DougM
Donor
The problem is very simple, where are you refueling the bombers (in the Eurpean theater) at?
To be of much use the refueling is going to have to be basically over Germany some place. But even today or during the height of the Cold War we did plan refueling over enemy territory.
So in order to avoid refueling over enemy held territory you have to basically refuel over England, so what is the point?
Now for long distance patrol that may be a bit different. But even then you are going to need a lot of tankers. As the tanker has to fly out and fuel the patrol craft then it returns while the patrol craft continues. But to get best range you need to refuel the patrol craft on the way back so you need another tanker.
If you look at what we do with refueling today you will find that it is not that useful in a WW2 setting. We use refueling to allow us to fly bombing missions from distant bases but usually the refueling aircraft are stationed closer to the destination. Of if flying from similar distance then it is a situation that we are flying missions from rediculus distance like B52s from the Continental US to the Middle East. And we only enter contested airspace in the last few hundred miles This was not the case in WW2. In general we got our air bases as close as we could to the target and thus we didn’t fly that far in uncontested airspace where we could refuel. Obviously the Pacific was a bit different but even then it was only flying raids from China to Japan that refueling would have helped and as stated the issue then is. The number of aircraft having to be refueled. The ability to find your tanker aircraft (especially hard to do on the outbound leg without giving away the refueling location) and the vulnerability of the refueling aircraft if detected.
As for the patrol aircraft. That is a bit different, you will note that today we tend to refuel small aircraft from large aircraft or we refuel large aircraft with heavy weapons loads from large aircraft with no weapons load. And neither of those really describe a patrol aircraft all that well. A patrol aircraft can be as large as you want to build it. It doesn’t need to maneuver that well and it needs little to no weapons. None if it is a scout and little if it is anti sub. So the reality is that the patrol aircraft will have extremely long range. So long that your tanker aircraft will have difficulty matching that range with enough fuel to refill the patrol aircrafts tanks.
Thank about this
Patrol Aircraft (called PC from here on) flys out X distance on internal fuel so Refueling Aircraft (RC) has to fly out X distance to refuel it. Assuming similar size aircraft of similar load that means RC needs to carry 3 times PCs fuel. As it needs to fly out X, back X and transfer X distance of fuel to PC. So in order to match this PC is has 2X of weapons. And that is over kill.
So if we say that PC has X +X fuel and X weight of weapons that means that you only get half the fuel from RC. So in order to double the range of the patrol Aircraft you need TWO tankers on outbound leg. Then you need two more on inbound leg.
So you need 4 tankers per Patrol and you need to find the second group of tankers in the middle of the ocean.
Good luck with that. Navigation was a pain over the open ocean in WW2 aircraft (Remember those lost Avengers out of Florida after the war?)
Frankly it would have been simpler to build tanker ships and flying boats or to just use baby Carriers.
To be of much use the refueling is going to have to be basically over Germany some place. But even today or during the height of the Cold War we did plan refueling over enemy territory.
So in order to avoid refueling over enemy held territory you have to basically refuel over England, so what is the point?
Now for long distance patrol that may be a bit different. But even then you are going to need a lot of tankers. As the tanker has to fly out and fuel the patrol craft then it returns while the patrol craft continues. But to get best range you need to refuel the patrol craft on the way back so you need another tanker.
If you look at what we do with refueling today you will find that it is not that useful in a WW2 setting. We use refueling to allow us to fly bombing missions from distant bases but usually the refueling aircraft are stationed closer to the destination. Of if flying from similar distance then it is a situation that we are flying missions from rediculus distance like B52s from the Continental US to the Middle East. And we only enter contested airspace in the last few hundred miles This was not the case in WW2. In general we got our air bases as close as we could to the target and thus we didn’t fly that far in uncontested airspace where we could refuel. Obviously the Pacific was a bit different but even then it was only flying raids from China to Japan that refueling would have helped and as stated the issue then is. The number of aircraft having to be refueled. The ability to find your tanker aircraft (especially hard to do on the outbound leg without giving away the refueling location) and the vulnerability of the refueling aircraft if detected.
As for the patrol aircraft. That is a bit different, you will note that today we tend to refuel small aircraft from large aircraft or we refuel large aircraft with heavy weapons loads from large aircraft with no weapons load. And neither of those really describe a patrol aircraft all that well. A patrol aircraft can be as large as you want to build it. It doesn’t need to maneuver that well and it needs little to no weapons. None if it is a scout and little if it is anti sub. So the reality is that the patrol aircraft will have extremely long range. So long that your tanker aircraft will have difficulty matching that range with enough fuel to refill the patrol aircrafts tanks.
Thank about this
Patrol Aircraft (called PC from here on) flys out X distance on internal fuel so Refueling Aircraft (RC) has to fly out X distance to refuel it. Assuming similar size aircraft of similar load that means RC needs to carry 3 times PCs fuel. As it needs to fly out X, back X and transfer X distance of fuel to PC. So in order to match this PC is has 2X of weapons. And that is over kill.
So if we say that PC has X +X fuel and X weight of weapons that means that you only get half the fuel from RC. So in order to double the range of the patrol Aircraft you need TWO tankers on outbound leg. Then you need two more on inbound leg.
So you need 4 tankers per Patrol and you need to find the second group of tankers in the middle of the ocean.
Good luck with that. Navigation was a pain over the open ocean in WW2 aircraft (Remember those lost Avengers out of Florida after the war?)
Frankly it would have been simpler to build tanker ships and flying boats or to just use baby Carriers.