Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Could the US have landed at Omaha Beach with less casualties?

figfhting Frogs and Gunies is not the same as Germans.

I shall have to read Atkinson’s “The Guns at Last Light” again, the last part of his outstanding WWII trilogy. It might have been there I read of American incredulity when British troops in Normandy insisted on 4pm tea breaks.

That rang a bell with me, who grew up in 1960’s Working Class England. The often petty demands of the omnipresent trade unions absolutely crippled British industry, contributing in a major way to its decline. Sounded like a similar mindset at play in Normandy.

We might mention the Dieppe disaster- Operation Jubilee- 1942, at this point. It should have never went forward after original plan for naval and bomber support was removed. Waste of life to placate Stalin and get a few
Americans killed in the process. The Brits own that one.

I did read a report of another landing where some Brits were onboard American ships and were furious with what they considered cowardice of craft staying too far from shore. Still looking for that and will share if I find.

For instance, The Philippines. Nimitz argued hard for bypassing them. FDR was persuaded by you know who.

Sure, they could have... could you imagine what could have been had the military and congress not been so skeptical and afraid of air transportation when it came to troops. The U.S. blew its chance back in early '42 when Kaiser and Hughs wanted to build the Hercules... had they gotten fully behind the idea instead of restricting materials used and considering it as a crazy idea. Things would have been very different. It would have been completed well within the time frame of D-Day. With a capacity of 750 fully armed troops instead of the C-47's messily 28, and once we had air superiority it could have easily landed battalions behind enemy lines using Frances larger lakes and bays. Germany wasn't expecting invasion by air, even though they had made great use of large transports themselves. Throughout all of WW2 the U.S. was far superior in ability to manufacture in great numbers. But was drastically outclassed in technology and the willingness to follow-through with ideas that they stooped to using manpower in ways as it it was still the civil war.


Phil

interesting thought Greyghost. It is hard to fault them for not approving the air invasion. That is a lot of eggs in every basket and air crew\air plane losses were still horrendous, especailly in '42. Higher casualty rates than marines. Thinking that was in their heads and even with air superiority you would have to account for antiaircraft. I suppose it if were possible to land within range of naval bombardment and combine air forces with naval support ....might have been an interesting tactic. Being able to land plane after plane behind enemy lines though.......logistics and supply headache.

Gliders seemed a brilliant idea for D-day. Would not have wanted to be in one but I like the out of boxness of it.

At that time massive air invasion was really not feasible due to the casualty rate. Take a look at the the Me323 losses. The sent 27 fully loaded across to North Africa at one point in 1943, about 3,510 troops. They lost 17 with about 2,210 troops killed something like 60+ percent losses. That level is not sustainable.

I agree that the HK-1 could have made a major contribution to the war effort, but even with massively increased funding they could not possibly have manufactured enough working aircraft to enter combat by the end of the war, let alone by June of 1944. Even with the accelerated pace of the War Years, it took a lot of time to take an aircraft from concept, to development, to prototype, to flight test, and finally to manufacturing.

For example, the North American P-51 Mustang was produced in a phenomenally short time period for its day: the initial development contract was awarded in May, 1940, but by the time all the bugs had been worked out, manufacturing of the P-51B didn't start until the summer of 1943. The first battle-ready aircraft didn't start arriving in Europe until the winter of 1943-44. That's a 3.5-year timeline, from concept to flying the aircraft over Europe. And that was a relatively simple project, a single-engine fighter.

Multi-engine aircraft were and are a much, much more formidable problem for design and manufacture. Boeing began initial development of the B-29 design in 1938, was awarded a development contract in 1939, produced prototype for wind tunnel and other static testing in 1940, but did not produce the first flying prototype until September, 1942. By the time Boeing had worked all the worst of the bugs out of the Superfortress and it was able to fly its first combat mission, it was June, 1944. That was a 6-1/2 year development time. And the B-29 was not an 8-engined aircraft. The complexities involved in producing a reliable airworthy 8-engine seaplane would have exceeded those of the B-29 by a large margin.

The development contract for the HK-1/Spruce Goose/Hercules was awarded in 1942, and was funded as well as any other military aircraft development contract could expect to be. But even if they had had all the advantages North American had with the P-51, and had been able to somehow complete the development process in 3.5 years, HK-1's couldn't have possibly been pressed into war service until 1945 at the earliest. The R-4360 Wasp Major engine (the engine that was eventually used by Hughes in the test flights of Spruce Goose in 1947) was the only engine produced in WW2 that had the power to get the HK-1 airborne, and it wasn't developed until 1944 and production didn't become viable until after V-J Day.

It's amazing that Howard Hughes was able to fly the only prototype in 1947, only 5 years later. But even this wasn't a true service-ready aircraft, as it was only capable of flying a few hundred feet in ground effect, and it's probable that a fully functional HK-1 wouldn't have been available until 1948 or 1949.

#Pards

The problem was in getting materials. The B-29 wasn't designed until May 1940 and the first aircraft was completed in Aug 1941, the problems with its engines was due to its fitment to the B-29, it went through a lot of testing and changes due to its requirements mainly having to be pressurized and its high-altitude requirement. Besides the fact that it never was planned to be used in Europe. On the other hand, the Spruce Goose was constantly at a snail's pace because of all the restrictions place upon it and the withholding of aluminum and other materials. Causing Kaiser to become so frustrated that he withdrew from his own idea. It was still designed in just 16 months. But it also didn't have the requirement of having to fly at high altitude or require pressurization. The engines originally planned for it was the R-3300 which was designed in 1937. Two different engines. As to the ground effect, all aircraft take advantage of that to take off, less so for high winged aircraft but it helps with sea planes just as much as those on land, but not so much after it rises past some 20% of its wingspan. The aircraft also never was planned to take off in Long Beach harbor and fly out to sea when it became airborne. But the whole point of my statement was that had the plane been given the go ahead early and the rush through of other projects, and the material to build it of aluminum, with the R-3300 engines, it could have been finished in quantity by late '44. Instead of or in conjunction with the beach invasion. As to air superiority, we already had that.
As to feasibility, all you have to look at is the Boeing/Pan Am 314 Clippers which had an outstanding history from 1939 to well into the '50's with only 4 - 1,600 hp engines instead of 8 - 3,700 hp engines.


Phil

Phil, all due respect, but your reply is just shoulda-woulda-coulda and wishful thinking. The problem was NOT availability of materials The problem was finding an engine of sufficient power for the size of the aircraft. The HK-1 could not have flown before a sufficiently powerful engine was available.

I must reiterate that the engines Hughes eventually used (Pratt &Whitney Wasp Major) was not developed for production until 1944, and not available in any numbers until 1945. Advances in engine technology and supercharging during WW2 proceeded very quickly, yes. But seriously, there was no engine in the production that could have made the HK-1 fly in time for D-Day in 1944.

Again, the most critical component the HK-1 needed was an engine of sufficient power. Let's look at the 3 aircraft you mentioned (plus the workhorse DC-3) and it becomes readily apparent why:

Aircraft Empty Weight (lb) Gross Weight (fully loaded and fueled) Engine HP Total HP HP/Wt Ratio

Pan-Am Clipper (Boeing 314): 48,400 84,000 Wright Twin Cyclone (4) 1600 hp 6400 0.74
Boeing B-29 74,500 120,000 Wright Duplex Cyclone (4) 2200 8800 0.73
Hughes HK-1 250,000 400,000 P&W Wasp Major (8) 3000 hp 24,000 0.60
Douglas DC-3 16,800 25,200 P&W 1800 Twin Wasp (2) 1200 2400 0.95

Even running 8 Wasp Majors, the HK-1's horsepower to weight ratio was really low. Hughes said after the single flight of the aircraft that he would not fly it again until "further development" could be done. The only thing that could realistically help it was to put more power into it, and that would have required (probably) jet engines.

There is no way the Wright R-3350 could have powered the HK-1. Eight R-3350s would have made only 17,600 hp, for a horsepower to weight ratio of 0.44.

We might wonder if they had constructed it out of aluminum instead of wood, it might have been a bit lighter, but that's comparing apples to oranges... the construction techniques for wood vs metal are completely different. There is only one example I know of that has some relevance, and that is comparison between the DeHavilland Mosquito (wood) and the Argentine I.Ae.24 Calquin (aluminum). The Argentines basically duplicated the shape and size of the Mosquito in metal. The Calquin was about 18% lighter than the mosquito when empty, but when fully fueled and loaded was identical in weight. So even if they had made the HK-1 of aluminum, they would still have needed to wait for the Wasp Major to get it into the air.

Another "armchair general".

It’s war and mistakes will be made. The British weren’t infallible. Monty’s egg was laid on operation market garden.

Except that your math is wrong, guess you forgot your glasses. hp/lb... the R3300 series of engines had many ratings, but it also had cooling problems which was exasperated i the limited space of the B-29, the version 42WA which was originally to be used in the Hughes aircraft was rated for 3700 hp, and as much as 3,800 hp.


8 x 3,700 = 29,600 hp.

29,600 hp / 400,000 mw = 0.074 hp per pound,


slightly better than that of the B-29, which was 0.073.


Phil