Ekhronoplanes effect on operation sea lion
- Thread starter Munrojock2
- Start date
Much of the discussion here has made the (not unreasonable) assumption of a cross-channel invasion. Maybe these craft could be used to attack from unexpected vectors. For example, a rapid assault from Norway into Northumberland, or from the German or Dutch coast on Norfolk. Perhaps a simultaneous approach in an attempt to swamp the British with landing sites. Might make a good movie, but still doesn’t change the result though.
Maybe they can take the Shetlands first and use that as a build up area and forward base.
nbcman
Donor
Maybe they can take Ellis Island first. We are innocent german refugees and our ekhronoplanes are simple Kraft durch Freude ships.
Given how useless and expensive ekranoplans were and remain, it's surprising no one in the Third Reich had conceived them and then wasted an enormous amount of resources to build some half-working model just in time for it to get strafed by some bemused American or British pilot and for the wreck to be captured by an equally bemused Soviet tank commander. But we would have some fun model kits now. But yeah, Sealion is still impossible, even if the Luftwaffe (or is it the Kriegsmarine) have a Kornweihe of their own.
I see this plan totally working, because the British, watching the Germans laboriously put this plan into operation, would all die from strokes from laughing too hard.
350 miles an hour is fast by WW2 fighter standard. A 1930s Wing in Ground Effect aircraft built as a transport will certainly be slower both due to the level of drag inherent in a relatively boxy transport plane and due to the much lower power available to throw at the problem than in the 1960s-80s (likely 2-4 800-1200 HP class piston engines vs multiple turboprops and turbofans each with >10,000 HP). The engine power available will also limit practical cargo/personnel lift, rather than being able to deliver a company of infantry or 20 tons of cargo you're likely looks something more like a platoon or five tons of cargo (and that's if you get the 4x 1200 HP engines rather than 2x800 HP...), and you're certainly not gonna be able to move tanks and trucks by the dozen to hundreds. So, you're Erkanoplans are probably limited to landing light infantry only.
So, that make your Erkanoplans looks decidedly less good but still maybe useful (e.g. light inf descending out of nowhere to grab a port might make a followup landings of heavy equipment much easier), but there's competition for those engines you need.... Goering wants his bomber, fighter and transport planes, so you're maybe (if everything goes well) gonna be able to shake loose enough engines for maybe 100-200 Erkanoplans (being optimistic...).
Then, well, you're working with 1940s avionics and control systems. Operating your Erkanoplans in any poor weather will be rather non-ideal in the collisions; wrapping Erkanoplans round masts and going into but not out of waves kinda non-ideal.
TDM
Kicked
make in an "88" I remember a poster here who in one of these threads was convinced that RN destroyers would be scared off by 88's nailed to coal barges
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TDM
Kicked
I never get this one, the Vikings managed amphibious assaults on the British islands perfectly well
!Aha! My brilliant idea solves that problem. One eliminates the need for extra takeoff engines by launching them down ski ramps off the Cap Blanc Nez chalk cliffs. These will totally not launch half the planes directly into the water; nor - since one can simply paint them white - will they be noticed during construction by artillery spotters in Dover for whom they are within easy range.
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The OTL attitude to other occupied countries appeared to involve a lot of not caring if the local population went hungry or starved. I can't see why they'd make an exception for Britain.
I think that's the point.I never get this one, the Vikings managed amphibious assaults on the British islands perfectly well
TDM
Kicked
See I first thought (as in the viking is telling the later guys what they should have done), but he look really depressed about it and dinghies doesn't make much sense as a suggestion in general or for a viking