From: cdb100620@aol.com (CDB100620) Subject: Re: p-40 Date: 30 Sep 1997 Newsgroups: alt.history.what-if Re the P-38: The intercoolers were the problem with the P-38 prior to the J model. After the J was introduced there were no problems. The J and later P-38s performed very well in Europe. The decision had been made, however, for logistical reasons, and because the P-38 was in such demand in the Pacific and Med, to use the P-51 for escort in northern Europe. The P-51 had plenty of its own teething problems, most of which have been forgotten. Re the P-40: It seems it is always compared with the Zero. Why not compare it with the Bf 109? The only advantage the most commonly encountered G models had over the Curtiss was a faster rate of climb and a higher critical altitude. In the MTO and the Eastern front, most combat took place below 10,000 ft., making this advantage of little value. The P-40 could out dive, out roll and out turn the Bf 109, it was more rugged in construction and better protected against battle damage. The radiator and associated plumbing were bunched forward in the nose and protected by armor, while the Bf 109 had exposed and unprotected radiators under the wings. The P-40 also outgunned the Bf 109, except for the models with two extra cannon slung under the wings. But these versions were dead meat for the P-40, their performance was so degraded. The fate of Curtiss-Wright is an interesting one. It suffered from designers and engineering personnel jumping ship to other manufacturers. Don Berlin, designer of the P-36/P-40, himself went over to General Motors. Curtiss also suffered from the success of the P-40. With government contracts that allowed it to build some 14,000 of the machines, there was no compelling reason for it to come up with something else. The C-46 was certainly an exceptional transport, the size of other makers' four-engine transports, but using only two huge engines. Part of the trouble Curtiss faced is the fact that no post-war civilian version of this transport was ever produced. But these were all minor parts of the real problem. At the end of the war, Curtiss was the second-largest manufacturing firm in the world, behind only General Motors. It had more than $300 million in cash reserves (a stupendous sum in those days). It had some of the most modern manufacturing plants in the world. And it was manufacturing a line of excellent aircraft engines--Wright Cyclones, etc. It purchased Packard, not only licensed manufacturer of Merlin aircraft engines, but producer of the Packard motor car, the Mercedes of the United States. It also obtained a license to produce the British Nene jet engine. So what happened? In a nutshell: asset stripping. Speculators bought enough stock to control the company and basically broke it up and sold it off to turn it into ready cash. That's one reason there was no new product, not even a civilian version of the C-46. The asset strippers would allow no money to be spent on anything. It's a long, complex, rather sad story. It has nothing to do with the quality of the P-40 as a fighter, which was quite good, although it was obviously surpassed by later designs. Re the P-39: It was put into production before all the bugs were worked out. And, yes, it certainly should have retained the turbo-supercharger it was originally equipped with (which gave it a top speed of 390 mph at 20,000 ft when it was first flown in 1939, making it much faster than any European fighter of that era). The P-63 was the aircraft the P-39 should have been. The early versions of the P-39 were underpowered. The Q version was actually quite good, performance-wise, but still suffered from over-sensitive controls and the rearward movement of the center of gravity once the nose ammo was expended. This made the plane susceptible to flat spins. Experienced pilots could handle it. But most service pilots first got their hands on a P-39 with less than 300 hours in their logbooks. It was an easy plane to bail out of: merely jetison the door and roll out. It was actually easier to bail out of that most other fighters. That's not really saying very much. The chances of a successful bailout averaged between one in four and one in two, regardless of aircraft type. The chances of successful bailout varied based on the reason you had to bail out, the attitude of the aircraft and its motion, and what the altitude was. P-39s were notorious for killing their pilots because they used an unreliable electric propeller that often ran wild. At altitude, no problem. The pilot merely exited and floated to safety. But if it happened at low altitude--and it seemed to happen most often when pilots were practicing touch-and-goes in the landing pattern--the pilot usually died. This was because the pilot tried to do something to bring the prop under control, all the while losing altitude and airspeed. He often stayed with the plane until it stalled and then it was too late. Veteran P-39 pilots got the hell out at the first sign of a runaway prop.
