The people who decided to call the Avro Type 683 the Lancaster Mk I would have saved me
a lot of bother had decided to stick to its original name, which was Manchester Mk III.
I called the thread
"Have the Avro Manchester be more successful" instead of
"Have the Avro Lancaster be more successful" because the earlier change of engines wouldn't precipitate the change of name. If it had done the Halifax would have been renamed when the Air Ministry allowed Handley Page to change the design from two Vultures to four Merlins.
I did think of naming the thread
"Reverse the Manchester/Lancaster and Halifax". That is The Air Ministry allows Avro to redesign their Spec. P.13/36 aircraft around four Merlins and Handley Page has to stick to two Vultures.
I can live with that. As BSM Williams would often say,
"Oh dear! How sad! Never mind!"
I'll tell you what I want, what I really, really want is for:
- Avro and Metrovick to build four-Merlin Manchester Mk IIIs (Lancasters) instead of the two-Vulture Manchester Mk Is that they built IOTL.
- Avro to build more Lancasters instead of some of the 1,000 Blenheims that it built IOTL. Avro had to build the Blenheim for longer than intended because the Manchester/Lancaster was delayed.
- Armstrong-Whitworth to build more Lancasters instead of many of the 1,814 Whitley's that it built IOTL. The Whitley had to be kept into production for longer than intended because the Manchester/Lancaster was delayed. The firm delivered 664 Whitleys to December 1940 including the two prototypes. Therefore, I want the extra Lancasters to be built instead of the last 1,150 Whitleys that were delivered between December 1940 and March 1943.
- IOTL A.W. Hawksley built 602 Armstrong Whitworth Albermarles (out of 1,280 ordered) that were delivered between October 1940 and May 1945. ITTL I want the firm to built Lancaster Mk IIs with Hercules engines in their place.
- Fairey's Stockport factory was to have built Manchesters IOTL and a contract for 150 was placed in 1939. However, the contract was cancelled and the firm built 662 Halifaxes (of 1,030 ordered) instead that were delivered from October 1942. I want Fairey to build 662 Lancasters from October 1942 ITTL.
- IOTL Austin built:
- 1,029 Fairey Battles (of 1,263 ordered) that were delivered from July 1938 to October 1940.
- 300 Hawker Hurricanes (of 400 ordered) that were delivered between February 1941 and October 1942.
- 620 Short Stirling Mk III (of 620 ordered) that were delivered between December 1940 and June 1943.
- 330 Avro Lancasters (of 770 ordered) that were delivered between March 1944 and December 1945. 290 of the 440 cancelled Lancasters were re-ordered as Lincolns, but they were cancelled too.
- ITTL I want Austin to build more Lancasters instead of the Hurricanes and Stirlings. The aircraft built instead of the Stirling would be Lancaster Mk IIs with Hercules engines.
- 235 Lancasters (of 1,620 ordered) were built by Vickers, Chester. They were delivered between June 1944 instead of September 1945. However, I want the factory to build more Lancasters instead of most of the 5,540 Wellingtons (of 6,172 ordered) that delivered between August 1939 and July 1945.
- Vickers, Blackpool didn't built any Lancasters IOTL and AFAIK their were no plans to do so. However, they did deliver 3,406 Wellingtons (of 5,191 ordered) between August 1940 and October 1945. I want it to build Lancasters instead of this aircraft ITTL.
- Short & Harland didn't built any Lancasters IOTL but they did receive a contract for 400 (including 200 re-ordered as Lincolns) that was cancelled at the end of the war. However, the firm did built 1,218 Short Stirlings (of 1,475 ordered) that were delivered between October 1940 and December 1945. ITTL I want S&H to built 1,218 Lancaster Mk II with Hercules engines in their place.
- There were plans to build Short Stirlings in Canada. These would have been Mk IIs with Wright Cyclone engines. According to Putnams Canadian Aircraft since 1909. "150 Stirlings were ordered in January 1940. The total was reduced to 140 in March and the contract was cancelled altogether in June to release material for Hurricanes. The order was reinstated in August 1940 and cancelled for the final time in January 1941." Air Britain's Royal Air Force Aircraft W1000 to Z9999 has serials for 140 aircraft in the range X5139 to X5319 (with gaps) and that these 140 aircraft were ordered from Canadian Associated Aircraft to Contract SB.103. 430 Lancasters, one York and one Lincoln were built in Canada by Victory Aircraft (from a contract for 750) and delivered between September 1943 and August 1945. ITTL I want 140 Lancasters with Cyclone engines to be built in Canada instead of the cancelled contract for 140 Stirling Mk IIs.
I know that a one-to-one substitution of Lancasters for some of these aircraft will be difficult if not impossible because of the extra raw material and labour required for the airframes and the extra engines. However, the improvement in quality would more than make up for the loss of quantity.