Undeniable spitfire beautiful plane. Spitfires and mustangs get the glory. But if I had a choice I'd take either p47 for its tuff and survivability to fight another day. Or the hawker hurricane for fire power. Just my opinion.
Op pilots didn't care about looks. It wasn't about glory, that's a social media conn. Pilots wanted the best fighter for effectiveness - the Mustang and Spitfire had the best performance.
The weak armament and location of the gas tank right in front of the pilot caused a lot of casualties. German bombers had Mouser 8x57 cartridge defensive guns. Using .303s put the British pilots in range of the bombers guns. The early Spits, and Hurri's combat altitude was the same as a P-40. So was the early 109e. The Warhawk's twin .050s and four 30-06 guns would have shredded German fighters, and bombers. The 109's 20mm's had only 60 rounds, were low velocity, and slow firing, the twin nose mounted Mouser 8x57s were weak and slowed by the prop synchro. P-40's had much faster firing high velocity guns each with 400 rounds of ammo or more. The P-40 had better armor, dive speed, equal to or better turning rate, safer fuel tank location, and better range than the British, or German fighters in the BOB. The British and German machines have been far overated by comparison.
got the job done though, The structure of the Hurricane actually helped because it wasnt steel skin, and was made of irish linen, a german 20mm shell would often just pass straight through without detonating, and fixing and holes cause by MG or Cannon would take minutes with a patch and some glue
Well the .50-cal with bullets would be too heavy to carry and one other thing: who’s going to do the logistics to get the .50-cal guns and ammo from the States?
In 1940 the Allison had severe reliability problems. Even NAA was trying to switch to Merlins in early 1941. The .50 cal ammo was also unreliable until late 1942 and those guns/ammo were much heavier. The P-40b had no armour, no self sealing tanks then. So no, the P-40 wasn't a contender.
This is an excellent documentary. I appreciate the candidness of the narration, describing the good, bad, and ugly.
Glad I had the VHS tapes for both documentaries. Very well done and a stirring music behind it.
Undeniable spitfire beautiful plane. Spitfires and mustangs get the glory. But if I had a choice I'd take either p47 for its tuff and survivability to fight another day. Or the hawker hurricane for fire power. Just my opinion.
Op pilots didn't care about looks. It wasn't about glory, that's a social media conn. Pilots wanted the best fighter for effectiveness - the Mustang and Spitfire had the best performance.
The weak armament and location of the gas tank right in front of the pilot caused a lot of casualties. German bombers had Mouser 8x57 cartridge defensive guns. Using .303s put the British pilots in range of the bombers guns. The early Spits, and Hurri's combat altitude was the same as a P-40. So was the early 109e. The Warhawk's twin .050s and four 30-06 guns would have shredded German fighters, and bombers. The 109's 20mm's had only 60 rounds, were low velocity, and slow firing, the twin nose mounted Mouser 8x57s were weak and slowed by the prop synchro. P-40's had much faster firing high velocity guns each with 400 rounds of ammo or more. The P-40 had better armor, dive speed, equal to or better turning rate, safer fuel tank location, and better range than the British, or German fighters in the BOB. The British and German machines have been far overated by comparison.
got the job done though,
The structure of the Hurricane actually helped because it wasnt steel skin, and was made of irish linen, a german 20mm shell would often just pass straight through without detonating, and fixing and holes cause by MG or Cannon would take minutes with a patch and some glue
fought off a ratio of 3:1 total air force numbers during the battle of britain though. also world war back to back champions :D
Mauser, surely?
Well the .50-cal with bullets would be too heavy to carry and one other thing: who’s going to do the logistics to get the .50-cal guns and ammo from the States?
In 1940 the Allison had severe reliability problems. Even NAA was trying to switch to Merlins in early 1941. The .50 cal ammo was also unreliable until late 1942 and those guns/ammo were much heavier. The P-40b had no armour, no self sealing tanks then.
So no, the P-40 wasn't a contender.