A better Hawker Hurricane

More unlikely. The irony would be that they would use German designed guns to shoot down German bombers. Nothing ironic in using an ally weapons, even if you only find out its an ally after the deal. Now MiG15s with nene derived engines shooting down meteors over Korea, that was ironic:cool:

It would be more ironic if the Meteors were armed with ADEN cannons.
 
Probably this is ASB, but was it possible for the Hurry to get a turbocharged Merlin?

Was it possible for Allison to offer engines? Say, for Canadian-built examples?
 
Probably this is ASB, but was it possible for the Hurry to get a turbocharged Merlin?

Was it possible for Allison to offer engines? Say, for Canadian-built examples?

The turbo-charged Merlin was considered and rejected in lieu of the sixty series.
It was never considered for the Hurri.

It was possible for Canadian Hurricanes to get Packard-built Merlins, and the trouble of re-engineering the Hurri to take a different engine offering no advantages never became a factor. Why would you consider it?
 
Given the 1939-1940 time frame, there is probably not a whole lot that could have been done to drastically improve the Hurricane until the BoB was basically over. Actually, it was a fine fighter for the time it was most needed, and an RAF consisting solely of Huricanes could still probably have defeated the Luftwaffe in the BoB. I think introduction of a bubble or blown canopy would be a cosmetic improvement at best. Introducing a newer thinner wing would probably require a virtual redesign (plus the new wing would be less easily adapted for ground attack). Probably, as others have noted, the best improvement would be replacing the eight .303 MGs with a more potent mix of .50 cal guns and 20 mm cannon, but the Spit had the same "flaw".

I think the best thing that could be done with the Hurri is what happened. Convert it a dedicated ground atack machine as soon as feasible, but unlike the Stuka and Sturmovik, it would be a ground attacker that retained at least some abililty to mix it up with fighters if necessary.
 
Buying from the Germans might be a little to ironic for OTL. The Russians needed cash, so why not buy the rights for the ShVAK instead? (and buy the ShVAK while at it) It was a better gun than the Mauser FF, and had proved reliable in fighters since tested in the I16P of 1936...
A weapons fit of two ShVAK and four ShKAS would have given alternative Hurricanes and Spitfires impressive firepower.
Back in 1937 armour protection and self sealing tanks were rare, wich explains the allure of lots of rifle caliber bullets, but the French and russians at least at recognised the need for cannons in fighters from early on.

Sounds like a good solution. Nice idea
 
One other thing during the mid thirties there was a strong push for a polish fighter which on paper was superior to both aircraft but was shot down by the aircraft manufacturers and national pride. regards

Interesting. The P11 used the Bristol Mercury engine I believe. Same type as the Gladiator. I'd wondered before about a British version of the gull winged P11 instead of the Gladiator but thought it too far fetched.
 

amphibulous

Banned
I think the best thing that could be done with the Hurri is what happened. Convert it a dedicated ground atack machine as soon as feasible, but unlike the Stuka and Sturmovik, it would be a ground attacker that retained at least some abililty to mix it up with fighters if necessary.


It was a pretty lousy ground attack aircraft though. From wikipedia:

The Mk IV was used in ground-attack missions in the European theatre until the early days of 1944, before being replaced by the more modern Hawker Typhoon. French ace Pierre Clostermann recalls in his book, The Big Show, that RP-3-equipped Hurricanes were limited to 205 mph (330 km/h) top speed due to the rockets' drag, and that Hurricane casualty rates against the lethal German flak were extremely high. In particular, Clostermann describes a rocket attack by Hurricanes from No. 184 Squadron RAF against a V-1 flying bomb launch-site on the French coast on 20 December 1943, in which three of the four aircraft were shot down before they could attack.


A reasonably optimized ground attacker would have used a radial and/or twin engines, had enough power to fly at reasonable speeds while armed - and would probably have had an internal gun. The A10 was inspired by a German WW2 aircraft of this spec, but I can't remember what it was called - it never got a decent priority for engines so very few were built.
 
Fair enough everyone. I'm convinced that, with the Spitfire already replacing home defence Hurricanes and the Typhoon well advanced that the Hurricane isn't going to be developed much further as a day fighter. As far as planning was concerned all the old Hurricane had to do was face up to the Italians over Africa who were equipped with fighters comparable to the Hurricane. Maybe it wasn't expected then that Hurricanes would be mixing it with the latest Me109s over Greece, Malta and the desert and I suppose the Japanese fighters weren't even considered.

Unless the RAF were blessed with hindsight then there would be no reason to develop the Hurricane further, except for ground attack. Even with hindsight they might have decided that they needed a more potent fighter in secondary theatres and replaced the Hurricane with something else entirely.

I have enjoyed the speculations over gun armament though. I like the Russian solution best.
 

amphibulous

Banned
Yes! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henschel_Hs_129

It's a pity Bill Lind's site "Defense and the National Interest" site isn't still up. He and some of the other people involved with the A10 (and the F16 - John Boyd and Pierre Sprey et al) had some very interesting analysis up. They had a model showing that the Germans would have done ***much*** better in Russia if they'd stopped producing twin engine medium bombers and put the resources into Stukas or 129s instead.

Interestingly the British had a superb auto feed mechanism for a a big gun in a Mosquito variant. This was compatible with recoiless guns, which could have been used very nicely from twin boom aircraft - as was planned for the Bronco. An aircraft like this could used have full sized shaped charge rounds to kill anything on a WW2 battleground.
 
Just Leo said:
The turbo-charged Merlin was considered and rejected in lieu of the sixty series.
It was never considered for the Hurri.
I suspected not.
Just Leo said:
It was possible for Canadian Hurricanes to get Packard-built Merlins, and the trouble of re-engineering the Hurri to take a different engine offering no advantages never became a factor. Why would you consider it?
Just thinking out loud, say it the Packards weren't available (for some reason).
EAF602Whizz said:
I have enjoyed the speculations over gun armament though. I like the Russian solution best.
Me, too.;) It does raise issues of ammo supply, tho: if the ShKAS burns through ammo so fast, you'd want to carry quite a bit more...:eek:
 
The Soviets liked the "Russian solution" the best as well. Four ShVAK cannon were too heavy. Four UBT 12.7 guns were considered optimum, but due to shortage of supplies, two UBT and two ShVAK were chosen when required.
 

Sior

Banned
It was a pretty lousy ground attack aircraft though. From wikipedia:

The Mk IV was used in ground-attack missions in the European theatre until the early days of 1944, before being replaced by the more modern Hawker Typhoon. French ace Pierre Clostermann recalls in his book, The Big Show, that RP-3-equipped Hurricanes were limited to 205 mph (330 km/h) top speed due to the rockets' drag, and that Hurricane casualty rates against the lethal German flak were extremely high. In particular, Clostermann describes a rocket attack by Hurricanes from No. 184 Squadron RAF against a V-1 flying bomb launch-site on the French coast on 20 December 1943, in which three of the four aircraft were shot down before they could attack.

A reasonably optimized ground attacker would have used a radial and/or twin engines, had enough power to fly at reasonable speeds while armed - and would probably have had an internal gun. The A10 was inspired by a German WW2 aircraft of this spec, but I can't remember what it was called - it never got a decent priority for engines so very few were built.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henschel_Hs_129
 
Interestingly the British had a superb auto feed mechanism for a a big gun in a Mosquito variant. This was compatible with recoiless guns, which could have been used very nicely from twin boom aircraft - as was planned for the Bronco. An aircraft like this could used have full sized shaped charge rounds to kill anything on a WW2 battleground.

Good God! An airborne Wombat!

Now that would deal with anything short of a concrete u boat pen. 120mm HESH rounds at 55rpm.

The Dutch Fokker G1 might be suitably modified.
 
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