On Thu, 04 Sep 2003 19:37:14 GMT, Guy Alcala
wrote:

And the Wellington was upgraded to become the Warwick.... Have you
seen the thickness of the Stirling's existing wing?

Nothing like extending the tips to lower the overall t/c ratio.

Yes, but those wings needed an Atkins diet or something. They're
almost as thick as the fuselage.

Even moving the
tips out for greater wing area is going to leave it struggling with
poor engine output at altitude and serious airframe weight issues.

The engine output should be no worse than the Halifax III, but I grant you
the weight issues. OTOH, the Stirling seems like it was quite strong, so a
boost in MTOW may have been possible.

Actually, reducing the weight might have helped more to raise the
ceiling, and you won't be getting many Hercules XVI engines until 1944
as the Halifax production will eat them up. You might as well stick
to using them pretty much as is as an interim type, and get another
ten squadrons to increase the short-penetration supporting missions
along with the six-eight squadrons of 2 Group. They can then re-quip
with the B-24 over time, after gaining daylight experience during the
supporting ops.

Just don't ask me to fly in them....

[snip Sabre-engined gibbering]

[B25 bombload]

Personally, I wonder if your source that claimed 2 x 1,000 'and' 4 x 500
should have read 'or', as that would fit better with the claimed bomb bay
capacity in several sources. It wouldn't be the first time that has
happened.

Agreed, and I will check the Squadron ORBs when I get the chance. Any
American stats to compare with this?

You think the Good Old Days on Usenet (as you define them) are gone? A quick
skim of posts on this or most any other forum will show that, as the
Republican Party's semi-official theme song says, Happy Days are Here Again!
But then, you've never been there and done that, you're just another wannabe
;-)

And if you'd ever seen Serdar Argic strafing an unprotected and
immobilized newgroup with .50 calibre-crosspostings with your own
eyes, maybe your reading would be different. We never made posts in
those days, just threads. The time was this group once had real
veterans like Orville and Wilbur Wright conducting their flamewar with
Langley and Curtis, and now they've been driven off by the
wannabes.....[tirade continued ad nauseam].

Gavin Bailey


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