p-38E in 9/42

[Sredni]

I've been mulling p-38's over in my head for the past couple days while reading this thread off and on, and I think one of the biggest impediments to using them effectively that I see, that people on the other side may not, is the 2 engines.

Each squadron of p-38's takes up a full field of your airfield. Each airfield supports 50 engines, that's 25 p-38's right there. This is unaffected by hq's, as well so you can only support 1 group per field until you reach the magic 9 field. Compare a level 8 field with a 5 range HQ and p-38's vs p-40's. It can fit 8 p-38 squadrons (400 engines), or 13(I think, correct me if my understanding of the rules is off) normal single engine groups (325 engines). Now that I think about it... 8+5 might make the field unlimited administratively (but still not for engines), so you might be able to fit 16 p-40 groups there (400 engines).

Level 4 airfield? That field can only fit 4 groups. And nothing else. (and does that count the extra 4 planes you can get per group as well? I'm not sure how that math works out, whether you'd have to limit each group to just 25 instead of 25+4)

Considering what a major impact airplanes in the air has on combat having p-38's limited to half the number of aircraft per airfield as other normal fighters (until you get to level 9 airfields) I don't really see the issue here.


apologies for going back on topic after the thread has wandered so far afield heh [8D]

[Alpha77]

Also have now some experience with P38Es. They are not super planes, like the OP suggested. But they are very usefull as LR escort or sweeping of airfields. You just need to bring some more air support and pause them 2-3 days then they will fly in greater numbers. My P38E unit at PM did a good job as escort for B17s and B25s also they can provide LR CAP over supply fleets sailing from Townsville for example. They are not killers however just "Good", but my pilots are also only average at best, so guess with super pilots even P38es will be kind of "super". I have no real super pilot group to test this, well British have some, but they have already a good plane: Hurricane.Also P38 are not available for the British.....

Maybe someone with super pilots can test this [;)]

REG bombing in Europe: You should note that Germans had much better planes to fight bombers than Japs. Just take a look at the later or midwar versions of FW190s. They had so much options on arming them up to 30mm cannon and rockets etc. This was called "Ruestsaetze". Also the Luftwaffe brought in sometimes heavy planes like BF110 or JU88 also with rockets or heavier guns. Of course later when the US escorts were better and more numerous this proved to be difficult. Of course the planes with the heavy weapons were not very agile anymore and probably prey of P47s + P51s.......

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rüstsatz (Wiki link but ok)

[wdolson]

It would be pretty easy to make a sand box and test it.  Start the scenario editor, open say the Coral Sea scenario (it's the smallest, so a good choice for this sort of thing).  Save as another scenario number (now you have a complete copy of the Coral Sea scenario).  You can then chop and play with it as much as you want.  You can make an exp 90 P-38E group if you want and see how they fare against high exp Japanese pilots flying Zeros or anything else.

It's a little bit of a learning curve for the editor, but it's not as steep as for the game itself and playing around with the editor might teach you some things about the game.

Bill

[ChezDaJez]

ORIGINAL: mike scholl 1

ORIGINAL: Icedawg

ORIGINAL: crsutton
The P38 E was a complex plane compaired to other Allied fighters but in game the difference between a service rating of 3 vs 2 is quite onerous. I have whined about this before but nobody pays me much heed [;)], service ratings are one of the nicest new features to aircraft in AE but I think they really have it backwards. As it is now the Japanese player with most of his early war fighters having service rating of one to the Allies two or three really hold a distinct advantage in that he can normally put his fighters back up in the air very fast. The reality was that by late 42 Japan was already suffering severe shortages of parts and trained mechanics at front line bases. It was not uncommon for 50% of the aircraft at an advance base to be grounded for lack of parts and the Allies destroyed many on the ground.

Allied planes were more complex but even with spot shortages of parts the Allies were in a much better postion to keep those complex aircraft in the air than Japan was able to keep her more simpler planes flying. This is not the effect we see in game until much later when the Japanese service ratings get pretty bad.

Isn't this more an indication of poor supply and low replacements than of service rating? IF adequate supply and mechanics had been available, the planes would have been relatively easy to service, right?

Not really..., you can't deliver what you don't produce. And Japan lacked the huge pool of trained and backyard auto mechanics the US had to draw from because her automotive industry was primitive and small.

Mike has this correct. The average Japanese did not have the "shade tree mechanic" experience or mentality that allied mechanics had from years of tinkering around with automotive engines and other mechanical devices. Japan was only a few decades into the industrial age. The average Japanese mechanic also could not hope to match the average allied mechanic's ability to jury rig.

Another issue with Japanese aircraft maintenance was the near complete lack of spare parts in the field later in the war. Japan's industrial capacity was churning out sufficient parts to build new aircraft but they couldn't maintain a decent supply of parts. This was one of the reasons that the Ki-61 Tony had such a dismal service record. With it's extremely tempermental engines, it needed spare parts that often could not be found. And even when available, the machining tolerances were often too great to allow for reliable use.

Another issue lay in the design of certain Japanese aircraft. The A6M series Zero was one. It had a very straightforward, simple and strong design that made it easy to build. But repairing battle damage was another thing entirely. For example, if one of the wings was damaged and needed replacing, you just couldn't remove the damaged wing. Both wings had to be removed as they were built as a single unit. That meant suspending the fuselage from a special cradle and removing most of the cockpit assembly as the top of wing center section was the floor of the cockpit. Made for quick production but very slow repair.

Chez

[ChezDaJez]

ORIGINAL: Reg

ORIGINAL: wdolson

During the dark days of the strategic bombing campaign when the Germans had the advantage, the Germans would usually concentrate on one or a few boxes of bombers and could end up damaging most planes in a box.  It did happen that every bomber in a squadron was damaged or shot down, but I don't think there was ever a raid in which every single bomber in the raid was damaged, unless it was a fairly small raid.

I believe the Schweinfurt Raid was the worst of the raids as far as Allied losses go.  I think one squadron only had one plane return.  Some groups got pretty badly mauled.  In that raid I think 70-80% of the B-17s participating were damaged or lost.

Bill

From: http://www.100thbg.com/

Black Week - Munster

100TH BOMB GROUP (HEAVY)
Munster - 10 Oct 1943

The Group (100th BG) put up 18 aircraft along with 2 from the 390th BG to make it an even 20. Six Aircraft aborted over the sea, one of which being a 390th a/c. That left 13 100th Bomb Group aircraft to carry on towards Munster. Here is the fate of those 13 Crews....

<see link above>

A/C 42-6087 "ROYAL FLUSH" 418TH LD-Z
The only crew to return from the mission with two engines shot out and two crew members seriously wounded.

The 100th BG supposedly was a special case. According to "Flying Fortress" by Edward Jablonski, the 100th became known as the "Bloody 100th" after an incident that occurred during the 14 Aug 1943 Regensburg raid. Apparently, a B-17 piloted by Capt. R. Knox was heavily damaged with 2 engines shot out by German fighters. His B-17 drifted back through the formation and then was seen to lower its landing gear. This was interpreted by the German fighters as a sign of surrender and several formed an escort to guide him to a nearby airfield. The B-17 gunners suddenly opened up on the escorting fighters. The wheels were raised and the B-17 headed for home as best it could. German fighters tore it apart within seconds and then proceeded to concentrate on the remainder of the group. 9 of 24 B-17s were lost with 9 others heavily damaged on this mission.

The legend is that the 100th BG was marked for special attention from German fighters thereafter but this is possibly one of those legends that pop up every now and then. The 100th didn't lose any bombers on its next 4 missions and 100th BG losses for the war were about the same as other BGs.

Chez

[Sheytan]

Spoke to my Dad today about this issue regarding maintance of P38s. My Father was a mechanic and armorer assigned to a air base squadron that supported P38s in India. He says any asserition these birds were difficult to maintain in the field is nonsense. I have a number of photos he gave me of himself and comrades servicing these birds at a unimproved airfield in India while the squadrons flew missions into Burma.