Thanks Ed. After the Seafire and the Seahorse now we need a video about the Dewoitine 790, the cancelled navalised version of the Dewoitine 520. Thanks
@@57thStIncident 85 mph is not a high stalling speed for a plane of that era. A carrier steaming at 18 knots with a 10 knot prevailing wind makes the approach relative to the deck a very manageable 60 mph. I also think that the USAAF wanted the P51 for itself and the RAF wanted what the USAAF would allow. The F6F was still competitive, and the Corsair was king, so there really wasn’t a need for the Seastang. By the time it would have been actually in service the F8F and Seafury would have been arriving in quantity. Just my speculation.
@@kellybreen5526And by the time the P-51 Sea Horse was in development the next North American fighter, the FJ-1 Fury was in development which wrapped the P-51 wings, cockpit and tail around a jet engine.
The USN was also interested in one of the Pratt & Whitney 24 cylinder H layout sleeve valve engines that were dropped in favor of the R-4360. These sleeve valve engines actually featured something of a throwback in some ways featuring seperate cylinders on an inline engine. The supposed reason was the ability make servicing easier. The engines were also bulkier than cast block engines such as the Sabre.
British carrier aircraft with an inline that you didn't mention: Barracuda, Sea Hornet, Sea Hurricane. British carrier aircraft with radials: Skua, Roc, Swordfish, Albacore, Firebrand, Sea Fury. (yes I know that the Firebrand and Sea Fury didn't get into service until after the war, but they were developed during it.) More advantages of air-cooled radials on carriers: 1. Faster warm-up time meant a quicker deck operating cycle. 2. Shorter: the width of the fuselage doesn't matter so much when the stowage width is set by the distance between the wing folds. (Edited to include Sea Hurricane as per replies)
The Japanese and Germans went to in-line engines for tighter stowage on at least two naval aircraft - the Aichi M6A and Arado Ar231. You also missed the Sea Hurricane…
@@allangibson8494 Fair point about the Sea Hurricane: I'll edit the post. Thanks.👍 The two axis aircraft you mentioned were both made to fit inside very tight pressure-vessel hangars on submarines, so stowed width was even more critical than on a surface carrier plane. The M6A was also intended to carry out surprise attacks in situations where it was completely outnumbered, so it needed absolutely every knot of speed it could get, which also favoured a low-drag inline engine.
And the Aichi M6A series floatplanes… 28 built. The Ar231 also had an inline engine (albeit with air cooling). (Possibly another candidate for this channel in regards to really odd Arado aircraft designs with asymmetric wings). Both were submarine launched aircraft.
Thanks. The version I'd seen before this was that the P-51 was successful at this - not - just barely able to do it. Still, I'd imagine that the basic design of the P-51's undercarriage was more suitable to Carrier Operations than that of the Sea Fire. .
I love your videos because they have just enough technical info without either overwhelming my uneducated brain or being so long that I simply don't have time to sit down and watch it from beginning to end.
Great story. I read that for Operation Dragoon, the invasion of southern France, the USN reassigned its floatplane pilots to P-51Cs (as the USAAF had P-51Ds) for ground attack. Also the USN tested deploying B-25s from carriers but the success of the island hopping campaign negated that.
@@robertdragoff6909 Because of the success of the Doolittle raid, the USN explored launching and recovering B-25s aboard carriers. That became moot because the island hopping campaign allowed the US to use island airfields as bases for the bombers.
@@robertdragoff6909 Dedre doesn’t get as much credit for changing the word Pacific as it should it caused them to rush the coral battle and midway. Yeah yeah.
According to one of the online Warbird sites the wartime Navy designation “ETF-51D“ is a popular misconception - is only what NACA called the plane when using it after the war (meaning “Extended Tail F-51D”) - the Navy apparently never gave it a new designation.
The wingtip fuel tanks looks really weird on the seahorse, but when you look at the far-flung derivative, the Piper PA-48 Enforcer, it shows it’s lineage
Interesting the USN named a carrier Shangri-la. FDR when asked by the press where the Doolittle Raid took off answered Shangri-la. One cant faultbthe Navys rationale for radials. The ability to fly w/o liquid cooling and cylinders shot out meant added get-me-home security over the vast distance of Pacific operations.
No mention of why the Navy wanted to explore fighters with liquid cooled engines. Perhaps for the same reason the European powers used liquid cooled engines in their carrier aircraft? Liquid cooled engines in general can produce more power per unit of displacement, per unit of frontal area, and sometimes even per unit of weight. Basically, superior cooling allowed use of higher manifold pressure. The liquid cooled engines were also generally more fuel efficient, allowing an airplane to carry less fuel or fly longer on an equivalent amount of fuel. The countries using the liquid cooled engine were not deterred by the supposed drawbacks commonly attributed to them, so how serious could they be? For example, do radials really require so much less maintenance that the difference is significant enough to outweigh the superior performance of liquid cooled engines? Eliminating the need to maintain a cooling system (and the stores to service it) is a benefit, but then you have more spark plugs to check and change, more valves to adjust, maybe more bolts and connections to check for security considering all the separate cylinders and the wider temperature cycle of the air cooled engine. I would like to hear from a maintainer of these WWII engines on this subject. Perhaps the Navy preference for radials is due as much to the usual factor that drives the Navy - tradition -- as it is to these perceived advantages of the radial. Between the wars, radials were pretty much king in the U.S., and inline engines more favored in Europe. It was natural for many U.S. fighters to have radial engines, even the land-based Army fighters. It was only after the excellent Allison V-1710 arrived that the P-40 was developed out of the radial engine P-36, and outperformed it. (Note, as aircraft speeds increased the advantage of lower frontal area was magnified.) In the run up to WWII the U.S maintained an edge in radial development and Europe had an edge in inline development, so perhaps the superior potential of the liquid cooled engine was not really perceived by many in the U.S. Perhaps the Navy just stuck with what they knew rather try to put that engine developed for the Army into one of their fighters. Food for thought?
No, the Navy's preference for radial engine's had to do with the fact that their pilots flew long distances over water and a cooling system is just one more thing that can go wrong putting an aviator in the water and not just from battle damage, a blown gasket or leaky seal could cause a pilot to ditch his aircraft in the sea hours from his carrier or the nearest land, then you've got the massive effort and complications of trying to find a man in the middle of the ocean with little chance of finding him, it's just that simple and no more complicated than that as to why they always wanted air cooled engine's. The Army had problems with P51 pilots disappearing in the Pacific after strafing runs on the Japanese air fields on islands, they'd disappear after strafing air fields where there was no ground fire occurring and at first no one could figure out why, they eventually found out that they were literally shooting themselves down and didn't even know it, turns out that the coral based😮 islands were perfect for bullets from strafing aircraft to ricochet back up in the air and into the strafing aircraft when it would pull up, and since the P51 was sent to the Pacific at just about the time the Army quit using tracers in their aircraft's ammunition compliment they couldn't see that they were flying through their own ricochet's, wing men and pilots getting separated from others and having to return on their own was not an uncommon occurrence, the radios in those aircraft didn't have a very long range either so a pilot who'd gotten separated from his wing man that was flying home alone only to discover out in the middle of nowhere that his engine was overheating was in big trouble, and since their radio's didn't have a very long range if no one heard his Mayday's his disappearance would not only be a mystery they wouldn't even know where to begin looking for him, after the Army started to figure out what was happening to the P51's that were mysteriously disappearing after strafing missions they removed them from those missions in the Pacific, as for them escorting B29's that turned out, and was later verified in a post war report, was a waste of time because of the B29's computer augmented remote control defensive guns giving it an 11 to 1 kill to loss ratio against enemy fighter's vs the P51's kill to loss ratio of 10.2 to 1, it meant that the only thing that happened when they escorted B29's was they were being unnecessarily placed in harm's way, they were simply not needed for escort duty with the B29, between that and the P51's experiences with being used to attack aircraft bases it's experiences in the Pacific weren't nearly as successful as in Europe, it just wasn't a very good aircraft for the environment of the Pacific just being flown from land bases, with it's liquid cooled engine had it been on carrier's it'd probably have been removed from them due to a seriously high loss rate, matter of fact the P47 with it's air cooled radial engine was far more successful in the Pacific, one of the highest scoring US aces of WW2 and a Medal Of Honor recipient for actions when he went up against Japanese fighter's while greatly out numbered flew a P47 in the Pacific.
@@dukecraig2402 Thanks for repeating all the usual narratives, but I guess you couldn't tell from my post that I have heard them all, and they don't answer the question of why the Navy suddenly wanted to explore the possibility of a liquid cooled fighter. That was the subject of this video, if you recall. But if you come up with any original thoughts that are not a repeat of the usual "liquid cooling bad" mantra it might be interesting.
@@gort8203 First off they very clearly said in the video that everyone knew the Navy wasn't serious about pursuing it and that's why none of the manufacturers responded to their request for a design proposal. And no I couldn't gather from your post that "you've heard them all" when it came to the reasons why the Navy preferred air cooled radials, you yammered on at length about liquid cooled engine's and then say that the best you can figure about why the Navy didn't want a liquid cooled engine was simply "tradition", your very word and your entire summary of why they would, then when provided with an explanation that went as far as giving and example of how the liquid cooled engine aircraft were failures operating over vast expanses of water you pop off and crack wise with me with your "I already knew that" punk kid smart mouthed reply, as if your single word "tradition" is supposed to imply that you would know anything beyond that, you ask a serious question as if you don't know something and then when someone takes the time to explain something you're an instant expert, well if you know so much and already have all the answers then why'd you have to ask in the first place? I know why, just so when someone answers you can pull your little punk kid act. You wanna talk to adults then act like one, otherwise limit your smart kid mouth to the school cafeteria, ah that's right, you've already found out doing that to someone in person will get you smacked across that smart punk mouth of yours, that's why now you'll only pull a stunt like baiting someone for an answer to a question just so you can get mouthy with them from the safety of a keyboard with an anonymous name, your parents must really be class acts to have raised something like you, you're undoubtedly in the 12 to 14 year old age group and just looking to get smart with adults, it perfectly fits that age. A big mouth don't make for a big man boy.
Thanks Ed. I'd like to add a plane to the list of requests. The Convair XFY Pogo. I've always thought it was a cool looking aircraft and would be interested to see your take on it.
No they weren't, VF-12 and VF-17 were both carrier qualified first, and while VF-17 was getting carrier qualified on the converted steamship Charge in the Chesapeake Bay after being formed on January 1st 1943 it was them who Vought had sent people to work with to improve the F4U resulting in the F4U-1A, that's why the very first one's off the assembly line were given to VF-17 before they shipped out on the USS Bunker Hill for the Solomon Islands Campaign. it's a complete and total myth that the US Navy had problems landing the F4U on carrier's, VF-17 never even suffered an injury much less a death while becoming carrier qualified even with the early birdcage style F4U, which is also proof that the US Navy didn't pull F4U's from carrier service because of problems landing them on carrier's, they pulled them because the F4U was notoriously over engineered leading to half of them constantly being deadlined, they also had the problem of not having enough trained maintenance crews and lacked spare parts for them so they were pulled in favor of the simpler and more maintenance friendly F6F with units like VF-17 being reassigned for land based naval airstrips like the one on the island of Espiritu Santo where after just 76 days of combat they had 156.5 confirmed Japanese aircraft destroyed with another 24 probably destroyed and 13 aces in VF-17 making them the most successful F4U unit in history. In June of 1944 the Japanese launched their Kamikaze campaign in ernest, this alarmed the commander's of the US Navy and prompted them to return F4U's to carrier service by putting one unit on each Essex class carrier with the thinking that with their superior 4,200 ft per minute climb rate compared to the F6F's 3,600 ft per minute rate they'd launch F4U's first at the sign of incoming Kamikaze's so they could climb up and intercept them with F6F's launching behind them to intercept any that made it through the F4U's. That's the true story, the nonsense that gets thrown around that the US Navy couldn't land it's own aircraft on their own carrier's until the British showed them how is a bedtime story fairytale invented by British aviation writer's after the war for the sake of printing something they knew their target audience would want to hear that have no proof of their fairytale story beyond "We say so", and by a bunch of braggers taking credit for something they don't deserve to. And that, is what's called a dose of reality.
Really exciting seeing you get closer to 100k subscribers. A lot of what you went over in this video is new info to me. Some of the pictures I've not seen before either. Thank you for creating and sharing. 🛩
Ryan liked names starting with “fire” like Grumman liked it’s “cats”. They just stopped building manned aircraft and concentrated on drones and missiles after this (and a North American Aircraft design as a time filler - the Navion).
Good video, this was not known to me before. Very informative. Thanks. 🙂 [Edit] The Brits did have a good radial available early in WW2, the Bristol Hercules. Which developed very good take-off power and it's best power rating was at lower altitudes; ideal for Naval use.
The Mustang was a slippery airframe and gave pilots trouble at low speeds (under 130 mph) with gear and flaps down. Can't be all things for all missions.
Ed, where can I get plans snd pics of the Seahorse prototype? I'd like to build a 1/72 scale model of it during my volunteering to the Australian National Maritime Museum, Sydney. Thanks a lot! Diego.
Honestly, I think every available pic I used in this video! If you check out the military matters article on it there should be links in it to other sources.
I sometimes wonder why either service bothered with accepting any proposals from Curtiss by that time. Although I do wonder just what would have happened if Curtiss had converted the XP-55 to jet power.
Before the P-51 ever landed on a carrier the aircraft was well know to be unforgiving near stall speed. A dangerous combination in carrier operations and need to consider aircraft that might need to land with battle damage, fuel tanks & or munitions would make for even more challenging conditions. As jets took over the air superiority role only combat need for slower propeller aircraft on carriers was in ground support (where going slow dropping unguided munitions or firing rockets is better for accuracy) but risk of damage from ground fire made air-cooled radial engine a necessity. The A-1 Skyraider took such a principal about as far as the (radial engine) technology could go.
Much more interesting than the question why the Navy never adopted Air Force aircraft for carrier use, is the question why the Air Force very rarely adopted Navy aircraft for land based use. They adopted some Divebombers early in the war but not much more. The Marines used Corsairs from land bases exclusively while they were not carrier rated yet, but they kept the complete set of naval equipment in them, so that doesn't count. Hellcats and Corsairs stripped of all their naval equipment would have made very capable and very sturdy flighterbombers for the Air Force. Even a denavalized Wildcat would easily have been better than the Hurricane and even been able to rival most versions of the Curtiss P-40.
I'd question the assertion that Britain were late in developing radials comparable to the US for a naval fighter - true, the Centaurus had protracted development, only seeing fighter service late and post war with some Tempests and the Fury, but, at low-medium altitude (where naval air fighting mostly took place) the Bristol Hercules - and their earlier Mercury and Taurus - were available and effective (c.f. the Beaufighter) for earlier use, and comparable to the F4F/Wildcat
True, the Hercules could have been a suitable powerplant for a hypothetical early to mid war British F4F-like aircraft. My understanding is that it was more politics and budget constraints that prevented it; at that point the navy didn't have it's own aircraft, it was all handled by the RAF. And the RAF was concentrating on land-based aircraft and had little interest in spending resources on developing aircraft specifically for carrier usage. Hence they ended up with navalized versions of the Hurricane and Spitfire.
He didn't imply that they were late developing them, he only meant that during the war for whatever reason they simply weren't using them but towards the end started showing interest. At least that's the way I took what he said.
The 1st aircraft to fly LA to New York (or coast to coast) NON-STOP was............. a modified F4F Wildcat! Huh? Yep! Sir I'd like to know every battle that the F4F participated in. It was used for the entire war. Was it at D Day? I heard it was, Was it at the Marianas turkey shoot? I heard that it was! Corral Sea? etc... Yes it would have been a limited participant in that most CVLs could carry Hellcats but a few CVEs could only carry Wildcats for their lack of deck size. Precisely and completely... how and where did F4Fs participate after the coming of the F6F? The F4F seems to have an incomplete place in History even though it continued to fight "everywhere"! Maybe you could include the rest of the fighter aircraft that participated "in front line duties" from the beginning to the end of WWll. P-40, P-38, F4F. are there more? (front line duties) Did manufacturing ever stop for these birds before wars end????? I think not! Cheers: Robert
Was a navalised version of the P47 ever considered? After all it was a sturdy well armed radial aircraft which could outspeed any opponent in a dive and I would not be surprised if its turbosupercharger did well in the hot thin air of the Pacific theatre. Does any one know? Thanks
@@petesheppard1709 Launched via catapults iirc. One example would be in the Marianna's once an air field was secured. And I've wondered the same thing myself.
I was a classic case of technology outrunning what the navalized P-51 could do. Sure, it worked, but the impending arrival of the FJ-1 Fury made the whole idea superfluous.
Does anyone know anything about the Cunliffe-Owen Marlin? It was a british naval aircraft. It seems, it is a just a model aircraft according to images on google.
hmmmm .. the sleek lines of the "Mustang" and they call it the "Sea Horse" ??? ,which conjures an imagine of a British Cross-breed Fulmar and Skua ! :D
Late model P-38s with drop tanks had combat radius of 1300 miles. Okinawa to Tokyo is 950 miles. Why were P-51s used when their combat radius was 715 miles with tanks. P-38 Service ceiling 44,000 feet vs 4190 ft for the Mustang. Top cruise speed for either exceeded the max speed for the B-29, cruising speed for the bomber was 220 mph. Cost, the P-51 was less expensive more than half for P-38 which were available, and the operational cost was less. The wet wing wing P-47N flew missions to Taiwan (Formosa) at the extreme length of their range also less money than the P-38, its combat radius was 1000 miles. The P-38L could turn inside of P-51, a P-47 (88% the price of the Lightning) could absorb more punishment and a better choice for ground attack. However, the USA was deeply in debt and P-51 was cheaper and more fuel efficient. However, all those lives lost just so the P-51 could be used on Iwo Jima when the P-38 could have flown from Okinawa, but you could have 2 Mustangs which used less fuel for the price of a Lightning. The Twin Mustang was designed to fly from the Solomons or the Philippines as the range was 2300 miles with 2 drop tanks, with to two drop tanks 300-310 gallons the P-38 had a ferry range of 2500 in 1942. The only advantage was the second seat pilot navigator in the twin had minimalist flight controls to spell the pilot. And it wasn’t available until after the war ended.
Unfortunately, Allison engines weren't reliable especially at high boost/ high altitude. Even the later P-82 in Korea were engine maintenance nightmares.
@@bobsakamanos4469 There weren’t unreliable in Alaska with the extreme cold at any altitude. As to the P later F-82, the USA military no longer could afford the Royalty payments for Packard to continue production of the Merlin engines. The only Merlin powered Twin Mustang was the XP-82. And the reason for the P-82 as a Bomber Escort was still born with the advent of the Jet Engine. My father said Korea was damn cold in winter, he was there as part of the USAF. The F-82 was used as an all weather ground attack, and night fighter but the tactics used by the Chinese and Soviet Mig 15 precluded its original mission as a long range bomber escort.
@@Renshen1957 The F-82 Allison engines were a maintenance nightmare with no intercooler, aftercooler nor backfire screens. GM rules the roost in governement.
*It was supposed to remain secret but, forget vortices, the REAL story is* ............ That was the export version during marketing for the Chinese - They attached streamers to the proptips to emulate traditional 'ribbon dancing'
The seafire was not the best aircraft carrier fighter because it's narrow undercarriage was not suitable for air craft carriers and therefore the Fairy Fier and sea Hurricane were better suited but the best British air craft carrier fighter was the Hawker Seafury which did not enter service until late in the war.
propeller engine plane are back for counter insurgent . But only limited number old but cheaper use sad Philippines give up OV 10 bronco they not buy license build
you're making WILD assumptions and HUGE leaps to claim it was a death trap. ALL reports were that the P-51 sea horse passed ALL its carrier trials, and could have been used and was found more suitable overall than expected, but was deemed not worth the effort given the aircraft in the pipeline. also, improved visibility is not a matter of experience. it either is better for everyone, or it's worse for everyone. Test pilot or not.
Chill out. Greg and Ed cover the same general topic, so Greg’s videos might be of interest to someone watching one of Ed’s. Don’t be tribal about it. It’s not a competition.
@@PaulMcElligott Maybe Greg's posh accent 'triggers' a lot of folk? Aye Ed dun't talk reet, but happen that's cos being sort of Londonish he's getten an unavoidable speach impediment like cockney or summat - But its an unfortunate disability, not 'condescending' like.
Thanks Ed.
After the Seafire and the Seahorse now we need a video about the Dewoitine 790, the cancelled navalised version of the Dewoitine 520. Thanks
That sounds so cool! The D.520 is my favorite WW2 aircraft
Agree
Same criticisms as the Seafire. Good performance but a tad weak for the job.
But seemingly a lot easier to land on a carrier with that much wider track undercarriage.
While maybe true, the video doesn’t seem to stress this - it’s suggesting that the high landing speed was perhaps an even bigger issue.
@@57thStIncident
85 mph is not a high stalling speed for a plane of that era.
A carrier steaming at 18 knots with a 10 knot prevailing wind makes the approach relative to the deck a very manageable 60 mph.
I also think that the USAAF wanted the P51 for itself and the RAF wanted what the USAAF would allow.
The F6F was still competitive, and the Corsair was king, so there really wasn’t a need for the Seastang.
By the time it would have been actually in service the F8F and Seafury would have been arriving in quantity.
Just my speculation.
The Sea Horse would have had far, far greater combat range than the Seafire. The Seafire was restricted to CAP duty because of this fact.
@@kellybreen5526And by the time the P-51 Sea Horse was in development the next North American fighter, the FJ-1 Fury was in development which wrapped the P-51 wings, cockpit and tail around a jet engine.
The USN was also interested in one of the Pratt & Whitney 24 cylinder H layout sleeve valve engines that were dropped in favor of the R-4360. These sleeve valve engines actually featured something of a throwback in some ways featuring seperate cylinders on an inline engine. The supposed reason was the ability make servicing easier. The engines were also bulkier than cast block engines such as the Sabre.
British carrier aircraft with an inline that you didn't mention: Barracuda, Sea Hornet, Sea Hurricane.
British carrier aircraft with radials: Skua, Roc, Swordfish, Albacore, Firebrand, Sea Fury.
(yes I know that the Firebrand and Sea Fury didn't get into service until after the war, but they were developed during it.)
More advantages of air-cooled radials on carriers:
1. Faster warm-up time meant a quicker deck operating cycle.
2. Shorter: the width of the fuselage doesn't matter so much when the stowage width is set by the distance between the wing folds.
(Edited to include Sea Hurricane as per replies)
Interresting thanks.
The Japanese and Germans went to in-line engines for tighter stowage on at least two naval aircraft - the Aichi M6A and Arado Ar231.
You also missed the Sea Hurricane…
@@allangibson8494 Fair point about the Sea Hurricane: I'll edit the post. Thanks.👍
The two axis aircraft you mentioned were both made to fit inside very tight pressure-vessel hangars on submarines, so stowed width was even more critical than on a surface carrier plane. The M6A was also intended to carry out surprise attacks in situations where it was completely outnumbered, so it needed absolutely every knot of speed it could get, which also favoured a low-drag inline engine.
The first two variants of the Japanese carrier-based Judy dive bomber, the D4Y1 and D4Y2, were equipped with inline engines.
Also no need to store extra water for coolant😊
That photo with prop contrails...beautiful.
That was great - thank you - also people might like to check out Greg’s aircraft latest history of North American - equally fascinating!
Early versions of the D4Y had an liquid cooled inline engine which was a licensed version of the Daimler-Benz DB 601 before switching over to radials
And the Aichi M6A series floatplanes… 28 built.
The Ar231 also had an inline engine (albeit with air cooling). (Possibly another candidate for this channel in regards to really odd Arado aircraft designs with asymmetric wings).
Both were submarine launched aircraft.
I read that those d4y you mention were on the ijn soryu which was sunk at midway
Thanks. The version I'd seen before this was that the P-51 was successful at this - not - just barely able to do it. Still, I'd imagine that the basic design of the P-51's undercarriage was more suitable to Carrier Operations than that of the Sea Fire.
.
I love your videos because they have just enough technical info without either overwhelming my uneducated brain or being so long that I simply don't have time to sit down and watch it from beginning to end.
Great story. I read that for Operation Dragoon, the invasion of southern France, the USN reassigned its floatplane pilots to P-51Cs (as the USAAF had P-51Ds) for ground attack. Also the USN tested deploying B-25s from carriers but the success of the island hopping campaign negated that.
Ever heard of a little operation called the Doolittle raid?
@@robertdragoff6909 Because of the success of the Doolittle raid, the USN explored launching and recovering B-25s aboard carriers. That became moot because the island hopping campaign allowed the US to use island airfields as bases for the bombers.
@@robertdragoff6909 Dedre doesn’t get as much credit for changing the word Pacific as it should it caused them to rush the coral battle and midway. Yeah yeah.
Excellent job, Ed. 👍
According to one of the online Warbird sites the wartime Navy designation “ETF-51D“ is a popular misconception - is only what NACA called the plane when using it after the war (meaning “Extended Tail F-51D”) - the Navy apparently never gave it a new designation.
Excellent.
A great very interesting video and aircraft Mr.Ed.Have a good one.
The wingtip fuel tanks looks really weird on the seahorse, but when you look at the far-flung derivative, the Piper PA-48 Enforcer, it shows it’s lineage
2:24 That Curtiss XF-14C looks like a Fairey Gannet
Mustang Horse ..... Sea Horse .......... wellllll maybe 🤔
Neat vid as usual Ed
2:23 - Never ever heard of this one. Thanks for a new curiosity again, Ed!
As always Ed. Many thanks for your constant ......"well l never knew that "
Outstanding episode.
Excellent report.
Interesting the USN named a carrier Shangri-la. FDR when asked by the press where the Doolittle Raid took off answered Shangri-la.
One cant faultbthe Navys rationale for radials. The ability to fly w/o liquid cooling and cylinders shot out meant added get-me-home security over the vast distance of Pacific operations.
You deserve my comment even if I have nothing to say but thanks
LOL thank you
No mention of why the Navy wanted to explore fighters with liquid cooled engines. Perhaps for the same reason the European powers used liquid cooled engines in their carrier aircraft? Liquid cooled engines in general can produce more power per unit of displacement, per unit of frontal area, and sometimes even per unit of weight. Basically, superior cooling allowed use of higher manifold pressure. The liquid cooled engines were also generally more fuel efficient, allowing an airplane to carry less fuel or fly longer on an equivalent amount of fuel.
The countries using the liquid cooled engine were not deterred by the supposed drawbacks commonly attributed to them, so how serious could they be? For example, do radials really require so much less maintenance that the difference is significant enough to outweigh the superior performance of liquid cooled engines? Eliminating the need to maintain a cooling system (and the stores to service it) is a benefit, but then you have more spark plugs to check and change, more valves to adjust, maybe more bolts and connections to check for security considering all the separate cylinders and the wider temperature cycle of the air cooled engine. I would like to hear from a maintainer of these WWII engines on this subject.
Perhaps the Navy preference for radials is due as much to the usual factor that drives the Navy - tradition -- as it is to these perceived advantages of the radial. Between the wars, radials were pretty much king in the U.S., and inline engines more favored in Europe. It was natural for many U.S. fighters to have radial engines, even the land-based Army fighters. It was only after the excellent Allison V-1710 arrived that the P-40 was developed out of the radial engine P-36, and outperformed it. (Note, as aircraft speeds increased the advantage of lower frontal area was magnified.) In the run up to WWII the U.S maintained an edge in radial development and Europe had an edge in inline development, so perhaps the superior potential of the liquid cooled engine was not really perceived by many in the U.S. Perhaps the Navy just stuck with what they knew rather try to put that engine developed for the Army into one of their fighters. Food for thought?
No, the Navy's preference for radial engine's had to do with the fact that their pilots flew long distances over water and a cooling system is just one more thing that can go wrong putting an aviator in the water and not just from battle damage, a blown gasket or leaky seal could cause a pilot to ditch his aircraft in the sea hours from his carrier or the nearest land, then you've got the massive effort and complications of trying to find a man in the middle of the ocean with little chance of finding him, it's just that simple and no more complicated than that as to why they always wanted air cooled engine's.
The Army had problems with P51 pilots disappearing in the Pacific after strafing runs on the Japanese air fields on islands, they'd disappear after strafing air fields where there was no ground fire occurring and at first no one could figure out why, they eventually found out that they were literally shooting themselves down and didn't even know it, turns out that the coral based😮 islands were perfect for bullets from strafing aircraft to ricochet back up in the air and into the strafing aircraft when it would pull up, and since the P51 was sent to the Pacific at just about the time the Army quit using tracers in their aircraft's ammunition compliment they couldn't see that they were flying through their own ricochet's, wing men and pilots getting separated from others and having to return on their own was not an uncommon occurrence, the radios in those aircraft didn't have a very long range either so a pilot who'd gotten separated from his wing man that was flying home alone only to discover out in the middle of nowhere that his engine was overheating was in big trouble, and since their radio's didn't have a very long range if no one heard his Mayday's his disappearance would not only be a mystery they wouldn't even know where to begin looking for him, after the Army started to figure out what was happening to the P51's that were mysteriously disappearing after strafing missions they removed them from those missions in the Pacific, as for them escorting B29's that turned out, and was later verified in a post war report, was a waste of time because of the B29's computer augmented remote control defensive guns giving it an 11 to 1 kill to loss ratio against enemy fighter's vs the P51's kill to loss ratio of 10.2 to 1, it meant that the only thing that happened when they escorted B29's was they were being unnecessarily placed in harm's way, they were simply not needed for escort duty with the B29, between that and the P51's experiences with being used to attack aircraft bases it's experiences in the Pacific weren't nearly as successful as in Europe, it just wasn't a very good aircraft for the environment of the Pacific just being flown from land bases, with it's liquid cooled engine had it been on carrier's it'd probably have been removed from them due to a seriously high loss rate, matter of fact the P47 with it's air cooled radial engine was far more successful in the Pacific, one of the highest scoring US aces of WW2 and a Medal Of Honor recipient for actions when he went up against Japanese fighter's while greatly out numbered flew a P47 in the Pacific.
@@dukecraig2402 Thanks for repeating all the usual narratives, but I guess you couldn't tell from my post that I have heard them all, and they don't answer the question of why the Navy suddenly wanted to explore the possibility of a liquid cooled fighter. That was the subject of this video, if you recall. But if you come up with any original thoughts that are not a repeat of the usual "liquid cooling bad" mantra it might be interesting.
@@gort8203
First off they very clearly said in the video that everyone knew the Navy wasn't serious about pursuing it and that's why none of the manufacturers responded to their request for a design proposal.
And no I couldn't gather from your post that "you've heard them all" when it came to the reasons why the Navy preferred air cooled radials, you yammered on at length about liquid cooled engine's and then say that the best you can figure about why the Navy didn't want a liquid cooled engine was simply "tradition", your very word and your entire summary of why they would, then when provided with an explanation that went as far as giving and example of how the liquid cooled engine aircraft were failures operating over vast expanses of water you pop off and crack wise with me with your "I already knew that" punk kid smart mouthed reply, as if your single word "tradition" is supposed to imply that you would know anything beyond that, you ask a serious question as if you don't know something and then when someone takes the time to explain something you're an instant expert, well if you know so much and already have all the answers then why'd you have to ask in the first place?
I know why, just so when someone answers you can pull your little punk kid act.
You wanna talk to adults then act like one, otherwise limit your smart kid mouth to the school cafeteria, ah that's right, you've already found out doing that to someone in person will get you smacked across that smart punk mouth of yours, that's why now you'll only pull a stunt like baiting someone for an answer to a question just so you can get mouthy with them from the safety of a keyboard with an anonymous name, your parents must really be class acts to have raised something like you, you're undoubtedly in the 12 to 14 year old age group and just looking to get smart with adults, it perfectly fits that age.
A big mouth don't make for a big man boy.
While I'm familiar with most of the aircraft featured on this channel, this is one I wasn't aware of. So thank you. Keep up the awesome work Ed.
"Hope you found the video interesting" HELL YEAH! thanks.
Thanks Ed. I'd like to add a plane to the list of requests. The Convair XFY Pogo. I've always thought it was a cool looking aircraft and would be interested to see your take on it.
I really enjoy your videos, thank you!
Great video of an interesting prototype, thanks.
Stuff you'd never hear of otherwise.... very cool.
Damn, this NAA-133 were it built would have been something to fly for sure!
the fleet air arm was the first to fly a corsair from a carrier
No they weren't, VF-12 and VF-17 were both carrier qualified first, and while VF-17 was getting carrier qualified on the converted steamship Charge in the Chesapeake Bay after being formed on January 1st 1943 it was them who Vought had sent people to work with to improve the F4U resulting in the F4U-1A, that's why the very first one's off the assembly line were given to VF-17 before they shipped out on the USS Bunker Hill for the Solomon Islands Campaign.
it's a complete and total myth that the US Navy had problems landing the F4U on carrier's, VF-17 never even suffered an injury much less a death while becoming carrier qualified even with the early birdcage style F4U, which is also proof that the US Navy didn't pull F4U's from carrier service because of problems landing them on carrier's, they pulled them because the F4U was notoriously over engineered leading to half of them constantly being deadlined, they also had the problem of not having enough trained maintenance crews and lacked spare parts for them so they were pulled in favor of the simpler and more maintenance friendly F6F with units like VF-17 being reassigned for land based naval airstrips like the one on the island of Espiritu Santo where after just 76 days of combat they had 156.5 confirmed Japanese aircraft destroyed with another 24 probably destroyed and 13 aces in VF-17 making them the most successful F4U unit in history.
In June of 1944 the Japanese launched their Kamikaze campaign in ernest, this alarmed the commander's of the US Navy and prompted them to return F4U's to carrier service by putting one unit on each Essex class carrier with the thinking that with their superior 4,200 ft per minute climb rate compared to the F6F's 3,600 ft per minute rate they'd launch F4U's first at the sign of incoming Kamikaze's so they could climb up and intercept them with F6F's launching behind them to intercept any that made it through the F4U's.
That's the true story, the nonsense that gets thrown around that the US Navy couldn't land it's own aircraft on their own carrier's until the British showed them how is a bedtime story fairytale invented by British aviation writer's after the war for the sake of printing something they knew their target audience would want to hear that have no proof of their fairytale story beyond "We say so", and by a bunch of braggers taking credit for something they don't deserve to.
And that, is what's called a dose of reality.
I have a ton of fun flying the Sea Horse in IL-2/SAS-BAT.
Great video, Ed...👍
Really exciting seeing you get closer to 100k subscribers. A lot of what you went over in this video is new info to me. Some of the pictures I've not seen before either. Thank you for creating and sharing. 🛩
The FH-Phantom looked nice. Streamlined.
sounds terrifying. Sea Horse..., the whispering death..
Could you do a video on early air to air refueling?
Yes! I genuinely would like a video on that.
D4Y Judy was an excellent in-line powered dive bomber
Very interesting. Thanks.
Fireball is a pretty unfortunate name for an aircraft.
Ryan liked names starting with “fire” like Grumman liked it’s “cats”.
They just stopped building manned aircraft and concentrated on drones and missiles after this (and a North American Aircraft design as a time filler - the Navion).
FIRE the marketing team?
@@allangibson8494firebee drones
XL5
Can you do a follow-on story involving the North American Fury jet series?
Already have:
ua-cam.com/video/BrygHGWdct0/v-deo.html
By that point the F8F was getting delivered, which wasca much better superprop and designed for carrier use.
Good video, this was not known to me before. Very informative. Thanks. 🙂
[Edit] The Brits did have a good radial available early in WW2, the Bristol Hercules. Which developed very good take-off power and it's best power rating was at lower altitudes; ideal for Naval use.
02:27 aaggh my eyes....
The Mustang was a slippery airframe and gave pilots trouble at low speeds (under 130 mph) with gear and flaps down. Can't be all things for all missions.
Didn't Eric "Winkle" Brown do some testing of a Mustang with a hook in the UK?
Ed, where can I get plans snd pics of the Seahorse prototype?
I'd like to build a 1/72 scale model of it during my volunteering to the Australian National Maritime Museum, Sydney.
Thanks a lot! Diego.
Honestly, I think every available pic I used in this video! If you check out the military matters article on it there should be links in it to other sources.
My first thought when I see anything of this type/era.. "Did Winkle fly it? What was his opinion?"
No, he didn't
Why? You'd never get the truth out of him about American aircraft anyway, with him you never know if he's telling the truth or not, it's a crapshoot.
Oh, you tease..."Curtiss XF14C", with photo... 😃
I sometimes wonder why either service bothered with accepting any proposals from Curtiss by that time. Although I do wonder just what would have happened if Curtiss had converted the XP-55 to jet power.
Before the P-51 ever landed on a carrier the aircraft was well know to be unforgiving near stall speed. A dangerous combination in carrier operations and need to consider aircraft that might need to land with battle damage, fuel tanks & or munitions would make for even more challenging conditions. As jets took over the air superiority role only combat need for slower propeller aircraft on carriers was in ground support (where going slow dropping unguided munitions or firing rockets is better for accuracy) but risk of damage from ground fire made air-cooled radial engine a necessity. The A-1 Skyraider took such a principal about as far as the (radial engine) technology could go.
1:59 coulda been the fw-159, but upside down. Nice lookin bird, have you done a project on it?
The airabonita? Not yet, one day :)
Much more interesting than the question why the Navy never adopted Air Force aircraft for carrier use, is the question why the Air Force very rarely adopted Navy aircraft for land based use. They adopted some Divebombers early in the war but not much more. The Marines used Corsairs from land bases exclusively while they were not carrier rated yet, but they kept the complete set of naval equipment in them, so that doesn't count.
Hellcats and Corsairs stripped of all their naval equipment would have made very capable and very sturdy flighterbombers for the Air Force. Even a denavalized Wildcat would easily have been better than the Hurricane and even been able to rival most versions of the Curtiss P-40.
"You always fight the last war." - the old saying in regard to doctrine lagging behind the innovation of warfare- explains a lot of "failed" systems.
For more on the P-51H, Greg just did a great video on it here ua-cam.com/video/KGFsAOUdX7A/v-deo.html
It's the Fury's granddad.
I'd question the assertion that Britain were late in developing radials comparable to the US for a naval fighter - true, the Centaurus had protracted development, only seeing fighter service late and post war with some Tempests and the Fury, but, at low-medium altitude (where naval air fighting mostly took place) the Bristol Hercules - and their earlier Mercury and Taurus - were available and effective (c.f. the Beaufighter) for earlier use, and comparable to the F4F/Wildcat
True, the Hercules could have been a suitable powerplant for a hypothetical early to mid war British F4F-like aircraft. My understanding is that it was more politics and budget constraints that prevented it; at that point the navy didn't have it's own aircraft, it was all handled by the RAF. And the RAF was concentrating on land-based aircraft and had little interest in spending resources on developing aircraft specifically for carrier usage. Hence they ended up with navalized versions of the Hurricane and Spitfire.
He didn't imply that they were late developing them, he only meant that during the war for whatever reason they simply weren't using them but towards the end started showing interest.
At least that's the way I took what he said.
The 1st aircraft to fly LA to New York (or coast to coast) NON-STOP was............. a modified F4F Wildcat! Huh? Yep!
Sir I'd like to know every battle that the F4F participated in. It was used for the entire war. Was it at D Day? I heard it was, Was it at the Marianas turkey shoot? I heard that it was! Corral Sea? etc...
Yes it would have been a limited participant in that most CVLs could carry Hellcats but a few CVEs could only carry Wildcats for their lack of deck size.
Precisely and completely... how and where did F4Fs participate after the coming of the F6F? The F4F seems to have an incomplete place in History even though it continued to fight "everywhere"!
Maybe you could include the rest of the fighter aircraft that participated "in front line duties" from the beginning to the end of WWll. P-40, P-38, F4F. are there more? (front line duties)
Did manufacturing ever stop for these birds before wars end????? I think not! Cheers: Robert
What the hell happened here (1.25)? It looks like utter carnage!
TY 🙏🙏
1:04 What about the Sea Hurricane..?
The Marines AF-1E, the best of the Sabres.
Was a navalised version of the P47 ever considered? After all it was a sturdy well armed radial aircraft which could outspeed any opponent in a dive and I would not be surprised if its turbosupercharger did well in the hot thin air of the Pacific theatre.
Does any one know? Thanks
AAF P-47s were flown off US carriers to shore bases.
@@petesheppard1709
Launched via catapults iirc. One example would be in the Marianna's once an air field was secured.
And I've wondered the same thing myself.
@@cancermcaids7688 yep makes sense.
@@cancermcaids7688Yep. The big, heavy Jugs dearly loved their runways and there were plenty of Corsairs and Hellcats.
Size?
I was a classic case of technology outrunning what the navalized P-51 could do. Sure, it worked, but the impending arrival of the FJ-1 Fury made the whole idea superfluous.
Does anyone know anything about the Cunliffe-Owen Marlin? It was a british naval aircraft. It seems, it is a just a model aircraft according to images on google.
You should do the p51 h mustang
No carrier landings for Mustangs in our Axis&Allies Global 1940 board game's house rules.
hmmmm .. the sleek lines of the "Mustang" and they call it the "Sea Horse" ??? ,which conjures an imagine of a British Cross-breed Fulmar and Skua ! :D
Set me thinking - Sea Horse would relate better to something like JU52 with its masses of corrugations
(Kind of like a sea horse's)
7:02 That prop wash is giving me a stiffy.
"Sea Stang" sounds much better😆
See yoo Jimmy .........
Well, it doesn't really sound right either you know
video on the navalized F-22?
Late model P-38s with drop tanks had combat radius of 1300 miles. Okinawa to Tokyo is 950 miles. Why were P-51s used when their combat radius was 715 miles with tanks. P-38 Service ceiling 44,000 feet vs 4190 ft for the Mustang. Top cruise speed for either exceeded the max speed for the B-29, cruising speed for the bomber was 220 mph. Cost, the P-51 was less expensive more than half for P-38 which were available, and the operational cost was less. The wet wing wing P-47N flew missions to Taiwan (Formosa) at the extreme length of their range also less money than the P-38, its combat radius was 1000 miles. The P-38L could turn inside of P-51, a P-47 (88% the price of the Lightning) could absorb more punishment and a better choice for ground attack. However, the USA was deeply in debt and P-51 was cheaper and more fuel efficient. However, all those lives lost just so the P-51 could be used on Iwo Jima when the P-38 could have flown from Okinawa, but you could have 2 Mustangs which used less fuel for the price of a Lightning. The Twin Mustang was designed to fly from the Solomons or the Philippines as the range was 2300 miles with 2 drop tanks, with to two drop tanks 300-310 gallons the P-38 had a ferry range of 2500 in 1942. The only advantage was the second seat pilot navigator in the twin had minimalist flight controls to spell the pilot. And it wasn’t available until after the war ended.
Unfortunately, Allison engines weren't reliable especially at high boost/ high altitude. Even the later P-82 in Korea were engine maintenance nightmares.
@@bobsakamanos4469 There weren’t unreliable in Alaska with the extreme cold at any altitude. As to the P later F-82, the USA military no longer could afford the Royalty payments for Packard to continue production of the Merlin engines. The only Merlin powered Twin Mustang was the XP-82. And the reason for the P-82 as a Bomber Escort was still born with the advent of the Jet Engine.
My father said Korea was damn cold in winter, he was there as part of the USAF. The F-82 was used as an all weather ground attack, and night fighter but the tactics used by the Chinese and Soviet Mig 15 precluded its original mission as a long range bomber escort.
@@Renshen1957 The F-82 Allison engines were a maintenance nightmare with no intercooler, aftercooler nor backfire screens. GM rules the roost in governement.
What are the swirls around the aircraft in that one photo?
Propellor vortices
Moisture vortex from prop.
@@uingaeoc3905 Which is also visible in the Hellcat take off footage early in the vid.
*It was supposed to remain secret but, forget vortices, the REAL story is* ............
That was the export version during marketing for the Chinese -
They attached streamers to the proptips to emulate traditional 'ribbon dancing'
I believe that you meant RADIAL engines
He left out the Sea Hurricane
The seafire was not the best aircraft carrier fighter because it's narrow undercarriage was not suitable for air craft carriers and therefore the Fairy Fier and sea Hurricane were better suited but the best British air craft carrier fighter was the Hawker Seafury which did not enter service until late in the war.
Nifty!
propeller engine plane are back for counter insurgent . But only limited number old but cheaper use sad Philippines give up OV 10 bronco they not buy license build
you're making WILD assumptions and HUGE leaps to claim it was a death trap. ALL reports were that the P-51 sea horse passed ALL its carrier trials, and could have been used and was found more suitable overall than expected, but was deemed not worth the effort given the aircraft in the pipeline.
also, improved visibility is not a matter of experience. it either is better for everyone, or it's worse for everyone. Test pilot or not.
Ta la!
Getting tired of people pumping "Greg's" videos on here. Go back over with the rest of his pompous fan-boys.
Chill out. Greg and Ed cover the same general topic, so Greg’s videos might be of interest to someone watching one of Ed’s. Don’t be tribal about it. It’s not a competition.
@@PaulMcElligott Maybe Greg's posh accent 'triggers' a lot of folk?
Aye Ed dun't talk reet, but happen that's cos being sort of Londonish he's getten an unavoidable speach impediment like cockney or summat - But its an unfortunate disability, not 'condescending' like.