Comments by "John Burns" (@johnburns4017) on "Why the Merlin engine was essential to the war" video.

  1. Pre WW2 Britain was on two paths: 1) The axial-flow air compressor by Griffiths; 2) The centrifugal air compressor by Whittle. Griffiths' 1926 seminal paper laid down axial-flow. His paper actually outlined a turbo prop. He did not believe at the time the engines could produce enough thrust, but could turn a propeller. He got Metrovick to develop an axial-flow turbojet in 1938, who started the groundwork of the F.2 axial-flow in 1940, having an engine first spin in 1940, with a successful test bed spin in 1941. Whittle's patent was in 1930, which laid down the turbojet. All this info was available to the Germans. Whittle went for centrifugal, as it was a simpler way of compressing air. Whittle wanted a simple air compressor to establish his turbo jet design quickly. In short, he was interested more in establishing the back end of the engine, the thrust, rather than the front. Once the back end was perfected then he could improve the front, the air compression. This was the sensible approach. The centrifugal compressor was perfectly adequate to prove the rear thrust side of the engine.  As post war engines proved the centrifugal was taken to higher limits. Axial-flow compression was a series of turbine fans on one shaft, with successive fans passing air to the next fan to increase air compression. This added complexity in many ways. Griffiths went for the more complex axial-flow. He also laid down a contra-rotating compressor, but Metrovick did not go down that road. The more powerful F.2 was used to fly the Meteor plane but considered unreliable at that stage, so Whittle's centrifugal engine was used. The F.2 was more reliable, and powerful, than the German Jumo, but the British would never put a plane in the air with such an unreliable under-developed engine. Wiggin in Birmingham were commissioned to develop high temperature resistant alloys as the jet engines were being developed. The Germans had no such programme. The F.2 ended up as the post war Sapphire being built under licence in the USA as the J65, powering the: Douglas A-4 Skyhawk, Grumman F-11 Tiger, Martin B-57 and the Republic F-84F Thunderstreak. It took the French a wasted eight years to get the German design reliable, which by that time they had discarded many of the German engine concepts. The French airliner the Sud Aviation Caravelle, used Rolls Royce Avon engines the French engines based on the German designs were so good.
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  2.  @cliveengel5744  The Germans did no such thing. For e.g., in aviation they were totally outclassed by the British. Also in radar,. The best anti-tank gun was the British 17-pdr. I could go on and on. Look up Callum Douglas an F1 engine designer. He did historical research on WW2 plane engines. He went back to the raw data. It is amazing how bad German engines were. He is on Youtube.
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  3. Merlin engines were mass produced in: Crewe, Glasgow, Detroit and Manchester. Not Derby.
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  4. Wrong! The Mustang became the P51. The Mustang was first.
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  5. I once worked with an old guy who told me that during the war he was with the RAF rebuilding Merlins, well away from fighting and bullets. He could not drive and rode a bike everywhere.
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  6.  @cliveengel5744  Germany being landlocked built a huge army. Their focus was on their army. The air force was to assist the army. Their navy was minuscule. The British had a very small mobile army. Unlike the German army it never used horses being the world's first motorized army were men never marched. The British Royal Navy was gigantic to Germany's. No contest there. Initially The RAF was about the same size as the Luftwaffe but had a huge 4-engined bomber fleet, unlike Germany. The RAF gradually became larger than the Luftwaffe with superior planes introduced. When the two air forces engaged in large battles, the RAF invariably won. So, in two of the three services the British were initially superior. The British then expanded its army by necessity as the huge French army, which the British were relying on, was no longer there. When the German army met the expanded British Army en mass the Germans were defeated - in the desert and NW Europe.
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  7.  @cliveengel5744  ▪The Englanders appreciate the Soviet T-34. German achievements? Their tanks were OK, the Tiger was an expensive waste of time, braking down all the time. It was more of a self propelled gun than a tank. ▪The 17 pounder anti-tank gun was superior to the German 88mm - it was the best in WW2. The 88mm was not the best anti-aircraft gun of WW2. ▪The 262 was a desperate under-developed joke. Piston planes were knocking this death trap out of the sky. It killed more of its own men than the allies did. ▪The V1s and V2 were a waste of time - they using existing technology. ▪The Germans did some decent work on guided missiles, but they were easily jammed. ▪The US space programme was based on the British, which was to put an man in space by 1950. They built the rocket. They were to use captured V2 rockets engines as they were OK, but made the rocket larger. Look up on Youtbube Felton Megaroc. The technology was passed over to the USA. British used mainly British built vehicles.
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  8. ​ @cliveengel5744  Such a confused mind. ▪The Great Patriotic War was a silly name for WW2. Britain gave lend lease to the USSR. 40% of the tanks used at vital Battle of Moscow in Dec 1941 were provided by the British. ▪Britain went into WW2 not attacking anyone or being attacked. They went in under principle. The only nation to be at the surrender in Tokyo Bay that was in the first day to the last day. ▪Major parts of the British empire were already independent: Canada, Australia, NZ and South Africa. India was next. Best you find out. ▪The War was about stopping evil. Lebensraum was stealing from others. ▪Britain had the raw materials of it empire and Commonwealth and of its trading empire. ▪The British showed the Germans how to do it - Liddle Hart in the late 1920s. ▪The Germans never pushed the British into the Sea. They retreated as the huge French army capitulated. British Army was only 9% of all allied forces. ▪Germans at Dunkirk never halted the advance to allow the British to evacuate. Read Hitler's Directive 13 to annihilate the forces in the Dunkirk pocket. They failed. The British beat them. The RAF beat the Luftwaffe over Dunkirk. Not one British general surrendered his forces to Germans at Dunkirk. The British Army then went to the desert with 30,000 taking 130,000 Italian POWs. Also disabling a large part of the Italian fleet and sinking the French fleet at Oran to ensure the German never got hold of it. Months after the RAF beat the Luftwaffe over southern England, British forces were about to take the whole of the southern Mediterranean coast.
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  9.  @cliveengel5744  wrote: "The Englanders only talk themselves up" They have a lot to talk up about.
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  10.  @cliveengel5744  Read again what wrote. Quite clear. The British retreated at Dunkirk. They were not pushed out. Not one general surrendered any troops to the Germans at Dunkirk. The British won the Battle of the Dunkirk Pocket. The British achieved their aims, the Germans failed in theirs. The Soviets were so bad at fighting the Germans just scythed into them. The Germans did no such thing against the British in the desert. Go the Youtube channel: Curious Droid. and the vid: What happened to the British aircraft industry? World leaders.
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  11. ​ @cliveengel5744  The Germans halted their advance to Dunkirk as they extended their supply lines. The general suggested it Hitler who agreed. It was only for 24 hours. The USA? They were not even in the war/ You make me larf. The British stopped Rommel's panzers at Arras using the new Matilda 2 tank. It ran over German anti-tank runs. The panicked and ran. Invading the USSR was only give the go in February 1941, and finalized in April. Please find out.
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