F6F production numbers and HUGE discrepancies...

[Apollo11]

Hi all,

With recent discussion about aircraft productions I remembered one old thread (2 years ago) where I asked something that never was answered... IMHO it is nice time to "resurrect" that question... [;)]


The PDF document "US Naval Aviation Combat Statistics WWII" is very very interesting one indeed!


But some basic mathematics in it struck me as interesting/worth discussing...


Let's just concentrate on one singe aircraft type mentioned in that document - the Grumman F6F Hellcat.


On page 15 of that PDF there is list of all losses for that type:

A/A: 553
A/C: 270
Operational: 340
Other: 885
On ship/ground: 413

TOTAL: 2416


Now, I have number for whole Hellcat production (including all subtypes) which is 12275 (from 30 September of 1942 till 16 November 1945).

Note that in this 25 and half months it means that average monthly production was 481 units.

This number is given in book "The Great Book of World War II Airplanes" ISBN 0-517-459930 (this is _BIG_ book of almost 5 kg / 10 lb with 700+ pages dealing with 12 remarkable aircraft of WWII illustrated by great fold outs by Ryuko Watanabe). The F6F Hellcat part of the book was written by David A. Anderton.

Also, in my book the very same (exact) number of aircraft looses for enemy A/C is given (270) and the total number of enemy aircraft shoot down differs by just 60 or from PDF Tristanjohn gave URL for (US Naval Aviation Combat Statistics WWII). Therefore we can safely assume that same data was used and that numbers were accurate.


But (there is always but)... can we now do simple arithmetic... [:D]


12275 (total production) - 2416 (total looses) = 9859

Therefore can we assume that by the end of the war there were almost 10000 fully operation F6F aircraft in squadrons.


On pages 20 and 21 of PDF there is list of F6F squadrons in action. In 1945 the largest number of carrier based squadrons was in May (22) and in July for land based squadrons (6).

Can 28 (22+6) squadrons in peak of action in 1945 account for 10000 aircraft?

IMHO Nope...


And then further down in PDF document on pages 46 and 47.

It says that in July of 1945 there were 412 F6Fs on 10 CVs and 144 F6Fs on 6 CVLs and that there were 84 F6F on CVEs in April of 1945.

This gives total of just 640 (412+144+84) F6F in service for late 1945.

Above numbers correspond OK with number of squadrons I mention above and everything is much clearer... the number of squadrons and aircraft add up just fine - something else must be wrong here...


Also on page 59 in PDF document there is summary for 1944/1945 regarding F6F availability (I think this table must be some kind of average on-hand availability since it covers 1944/1945).

It lists that Navy had 511 and Marines had 362 on hand. The calculated total is then 873 (511+362).

This also roughly corresponds with above data and, again, something else must be wrong here...


So... even if we generously round up numbers of F6F available in late 1945 to 1000 units this leaves us with 9000 F6F unaccounted for.


Add to that 930 that were supplied to UK via Lend-Lease agreement we deduct one more thousand but still 8000 F6F unaccounted for remain.


Why is there such _HUGE_ discrepancy in numbers?


To me this seems awfully big number (way too big)...

If this calculated number is inaccurate - then what happened to difference in numbers and who made mistake in counting?


Any ideas gentleman?


Leo "Apollo11"

[Bobthehatchit]

ORIGINAL: Apollo11

Hi all,

With recent discussion about aircraft productions I remembered one old thread (2 years ago) where I asked something that never was answered... IMHO it is nice time to "resurrect" that question... [;)]


The PDF document "US Naval Aviation Combat Statistics WWII" is very very interesting one indeed!


But some basic mathematics in it struck me as interesting/worth discussing...


Let's just concentrate on one singe aircraft type mentioned in that document - the Grumman F6F Hellcat.


On page 15 of that PDF there is list of all losses for that type:

A/A: 553
A/C: 270
Operational: 340
Other: 885
On ship/ground: 413

TOTAL: 2416


Now, I have number for whole Hellcat production (including all subtypes) which is 12275 (from 30 September of 1942 till 16 November 1945).

Note that in this 25 and half months it means that average monthly production was 481 units.

This number is given in book "The Great Book of World War II Airplanes" ISBN 0-517-459930 (this is _BIG_ book of almost 5 kg / 10 lb with 700+ pages dealing with 12 remarkable aircraft of WWII illustrated by great fold outs by Ryuko Watanabe). The F6F Hellcat part of the book was written by David A. Anderton.

Also, in my book the very same (exact) number of aircraft looses for enemy A/C is given (270) and the total number of enemy aircraft shoot down differs by just 60 or from PDF Tristanjohn gave URL for (US Naval Aviation Combat Statistics WWII). Therefore we can safely assume that same data was used and that numbers were accurate.


But (there is always but)... can we now do simple arithmetic... [:D]


12275 (total production) - 2416 (total looses) = 9859

Therefore can we assume that by the end of the war there were almost 10000 fully operation F6F aircraft in squadrons.


On pages 20 and 21 of PDF there is list of F6F squadrons in action. In 1945 the largest number of carrier based squadrons was in May (22) and in July for land based squadrons (6).

Can 28 (22+6) squadrons in peak of action in 1945 account for 10000 aircraft?

IMHO Nope...


And then further down in PDF document on pages 46 and 47.

It says that in July of 1945 there were 412 F6Fs on 10 CVs and 144 F6Fs on 6 CVLs and that there were 84 F6F on CVEs in April of 1945.

This gives total of just 640 (412+144+84) F6F in service for late 1945.

Above numbers correspond OK with number of squadrons I mention above and everything is much clearer... the number of squadrons and aircraft add up just fine - something else must be wrong here...


Also on page 59 in PDF document there is summary for 1944/1945 regarding F6F availability (I think this table must be some kind of average on-hand availability since it covers 1944/1945).

It lists that Navy had 511 and Marines had 362 on hand. The calculated total is then 873 (511+362).

This also roughly corresponds with above data and, again, something else must be wrong here...


So... even if we generously round up numbers of F6F available in late 1945 to 1000 units this leaves us with 9000 F6F unaccounted for.


Add to that 930 that were supplied to UK via Lend-Lease agreement we deduct one more thousand but still 8000 F6F unaccounted for remain.


Why is there such _HUGE_ discrepancy in numbers?


To me this seems awfully big number (way too big)...

If this calculated number is inaccurate - then what happened to difference in numbers and who made mistake in counting?


Any ideas gentleman?


Leo "Apollo11"

The Fleet Air Arm had a large number of F6's but not that many!

[Apollo11]

ORIGINAL: Bobthehatchit

The Fleet Air Arm had a large number of F6's but not that many!

Yup... I mentioned it in my original post... [;)]

Add to that 930 that were supplied to UK via Lend-Lease agreement we deduct one more thousand but still 8000 F6F unaccounted for remain.

Leo "Apollo11"

[Bobthehatchit]

ORIGINAL: Apollo11

ORIGINAL: Bobthehatchit

The Fleet Air Arm had a large number of F6's but not that many!

Yup... I mentioned it in my original post... [;)]

Add to that 930 that were supplied to UK via Lend-Lease agreement we deduct one more thousand but still 8000 F6F unaccounted for remain.

Leo "Apollo11"

Been a long day[:(]

[DuckofTindalos]

Even with a "paper strength" of X aircraft, there's never going to be X aircraft available for action, no matter what type.

Aircraft down for maintenance at squadrons, aircraft cannibalised for spare parts, aircraft disassembled in crates, replacement aicraft being transported, aircraft still at the factory, aircraft at training establishments in the rear, aircraft written off due to wear and tear (the Americans were notorious for discarding aircraft that other nations would have repaired)... The list is endless.

Those 10,000 airframes were probably arrived at by counting serial numbers. The Germans built 35,000 Me-109's, and the Soviets built 38,000 Shturmoviks. Doesn't mean they were all available at a given point in time...

[ChezDaJez]

Any ideas gentleman?

I don't have any figures but I would assume that anywhere from 500-1000 were assigned to various training commands. Then a few were kept for test and evaluations by both the factory and by the Navy. Your numbers probably also include the night fighter production but I don't think you included the number of night fighter squadrons in your squadron tally. Did you also include the Atlantic and Mediterranean squadrons?

In addition, many new production aircraft simply sat in marshalling yards awaiting transfer to fleet units. I wouldn't be surprised if a couple of thousand were never flown after acceptance flights. Also, as Terminus said, many would be in overhaul depots through out the Pacific.

You will find the same kind of discrepancies with P-40 production and many others. It almost seems like the US simply wrote a blank check and said start building this model and we will tell you when to stop. Only problem was that someone forgot to say stop.

Chez

[spence]

I suspect that the same sorts of reasons might also explain why the IJN sailed into battle at Coral Sea and Midway with Claudes and Myrts (or whatever the biplane predecessor of the Kate was) on their some of their CVLs and understrength squadrons in the KB (or strength made up by attaching an active LB Zero unit to KB and the Aleutians Force): production a/c sitting in a some supply officer's never-never land being inventoried 3 times a week and being faultlessly maintained in pristine condition.

[Big B]

ORIGINAL: ChezDaJez

Any ideas gentleman?

I don't have any figures but I would assume that anywhere from 500-1000 were assigned to various training commands. Then a few were kept for test and evaluations by both the factory and by the Navy. Your numbers probably also include the night fighter production but I don't think you included the number of night fighter squadrons in your squadron tally. Did you also include the Atlantic and Mediterranean squadrons?

In addition, many new production aircraft simply sat in marshalling yards awaiting transfer to fleet units. I wouldn't be surprised if a couple of thousand were never flown after acceptance flights. Also, as Terminus said, many would be in overhaul depots through out the Pacific.

You will find the same kind of discrepancies with P-40 production and many others. It almost seems like the US simply wrote a blank check and said start building this model and we will tell you when to stop. Only problem was that someone forgot to say stop.

Chez

They would most certainly be in training commands and "storage" to supply the "pipeline" when needed, as is almost all military hardware produced.
IIRC any squadron is figured to consume about four times it's paper strength in aircraft annually in war time - if not much greater than that.

B

[Nicholas Bell]

A lot of them were probably used - and used up - in training. Unfortunately your document doesn't cite losses in the US.

The losses in training were tremendous. The USAAF records show that 21,582 aircraft were lost in CONUS. In 1943-1944 more than 20 Army planes were destroyed per day in training. This does not include aircraft lost in transit overseas. 43,581 aircraft were lost to all causes overseas.

One might suspect that USN aircraft losses were also considerable, especially given the nature of carrier landings. Maybe that's where a lot of those F6Fs went - although I suspect a lot were "in reserve" too.

[treespider]

ORIGINAL: Nicholas Bell

A lot of them were probably used - and used up - in training. Unfortunately your document doesn't cite losses in the US.

The losses in training were tremendous. The USAAF records show that 21,582 aircraft were lost in CONUS. In 1943-1944 more than 20 Army planes were destroyed per day in training. This does not include aircraft lost in transit overseas. 43,581 aircraft were lost to all causes overseas.

One might suspect that USN aircraft losses were also considerable, especially given the nature of carrier landings. Maybe that's where a lot of those F6Fs went - although I suspect a lot were "in reserve" too.

All the more reason for an enhanced training routine for the game with commensurate OP losses.

[spence]

And probably a good reason to not separate this one aspect of Japanese production from the rest.  Rather than a free 20 or 30 pilots/month give Japan her trainers and leave the training of pilots completely in the IJ Player's hands.   If it were me I'd have a really hard time keeping them out of combat before they were trained.
 

[tabpub]

Can 28 (22+6) squadrons in peak of action in 1945 account for 10000 aircraft?

IMHO Nope...

Quick question.

How many Marine squadrons were operating the F6F. None?
Your original documention was for "Naval Aviation", which would not include Marine aviation, I believe.

[RevRick]

Another obvious point to reduce the discrepancy would be that some would be no longer active because they were replaced by later models - F6F-5s instead of F6F-3s.

But, there is another error which should be noted.
"Now, I have number for whole Hellcat production (including all subtypes) which is 12275 (from 30 September of 1942 till 16 November 1945).

Note that in this 25 and half months it means that average monthly production was 481 units."

Now unless the calendar has changed from 30 September 1942 to 16 November 1945 is actually 37 and a half months. Which means that the monthly production figure (on average) would be 327.333 units. I think the real discrepancy would be why in the name of.. well, you know... would the USN build 144 night fighters a month. I think the 288 Hellcats produced in game turns would have been distributed a little differently, say like 216/72, or even 240/48.

Also, remember that some of the Squadrons show up fully or partially equipped. All of the units don't have to be fleshed out.

[DuckofTindalos]

Hah! Nice catch, Reverend...

[dtravel]

Stock game - US Air units arriving equipped with F6Fs

3 x 36 plane VF land units.
9 x 24 plane VR CVE units.
4 x 21 plane CVL units.
12 x 38 plane CV units.

(3x36) + (9x24) + (4x21) + (12x38) = 864

[RevRick]

AND ANOTHER POINT.. Production did start effectively, October 1942. We don't begin production in the game until July 1943 - ten months later. Now, it may be that the designers did not want to have a sudden glut of F6Fs messing with the late 42 action, but at least we should have them show up with a number already produced sometime early in 1943 - say March/April. They were declared operational in March 1943, and they had been building since October. A few ought to be around (not 1440, nor 2160, but at least a few hundred to start changing existing squadrons out.) I wonder if it might be possible to rig the start of production for a new plane with some already in stock on the turn it begins to replicate this.

[Big B]

If you guys think aircraft production is "questionable" you should look at the garden variety M4 Sherman medium tank.

I just checked stock scenario 15 - and it's only 28 per month starting in Dec 1942. Now there were no fewer than 49,000 Shermans made during the war, if only 1 out of 10 made it to the Pacific (and I think that is a low estimate) production should be at least 102 per month....

Contrast that with M-10 Tank Destroyers, of which only about 6,000 were made (and the VAST majority of those went to N.Africa and Europe), and you find that they have a production rate of 40 per month.... go figure?[8|]

B

[Monter_Trismegistos]

So, 4900 Shermans for at most two tank battallions? Quite a big reserve pool...

[Big B]

ORIGINAL: Monter_Trismegistos

So, 4900 Shermans for at most two tank battallions? Quite a big reserve pool...

Well - it was a couple more than two tank Bns Monter, figure about 6 Tank Bn's, 21 Inf div's, & 6 marine div's - each with at least a Tnk Bn apiece...oh yah - and a couple Armored Div's too [;)][:D]

[Mike Scholl]

ORIGINAL: Big B

ORIGINAL: Monter_Trismegistos

So, 4900 Shermans for at most two tank battallions? Quite a big reserve pool...

Well - it was a couple more than two tank Bns Monter, figure about 6 Tank Bn's, 21 Inf div's, & 6 marine div's - each with at least a Tnk Bn apiece...oh yah - and a couple Armored Div's too [;)][:D]

"B" Until the actual invasion of Japan would be taking place, there were NO US Armored Divisions in the Pacific. But you are pretty much right about the rest...., by midwar we were attaching at least one Tank Bn. to virtually every division going into combat in the Pacific. Early on, it had been felt that the Pacific wasn't suitable terrain-wise for much more than light tanks. We soon learned better....

Wonder what " Monter" was drinking when he decided that America only had two Tank Bns in the Pacific?
I gotta get a bottle of that stuff....