of wrong-headed bomber design in WWII.  It had the best range, best speed and the best war load. True! It was also well ahead of its time in that the B-29's basic fuselage design (In the form of the TU-4, Bull) could be, modified and adapted to handle swept wings, turboprops and even jets when it was reborn as the Tu-95 Bear and the Tu-16 Badger.  Its effectiveness as a modern weapon may be nil, but the heart of the B-29 still flies today. 



 
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45-Shooter       2/18/2013 5:35:39 PM

That armorer in the photo is NOT John Moses Browning, though the remote turret is an experimental aircraft installation test rig. B.
Not exactly? It was the prototype test rig for the four gin top nose turrit on the B-29/50 and it was put on the last 1,500 or so B-29s.



 
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45-Shooter       2/18/2013 10:52:05 PM
Watch this video! It's neet!
 
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Belisarius1234    Do your own work.    2/18/2013 11:02:00 PM
and let others discuss in peace.
 
B.


      How is it nearly as bad as the B-17 and in what way?
 




Details would be nice?

 
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Belisarius1234       2/18/2013 11:33:18 PM
1. That works. Bit awkward shoving him in legs first, but that works, much better than my dumb idea. Like the flash-hiders, too. Too small, but at least someone was thinking it through.
 
2. Not all the Russian guns were recoil operated, in fact many of them were not. The gas-operated  ShVAK cannon was something that I wish our witless Moscow technical mission had grabbed as a sample as early as 1940 when we had the people there.
 
Can you imagine a Wildcat with four or those in 1942? Lots more of dead Zekes. The Russians were using American machine tools and gauges to make the things, so I know we couldn't foul those designs up like we did the German ones when we reverse engineered.
 
B.

b
 
when the .5 turret was finally completed and fitted to Lanc the gunner could carry the parachute (seat cusion type) and the accepted method of leaving was to dive head first between guns


 

as for the shortage, I believe it was a case of production being always behind demand and the US taking priority

the US did seem to have problems with machine gun and cannon design after Browning

as for gas operated, the majority of european guns were also blowback designs, only the lewis and vickers were gas operated (usually used as a hand held defensive gun in obsolite designs or in non effective roles like the nose of a Halifax where it wasnt expected to do anything)

 
 
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Belisarius1234       2/18/2013 11:49:31 PM


B wrote:

... That's the problem with photographic bombing maps in general. Deal with it. Use the appropriate IR inks. Those exist and were known. US used them.

a lot of work to counter a issue that didn't exist.


B writes:

But it did exist, hence the USAAF went to the trouble.

 B wrote:

that nose, okay, I see your good point, but didn't you mean CANOPY, too? There you don't have a choice. You have to have blow-out panels for either manual bail-out or ejector seat. That sheeting is THICK and HEAVY. Ease of manufacture is the key, time and expense likewise. Tradeoffs are acceptable.

 OBNW wrote:

no canopy i agree was not practical, it was also a problem for your ejector seats and you need to ensure the exit route is clear

B wrote:

British RAF opinion, and as the USAAF proved in combat; a wrong one. The remotes worked very well. Easier to stabilize in 2-d, traverse, elevate; smaller, and weighed MUCH less, so more ammo aboard. Easier to bail out the gunner from an observer blister too.  

OBNW wrote:

problem was that at time positioning your gunner so far away from your turret meant that his view was virtually non existent, the manned tail turret was the most effective defense during the war period.


The gimbal quad mount can be stuck under the gunner bubble, as it was in the later B-47.

B wrote:

a. The Lancaster wasn't made until '41.

OBNW wrote:

and the turret to take 0.5s didn't arrive to 43/44 they did try US B-24 liberator units but they were incompatible with British planes (electrical vs hydraulic iirc)

I prefer 100% electrical control and feed. Hydraulics may seem lighter but in reality not. Electrical allows fine control and slam stop with variable slew elevate track. Plus there is FIRE hazard with hydraulics.

 

OBNW wrote:

Actually the cowling of an engine is aerodynamic critical, even stuck behind the prop the drag of a poor design  (not that the Pod Merlin was poor just compromised) had significant effect of drag, had you designed the unit to work with the wing  a gain in performance could have been achieved, look at the difference between that of the Halifax and the Lanc or for that matter the later Lanc with the annular radiators;

B. writes:

Not making myself clear, before so I explain. When you fiddle with the cowl geometry, you start modifying criticals such as plumbing, external air cooling  flow around an ICE block and its radiators. As you apply lessons learned you can change the power-egg arrangement as installed in the factory, but that is COMPLEX and more uncertain as to result. Changing the propeller geometry is a LOT simpler, easier and yields immediate benefit with field retrofit without fouling things up on the factory floor.

 OBNW wrote

Prop design was still a art rather than science not all developments worked on all airframes, it is often a tradeoff of speed and climb, the power egg was not even AVRO but was a joint development between RR and Bristol and was initially a temporary arrangement until AVRO could build its own Merlin installation but were good enough until the annular radiator installation arrived

B writes:

Agreed that prop design is an art form. The US could do it by the numbers (NACA) but apparently not the British (at least not without help.) So get the HELP. Tizard has to be reciprocated someway.

===================================

Time is the driver. You want to keep those bombers rolling out as fast as you can with as little down time as possible, while improving them as much as you can. That is why the Dyson special is essentially a MB III modified with manual bailout through the canopy for the main crew and a better tailgun that fits in the existing B III balcony space. The bomb-aimer goes out the nose-belly trapdoor (How he enters) while the gunner climbs through the roof hatch on his turret to jump.


B.
 
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45-Shooter       2/19/2013 1:01:10 AM

B wrote: that nose, okay, I see your good point, but didn't you mean CANOPY, too? There you don't have a choice. You have to have blow-out panels for either manual bail-out or ejector seat. That sheeting is THICK and HEAVY. Skin thicknes was less than ONE Milimeter thick! So how is it thick and heavy? If this is proof of your aerodynamic engineering knowledge???

B wrote:
The gimbal quad mount can be stuck under the gunner bubble, as it was in the later B-47.  -"Gimbal quad mount in a B-47??? Just one more example of your faulty aero-anything knowledge base!!!
B wrote:

I prefer 100% electrical control and feed. Hydraulics may seem lighter but in reality not. Electrical allows fine control and slam stop with variable slew elevate track. Plus there is FIRE hazard with hydraulics.

Then why are all modern aircraft made with hydraulic systems instead of electric drive for the movable control surfaces?  Electric circuts do not have a fire hazard? These are two more examples of your faulty knowledge base!!!!        
    

 
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oldbutnotwise       2/19/2013 3:22:15 AM
1. That works. Bit awkward shoving him in legs first, but that works, much better than my dumb idea. Like the flash-hiders, too. Too small, but at least someone was thinking it through.
 
I think enterance was still by a rear door (the rose I believe had room for two!), All RAF turret guns had flash hiders IIRC
2. Not all the Russian guns were recoil operated, in fact many of them were not. The gas-operated  ShVAK cannon was something that I wish our witless Moscow technical mission had grabbed as a sample as early as 1940 when we had the people there.
I had forgotton the Russians, dont usually consider them Europeans
Can you imagine a Wildcat with four or those in 1942? Lots more of dead Zekes. The Russians were using American machine tools and gauges to make the things, so I know we couldn't foul those designs up like we did the German ones when we reverse engineered.
 
I never underestimate the ability to foul up,
 
 
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