Khanzeer
Banned
Can we have a british " mig15"[ let's call it hawker cossack ] be so successful that it replaces F86 as the interceptor of choice for most NATO and western allies ?
Britain develops the MIG 15 not the Soviets.
- Thread starter Peg Leg Pom
- Start date
Can Britain undercut the US? It should be an easy sell to Commonwealth Air forces at least.
Despite the British being bankrupt after WW2, a number of industries could have probably benefited from them better utilizing more captured German/Italian research and the services of many engineers as war reparations. Perhaps a post-war scenario with a number of pre-war (to pre-1900) PODs would have placed a now solvent post-war ATL UK in a better position to readily appropriate defeated German/Italian research. Think the DKW RT 125-based BSA Bantam motorcycle (that remained in production for 23 years until 1971) was one of the few examples of the British appropriating German/etc designs as war reparations.
It would be interesting to see how the British would adopt and further build upon German research in terms of aircraft and other military equipment.
It would be interesting to see how the British would adopt and further build upon German research in terms of aircraft and other military equipment.
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Differences between how effective the F 86 and MIG 15 were are largely down to training and experience levels for the pilots. Soviet sights were inferior as well, but that wouldn't be an issue with a British MIG. It should be said the F 86's armament was very inadequate for even the mid 1940's let alone the Korean war.
SsgtC
Banned
I think @Khanzeer was referring to the fact that the F-86 design lent itself to the ground attack role much more readily than the MiG-15 did. Not that the F-86 was just a better plane. As you noted, it had several deficiencies compared to the MiG and in the air, the two were so closely matched, it really was the pilot that made the difference.
Bristol Bandit?
Armstrong Whitworth Assassin?
Folland Foxbat?
Supermarine Spectre?
Avro Arrow?
Armstrong Whitworth Assassin?
Folland Foxbat?
Supermarine Spectre?
Avro Arrow?
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Would have thought that the Hawker P.1051 or P.1081 would pretty much fit the bill here. Perhaps the swept-wing P.1081 gets built earlier, rather than the straight winged Sea Hawk?
That's what I was thinking. That and also swept-wing versions of the Gloster G.A.2 Ace, Supermarine Attacker and De Havilland Venom and Sea Venom.
The swept-wing Attacker would be the Supermarine Type 510 built earlier and the swept-wing DH.112 Venom/Sea Venom would be the DH116 proposal brought forward.
A British Operation Paperclip sounds a lot like the second paragraph of Derek Wood's Scenario 1945.Brits do a Op. Paperclip and get Kurt Tank, along with the Focke Wulf facilities they did OTL
He finishes off this
and after the changes needed to go from Napkinwaffe to real production aircraft, it looks real similar to what the MiG15 looked like
Wonder how the British would be able to justify their own ATL equivalent of Operation Paperclip later on? Perhaps earlier pre-war (and pre-1900) PODs would allow them to claim the German/Italian/etc contribution has been significantly overstated?
Steve Koerner's book - The Strange Death of the British Motorcycle Industry also notes the British motorcycle industry could have also benefited from appropriating German and Italian research/designs as war reparations (along with developing motorcycles geared towards regular people and women outside of the small Cafe Racer demographic during the pre-war era akin to scooters/mopeds/etc like the Vespa/Lamretta/etc).
Roy Fedden's own government-backed People's Car project could have probably been fast-tracked had he abandoned his flawed radial engined attempt and instead accepted the plans for the Volkswagen Beetle (albeit copied with possibly different bodywork in a concession to anti-German sentiment of the British public at the time) along with the services of Ferdinand Porsche as war reparations at a Wolfsburg-like works town located Stoke Orchard in Gloucestershire (the plans of the Beetle and Porsche's services were being offered around to other British carmakers with many either hating, deriding or in some cases even laughing at the Beetle as all felt they could do better and had nothing to fear only to soon regret it by around 1954).
The DKW RT 125-based BSA Bantam meanwhile suggests the company in better circumstances could have followed up with appropriating a British-captured DKW F9 prototype as war reparations for a revived BSA marque in place of the pre-war FWD BSA Scout (and post-war Lanchester marque).
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The 'People's Car' of 1948 was not the Beetle of 1960 that most people think of
Advertising would like you to think that Types 1 were hardly changed since Wolfsburg started building them, but that 1947 car had a lot more in common with the Fords of the '20s than the Beetle of 1960
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25HP, 62 MPH top speed, and 39 seconds to get there from zero from the 1131 cc engine
noisy, both gear and engine sounds, deadening insulation(Cardboard) would be added later
unsynchronized four-speed gear box. mid 1950s before all gears got syncros
No gas gauge
Glovebox had no door, just a big cubbyhole
No radio option, or place in the dash for one, Dash needed to be sawed out.
Cable operated Brakes, hydraulic came later
Manual operation for fan cooling settings
Semaphores, not electric turn signals, and the control was on the dashboard
Heater that barely worked, no fan
And if the 6v electric starter wouldn't turn it over fast enough, it still had a starting crank.
And just like Henry liked, any color you wanted, as long as it was black.
No brightwork, everything was painted. No Chrome till 1949, along with high gloss paint
There were some good bones to the design, but hard to see at the time
Wulfsburg had been bombed, and had been making the Kübelwagen, the main differences that besides the
'bucket' body, used larger 18" wheels and portal axles on the rear, for better ground clearance and addition
lower ratio gearing for better offroad performance, along with a limited slip locking differential, so it have
very good offroad mobility.
These features were dropped, though the portal axles returned for the Bus.
While the main factory had been only had minor damage, the subcontractor that made the Kübelwagen bodies
had been wrecked.
So while facilities for making tens of thousands of chassis was available, the body line for the Type 1
Strength thru Joy body, were not really set for mass production at the end of the War.
That's why Ford and then the British really passed on the design. The Beetle body just wasn't that good compared
to 1939 Designs
Recall, that the Type I was sized for two Adults in front, and two kids in back
In Hindsight, its possible that they could have come up with a different body that didn't look like the Kübelwagen
or the Type I, and avoid much of the 'Hitlers Revenge' that people initially saw
UK had a lot of Coach builders, and the Volkswagen chassis could show it's true mettle there, like someone competing with Rover
Series I for Utility Vehicles.
Wulfsburg had what was today is called AWD for making the Schwimmwagen 4WD, and a PTO for the propeller could be used for agriculture implements
Am assuming development of the ATL Fedden rebodied "Beetle" would not remain static, rather it would eventually diverge from the OTL Beetle like between the IFA F9 and DKW F91 that were in turn both derived from the pre-war DKW F9 (prior to eventually diverging much further from each other as IFA produced both the Trabant and Wartburg). OTOH it is easy to see ATL VW-inspired Fedden being tied to the rear-engine layout, at the same time unlike Volkswagen they would probably try to replace their rebodied "Beetle", spawn other models and embrace a Type 3-like pancake engine layout much earlier.
Despite featuring a 12 hp Flat-Twin from some Volkswagen Tractor project (based off half the original 24-25 hp 985-1131cc Flat-4s with the tooling for the engine allegedly being destroyed during the war) as well as arguably using the wrong team of stylists and definitely lacking performance (especially if the later flat-twin powered Volkswagen EA48 prototypes are any indication), the 1949 Little Jimmy project by Craig Miller of the Rootes Group (Autopuzzles) also gives some idea as to how Fedden could have evolved with developing a similar sub-"Beetle" model (not to be confused with the pre-war front-engined little jim project also by Rootes).
Attachments
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Little Jimmy 1949 rootes craig miller vw rear engine (1).jpg -
Little Jimmy 1949 rootes craig miller vw rear engine (2).jpg
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That would be a good start. Conventional, if bland styling onto a bulletproof chassis, built in the UK with some tooling from Wulfsburg.
ATL VW will still be able to do their Type I, and will help the recovering West German economy, but not to the degree of OTL
Rootes and VW will later have trivia questions of 'Separated at Birth??' trivia questions
A VW chassis with the Rootes body ontop could be mass produced and exported in large numbers, just what the UK wanted to do.
As you say, they would not lock into that body forever, but regular updates, just as everyone else was doing, mechanical chassis upgrades as well, with the progression to a 'Type III' years earlier with the pancake engine and trailing arm setup
seen here with a few hop ups
Sorry for being late to the party.
If I remember correctly, the design for the F104 was heavily influenced by interviews with pilots in Korea talking about the sort of aircraft they thought they needed to fight jets like the MiG 15. Without that experience in Korea, the Starfighter program would be butterflied and the entire 'Century Series' might end up being very different.
Wulfsburg was able to make a few hundred Type Is during the War, but was not set for high volume production of any body type at the start. much of the factory was unfinished, and what was there was prioritized for Kübelwagen chassis production
That would be a good start. Conventional, if bland styling onto a bulletproof chassis, built in the UK with some tooling from Wulfsburg.
ATL VW will still be able to do their Type I, and will help the recovering West German economy, but not to the degree of OTL
Rootes and VW will later have trivia questions of 'Separated at Birth??' trivia questions
A VW chassis with the Rootes body ontop could be mass produced and exported in large numbers, just what the UK wanted to do.
As you say, they would not lock into that body forever, but regular updates, just as everyone else was doing, mechanical chassis upgrades as well, with the progression to a 'Type III' years earlier with the pancake engine and trailing arm setup
seen here with a few hop ups
Believe the 1949 Little Jimmy project by Craig Miller of the Rootes Group was not an official project, though could see it being passed on to Fedden via the British government in turn for a more favorable position in the post-war period (akin to how the Simca 1000 was originally a Fiat project).
Thank you but again who actually made the bodies postwar for the British Army's new production of VWs?