My dad told me a story about target practice from his (merchant) ship in World War 2. A message came from the aircraft tug pilot to say that he was pulling the target, not pushing it!
@@BlackMasterRoshi When I joined the navy we still towed our targets behind us, sometimes when they fired at certain angles you could hear the shells whistle past us, quite exciting! It was a step up from being the actual target though when we just changed the aspect or angle of the gun sights so the fire should miss us by let's say 30°. We did, unfortunately, have a few accidents, but that was once a ship was hit first it went through the funnel, the second one went straight through the chest of a lad who slept in a cabin a few decks below as he sat up with a jolt when the first round went through the ship. The captain immediately took the radio and call for an immediate ceasefire, but the response he got back was: "duck and cover boys, there are three more rounds in the air".
@@BlackMasterRoshi - I was a mechanic, AD assigned to VC-13 from 1980-84. The squadron used the 2 seat TA-4J to tow targets. Banners for aerial gunnery and simulated missiles for surface ships to fire at. Not one of out "Scooters" were shot down, or even hit.
@@Bruce-1956 Only thing good about a Defiant was the powered turret, though it did serve well as a night fighter and got the first kill of the war over the UK.. They really should have sent the Henley to north Africa, where it would only have to contend with second rate Italian stuff, at least till Rommel got re supplied.. (most was shipped off to Barbarrossa in 41 anyways').. I think it would have served far better in that Theater considering it's ruggedness, and simplicity.. Don't know why the Merlin was prone to breaking in this plane, but these things can be overcome, if it could be re gigged for a radial, maybe a Centaurus? or a Jupiter (poppet valve is less complicated), might have made a great, reliable desert fighter/bomber , with no rad's and coolant to worry about... keep the top line stuff for home defense, and European theater... Only other thing would be drop tanks and a nice cannon, since it had good range to begin with, it could escort Wellingtons to and from French targets , not a great fighter but good to Harass 109's etc off the bomber groups ...Id rather have the Henley along then nothing.. Tactically as a dive bomber.. allied lines of communication were too long by 42', and the Stuka was easy meat unless there was fighter cover, or air superiority over the target.. it was put to good effect in Russia, but the Russian air force was effectively wiped out till Stalingrad was won, by Kursk things were very bad for the Stuka's..
@@planegaper always thought it was a Spitfire of 603 City of Edinburgh squadron based at Turnhouse, October 1939. 1939 - Equipped with the Spitfire and credited with shooting down the first enemy aircraft over the UK in World War Two, shooting a bomber into the Firth of Forth
The Vultee Vengeance was a very good dive bomber that's gotten a bad reputation because non-naval dive bombing aircraft had more or less gone out of fashion with the Allies early in the war. The British and Australians found it useful in the CBI theater though.
The Defiant was a pre-war design and was successful as a nightfighter. I remember seeing one flying low over Tuffnel Park during the London blitz in 1940, silhouetted against an orange sky lit up by the flames. Its low altitude was probably to avoid the flak which was bursting much higher up.
Thank you for sharing about these obscure aircraft designs. Your video illustrates how difficult it can be to match evolving aircraft design to evolving military doctrine. Your video also points out how governments try to balance social and economic needs with military needs.
I suspect the gent is George Bullman, Hawker's chief test pilot, as the Hurricane is K5083, the prototype of that model. Somewhere I have Paul Gallico's book, "The Hurricane Story", that spends a lot of time on K5083 but never once mentions the Henley. It's like a Victorian story complete with the deformed sister locked in the attic! Cheers!
@@joseywales6146 Thanks for that extra detail Josey. I was, of course, making a (hopefully) humorous comment on what I thought was an amusing/odd image but I'm now keen to learn more of the dapper Mr Bullman!
Thank you for bringing this aircraft from the Hawker stable, to light. I thought that I had a pretty good grasp of 1930's, 40's era aviation history, but this youtube video has been a "humbling checkup" for me. Until now, I was totally unaware of this aircraft. Much appreciated, and please keep providing an excellent historical aircraft forum. Cheers from Canada!
thanks for the video Ed, very good stuff. I've always thought that the Henley was a missed opportunity, so very pleasing to find someone who thinks the same. Taking it a bit further, I can't help wondering whether the Hurricane /Henley combo could have been developed and navalised for the FAA. The Hurricane was easily as good as the Wildcat, and anything would have been better than the Skua. There would have been some parts commonality too. They may have been a boon in the first 2-3 years of the war
I can easily see this plane filling a lot of scouting and maritime roles. The canopy has pretty good visibility for the time, and the rear cockpit looks pretty spacious, good for plotting tables, maps, or cameras.
Excellent content and glad I found this channel! Hello from NZ! Some feedback - @ 5:30 the aircraft performance graph is very good, but could use tome improvements. I'd make the legend more prominent, include scales on the Y axis, include metric units (if possible), make the bar graph 2D rather than 3D. Keep up the good work and look forward to more content and seeing this channel grow!
I knew about the fighting service of the Henley from The Narrow Margin, mentioning Ira Jones' pursuit of a JU88. Jones, the second highest scoring ace in 74 Squadron behind Edward Mannock, during the First World War, chased a JU88 in July of 1940, firing a Verey pistol at the plane, urging the crew to head back home.
What a missed opportunity. Just imagine if the Henley would've been further developed to not just accept the later,more powerful versions of the Merlin engine but also incorporate a similar method of bomb delivery as the Ju87 with a trapeze type bomb mount to allow vertical dive bombing and the increased accuracy that would enable. Great video, thank you for uploading.
The Stuka was a slightly better dive bomber than the Dauntless, but the Dauntless had a much heavier payload and longer range In a fly off between the two the Dauntless would have won
@@Steve-cc6xc 'A great Dark Skies video' is an oxymoron. The maker just wants to push as much content out to the undiscerning as possible. His narratives bundles in all kinds of mixed up tosh.
@@Farweasel I call Dark Skies, and all of his other channels "Keep Beach City Weird" because his narratives always remind me of the character in "Stephen Universe" from Cartoon Network that makes conspiracy theory videos.
I knew an old guy when i was a kid that flew whirlwinds.....he reckoned that it was very nice to fly but wasn't something you could put a newbie straight out of flight training into.....that little problem aside however if you knew how to fly it and work the throttles and prop pitch in conjunction with the rudder it would turn inside a hurricanes turning circle and the big guns on it where unreal in their effectiveness, he got 2 kills in them, both at close range of about 100 yards, one fighter he hit at the wing root and the wing fell off, other one was a Do17 that he cut in half just aft of the rear gunners position......he spent pretty much all of his time shooting up german airfields and the chateaus that the germans where using as headquarters, both the aircraft he got were returning to their airfields when he jumped them......he liked the aircraft, he was somewhat miffed when he was transferred onto hurricanes in the we desert.
I have seen somewhere on youtube a person claiming that the whirlwind was plauged by propellers that caused vibrations causing the bad reputation of the aircraft. I too love the whirlwind.
I'm sorry, but why?? It looks nothing like a Hurricane at all, the only thing they share im common is an engine, and by that logic the P51 mustang is a Hurricane knockoff.
The tail and the outer wings were exactly the same as those used on the Hurricane, Hawker decided at an early stage that it would significantly cheaper to produce if it used as many components as possible from their other design.
Interesting video, thank you. I wonder how successful it would been in a CAS role though. Water cooled engines were the weak spot for most of the Merlin fighters pressed into CAS service. Same for the Typhoon with the Sabre engine. One rifle calibre round could take out the cooling system if it hit the wrong place. That's one reason the P47 was so successful in the CAS role later in the war - radials could actually take more punishment before they quit on you.
@@chanman819 Actually the Il-2 is a good example. It was a lot less successful as a tank-buster than its reputation would have you believe (like most WW2 CAS aircraft, actually). One reason cited for this is that it had to be fitted with an enormous weight of armour - partly to protect the engine. So it could only carry quite a light weapon load. I think the lack of tank buster success in WW2 was down to a combination of doctrine, training, techniques and available equipment. CAS aircraft were pretty effective against soft targets but nothing they carried was both accurate enough or hard-hitting enough to kill a tank consistently. That experience had a profound effect on the design of the A10 Warthog. The amazing, rapid fire cannon with DU rounds that can penetrate top armour like a knife trough butter. The gun has a great aiming system and basically sends so many rounds down range that a few are bound to hit something :-) Those options weren't really available to WW2 CAS aircraft.
I understand that the drag from the drogue meant that the merlin was working too hard with a fixed pitched airscrew at the towing speed and it was unable to cool sufficiently - hence engine failures.
Just Another Reason Why I Subscribed. I'm A Sexagenarian & Thought I'd Heard Of Most World War 2 Aircraft & I Call Myself An Anglophile. Never Too Old To Learn, Hey What? 8)
Ju 87 was insuperable in his work. But its heavier bomb was inable to pierce heavy battleship armour. Only Fritz X radio heavy bomb was. Battleship Roma during its way to Malta after armistice of Cassibile was hit by two Fritz X and exploded killing the crew and admiral Bergamini. These bombs were hanghed under the wings of a squadron of Dornier Do 217 based in Marseille. Also HMS Warspite during the landing of Salerno, was hit by this bomb, but fortunately for its crew, the bomb pierced the armour and the the keel and did'nt exploded.
I think they fitted a Vulture in one of these . Thanks Ed. As my panache is predominately aircraft don't be too upset if l pass on some of your other topics.
This so reminds me of the Vultee Vengeance POS "diver bomber", that Ed mentions. My dad's unit, the 359th FG, had an attached sub unit with A-31 Vultees as target tugs. An unofficial vital mission, of the Vengeance, was to support moral by flying American whiskey to Royal Navy bases in exchange for rum and other rare spirits. Such "training" missions furthered American-British by such spirited exchanges. They also helped lubricate on base parties between the over paid, over sexed, and over here Yank pilots with local British ladies invited to such spirited parties. Such parties resulted in more than a few marriages and improvements in the local gene pool.
question: why did the Merlin engine 'the same as fitted to the Hurricane and Spitfire (0.30) tended to wear out quickly'? It seems as though that did not happen with the Spit and Hurricane, where the engine is celebrated. What made the fitting to the Henley special (and bad)? Or have I misunderstood and do Merlins in general just tend to wear out quickly?
The problem with the Henley as a target tug was that the drag caused by the target and ancillary equipment frequently caused the engine to overheat and fail. A rather basic overlooked drawback at the time.
I agree with you and the Henley has always been one of my favorite airplanes , well since 1973 when I first read about. By the way why did the RAF use other aircraft with the Merlin like the Battle to do its intended job , wouldn't there Merlins be prematurely worn out also
I think it was just a question of availability. The battles got yanked from the frontline and were otherwise sitting around - might as well get some use from them.
BOSTIN lookin aircraft. Would love to see a pic of the prototype 5115 fitted with the Vulture engine, profile view. It would have been the British Mustang!
www.destinationsjourney.com/historical-military-photographs/hawker-tornado/ they were even going to put an 18 cyl Centaurus in the thing, for 2100 hp, sort of an early Thypoon, think it needed a more robust empennage to handle the weight.. as evidenced by the Typhoon, and taller gear, but the dna is there for sure
It does look like an under appreciated plane, possibly a larger oil cooler, I suppose it was a plane out of time. Later in the war with the typhoon it would be a cheap dive bomber(rockets being expensive) By the time of Normandy's advanced airfields became available it would have evolved to a sleak, better Dive-bomb delivery machine. You only have to look at the "Battle" with its slow wide high-cord wings, and could be identified by an enemy fighter quite easily.
@@theoriginaldylangreene If that's a reference to the shot at 5.50, I thought it was a Top Hat (Homburgs have less loft & far more brim) But then That chap's flying a bloody Hurricane not a Henley .......... And you're quibbling about *hats* ?
@@Farweasel There are a few different styles of Homburg, the US flat brimmed "Indiana Jones" style, and then the European style with the high crown and curled hard brim are the most common. A top hat has no indentation on the crown, the angle is bad in that photo at 5.50, but you can see an indented crown. I do promise you that it is a Homburg. As the other guy said, i'm a bit of a "hatzi". Though I do accept that flying an aircraft in any such headgear is (patriotically) the most gentlemanly thing a fine upstanding Britisher could do!
I always wondered why the brits didn't seem to take to the idea of tactical close support aircraft back then, I heard they had good experience with planes supporting ground attacks in WWI on western front i.e. cambrai and mid east i.e. megiddo (especially megiddo I heard the turks basically disintegrated in panic) ... but in late 30s it seemed the brits didn't want a plane for a stuka-type role... never heard of the henley though, this was interesting
@@EdNashsMilitaryMatters That answers my question, so when later Merlin variants would have been fitted the result would have been an outstanding attack bomber.
Victim of an ongoing story. We need several years notice of how a potential war might be fought, so guessing is always needed to decide the exact type of equipment required to best serve us. It's only hindsight that can tell whether the guesses were right or wrong. The RAFs need for a fast, pinpoint accuracy bomber only became apparent towards the end of WW2.
In the years leading upto and into the first phase of WW2 Dowding, Parkes and arguably Douglas were the only visionaries and trully capable leaders. The main motivator for most of the RAF 'Brass' and especially Bomber Command was to stay on the gravy train by keeping the RAF distinctive in its role. They feared if the worked closely with the Army or Navy the RAF would devolve back into the RFC & NAS. As that overlaid pigheaded dogmatism it was a sucidally lethal mix.
The drag from towing a banner meant that the aircraft was operating at a lower airspeed but with higher engine power than what it had been designed for. This meant that airflow for engine cooling was inadequate leading to overheating and failure.
But how well would it have performed in a steep dive? The early versions of the Merlin engine had a habit of stalling in a dive due to its injection system. Not something you want in a dive bomber.
"We need to come up with a powerful, awe-inspiring name for our new plane. Let's see....Hurricane, Spitfire, Typhoon, Tempest....they're already taken... wait, I've got it! We'll call it - drumroll - the HENLEY.
The problem with pre war RAF was that there were too obsolete aircrafts, such as the Battle, the Blenheim and others, probabilly also this one would've been butchered on France, german's air superiority was too strong.
A big problem was lack of military spending in the early 1930s particularly under Ramsay MacDonald's government. Manufacturer's need revenue to pay engineers and designers and build prototypes. There was also a misguided interest in turret fighters such as the Boulton Paul Defiant. After he became prime minister, Neville Chamberlain pushed the adoption of the Hawker Hurricane with pressure on Supermarine to get the Spitfire into production, while Winston Churchill apparently thought it was a mistake to produce Hurricanes instead of Defiants. Fortunate that while the Battle of Britain was fought under Churchill's premiership, it was fought with Neville Chamberlain's air force.
@@iansneddon2956 Interesting point about Chamberlain. Often criticised for not declaring war on Germany earlier. However, if he had, can only wonder at the outcome as Britain would have been far less prepared? Did he realise war was probably inevitable but take action to buy some time?
@@Steve-GM0HUU I think it would have been a disaster for Britain to go to war with Germany earlier. In hindsight we see September 1939 as working out okay and maybe being too late, but I wonder how Britain and the Commonwealth might have handled it if USA had pursued strict neutrality (no lend-lease, no US Navy support of convoy defense). And I think that the US attitudes supporting Britain came from Britain's stubborn defense and victory in the Battle of Britain. Considering how much Britain's military grew in 1939 to get to the level when war began, I doubt Britain could have staged the type of defense that would inspire Roosevelt to back Britain. And without American assistance coming in 1941 I don't see Hitler declaring war on USA. I think that growth in 1939 after Germany invaded Czechoslovakia was essential. His post-Munich re-armament sped up but still seemed cautious, as if he wanted a stronger military but didn't want to provoke Germany into a war. That it took Hitler making that first big move leads me to believe Chamberlain didn't have an overall plan here but was just trying to carefully manage a difficult situation. I think the lesson from Munich was that you wouldn't have peace with Hitler through normal diplomacy. I don't think he saw war as inevitable. I think the efforts to strengthen ties with France and Poland into a military alliance was based on a more traditional approach - that if they presented a strong united front then as a common bully Hitler would back down. I think war was inevitable because Germany needed the plunder that war might bring to keep their economy going, and Hitler was full of ideas that War would inspire Germans to achieve greatness (or something like that). So I think that it was inevitable Hitler would lead Europe into war even out of desperation. But I think Neville Chamberlain held out hope that a lasting peace could be obtained through strength.
One could imagine this with a Marlin 61 or even a Merlin that delivered roughly the same power down low without the two speed two stage supercharger and I could have been quick let's just say you could have gotten 380 miles an hour out of this and possibly ditched the rear Gunner On a side note though the hawker typhoon did seem to fit the close air support role even though it came into existence after the Battle of Britain but there's also the fact the Merlin is cheaper than the saber 24 cylinder H engine
Very interesting! My dad was a tow target operator flying in a Henley along the Cornish coast in 1942/3.
There is one in Hanger 10 at Jandakot Airport. Perth Western Australia
A well put together video on yet ANOTHER aircraft I've never even heard of - thank you, Ed!
More than welcome :)
My dad told me a story about target practice from his (merchant) ship in World War 2. A message came from the aircraft tug pilot to say that he was pulling the target, not pushing it!
@@BlackMasterRoshi When I joined the navy we still towed our targets behind us, sometimes when they fired at certain angles you could hear the shells whistle past us, quite exciting!
It was a step up from being the actual target though when we just changed the aspect or angle of the gun sights so the fire should miss us by let's say 30°.
We did, unfortunately, have a few accidents, but that was once a ship was hit first it went through the funnel, the second one went straight through the chest of a lad who slept in a cabin a few decks below as he sat up with a jolt when the first round went through the ship.
The captain immediately took the radio and call for an immediate ceasefire, but the response he got back was: "duck and cover boys, there are three more rounds in the air".
@@BlackMasterRoshi - I was a mechanic, AD assigned to VC-13 from 1980-84. The squadron used the 2 seat TA-4J to tow targets. Banners for aerial gunnery and simulated missiles for surface ships to fire at. Not one of out "Scooters" were shot down, or even hit.
Quality.✅😂
@@billy4072 - Meaning?
Classic, understated “wtf…!)
You are 3 for 3 with me.
I've watched 3 of your videos.
And all three are about things I have not heard of before.
Thank you.
Another British plane I've never heard of! 😳
Superb overview. Well done sir. Subscribed.
Replaced by both the Fairey Battle and the Boulton-Paul Defiant. The ignominy.
Remember building the Airfix models of both planes.
@@Bruce-1956 Only thing good about a Defiant was the powered turret, though it did serve well as a night fighter and got the first kill of the war over the UK.. They really should have sent the Henley to north Africa, where it would only have to contend with second rate Italian stuff, at least till Rommel got re supplied.. (most was shipped off to Barbarrossa in 41 anyways').. I think it would have served far better in that Theater considering it's ruggedness, and simplicity.. Don't know why the Merlin was prone to breaking in this plane, but these things can be overcome, if it could be re gigged for a radial, maybe a Centaurus? or a Jupiter (poppet valve is less complicated), might have made a great, reliable desert fighter/bomber , with no rad's and coolant to worry about... keep the top line stuff for home defense, and European theater...
Only other thing would be drop tanks and a nice cannon, since it had good range to begin with, it could escort Wellingtons to and from French targets , not a great fighter but good to Harass 109's etc off the bomber groups ...Id rather have the Henley along then nothing..
Tactically as a dive bomber.. allied lines of communication were too long by 42', and the Stuka was easy meat unless there was fighter cover, or air superiority over the target.. it was put to good effect in Russia, but the Russian air force was effectively wiped out till Stalingrad was won, by Kursk things were very bad for the Stuka's..
@@planegaper always thought it was a Spitfire of 603 City of Edinburgh squadron based at Turnhouse, October 1939.
1939 - Equipped with the Spitfire and credited with shooting down the first enemy aircraft over the UK in World War Two, shooting a bomber into the Firth of Forth
@@Bruce-1956 could be right Bruce, the Defiant may have gotten the first night kill, and I gave it the day credit..
The Defiant was a good aircraft but it was criminally misused
The Vultee Vengeance was a very good dive bomber that's gotten a bad reputation because non-naval dive bombing aircraft had more or less gone out of fashion with the Allies early in the war. The British and Australians found it useful in the CBI theater though.
I never heard of the Henley, great video
Many thanks for these insights into forgotten aircraft. Much appreciated.
I learn something every time. Thankyou.
The Defiant was a pre-war design and was successful as a nightfighter. I remember seeing one flying low over Tuffnel Park during the London blitz in 1940, silhouetted against an orange sky lit up by the flames. Its low altitude was probably to avoid the flak which was bursting much higher up.
Thank you for sharing about these obscure aircraft designs. Your video illustrates how difficult it can be to match evolving aircraft design to evolving military doctrine. Your video also points out how governments try to balance social and economic needs with military needs.
Never even heard of that one.... Thanks for the info ☺️
Yet another brilliant and most informative presentation. Much appreciated and enjoyed.
At 05:40 the Hurricane pilot is shown flying to a formal event, hence the top hat.
I suspect the gent is George Bullman, Hawker's chief test pilot, as the Hurricane is K5083, the prototype of that model. Somewhere I have Paul Gallico's book, "The Hurricane Story", that spends a lot of time on K5083 but never once mentions the Henley. It's like a Victorian story complete with the deformed sister locked in the attic! Cheers!
@@joseywales6146 Thanks for that extra detail Josey. I was, of course, making a (hopefully) humorous comment on what I thought was an amusing/odd image but I'm now keen to learn more of the dapper Mr Bullman!
Great commentary. Informative and to the point.
Ed Nash is fast becoming my go to for forgotten aircraft.
An oddly attractive plane. Thanks for the video 👍
Again I've learned something from an Ed Nash video. Thank you, sir.
Great video, Ed.
0:12 That's a damned short rope for a target tug.
The sleeve isn't fully winched in/out.
The thing in the front was the target 😂😂
He wasn't especially well liked.
There’s a school of thought that says that with most fighter jocks, the closer you are to the target, the less likely you are to get hit....
@@dorsetdumpling5387 One exception being when you're _in front_ of the target.
You find some obscure stuff, Ed. Carry on!
Subscribed. I like your channel. Thanks for the effort you're putting in.
Excellent Video My friend
Thank you for bringing this aircraft from the Hawker stable, to light. I thought that I had a pretty good grasp of 1930's, 40's era aviation history, but this youtube video has been a "humbling checkup" for me. Until now, I was totally unaware of this aircraft. Much appreciated, and please keep providing an excellent historical aircraft forum. Cheers from Canada!
thanks for the video Ed, very good stuff.
I've always thought that the Henley was a missed opportunity, so very pleasing to find someone who thinks the same.
Taking it a bit further, I can't help wondering whether the Hurricane /Henley combo could have been developed and navalised for the FAA. The Hurricane was easily as good as the Wildcat, and anything would have been better than the Skua. There would have been some parts commonality too. They may have been a boon in the first 2-3 years of the war
I can easily see this plane filling a lot of scouting and maritime roles. The canopy has pretty good visibility for the time, and the rear cockpit looks pretty spacious, good for plotting tables, maps, or cameras.
Excellent content and glad I found this channel! Hello from NZ!
Some feedback - @ 5:30 the aircraft performance graph is very good, but could use tome improvements. I'd make the legend more prominent, include scales on the Y axis, include metric units (if possible), make the bar graph 2D rather than 3D. Keep up the good work and look forward to more content and seeing this channel grow!
I knew about the fighting service of the Henley from The Narrow Margin, mentioning Ira Jones' pursuit of a JU88. Jones, the second highest scoring ace in 74 Squadron behind Edward Mannock, during the First World War, chased a JU88 in July of 1940, firing a Verey pistol at the plane, urging the crew to head back home.
Interesting video. Just my cup of tea!
What a missed opportunity. Just imagine if the Henley would've been further developed to not just accept the later,more powerful versions of the Merlin engine but also incorporate a similar method of bomb delivery as the Ju87 with a trapeze type bomb mount to allow vertical dive bombing and the increased accuracy that would enable.
Great video, thank you for uploading.
Such a nice looking plane
Best allied "Stuka" equivalent must have been the Douglas SBD Dauntless. Slow but Deadly.
Due to be retired before the war but I believe it sank more ships than any other naval aircraft
what an aircraft that was ..... great dark skies 🌌 video on it
The Stuka was a slightly better dive bomber than the Dauntless, but the Dauntless had a much heavier payload and longer range
In a fly off between the two the Dauntless would have won
@@Steve-cc6xc 'A great Dark Skies video' is an oxymoron.
The maker just wants to push as much content out to the undiscerning as possible.
His narratives bundles in all kinds of mixed up tosh.
@@Farweasel I call Dark Skies, and all of his other channels "Keep Beach City Weird" because his narratives always remind me of the character in "Stephen Universe" from Cartoon Network that makes conspiracy theory videos.
One aircraft I would like to learn more about is the British Westland Whirlwind
There is stuff out there. A great aeroplane plagued by crappy engines and a fast landing speed, requiring longer airfields. Merlins and airbrakes...
I knew an old guy when i was a kid that flew whirlwinds.....he reckoned that it was very nice to fly but wasn't something you could put a newbie straight out of flight training into.....that little problem aside however if you knew how to fly it and work the throttles and prop pitch in conjunction with the rudder it would turn inside a hurricanes turning circle and the big guns on it where unreal in their effectiveness, he got 2 kills in them, both at close range of about 100 yards, one fighter he hit at the wing root and the wing fell off, other one was a Do17 that he cut in half just aft of the rear gunners position......he spent pretty much all of his time shooting up german airfields and the chateaus that the germans where using as headquarters, both the aircraft he got were returning to their airfields when he jumped them......he liked the aircraft, he was somewhat miffed when he was transferred onto hurricanes in the we desert.
I have seen somewhere on youtube a person claiming that the whirlwind was plauged by propellers that caused vibrations causing the bad reputation of the aircraft. I too love the whirlwind.
Gaijin, this guy's channel is *perfect* for new aircraft that actually existed!
I'm watching your videos again 💎
Cheers
Got some new one :)
gosh that crate has the bones of something resembling the Typhoon and Tempest....
That would be Sydney Camm. His brother, FJ Camm was editor of Practical Wireless.
I'm reading Ed Nash's Desert Sniper book. It's a good read so far. He had some close calls!
I'm thinking about doing a series for patreon supporters on that subject 😁
Very interesting, not an aircraft I’d previously heard of. Thanks. RAF should have persevered with it, at least until the Typhoon was ready.
Fascinating....never heard of it....obviously a Hurricane inspired aircraft.
I'm sorry, but why?? It looks nothing like a Hurricane at all, the only thing they share im common is an engine, and by that logic the P51 mustang is a Hurricane knockoff.
The tail and the outer wings were exactly the same as those used on the Hurricane, Hawker decided at an early stage that it would significantly cheaper to produce if it used as many components as possible from their other design.
What a cool looking airplane!
I’ve been called unreliable on occasions.
Me too, John. Me too. 🍺
Yeah me too , and a bit " random"
@@doones4649 Well I haven't.
But then.
I'm a tractor.
awesome content always love learning about aircraft of world war two which didn't quite make it from the drawing board to combat thank you!!!!!!
RAF: We need a target tug...
GOVT: Excellent, have a dive bomber instead...
🤣😂🤣❤
Interesting video, thank you. I wonder how successful it would been in a CAS role though. Water cooled engines were the weak spot for most of the Merlin fighters pressed into CAS service. Same for the Typhoon with the Sabre engine. One rifle calibre round could take out the cooling system if it hit the wrong place. That's one reason the P47 was so successful in the CAS role later in the war - radials could actually take more punishment before they quit on you.
@@chanman819 Actually the Il-2 is a good example. It was a lot less successful as a tank-buster than its reputation would have you believe (like most WW2 CAS aircraft, actually). One reason cited for this is that it had to be fitted with an enormous weight of armour - partly to protect the engine. So it could only carry quite a light weapon load. I think the lack of tank buster success in WW2 was down to a combination of doctrine, training, techniques and available equipment. CAS aircraft were pretty effective against soft targets but nothing they carried was both accurate enough or hard-hitting enough to kill a tank consistently. That experience had a profound effect on the design of the A10 Warthog. The amazing, rapid fire cannon with DU rounds that can penetrate top armour like a knife trough butter. The gun has a great aiming system and basically sends so many rounds down range that a few are bound to hit something :-) Those options weren't really available to WW2 CAS aircraft.
I understand that the drag from the drogue meant that the merlin was working too hard with a fixed pitched airscrew at the towing speed and it was unable to cool sufficiently - hence engine failures.
Just Another Reason Why I Subscribed. I'm A Sexagenarian & Thought I'd Heard Of Most World War 2 Aircraft & I Call Myself An Anglophile. Never Too Old To Learn, Hey What? 8)
I am 65 and I thought I know about most of the planes from the era but ones I never heard of keep popping up.
There should be a movie about target tug pilots. Make it one of those motley crew type stories.
Pah. The Irons are way better than Motley Crew.
Nicely done.
Ju 87 was insuperable in his work. But its heavier bomb was inable to pierce heavy battleship armour. Only Fritz X radio heavy bomb was. Battleship Roma during its way to Malta after armistice of Cassibile was hit by two Fritz X and exploded killing the crew and admiral Bergamini. These bombs were hanghed under the wings of a squadron of Dornier Do 217 based in Marseille. Also HMS Warspite during the landing of Salerno, was hit by this bomb, but fortunately for its crew, the bomb pierced the armour and the the keel and did'nt exploded.
Good video learned something.
I think they fitted a Vulture in one of these . Thanks Ed. As my panache is predominately aircraft don't be too upset if l pass on some of your other topics.
This so reminds me of the Vultee Vengeance POS "diver bomber", that Ed mentions. My dad's unit, the 359th FG, had an attached sub unit with A-31 Vultees as target tugs.
An unofficial vital mission, of the Vengeance, was to support moral by flying American whiskey to Royal Navy bases in exchange for rum and other rare spirits. Such "training" missions furthered American-British by such spirited exchanges. They also helped lubricate on base parties between the over paid, over sexed, and over here Yank pilots with local British ladies invited to such spirited parties. Such parties resulted in more than a few marriages and improvements in the local gene pool.
5:40 - Hurricane pilot wearing a top hat???
Looks like an engineer-type. Probably carried a slide rule during test flights.
Noticed that. must have been going out for dinner after flight....
That’s a Homburg. It’s Churchill.
@@hekatoncheiros208 naw an imposter, Churchy wouldn't fit in the cockpit by that time, plus a stach just isn't him.. it's a Marx brother !!!
Top marks to your eagle eyes sir! 🤓
Timing is everything.
question: why did the Merlin engine 'the same as fitted to the Hurricane and Spitfire (0.30) tended to wear out quickly'? It seems as though that did not happen with the Spit and Hurricane, where the engine is celebrated. What made the fitting to the Henley special (and bad)? Or have I misunderstood and do Merlins in general just tend to wear out quickly?
Fascinating aircraft. Thanks for this👍🍺
"Hi I'm Ed, and welcome to another episode of "Forgotten Airplanes" 😋
Lol It does seem to be headed that way.
Would it have been possible to turn it into a carrier bomber? And with, for example, the Mark 24 mine underneath? Thoughts...
What is the aircraft at 1:20, before the Fox and Hind?
The problem with the Henley as a target tug was that the drag caused by the target and ancillary equipment frequently caused the engine to overheat and fail. A rather basic overlooked drawback at the time.
I agree with you and the Henley has always been one of my favorite airplanes , well since 1973 when I first read about. By the way why did the RAF use other aircraft with the Merlin like the Battle to do its intended job , wouldn't there Merlins be prematurely worn out also
I think it was just a question of availability. The battles got yanked from the frontline and were otherwise sitting around - might as well get some use from them.
I'm convinced that the Henley would have been a proper plane for the FAA.
5:56 old mate pilot just going for a fly in a top hat....
BOSTIN lookin aircraft. Would love to see a pic of the prototype 5115 fitted with the Vulture engine, profile view. It would have been the British Mustang!
www.destinationsjourney.com/historical-military-photographs/hawker-tornado/ they were even going to put an 18 cyl Centaurus in the thing, for 2100 hp, sort of an early Thypoon, think it needed a more robust empennage to handle the weight.. as evidenced by the Typhoon, and taller gear, but the dna is there for sure
It does look like an under appreciated plane, possibly a larger oil cooler, I suppose it was a plane out of time. Later in the war with the typhoon it would be a cheap dive bomber(rockets being expensive) By the time of Normandy's advanced airfields became available it would have evolved to a sleak, better Dive-bomb delivery machine. You only have to look at the "Battle" with its slow wide high-cord wings, and could be identified by an enemy fighter quite easily.
I guess the fuselage wasn't quite wide enough to install a radial engine, and may have decreased performance due to extra frontal area?
They did try to get a centaurus in there , over 200hp, but it looks like a more robust fusalage was needed.. and we got the Typoon
The Hurrican Prototype at 5:50, What on earth is the pilot wearing? It looks like a top hat.
Nice video.
that is a handsom looking aircraft, wish someone builds it for the MS Flight sim 2020
Today I discovered the Glister F5 ,Dr Havilland Hornet and now the Henley. All forgotten British designs.
Glister?
Designed to be flown whilst wearing a trilby.
Don't forget the pipe!
I'm sorry to be "that guy" and ruin the joke, but that's a homburg, not a trilby.
@@theoriginaldylangreene Hatzi fanboy.
@@theoriginaldylangreene If that's a reference to the shot at 5.50, I thought it was a Top Hat (Homburgs have less loft & far more brim)
But then
That chap's flying a bloody Hurricane not a Henley .......... And you're quibbling about *hats* ?
@@Farweasel There are a few different styles of Homburg, the US flat brimmed "Indiana Jones" style, and then the European style with the high crown and curled hard brim are the most common. A top hat has no indentation on the crown, the angle is bad in that photo at 5.50, but you can see an indented crown. I do promise you that it is a Homburg. As the other guy said, i'm a bit of a "hatzi".
Though I do accept that flying an aircraft in any such headgear is (patriotically) the most gentlemanly thing a fine upstanding Britisher could do!
I hope they used a longer bit of string when they towed the target drogue?
Love the content! Please could you use a wind sock or a mic shield to stop all the 'popping' on your commentary.
I always wondered why the brits didn't seem to take to the idea of tactical close support aircraft back then, I heard they had good experience with planes supporting ground attacks in WWI on western front i.e. cambrai and mid east i.e. megiddo (especially megiddo I heard the turks basically disintegrated in panic) ... but in late 30s it seemed the brits didn't want a plane for a stuka-type role... never heard of the henley though, this was interesting
The pilot @ 5:51 appears to be Sir Topham Hatt.
Why was the merlin engine unreliable in this plane but not in other planes?
@@EdNashsMilitaryMatters That answers my question, so when later Merlin variants would have been fitted the result would have been an outstanding attack bomber.
Merlin wasn’t designed to go slow at full power
It's got decent lines . You can tell it is armored.
Victim of an ongoing story. We need several years notice of how a potential war might be fought, so guessing is always needed to decide the exact type of equipment required to best serve us. It's only hindsight that can tell whether the guesses were right or wrong. The RAFs need for a fast, pinpoint accuracy bomber only became apparent towards the end of WW2.
I believe one of these was used by Rolls Royce as a test airframe for the Exe and possibly the Vulture 24 cylinder engines
In the years leading upto and into the first phase of WW2 Dowding, Parkes and arguably Douglas were the only visionaries and trully capable leaders.
The main motivator for most of the RAF 'Brass' and especially Bomber Command was to stay on the gravy train by keeping the RAF distinctive in its role. They feared if the worked closely with the Army or Navy the RAF would devolve back into the RFC & NAS.
As that overlaid pigheaded dogmatism it was a sucidally lethal mix.
Looks like a kit bash,around the cockpit.
Very good video. Could just have dealt with the partial myth about the Defiant‘s alleged inferiority a bit, and it would have been flawless.
Pity nonr survive today! It would have been great to see one in a museum or as a warbird.
great hat at 5:50
Nifty Video...
Why did the Merlin wear out quickly in this airframe?
The drag from towing a banner meant that the aircraft was operating at a lower airspeed but with higher engine power than what it had been designed for. This meant that airflow for engine cooling was inadequate leading to overheating and failure.
@5:50 is the pilot of the hurricane wearing a hat?
But how well would it have performed in a steep dive? The early versions of the Merlin engine had a habit of stalling in a dive due to its injection system. Not something you want in a dive bomber.
5:40 Is the Hurricane pilot wearing a top hat?!
5:40 is the Hurricane pilot wearing a TOP HAT?!
"We need to come up with a powerful, awe-inspiring name for our new plane. Let's see....Hurricane, Spitfire, Typhoon, Tempest....they're already taken... wait, I've got it! We'll call it - drumroll - the HENLEY.
The problem with pre war RAF was that there were too obsolete aircrafts, such as the Battle, the Blenheim and others, probabilly also this one would've been butchered on France, german's air superiority was too strong.
A big problem was lack of military spending in the early 1930s particularly under Ramsay MacDonald's government. Manufacturer's need revenue to pay engineers and designers and build prototypes. There was also a misguided interest in turret fighters such as the Boulton Paul Defiant. After he became prime minister, Neville Chamberlain pushed the adoption of the Hawker Hurricane with pressure on Supermarine to get the Spitfire into production, while Winston Churchill apparently thought it was a mistake to produce Hurricanes instead of Defiants.
Fortunate that while the Battle of Britain was fought under Churchill's premiership, it was fought with Neville Chamberlain's air force.
@@iansneddon2956 Interesting point about Chamberlain. Often criticised for not declaring war on Germany earlier. However, if he had, can only wonder at the outcome as Britain would have been far less prepared? Did he realise war was probably inevitable but take action to buy some time?
@@Steve-GM0HUU I think it would have been a disaster for Britain to go to war with Germany earlier. In hindsight we see September 1939 as working out okay and maybe being too late, but I wonder how Britain and the Commonwealth might have handled it if USA had pursued strict neutrality (no lend-lease, no US Navy support of convoy defense). And I think that the US attitudes supporting Britain came from Britain's stubborn defense and victory in the Battle of Britain. Considering how much Britain's military grew in 1939 to get to the level when war began, I doubt Britain could have staged the type of defense that would inspire Roosevelt to back Britain. And without American assistance coming in 1941 I don't see Hitler declaring war on USA. I think that growth in 1939 after Germany invaded Czechoslovakia was essential. His post-Munich re-armament sped up but still seemed cautious, as if he wanted a stronger military but didn't want to provoke Germany into a war.
That it took Hitler making that first big move leads me to believe Chamberlain didn't have an overall plan here but was just trying to carefully manage a difficult situation. I think the lesson from Munich was that you wouldn't have peace with Hitler through normal diplomacy. I don't think he saw war as inevitable. I think the efforts to strengthen ties with France and Poland into a military alliance was based on a more traditional approach - that if they presented a strong united front then as a common bully Hitler would back down.
I think war was inevitable because Germany needed the plunder that war might bring to keep their economy going, and Hitler was full of ideas that War would inspire Germans to achieve greatness (or something like that). So I think that it was inevitable Hitler would lead Europe into war even out of desperation. But I think Neville Chamberlain held out hope that a lasting peace could be obtained through strength.
The hostility towards interdiction and CAS continues today in the USAF and I suspect to some extent the RAF as well.
Is that why the A10 is so popular?!
So the Henley could have been an early version of the Hawker Typhoon? Wasn’t the Battle more of a high altitude, straight line, bomber?
Was this made in Hatfield Hertfordshire
My father flew Henleys at RAF Carew for about 2 years 1942-44 towing drogues for anti aircraft gun training
One could imagine this with a Marlin 61 or even a Merlin that delivered roughly the same power down low without the two speed two stage supercharger and I could have been quick let's just say you could have gotten 380 miles an hour out of this and possibly ditched the rear Gunner
On a side note though the hawker typhoon did seem to fit the close air support role even though it came into existence after the Battle of Britain but there's also the fact the Merlin is cheaper than the saber 24 cylinder H engine
AAHH!! Anther awesome site and I clicked subscribe!!! You'll pay for this!! But after I binge watch...