Nell Search Plane

[John 3rd]

Good Day All.

Michael and I were talking this morning and got to discussing Japanese search aircraft. Came upon the thought that as the Nell is retired from frontline service, what if the Japanese stripped the plane and just left its machine guns and added a camera to it? No bomb or TT capacity. What sort of range would that aircraft have? Would it make for a fine supplement to the Mavis/Emily?

Good or bad idea?

[Oberst_Klink]

Sure, why not? That's what they actually did anyway.

http://www.ww2warbirds.net/ww2htmls/mit ... g3mverstab
http://en.valka.cz/topic/view/31433/Micubisi-G3M

and an older thread...

tm.asp?m=2988746

Klink, Oberst

[el cid again]

In fact, there were three squadrons of Nell search aircraft BEFORE the Pacific War began.
These all had 8 machines. They were UNMARKED. They flew all over SE Asia taking pictures.
See Francillon among others. The color scheme was entirely gray - intended to be hard
to see at high altitude.

ORIGINAL: John 3rd

Good Day All.

Michael and I were talking this morning and got to discussing Japanese search aircraft. Came upon the thought that as the Nell is retired from frontline service, what if the Japanese stripped the plane and just left its machine guns and added a camera to it? No bomb or TT capacity. What sort of range would that aircraft have? Would it make for a fine supplement to the Mavis/Emily?

Good or bad idea?

[miv792]

G3M3
Max range 85
Ext Combat Range 43
Normar Combat range 40

[John 3rd]

Jiminy cricket. That is A BUNCH!

[spence]

Absolutely...any Japanese aircraft designer who had a wet-dream needs to have his dreams' incorporated into the game.

[John 3rd]

I'll take a look at Francillon to verify info and then Post some 'realistic' ideas based on the material.

[el cid again]

That is a LATER plane, developed as a hedge in case the G4M1 was a failure.
The recon plane was designated G3M2KAI. Utterly stripped of armament. Fitted
with a single stereoscopic (3D) camera - the first in Japanese service.


Max range 2365 nautical miles (60 hexes)
extended range 2129 nautical miles (27 hexes)
normal range 1892 nautical miles (24 hexes)

With a 79 gallon (300 litre) bomb bay tank (actually
imitating a JAAF concept of the same size)


"Drop Tank" range 2546 nautical miles (65 hexes)
Drop tank extended range 2307 nm (29 hexes)
Drop tank normal range 2002 nm (26 hexes)

This aircraft should be given a max load of 1764 pounds -
because that is its original design load, and so it can
replace the bomb load with a sort of conformal fuel tank.

ORIGINAL: miv79

G3M3
Max range 85
Ext Combat Range 43
Normar Combat range 40

[Dili]

I don't think G3M had a bomb bay.

[John 3rd]

Like the plane. Read up on it with my sources and Michael sent my the RHS versions. Think I'll allow it to be built and dedicate one production line of 2/Month for it and if players want the option they can then spend the points to do so.

[el cid again]

ORIGINAL: Dili

I don't think G3M had a bomb bay.

Well - yes and no. If it mounted a torpedo, the doors were removed.
The torpedo was carried semi-externally, recessed. If it had bombs,
I believe there were doors.

The recon plane was a very minimal modification of the bomber. Armament
was removed with a view to decreasing weight and improving performance -
altitude performance in particular. But it did convert some of that weight
to additional fuel. Inspired by the JAAF's Ki-21 series, which featured
removable tanks in its forward bomb bay area, the JNAF designed a tank which
was similar to the torpedo - designed to mount recessed in the bay. Today
we would call it a conformal tank, but no such term existed then.

These were very limited production - a single run of 24 machines - using
a special order of Zeiss recon cameras not made in Japan in 1941.

Not much information is available on this aircraft in English. There are occasional
cryptic mentions of it and a few brief aircraft articles on it on the web. And it
is mentioned by Francillon - sans details - even the formal designation. My information
came from the Mitsubishi Aviation Museum and the National Diet Library (where JASDF
kindly assigned a retired captain to assist me in translation).

[LargeSlowTarget]

It is the Betty which had a bomb bay, with the doors removed when carrying a torpedo.

The Nell had no bomb bay but bomb racks under the belly.

See for example http://www.warbirdsresourcegroup.org/IJ ... hig3m.html

[Dili]

Yes

http://arawasi-wildeagles.blogspot.pt/2 ... -nell.html 1x250 4x60 external

http://arawasi-wildeagles.blogspot.pt/2 ... -nell.html 2x250 probably 2x30kg external

[el cid again]

Umm- that means I need to revise the bomber ranges. I penalize for external
bomb loads. Thanks.

ORIGINAL: LargeSlowTarget

It is the Betty which had a bomb bay, with the doors removed when carrying a torpedo.

The Nell had no bomb bay but bomb racks under the belly.

See for example http://www.warbirdsresourcegroup.org/IJ ... hig3m.html

[wdolson]

The Betty's bomb bay doors were only installed for ferry flights. They were always removed for combat flights, both bombing and torpedo missions. They had a partial door for torpedo missions.

Bill

[oldman45]

Wouldn't the lack of doors cause a problem aerodynamically?

[Dili]

Yes will do.

Beaufort had a top speed of 418kph normal and 362kph with torpedo that could only be carried with partial bomb bay opened and torpedo parts outside. I must say that i found this penalty bit exageratted compared to what external stores penalty had a Ju-88 450kph reduced to 430/420kph, but it is true the Ju-88 was bigger and probably less aerodynamically optimized so unlikely to be affected as Beaufort.

Edit:

Cid i don't think you should penalize for bomber ranges in case of Nell. It was the only way it operated so the official bomb load ranges values will already include the drag penalization.

You might instead penalize top speed and benefit the range of a recon Nell without external stores.

[el cid again]

You are correct. Whatever the theory, our data on operational ranges with specific loads for this
well documented aircraft is firm. I agree. I find RHS did properly define the weapons as "centerline" -
not as "internal."

ORIGINAL: Dili

Yes will do.

Beaufort had a top speed of 418kph normal and 362kph with torpedo that could only be carried with partial bomb bay opened and torpedo parts outside. I must say that i found this penalty bit exageratted compared to what external stores penalty had a Ju-88 450kph reduced to 430/420kph, but it is true the Ju-88 was bigger and probably less aerodynamically optimized so unlikely to be affected as Beaufort.

Edit:

Cid i don't think you should penalize for bomber ranges in case of Nell. It was the only way it operated so the official bomb load ranges values will already include the drag penalization.

You might instead penalize top speed and benefit the range of a recon Nell without external stores.

[PaxMondo]

ORIGINAL: John 3rd

Like the plane. Read up on it with my sources and Michael sent my the RHS versions. Think I'll allow it to be built and dedicate one production line of 2/Month for it and if players want the option they can then spend the points to do so.

Pretty clearly possible irrespective of what actually happened (and everything I have read says that Nells were produced the entire war largely for NavSearch capability). Think land based Catalina ... 2E, large fuel storage, gives you very long range ...

Mavis/Emily were because IJ did not have powerful enough engines to be a 2E float plane with the range they wanted. They had to go to 4E to accomplish essentially the Catalina solely due to HP/engine ... The Nell being land based can get the range because of the float exclusion ...

[1EyedJacks]

ORIGINAL: John 3rd

Good Day All.

Michael and I were talking this morning and got to discussing Japanese search aircraft. Came upon the thought that as the Nell is retired from frontline service, what if the Japanese stripped the plane and just left its machine guns and added a camera to it? No bomb or TT capacity. What sort of range would that aircraft have? Would it make for a fine supplement to the Mavis/Emily?

Good or bad idea?

Maximum Range is normally flying the aircraft from point A to point B without a payload and the tanks topped off - right?

Since you are stripping the aircraft, how about using ((The Current Max Range / 2) - 4)) for the high end of your Extended Radius.

Pilot fatigue within a specific mission is the difference in Normal Radius VS Extended Radius - right? So how many hours is that? Six? Eight? So whatever you choose for that pilot time, multiplied by the aircraft's Mission Speed, should give you the Normal Radius in hexes.

When flying Naval Search or ASW - is your flight speed lower since your pilots are "searching" for the enemy?

Example of G3M2 Nell: ((6 hours pilot time x 120 miles per hour) / 46 miles in a hex) = 15.65 hexes for Normal Radius *** 120mph is my WAG for a Naval Search Mission Speed.