Double T
12th September 2005, 04:39
From Victory Through Air Power--published 1942
"I made exhaustive studies of cowling and streamlining of the air-cooled type, demonstrating that it could be quite as effective as the water-cooled. Besides, it was a proved type of engine and had nearly twice as much horsepower as the proposed engine--(Allison water-cooled inline)--which had mysteriously become the court favorite. In my letter of June 4, 1938, I proposed the construction of a plane equipped with an air-cooled Pratt & Whitney engine known as R-2800, of 2000hp. It's performance was 432 mph at substratospheric altitudes, where I envisioned modern fighting as likely to take place increasingly. My plan was to equip this craft with a turbo-supercharger placed in the rear portion of the fuselage. I could thus preserve the compactness and the tactically desirable location of the pilot in the Seversky P-35."
He goes on to say...
"The same offical who ruled that there must be no more air-cooled engine pursuits years laster boasted publicly about the new Republic (formerly Seversky) P-47 pursuit built around such an engine. In a recent speech, after mentioning the Bell Airacobra and Lockheed P-38, he said that "eclipsing both of these, however is the new single-engine Republic P-47-B." The publicity implied that was something new in the way of pursuits, pulled at long last out of the offical magician's hat. The truth is this airplane was concieved in 1937, presented for consideration to the Air Corps in 1938, only to be denied a hearing because it did not use the pet engine. It's production was thus postponed until 1941. No amount of self-congratulation by the very officals who prevented the construction of this plane until three years too late can wipe out their responsibiltiy for the delay. According to the Truman Committee, the P-47 cannot be delivered in appreciable quantities until the end of 1942, and production will not be in full swing until some time the following year.
Yet this plane could have been in action on all fronts years earlier."
Tim
"I made exhaustive studies of cowling and streamlining of the air-cooled type, demonstrating that it could be quite as effective as the water-cooled. Besides, it was a proved type of engine and had nearly twice as much horsepower as the proposed engine--(Allison water-cooled inline)--which had mysteriously become the court favorite. In my letter of June 4, 1938, I proposed the construction of a plane equipped with an air-cooled Pratt & Whitney engine known as R-2800, of 2000hp. It's performance was 432 mph at substratospheric altitudes, where I envisioned modern fighting as likely to take place increasingly. My plan was to equip this craft with a turbo-supercharger placed in the rear portion of the fuselage. I could thus preserve the compactness and the tactically desirable location of the pilot in the Seversky P-35."
He goes on to say...
"The same offical who ruled that there must be no more air-cooled engine pursuits years laster boasted publicly about the new Republic (formerly Seversky) P-47 pursuit built around such an engine. In a recent speech, after mentioning the Bell Airacobra and Lockheed P-38, he said that "eclipsing both of these, however is the new single-engine Republic P-47-B." The publicity implied that was something new in the way of pursuits, pulled at long last out of the offical magician's hat. The truth is this airplane was concieved in 1937, presented for consideration to the Air Corps in 1938, only to be denied a hearing because it did not use the pet engine. It's production was thus postponed until 1941. No amount of self-congratulation by the very officals who prevented the construction of this plane until three years too late can wipe out their responsibiltiy for the delay. According to the Truman Committee, the P-47 cannot be delivered in appreciable quantities until the end of 1942, and production will not be in full swing until some time the following year.
Yet this plane could have been in action on all fronts years earlier."
Tim