You will note that I've said 'DB-3/Il-4' above in the post. At ay rate - with Pe-2 and ANT-58 in production, it is time to phase that line of bombers.
More of the reasons to get working on the radios, pronto
Better Soviet Air Force in WW2
- Thread starter La Rouge Beret
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You will note that I've said 'DB-3/Il-4' above in the post. At ay rate - with Pe-2 and ANT-58 in production, it is time to phase that line of bombers.
More of the reasons to get working on the radios, pronto
Tu-2 and Pe-2 had shorter range then Il-4s. Soviets in my opinion were pretty effective on discontinuing aircrafts they didn't have need for. If they kept production till 1944 runing they probably had job for it.
Il-4 range was 3800 kms, Tu-2 range 2020 and Pe-2 range 1160 kms. Of course this varied with bombload. Il-4's were oftend used by long range bomber regiments as well as by naval aviation due to their range. And according to crews were able to take huge punishment.
Deleted member 1487
There was a limited pool of talent available and if they do focus on that, what do they lose out on in the meantime? Plus once the Germans invaded they largely ripped up the Soviet electronics industry, which IIRC was not prioritized for evacuation.More of the reasons to get working on the radios, pronto
Their aircraft guns were generally excellent being much lighter than most of their Western and Axis opponents with good reliability. One way to improve their industrial performance would be to stop Stalin shooting or exiling his best designers. I also think they had issues with the octane rating of their avgas which can't have helped with getting reliable high performance engines developed and fielded. Their fighters weren't as good as the British Spitfires and USAAF Mustangs; I read an account of some RAF Spitfire IX's being hassled by Soviet Yak9 fighters after VE Day and getting out-turned and out performed across the board.
I wouldn't say they lacked talents. What I read there were plenty of youn engineers with ideas. They lacked resources allocations in my opinion.
Yes, the DB-4 was known for it's long range.
If not the complete I-180 (hopefully with two cannons instead of the MGs), than at least the M-88B engine installed on the Yak-1 or LaGG-3 airframe - M88B was making 1000 HP at 6 km (without ram effect, or at 7+ km on max speed), where the M-105 was good just for ~820. The M-88 also being lighter due not having liquid cooling system.
It's actually shame I-180 was not given full support since 1938. It basically outperformed eveything Soviets put in production and much earlier. Same with I-185. Few were combat tried on frontlines over Soviet territory and pilots loved them. Saying I-185 is outeperforming enemy as well as L-L planes.
If they pushed for I-180/185 they would be much better off. Radio and formation improvements is must too.
Deleted member 1487
Do you have a source in english or online where I can use a translator? I'd like to read more about their program. As I understood the problem it wasn't something Stalin cared to focus on pre-war, so talent was encouraged into other fields. Post-war they really trained up people, but remained behind throughout the Cold War.
No. Just few articles I read some time ago. I remember many were working from Universities lab. I am not sure if they had set up big manufacturer ad Soviet used to like before WWII.
Shitokov comes to mind, designer of radio set A-7, Kobzarev (frequency stabilization), Kovalenkov.
Now come to mind. Radio mine. Explosions set up by radio control in occupied Kiev in 1941. I quess this was waste of resources and talents, especially development of whole system. Not radio bomb attack as such.
I guess you are right with evacuation of facilities too. For Soviets radar and radio import was huge help.
Ok I found Russian site about radio history -1 part about Soviet military radios in 30-ties till - 1945
http://www.rkk-museum.ru/WWII/WWII-2/WWII-2.shtml
Also it seems manufacturers were Leningrad, Moscow and later during war 2 or 3 more facilities were added further east
http://www.rkk-museum.ru/WWII/WWII-2/WWII-2.shtml
Also it seems manufacturers were Leningrad, Moscow and later during war 2 or 3 more facilities were added further east
I-185 of 650+- km/h means having the M-71 engine (18 cyl, 2000 HP) in production. That kind of power on a 15.53 m^2 wing will represent quite a challenge for non-expert pilots. The La-5 with M-71 was also that fast (supposedly making 685 km/h), but somewhat bigger wing will allow for a less tricky handling.
Weight of the I-185 and La-5, both versions with M-71, were the same.
From what I've read, the M-71, and the 2200 HP M-71F, were not produced due to not having any spare production capacity. Wind down the M-88 from Tumansky, accelerate the M-71 from Shvetsov?
Actually according to articles it wasn't so bad with piloting I-180. Final version I-185 was indeed getting Schvetsov M-82. Actually manufacturing was ordered but then cancelled as Schvetsov engines went into La-5 which was using almost same fusalage as La-3. Not dure how much M-82 could be acelerated. If it was due luck of facilities, how much time could be gained?
But if time was not lost since 1938, much more could be achieved.
Looking a bit on the I-185, notable is the wing profile - just 14% thick at the root, vs. for example the LaGG-3/La-5 with 16% (both used NACA 320 series wing profile). That, coupled with a phisically smaller wing will mean less drag = more speed on same engine, 35 km/h was supposed to be advantage of the I-185 vs. La-5, both with M-82. Hmm - have the I-185 enter production with M-82, leave the LaGG-3 mostly as-is?
M-82 was a development of M-80 and M-81. With M-71 also in developmentso IMO Svetsov's team was working as hard as it gets. cancel the M-71 even before the 'paper' stage is over so the M-82 is developed faster?
As with a lot of things, not pushing the military west into the territories secured in 1939-1940 would help. The VVS and VPO would benefit from both less logistical dislocation and better established airfields.
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The USSR sending young men to the US to be trained?
They would all be shot when they returned under suspicion of having become capitalist spies.
They did cancel the MiG-3 to free engine production for the Il-2, the AM-38 being built in the same plants as the high altitude AM-35.
They needed fighters, and most soviet fighters could double as fighter bombers, bomb carrying capability and rockets being more or less a standard requirement for VVS fighters since late model I-16. They built lots of fighters, and apart from a brief crises when factories were relocated the problem was never a shortage of fighters, rather their fighters being underpowered until the La-5. The better power to weight ratio of the German fighters allowed German pilots to dictate the terms of the fight, since they could out accelerate out climb and out dive soviet fighters.
Regarding the I-185 according to Yefim Gordon, the M--71 engine was not reliable enough (he says athat it was canceled despite several factories having spare capability) and by the time the I-185/M-82 could be produced the LA-5 had already been chosen.
The I-180 seem promising within its time frame, being better than the late model I-16 it was meant to replace, but remember that the performance figures for the prototypes are just that, and the carefully built prototypes would probably outperform series aircraft just as the I-26 was much better than typical stock Yak-1s.
The I-180 would have arguably done better than the I-16 against the Bf109F, but probably not much better or on pair with the Yak-1, so nothing gained in quality terms in 1941. There would have been more I-180 than OTL Yak-1 and Lagg-3, but the extra aircraft would probably have been destroyed on the ground in the initial German attacks.
There was nothing wrong with the Yak-1 that a reliable 1350HP engine wouldn't fix
The I-180 seem promising within its time frame, being better than the late model I-16 it was meant to replace, but remember that the performance figures for the prototypes are just that, and the carefully built prototypes would probably outperform series aircraft just as the I-26 was much better than typical stock Yak-1s.
The I-180 would have arguably done better than the I-16 against the Bf109F, but probably not much better or on pair with the Yak-1, so nothing gained in quality terms in 1941. There would have been more I-180 than OTL Yak-1 and Lagg-3, but the extra aircraft would probably have been destroyed on the ground in the initial German attacks.
There was nothing wrong with the Yak-1 that a reliable 1350HP engine wouldn't fix
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The VK-105PF was making 1350 HP for take-off in late 1943, it was still making just ~1050 HP at 4 km just like the old daddy M-105. In other words - it's altitude power was just about equal as what DB 601A was making in 1939. The reliable VK-105PD, with a 2-stage compressor, would've been a good thing with overheating issues cured in a timely manner, power was supposed to be 1160 HP at ~7km.
But at any rate, the M-82 line and Mikulin engines do offer a much better power by virtue of their much greater displacement.
Hi guys,
I have toyed with this idea too, i think most of it is covered already i.e. build the I-180 and then the I-185 (this might mean no Lavochkins, at least not until later in the war, as Polikarpov died in 1944, but the LaGG-3 was not that good anyway, while the I-185 should be a bit better compared to early La-5, and with similar deveopment path should remain slightly better- in this case the war winning fighters being Yaks and Polikarpovs, probably called Po-1, Po-3 etc.), however i would also want the I-17 built instead of the I-153 biplanes, at first with an M-100 engine and then an M-103. I also want the MiG-3 with two 20mm cannons instead of the OTL guns, the Il-2 with gunner from the start, the Tu-2 as early as possible etc. Finally i want the Pe-8 built in numbers at least before the war (for this Stalin must leave Tupolev alone and indeed as others say leave the builders, designers, engineers etc.etc. alone) with whatever engines are available, they ought to be better what the TB-3 regardless. Preferably at least several good hundreds must be available in 1941, which could be used to attack Ploiesti, and if the war goes better for USSR then they can manufacture few thousands more during the war.
Oh and of course, above all, don't get caught with the pants down! If they have these better machines, don't get caught and don't get slaughtered for little gain in hasty unescorted attacks, regardless how formidable the Luftwaffe we know was, they would be drowned by the soviet numerical superiority (and significantly closer technically) much sooner than in OTL. Off the top of my head the soviets lost something like 20,000 tanks and 20,000 planes by end 1941, imagine what they could do in their winter counteroffensive (which if they are not suprised could have the germans advance significantly less eastwards) if they would have lost 5000 less tanks and 5000 less planes, and have THOSE on hand in addition to the OTL forces.
I have toyed with this idea too, i think most of it is covered already i.e. build the I-180 and then the I-185 (this might mean no Lavochkins, at least not until later in the war, as Polikarpov died in 1944, but the LaGG-3 was not that good anyway, while the I-185 should be a bit better compared to early La-5, and with similar deveopment path should remain slightly better- in this case the war winning fighters being Yaks and Polikarpovs, probably called Po-1, Po-3 etc.), however i would also want the I-17 built instead of the I-153 biplanes, at first with an M-100 engine and then an M-103. I also want the MiG-3 with two 20mm cannons instead of the OTL guns, the Il-2 with gunner from the start, the Tu-2 as early as possible etc. Finally i want the Pe-8 built in numbers at least before the war (for this Stalin must leave Tupolev alone and indeed as others say leave the builders, designers, engineers etc.etc. alone) with whatever engines are available, they ought to be better what the TB-3 regardless. Preferably at least several good hundreds must be available in 1941, which could be used to attack Ploiesti, and if the war goes better for USSR then they can manufacture few thousands more during the war.
Oh and of course, above all, don't get caught with the pants down! If they have these better machines, don't get caught and don't get slaughtered for little gain in hasty unescorted attacks, regardless how formidable the Luftwaffe we know was, they would be drowned by the soviet numerical superiority (and significantly closer technically) much sooner than in OTL. Off the top of my head the soviets lost something like 20,000 tanks and 20,000 planes by end 1941, imagine what they could do in their winter counteroffensive (which if they are not suprised could have the germans advance significantly less eastwards) if they would have lost 5000 less tanks and 5000 less planes, and have THOSE on hand in addition to the OTL forces.