RAF Hurricane Pic Battle of France May 1940. Important for SoW Devs?

MB_Avro_UK · #1 12-20-2009, 08:13 PM

Hi all,

This picture of an RAF Hurricane Mk 1 shot down in the Battle of France ( probably May 1940) raises a number of questions. Maybe important for SoW Devs??

It is clearly a Mk I manufactured in the winter of 1940 (telltales: Rotol paddle-blade wooden prop with round spinner, sword-type radio mast, armour glass windscreen, armour behind pilot's back)' It appears to have a gas detection patch on the leading edge of each wing and very unusually for mid-1940, it has a gun camera in the root of the port wing. Paint on belly: black port wing, aluminum under fuselage, white starboard wing. Strangely, all national markings and squadron codes appear to be missing.

And a bullet hole in the armoured windscreen!

Many thanks to Lima-Mike in producing this report.

Best Regards,
MB_Avro.

Skarphol · #2 12-20-2009, 09:07 PM

I know next to nothing about Hurricanes, but isn't that aperture in the port wingroot facing too much upwards for beeing a guncamera?

Skarphol

MB_Avro_UK · #3 12-20-2009, 10:18 PM

Hi all,

Further information has come to light regarding the suggested Gun Camera port in the picture posted. It maybe an oil filler point.

But the picture still has much to answer.

Reference Lima-Mike.

Best Regards,
MB_Avro.

SlipBall · #4 12-20-2009, 10:34 PM

Regarding the two bullet hole's in the front windscreen. I think it possible that to be rifle shot's done at the ground level. Perhaps a curious person wanting to see what an 06 round would do to the screen. I say this because of the grouping of the two shots, and no other evidence of that tight of a grouping on the airframe is visable to me.

Crumpp · #5 12-21-2009, 03:27 PM

Great picture and it does raise some interesting questions.

What dates it to the Battle of France?

It is interesting in that it does appear to have wooden blades on the propeller.

AFAIK, the Rotol C/S had metal blades and was not adopted as it did not improve performance over the 2 speed Hamilton.

At least that is what the RAE says and that conclusion is backed up by the data on Williams site. This is actually the correct use of performance comparisons too! We can see the performance improvements brought about by the different configurations and propellers.

http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.o...rricane-I.html

The 2 speed DH is a 3 bladed hub. The same hub was later reworked to upgrade to a C/S. I would think most likely this is a 2 speed DH. The question arises about the wooden blades.

http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.o...ane/l1547.html

I do know that both DH and Rotol built wooden propellers for testing purposes.

Interesting photo and I look forward to learning more about it.

Igo kyu · #6 12-21-2009, 04:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Crumpp

What dates it to the Battle of France?

Aside from anything else, I think the chaps uniform is German, which since the Hurricane was not (I think, informed contradiction would be interesting) used on Rodeos and Circuses, pretty much nails it to the BoF (I always think of Norway as cold, but I suppose that's a possibility).