Name That Plane III

[Terminus]

Since the Japanese planes were too easy...

[Oznoyng]

Don't remember the name, but there was a fighter concept (French of course) where the guns were all mounted in a rear facing turret. I have a book at home with it in there. Lots of em were shot down in 1940 as I recall. Maybe that is it.

[IS2m]

Blackburn ROC

[Yamato hugger]

Defiant

[Feinder]

Between that one, and the Defiant... Those two go in the

"What the f_ck were you thinking?!" catagory.

Hm. Lemme think about this for a second.

"Let's design a "fighter" where the whole point is to maneuver yourself in such a way so the the enemy is on your tail!."

Am I the only one that thinks that's a fundamentally stupid idea?

Altho the Defiant did have a quick moment of success (litterally, for about a week), when the Luft engaged a few formations, thinking they were Hurricanes (they look very similar), and the quad 30s were a rude surprise. However, Luft learned quickly to posatively id their target, and the Battles were subsequently slaughtered again.

Let's put the entire armement of the aircraft in a turret, so it -can't- shoot directly forward, and is worthless firing at something oblique (deflection shooting is VERY tough, esp if your -not- the guy behind the stick!).

Bah.

I didn't even realize the made TWO species of collossally stupid aircraft. You'd think one was enough.

-F-


(* editted for correct aircraft name *)

[Monter_Trismegistos]

Maybe Bolton-Paul Defiant? It had its all guns backward...

[Duke71]

Blackburn Skua?

[Feinder]

Quick google -

The aircraft pictured is a Blackburn ROC - you can tell from the radial engine.

The Defiant had an inline engine.

-F-

[Hipper]

I dunno

as a fighter the Skua was a half decent dive bomber

Did the Rock have any bomb capacity at all? those look like (small) bomb fittings beneath the wings to me .

If so then 4 X 303 seems like a good thing for a dive bomber !

granted the defiant was a nitwit idea !

"Let's design a "fighter" where the whole point is to maneuver yourself in such a way so the the enemy is on your tail!."

Am I the only one that thinks that's a fundamentally stupid idea?

[Terminus]

It is, of course, the Blackburn Roc. It was intended to be a carrierborne aircraft, like Blackburn's other plane, the Skua, but none were ever based on British carriers, being relegated to second-line squadron.

An interesting point about this aircraft is that all production examples were equipped with attachment points for pontoons so they could be turned into float planes! Go figure...

[Monter_Trismegistos]

In few of my books there is a statement that X Squadron had a Y of ROC/SKUA.

My conclusion was that it's the same aircraft but with different mision. Am I right? What was the difference?

[Terminus]

The Roc's design was derived from the Skua, but they were not the same aircraft. The Skua was a dive bomber/scout and the Roc was (as noted above) an attempt at a fighter.

[wild_Willie2]

In one of the books by charles lamb " War in a stringbag" he discribed the primary use of the skua as a DIVE bomber, and it had a secondary role as a fighter [;)][:-][8|]

[jubail1999]

A little harder, but I would say that they are two airplanes flying in formation.