Strange Birds of WW II:

Taglia · Post by **Taglia** » Mon Aug 19, 2002 3:57 am

The He-162

The Me-163

The Caproni Campini CC2

CCB · Post by **CCB** » Mon Aug 19, 2002 4:49 am

hehe, look what they have holding up the rear of this plane!

G_X · Post by **G_X** » Mon Aug 19, 2002 5:21 am

I wonder if that's because of bad landing gear design, or the fact that there's no weight on the front wheels?

moore4807 · Post by **moore4807** » Mon Aug 19, 2002 8:17 am

Bing
I saw a picture of the Wasp's crewmen clearing snow off her decks after ferrying P-40's to Iceland at the outbreak (or shortly before) of WWII for the US. I didn't hear of anything else other than that -please elaborate?

Bing · Post by **Bing** » Mon Aug 19, 2002 9:04 am

P-40's were loaded on carriers and carried to the Med for Torch. Originally it was planned to offload them, same as usual but the idea - I believe - was the lack of port facilities might slow up the transfer indefinitely. So the idea of flying P-40's off carriers to land bases was hatched.

Calling a P-40 "carrier operational" is a wild stretch of imagination, so it was strictly a one way deal. I am not sure how many squadrons were transferred to N. African land bases in this manner, going just from memory I think it was several, perhaps a fighter group. Neat sidebar to WW2 air ops.

Do you have a mental image of the average US Army P-40 pilot shooting a carrier deck landing? AFAIK the P-40's weren't equipped with hooks, so return to deck was out of question (requires special airframe mods to prevent aircraft from literally being pulled apart - of course beefed up landing gear is also necessary, the forces involved really are tremendous).

Bing

antarctic · Post by **antarctic** » Mon Aug 19, 2002 10:51 am

Thanks Kaako.... luft 46 seems to be a real nice site...... and whilst I'm here..... how bout another vote for the V-1 missile??

Antarctic

Possum · Post by **Possum** » Mon Aug 19, 2002 11:18 am

Hello all..
Bing, All British and American Aircraft Carriers have the Island on the Starboard side.
The Japanese actually built 2 carriers with the island on the port Side (Kaga and Soryu, or was that Akagi and Hiryu?)
The carrier in question is either Couragious or Glorious.
The German rotorcraft on the U-Boat is A Rotary Winged Kite, it derived it's lift by being towed by the U-boat, it was not capable of independant flight. It uses a Rotary wing, as that is easier to collapse down for Stowage.

Bing · Post by **Bing** » Mon Aug 19, 2002 7:47 pm

You know what, I had the issue reversed, didn't I? The reason for that is watching movie footage of LANDINGS, which of course is looking aft, making it seem to be port rather than starboard.

One of these days a landlubber is going to get it correct, he really will. The basic idea is there however: Mixing carriers with starboard and port islands is nasty business. I do know IJN stopped doing it fairly early on, or did so only when tactical conditions forced it upon them.

Thanks for putting this straight.

Bing

moore4807 · Post by **moore4807** » Tue Aug 20, 2002 4:47 am

Its not im-possible, just totally unbelievable! I was astounded to find out P-40's were taking off short deck carriers with thier weight...But the Time-Life pictures of the Wasp off of Iceland (crewmen clearing off a deck with a biplane on it) then another picture of the P-40 ON THE DECK with blades turning... convinced me.
Thanks for the update.
jim

Hades · Post by **Hades** » Tue Aug 20, 2002 5:24 am

Have any of you heard or of pictures of a version of the Stuka where two passanger pods were attached onto the wings and could be dropped from low altt.

melcer · Post by **melcer** » Tue Aug 20, 2002 12:39 pm

If you like 'pusher' planes you'd like the swedish Saab J21.
It went into service 1946 I believe. A jet engine version, J21R, was later made (1949 I believe)

www.flygvapenmuseum.nu/utstallning/j21a21.htm

Melcer

Kaakao · Post by **Kaakao** » Tue Aug 20, 2002 7:58 pm

Originally posted by Hades
Have any of you heard or of pictures of a version of the Stuka where two passanger pods were attached onto the wings and could be dropped from low altt.

Well now that you asked

They were dropped from dives and both of them could carry two passangers.

kevsharr · Post by **kevsharr** » Tue Aug 20, 2002 8:55 pm

P=47's were also ferried by aircraft carrier's,imagine taking off of a flight deck in one of those.The first manned flight for the Natter was a failure,the pilot was killed as was the pilot of the first He=162 salamander to be flown before luftwaffe officials and the press,in fact it was filmed and you can see the wing leading edge coming off in a series of frames taken at the time.

Hades · Post by **Hades** » Wed Aug 21, 2002 6:12 am

cool. thanks

GYBLIN · Post by **GYBLIN** » Fri Aug 23, 2002 1:32 am

i remember seeing a flying bomb plane by germany or russia.It was a bomber loaded with a fighter attached on tope of it.looked alittle like the space shuttle on a 747.Anybody got the pic?

Hades · Post by **Hades** » Fri Aug 23, 2002 5:17 am

I dont have a pic on my computer but its either a Ju 88 or He 111

Taglia · Post by **Taglia** » Fri Aug 23, 2002 1:03 pm

Originally posted by GYBLIN
i remember seeing a flying bomb plane by germany or russia.It was a bomber loaded with a fighter attached on tope of it.looked alittle like the space shuttle on a 747.Anybody got the pic?

That's the "Mistel", a 'composite' airplane. The fighter flew until in reached the target, then dropped the Ju88 full of TNT on it. If I'm not wrong (I'm writing basing on my memory

), Germans blown up some bridges on the easter front with this "secret weapon" ...

From http://www.tgplanes.com

Belisarius · Post by **Belisarius** » Fri Aug 23, 2002 7:10 pm

What were these guys smoking, and where can I get it?

Taglia · Post by **Taglia** » Sat Aug 24, 2002 3:59 am

Update : they used the "Mistel" in 1944 on the Oder ... but with no results at all

AbsntMndedProf · Post by **AbsntMndedProf** » Sat Aug 24, 2002 6:54 pm

From the U.S. side of strange comes the Hughes Flying Boat, better known as the Spruce Goose:

http://homepages.tesco.net/~paul.crossley/goose.htm

After pouring lots of $$$ into its development, the Spruce Goose only flew once, with Howard Hughes at the controls. The one flight was done to prove that the plane could indeed fly.

Eric Maietta

Strange Birds of WW II:

P-40 carrier service

P-40 landing on a carrier? PLEASE!