Quote:
Originally Posted by *Buzzsaw*
Salute
but as you say, only in the outside wing tanks, and only for takeoff.
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Not really, what i said was indeed "only in outboard tanks" but it is far from saying "only for takeoff": unless they were planning a one-way trip they would have to burn that 100 octane on the return leg of the sortie as it was the only supply available to them after the inboard tanks had gone dry
What i previously described amounts to "on takeoff and half of the cruise portion of the flight", which is half the fuel burn for the sortie.
In other words, quite a lot of 100 octane fuel in case of long range sorties and as low as none at all in short range sorties (unless they were bending the rules and carrying a few minutes worth of it to get better WEP boost values in case of trouble, but that would be a negligible amount).
In conclusion, if the Blenheims generated enough sorties at long ranges or were routinely tasked with loitering around a certain area on patrol duty (eg, U-boats, reconnaissance, etc), they could account for quite a lot of 100 octane use. If on the other hand they were mostly flying cross-Channel hops in nuisance raids, they would mostly burn 87 octane.
Until someone can produce a relevant document that deals with the amount, type and range/duration of their sorties during the BoB the argument can swing either way
