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  1. A British plane that never left the drawing board.

    But what if it had? And if Airpeed had built them in numbers? Here is a Youtube video about a very strange design. Would it have been rubbish? It certainly looks like it would've been easy to bail out of, fortunately. Well, if not good for anything else it could've been used for...

  2. A flying Russian Wolfhound?

    Has anybody ever seen a flying Borzoi? Me neither. Until I stumbled upon a Youtube video about the Bolkhovitinov S-2M-103. One of the odder looking airplanes from the pre-war Soviet designers. Has anybody reading this thread ever heard of this unique airplane? Two Klimov liquid cooled V-12...

  3. The Grumman XP-50. "One heck of a what-if aircraft."

    Here is a new Youtube video on the XP-50 fighter. It covers some interesting points on its development and illustrates how good a design it was. The XP-50 showed much promise. If put into service in 1942 I think it would have been able to hold its own in the Pacific through the entire war...

  4. The Brewster Buffalo redeemed? As a target tug.

    Here is an old thread I wrote about creating a purpose designed target tug airplane. https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/design-a-ww2-target-towing-airplane.422162/ That thread created some interesting commentary. Including the post that inspired this new thread. "Finally, a job we...

  5. Greg's latest video examines the P-39 in American and Soviet use.

    It would appear the P-39 was very useful in the low to medium altitude range. In both air to air combat and ground attack roles. I think the Americans and possibly the British might also have found more use for the P-39 in the ground attack role if a specialized version with an increased range...

  6. The P-38 with radial engines? A slightly different X-608 proposal.

    Here is an excerpt from http://www.warbirdsresourcegroup.org/URG/p38_design.html website page. "Specifications called for a maximum airspeed of at least 360 mph (580 km/h) at altitude, and a climb to 20,000 ft (6,100 m) within six minutes; the toughest set of specifications USAAC had presented...

  7. Greg's view on the P-39s' unusual engine placement. Interesting new video.

    Here is the latest of Greg's Airplanes videos. This one takes another look on why the P-39 had a mid-mounted engine. And examines a few other features of the Airacobra as well. Are the aerodynamic advantages of placing the engine close as possible to the centre of gravity worth the added...

  8. SLOCs to Australia if the Japan takes Port Moresby and keeps Guadalcanal in 1942?

    How much more difficult would've it become to maintain supply to Australia and New Zealand if Japan had taken Port Moresby and the rest of Papua New Guinea? And the U.S. doesn't conduct Operation Watchtower? Suppose we have a situation in mid-1942 where the Japanese decide to hold at New...

  9. The 30 mm HE shell. The ideal weapon for use by WW2 Allied fighter planes?

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias from the Wikipedia article. Here is the well known image used to illustrate survivor bias as describe by Abraham Wald. Planes hit in the marked spots would often still be able to return home. There is no data recorded for the unmarked spots...

  10. I'm trying to find cutaway drawings of the Grumman XP-50.

    I'm posting this message here because of the large number of WW2 aviation knowledgeable members here. I'm trying to find X-Ray or cutaway views/ drawings of the XP-50. That was Grumman's modified version of the XF5F redesigned for the Air Force. Mainly I want to see how and where exactly they...

  11. The Hump Airlift. A better route to reduce losses?

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hump The wonderful C-54. The less admired but still useful C-87. Here is a link to the Wikipedia article describing the WW2 airlift carrying supplies and personnel from India to China. "The Hump." It's worth taking note of the astonishingly extremely high...

  12. Hadrian crosses the Atlantic. A historical oddity.

    Somebody had the idea of towing a CG-4A glider (Hadrian) across the North Atlantic. It seems a remarkably risky stunt even for WW2 times. Any problem on tow with the weather or turbulence causing a tow rope separation the glider crew would be down in those cold waters. But they crossed...

  13. Modern Spain if the Republicans had won the civil war.

    Considering what modern (2020) Spain is like just how different would modern Spain be if the Nationalists had lost and the Republicans had won the country? What different directions would Spain's economy had taken? Its political, cultural and social institutions? Autonomy for the Basque and...

  14. The German merchant raider problem in WW2. A Q-Ship solution?

    In WW2 the German Navy sent out merchant raiders to sink or capture Allied merchant ships. Not only warships like the Graf Spee but converted merchant ships like the Atlantis. These armed merchant cruisers were a significant threat to Allied shipping particularly in the first two years of the...

  15. The Pacific War begins without the Pearl Harbour raid. USN actions?

    The Japanese have initiated the Pacific War exactly as in OTL with the same attacks against the British and Commonwealth forces in Malaya and Hong Kong, the Dutch in the East Indies and the American forces in the Philippines. So yes, the U.S. is at war with Japan same as OTL. But the IJN have...

  16. The B-29. A different development path.

    Here is the "Hobo Queen." The only B-29 deployed to the ETO during WW2. She was displayed at several airbases in Britain for morale purposes and also to alarm German Intelligence. But perhaps things should have been different. In retrospect considering the high loss rates among the B-17 and...

  17. What do you get when you cross a DC-3 with a Shorts Skyvan?

    I don't know. It never happened. But perhaps it or something like it should have. The DC-3/C-47 was the work horse of the Allied, mostly American, air transport force for almost the entirety of WW2. And it performed very well at the job being a versatile, capable and reliable airplane. But for...

  18. F5F or F4F. Did the U.S. Navy make the right choice?

    Both of these fighters were built by Grumman. The F5F's performance was as good as the Grumman F6F Hellcat which wasn't introduced into service until early 1943. Because it wasn't possible to have the single engined Hellcat or Corsair put into service earlier because their engines (Pratt and...

  19. The P-38 with a P-51 type mounting for the radiators and coolers.

    Thinking about the OTL development of the P-38 the biggest change was from the earlier P-38 versions to the P-38J. This is the most visibly obvious change as the look of the front of the engines nacelles changes from the more streamlined shape to one more resembling the P-40s' nose. Glacier...

  20. No Pearl Harbour raid. Victory for Japan?

    What if the Japanese had decided against attacking Pearl Harbour when they started the Pacific War? In retrospect they didn't really need to as the U.S. Navy was no longer planning to adopt War Plan Orange to relieve the Philippines. The Japanese didn't know that but if the U.S. Navy had tried...
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