A Decent Plane With A Deadly Problem: Fairey Barracuda

[@oxcart4172]

There's a project going on in England to build another one out of a combination of new parts and parts from crashed ones. I really recommend it. They usually have updates every Friday.

[@DaveSCameron]

Where, who, when and build another what?

[@scrumpydrinker]

@@DaveSCameron A barracuda, It is under restoration by the Fleet Air Arm at Yeovilton in England, they are restoring one from a number of crashed aircraft to a static display standard. They are not going to get it to a flying standard as the parts from the crashed are too badly damaged for use in a flying airframe and, as a museum they wish to retain as much of the original aircraft as possible. If they got it to flying condition they would have had to replace so many components it would be classed as a replica with no historical significance.

[@emaheiwa8174]

@@DaveSCameron YOLO

[@foxhoundms9051]

Similar project here in the U.S. restoration of a P61 black widow

[@oxcart4172]

@@foxhoundms9051 true. And that one's going to fly!

[@timcvetic5054]

@11:12 you have the shot of the fairey firefly which also had the youngman flaps.

[@jongoffinet8511]

I really enjoy your uploads…..I laughed out loud when you said the Barracuda was kind enough to put the pilot to sleep before murdering them. 🤣

[@kitbag9033]

I did learn something today, thank you. That story of the ether poisoning was definitely new to me.

[@johnjephcote7636]

My father, while in the RAF saw a model of a Barracuda in a shop window. It had been made by someone who, with a keen eye, had seen a prototype flying over. Security spotted this and it had to be removed. It was, apparently, then on the secret list.

[@surferdude7013]

I read somewhere that an American naval officer (captain or admiral ?) on seeing the Barracuda remarked " it seems like a great flying machine but, it will never replace the airplane".

[@UncleDansVintageVinyl]

What a great line!

[@proteusnz99]

I think it’s telling that the U.S.Navy went from the Douglas TBD-1 to the Grumman TBF Avenger, both arguably state-of-the-art designs. The Royal Navy on the other hand in the same period went from the Fairey Swordfish (more state-of-the-ark), an aircraft that achieved much due to heroic crews rather than aircraft performance. The Fairey Albacore might have reduced the crews pneumonia risk, but didn’t advance much else. The Fairey Barracuda, well, I think Capt Eric Brown summed it up rather well, “Folded for stowage the Barracuda looked like the result of a rather nasty accident.” I think the long post-WW2 service of the TBM in a range of roles compared with the rapid extinction of the Barracuda tells you everything you need to know about these aircraft.

[@OlOleander]

"State-of-the-ark" is a humorously apropos typo given that the Swordfish was employed on the HMS Ark Royal.

[@treyhelms5282]

@@OlOleander Talking about arks and grails: "When though dost pull on the starter cord of the Swordfish, thou must count to three......"

[@osmacar5331]

Just goes to show tactics beat tech. But not to exclude tech.

[@ExcuseMePhoney]

The way they devise aircraft names, and numbers is fascinating and you should do an entire episode on that. And I actually love Heart.

[@johnjephcote7636]

Geoffrey de Haviland once said, when offialdom was having no interest in the prototype Mosquito, that his company was asked to build the wings for another's aircraft, apparently called the Ape. I have never been able to find out what and whose kite this was to have been.

[@survivingworldsteam]

​@@johnjephcote7636 the Armstrong Whitworth was a single research plane first flown on 5 January 1926 to "answer all the questions of aerodynamics." It could be configured and tested in an infinite range of configurations to see which ones worked best. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armstrong_Whitworth_Ape

[@peterdavy6110]

My father serviced Barracudas when he was in the Fleet Air Arm. He said they were horrible aircraft from a maintenance point of view. The undercarriage was complex and not over strong and the height of the engine meant using a ladder or staging for virtually every job. Not always easy on a carrier at sea.

[@98erics]

I really like your videos. It's always neat to learn about a plane I didn't know existed a half hour ago. Thanks and keep up the good work.

[@erictaylor5462]

17:55 Even today radar can't detect submarines. The aircraft using radar in WWII to detect submarines was only detecting these ships on the surface. Early on the days of ASW aircraft the Germans quickly learned to surface only at night. At first the aircraft used lights to find the subs on the surface, because the subs could see the lights from miles away and easily avoid them. Then the planes started keeping the lights off, only turning the lights on when the planes were very close. It was some time before the Geromans realized they were being detected with radar.

[@JosipRadnik1]

... and keeping them below the surface was already half the rent since it seriously limited the u-boats visual range. Please keep in mind that success in the battle of the atlantic wasn't neccessarely measured in U-boats sunk but in supplies delivered to britain relative to losses endured in the attempt. Apart from that - don't forget the arctic where the sun wouldn't set or rise for months during summer or winter respectively.

[@chamberlane2899]

Also worth noting that radar was capable of detecting periscopes, snorkels, radio/radar masts, and other surfaced equipment. This would ultimately lead to subs keeping an eye out for enemy radar contacts so long as such equipment was in use, on top of everything the above comment pointed out.

[@julianmarsano8212]

In certain conditions, keeping the lights *on* actually helps mask the aircraft against the sky. This is sometimes called ‘counter-illumination’. The eye needs (among other things) contrast to discriminate discrete objects from background clutter such as scud, haze, low clouds, etc., and lights of the right intensity and orientation can help reduce that contrast. The Americans experimented with lights-on attacks against U-Boats. Their big lights were known (unofficially) as ‘Yehudi lights’.

[@erictaylor5462]

@@julianmarsano8212 What you are talking about is totally different. The conditions you are talking about is when you have lights in the background. The Titanic lookouts spotted the iceberg because they could see a "hole" in the stars near the horizon. They didn't see the iceberg directly, and it was the less experienced lookout who say the berg first, but not knowing what it meant. His buddy did know, but by this time the berg was close and very big. Had someone put a bunch of tiny lights on the iceberg they would not have seen a hole and thus not seen the iceberg. The airplanes they the U-boat lookouts were trying to spot were very much smaller, whole the iceberg would have blocked dozens of stars the airplane blocked out just a few at any one time. In such a case what you are talking about would make the plane more visible, not less. Imagine you are in a large dark room. There is no light and someone is looking for you. You can see all of the light from the flashlight but for him to see you enough light from the flashlight needs to reflect off your body and get back to his eye. This would be a tiny fraction of the light from the flashlight so if he's far enough away, even if he shines the light directly at you, not enough light will return to his eye. Now he turns off the flashlight and you can no longer see him. He is using radar to get your general location and with that he can ger close to you without you knowing he is there. He can't get a location precise enough to shoot you, but when he things he's close enough he aims his flashlight at you then turns it on when he's 10 feet away. He aims and shoots before you recover from the surprise of having the light on you. This was the battle of the Atlantic.

[@toddabowden]

Well, you both are talking about different things but I don't see that there's any contention. I'm enjoying reading about what both of you are saying, so "carry on, carry on" as they say. There's plenty of room, and plenty of purpose, to learn about many different things, even in the same comment chain. Just as an example, I did not know that about how they detected the iceberg and that was actually something I wondered. I don't recall anyone mentioning that the ship ran with very bright frontal headlights of any sort, nor would I imagine that something a cruise liner would do. So the fact that they "saw" the object , the iceberg, because of it blocking the view of the stars makes perfect sense and fills in a lack of understanding that I had previously. The other comments about use of RADAR and considerations for the Battle of the Atlantic are equally interesting. So personally, I appreciate every commenter, as there is so much knowledge here that so many can contribute, but not if they keep silent!

[@nerd1000ify]

The Merlin 32 was one of the 'cropped' Merlins with a smaller supercharger impeller, max power was achieved at only 610m altitude. That's why the top speed decreased for the Mk II, it had power only when flying low in dense air.

[@malcolmmoy]

The other design fault was loss of lift caused by opening the canopy so that air came up and out of the cockpit and that airflow detached the upper airflow on the top of the inner wing and that turbulence then interfered with the tail. Fixed with a floor to the cockpit.

[@shakybill3]

So before that they just didnt have a floor? Or an entire floor?

[@roysutherland4681]

@@shakybill3 More of a sealing the floor by installing a strip that prevented air from coming up through the floor.

[@brookeshenfield7156]

Really enjoyable, as usual. Aloha! A video about Eric Brown’s opinions on various planes might be interesting…

[@CharlesStearman]

Eric Brown in his autobiography "Wings on My Sleeve" describes another issue with the Barracuda which led to a number of pilots being killed during training. This was a sudden nose-drop that occurred when the aircraft turned sharply away from the target after releasing the torpedo at low level, and could result in it diving into the sea. Brown doesn't say what the solution was, but I would guess it was a change in tactics rather than any alteration to the aircraft.

[@2011Kestrel]

My grandfather had Barracudas on the escort carrier he served on - they frequently used them for reconnaissance. He said they sometimes also used them for ferrying vips. Apparently, in a pinch you could stuff several people into one of them. Must have been an awful way to fly.

[@JTA1961]

Very Intense Position

[@johnjephcote7636]

They used Battles for this ferrying work in South Africa - out of harm's way by then. Barracudas were also dubbed 'Barra-wee-wees'. The 'wee-wee' implying weak and rather a piss-off.

[@grantm6514]

Barracuda for reconnaissance? Ops officer: What did you see? Barracuda pilot: Just my wings, not much else.

[@FrankJmClarke]

We need a top 10 classic rock aircraft video like a hurricane, barracuda by hart, battle of evermore, whirlwind by Roxy, Mustang Sally and so on.

[@Matt_The_Hugenot]

Once again Westland got told to build someone else's aircraft. On names, each company had their own conventions. In this period Avro named theirs for cities (Manchester, Lancaster, York, Lincoln), de Havilland used insects, Fairey used a mix of predatory fishes and seabirds for its carrier aircraft but were pretty random otherwise. A number used a standard often alliterative initial letter, Miles used M, Short Brothers used S, Bristol used B, Handley Page used H as did Hawker, Gloster used G until the Meteor, Vickers used V or W, Westland used W (apart from the Lysander for army reasons).

[@nerd1000ify]

Hawker had a 'storm' theme going for their fighters: Hurricane, Tornado, Typhoon, Tempest, Fury. Supermarine had a marine mammals theme for their seaplanes for a little while (Walrus, Sea Otter), and a S for spite theme going for piston fighters (spitfire, spiteful and seafang).

[@Matt_The_Hugenot]

@@nerd1000ify Yep, thanks for the additions, those were just the ones I could think of.

[@toddabowden]

3:14 Oh I laughed! Even before you begged us to! That was brilliant

[@jaws848]

As far as the teen series is concerned (F-14,F-15, F-16 and F/A-18) the reason why the 18 is the only 1 of the 4 with the "F/A" designation is at the start it was planned to have 2 distinct versions...a fighter only version (F-18) and an attack only version (A-18) but early in the programme it was decided to merge them together in 1 airframe to keep costs down....hence "F/A".

[@mickvonbornemann3824]

They were planning to make land only versions too, by Northrop, the Grumman version just being the carrier version. However foreign airforces, like Australia, Canada & Finland were quite happy to buy the carrier version, leaving the land version stillborn. Meaning they got a tougher plane with marine certification for the plane including the engines, making it suitable for shoreline airfields. Makes one ask how much the US would save if the airforce simply bought the same planes the navy bought. Australia forgot to take this into account when it purchased the F35, buying the A variant, leading to the corrosion issues it has now, due to a significant percentage of the RAAF’s major fighter airfields being on the coast.

[@mickvonbornemann3824]

Sorry, where I typed Grumman, I meant MacDonnell Douglas. The browser I’m using doesn’t seem to be compatible with UTube’s edit feature.

[@hazchemel]

Thanks. I must remember the bit about spontaneously spraying hot jets of soporific hydraulic oil at the pilot if I wake up in a pain free haze slumped inside a plunging Barracuda.

[@mikearmstrong8483]

Coooool Barracuda! Yeah, whatever; someone had to say it sooner or later.

[@mukadewolf530]

I just love how the barracuda look , wish the RAF still produces such unique aircraft's , world war 2 really did made some good looking hawks

[@cynthiakoehne7004]

as we now know Josh Gates is now helping rebuild the only Barracuda left on earth, I can not wait to see it completed!

[@andreaslermen2008]

I would give 2 thumbs up for the Heart reference 😁

[@311Bob]

25:02 can someone explain why this plane has a periscope?

[@briancavanagh7048]

The volume of aircraft built and the lack of use in its intended performance makes one wonder who ordered these aircraft. The Navy as Britain’s senior service makes you think there was lots of older, crusty Admirals I presume, sitting around in a gentlemen’s club over dinner organising the spending on the Admiralties budget allotment. Bit of a shame really as it contributed to Britain’s bankruptcy in the 1950s.

[@nerdyali4154]

Naval was always second to the air force when it came to production decisions. They were always having to change engines when the desired one was canceled and they were expected to produce aircraft with capabilities which compromised one another. What did those "crusty" admirals do to deserve your criticism? There are so many assumptions made about the officer class of the period which are little more than prejudice.

[@philhawley1219]

The Air Ministry was in charge of all aircraft production. They simply thought they knew more about shipborne aircraft than the men who would have to use them. The Navy had to put up with second rate kit until they could get more modern planes from the USA near the end of the war. Nothing to do with crusty old admirals, in fact the Royal Navy had some of the best admirals in the world at this time.

[@cesarvidelac]

You made me laugh so hard 😸 I was whistling the song even before playing the video! BARRACUDA!

[@martkbanjoboy8853]

'The wings tend to get ripped off in standard tactical maneouvers.' lol! USN officials went on record to the RCN Fleet Air Arm that the McDonnel Douglas Banshee warplanes supplied to them tended to shed their wings during violent aerial maneouvers. RCN pilots no doubt were dismayed by this as an RCN Fleet Air Arm pilot on exchange to a USN squadron brought in his Phantom to his a/c carrier inverted and flipping his a/c at the precise moment to catch the tailhook. It was common for these guys to test their cosmic chariots like this. We badly need boys like this in uniform pdq. : (

[@appaho9tel]

McDonnel Banshee

[@martkbanjoboy8853]

​​​@@appaho9telThis pilot I speak of was loaned to the USN and was on his tour of duty with the USN squadron for the Cuban Missile Crisis. His C.O. at his RCN Fleet Air Arm squadron wrote to the USN C.O. mentioning the pilot was absolutely forbidden from flying wartime sorties if WWIII broke out. I am not sure what would actually have happened. Peacetime plans tend to get flushed down the toilet in wartime.

[@Zain-fi]

Will you cover the albacore??? It’s one of the planes that is the least talked about and all I have read or watched about it is that it was ok but not as good as the swordfish.

[@uingaeoc3905]

it served in the Pacific in USN colours!

[@towgod7985]

@@uingaeoc3905 Shhhh! No one is supposed to know about that. Cheers.

[@michaelleslie2913]

I once while on vacation in Greece I met an elderly gentleman who was a Barracuda pilot during WW2 will never forget him and his under stated description of this perilous aircraft . What an absolute hero ❤

[@JeffreyWilliams-dr7qe]

Was thus the trip when you met Eddie Rickenbacker in Crete?

[@michaelleslie2913]

@@JeffreyWilliams-dr7qe wow a comedian 👏

[@JeffreyWilliams-dr7qe]

@@michaelleslie2913 Wish this was funny.

[@philiphumphrey1548]

In the raid on the Tirpitz the Barracudas failed to penetrate the armoured deck so there was no magazine explosion (like the USS Arizona suffered at Pearl Harbor). Mostly because the armoured deck on the Tirpitz was thicker overall and reinforced above the magazines. But they did wreck pretty much everything above the armoured deck and that put the ship out of action, it never was fully repaired before 617 Dambusters squadron finished it off with Tallboy bombs..

[@MrJohndoakes]

25:00 Many WWII aircraft on the Allied side would up like that; the Boulton-Paul Defiant (the turret fighter) wound up as a target tug, the P-70 Nighthawk was the A-20 Havok as a night fighter, the Douglas DC-2 was heavily modified into the B-18 Bolo (and that was before the war) serving as a sub hunter and training bomber during WW II --- the list is endless.

[@MGB-learning]

Outstanding video

[@DaveSCameron]

Swordfish, the Terror of Taranto. 🎵🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿

[@johnstirling6597]

At 90 mph 🤣

[@gingervirus2988]

@@johnstirling6597 Slow but steady wins the race...

[@treyhelms5282]

@@gingervirus2988 And gets you shot down against a competent opponent.

[@alganhar1]

@@treyhelms5282 And people seem to think the Royal Navy did not know that. Fun fact, they did. The Swordfish was designed with British pre War carrier doctrine in mind, and the RN were absolutely aware of the vulnerability of ALL torpedo bombers. Which is why the Royal Navy pre war Carrier Strike Doctrine was TO STRIKE AT NIGHT. The Swordfish was designed as a night torpedo bomber, it was not supposed to operate during the day. The attack on Taranto is how the Swordfish was SUPPOSED to be used. All pre war and early was Fleet Air Arm Strike pilots and crews manning the Swordfish were highly trained and qualified night fliers. This reason behind the Swordfish design, and a large reason it was designed in the way it was, is of course TOTALLY ignored. Let me point out to you that the USN was also aware of what happened to torpedo bombers that attacked unescorted against modern fighter escorts, or have you conveniently forgotten what happened to the US Torpedo squadrons at Midway? Who were literally slaughtered almost to a man....

[@treyhelms5282]

@@alganhar1 funny how USN devastators did fine at Coral Sea, and Avenger bombers at many many other daylight battles since. From the Guadalcanal campaign through Leyte. Did you not know about that? The Kido Butai at Midway was just that good. (And the TBDs were proven obsolete then, though still better than the Swordfish if you had to attack warships) And no, the Swordfish sucked as a torp bomber by the time WW2 started. No wonder the RN had to plan on only night operations, and aside from attacking docked warships in port, was not a good torpedo bomber even at night. Thank god the RN switched to Avengers when they could.

[@baanibarnes9711]

Has anyone else noticed that Supermarine only ever produced the one beautiful design, the superlative Spitfire, all the other designs they have put out are horrendous including that horrible torpedo bomber. Weird huh?!?

[@DaveSCameron]

A matter of opinion I would suggest, clearly the Spitfire has almost become the logo for Allied air power and is so ingrained in our culture it would be impossible to out do it but take away the legendary halo I believe Supermarine made a few belters including the Seafire and the flying boat but other contenders. 🎚️🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿

[@DOSFS]

Literally puting all of their aritistic skill on Spitfire and then none for others.

[@Matt_The_Hugenot]

It's later jet aircraft were fine but they managed some truly hideous piston engine types in the 30s and 40s

[@tomgoff7887]

Supermarine's jet aircraft were quite good looking.

[@dougcastleman9518]

Supermarine Swift was attractive, but wasn’t especially successful.

[@mikegosselin2391]

I felt sorry for the two blokes in the back. As the pilot slept softly all the way to the crash, the were screaming "WE'RE GOING TO DIE!'

[@malcolmmoy]

Never understood why they didn't use the RR Griffon as it's a superb low altitude and high horsepower engine that was only slightly larger than the Merlin. Plenty of room for it in this airframe.

[@FinsburyPhil]

The Mk.V had a Griffon

[@pcka12]

Was the Griffon available when the Barracuda was designed?

[@michaelleslie2913]

I wonder how it would have done with the Napier Sabre in , although that engine was problematic it plenty of power.

[@pcka12]

@@michaelleslie2913 the original RR Exe 24 cylinder, sleeve valve engine was more powerful than the RR Merlin engines first fitted & similar to the Napier Sabre which developed over it's period of service.

[@womble321]

​@pcka12 the exe was in a different league but unnecessary due to jet engines

[@kentbarnes1955]

I once heard this plane described as "origami in metal". Another strangely weird yet appealing air frame. Someday I've got to model one...although there are FEW model kit manufactures that make one.

[@proteusnz99]

Special Hobby, the Czech firm offer both 1/72 and 1/48 versions, fiddly but buildable.

[@lancerevell5979]

Ark Models of Russia makes it in 1/72 scale.

[@raygreenberg6720]

I hate to say this, but I had to laugh out loud at the final story of the hydraulic fluid containing ether, and the plane gently putting the pilots to sleep before it killed them.

[@DavidSiebert]

You left out Block like the F-16 C/D Block 70/72. What I don't get is why the shoulder mounted wings? Just seems really to me.

[@AnthonyGentile-z2g]

The specifications for the Japanese B5N and the US TBD were issued in 1934 and 1935. Why was the RN so late (1937) specifying a metal monoplane?

[@Bob-b7x6v]

That shoulder-mounted wing was a bad idea, too. The most successful torpedo bomber monoplane designs in WW2 were low-winged or mid-winged.

[@MisterOcclusion]

The hydraulic fluid bit reminds me of a video on Russian aircraft where it was stated that alcohol comprised a large component of the hydraulic fluid. Of course they drank it...

[@mfree80286]

Ah, the Tu-22's electronics coolant. Alcohol wasn't a large component, it was THE component, 100% ethanol.

[@teehasheestower]

"We need a plane that can carry 1 1500lb torpedo, or 1500 1lb torpedoes..."

[@fishingthelist4017]

The Wildcat was the exception to the "give American planes American names" rule. I have never heard the word martlet used on this side of the pond since British heraldry isn't something we worry about here.

[@baanibarnes9711]

Sorry, had to comment again - the Spearfish!?! What a terrible design, what is it with these aircraft? Couldn't anyone in British aviation industry produce a decent looking/performing torpedo bomber? They were all so heavy and clunky looking, it's amazing they could take off let alone carry a torpedo a reasonable distance. I still find it incredible that the Swordfish served right through WWII even outliving it's supposed replacement, the Albacore. I heartily agree with Eric Brown's assessment of the Grumman Avenger, a thoroughly well conceived and designed navy aircraft with a good all round range, load carrying ability and speed, it looked cool too. Great breakdown, look forward to more.

[@DaveSCameron]

Swordfish 👏👏👏

[@allandavis8201]

At the time that the aircraft manufacturers were designing their aircraft we British knew that we would be going to war with Germany (again) and the other Axis nations, thus the priority was not to be building prototypes but the aircraft that we were going to send into battle, and unlike the USA and Russia who didn’t enter WWII until they were attacked/ready to enter the war we were, unfortunately, going to be leading from the front (as usual) and it damn near bankrupted us, material like aluminium, steel, rubber and fluids became scarce, scarce enough to stop building prototypes, we had to rely on what we had at the time and hope that enough development could be achieved to replace our existing aircraft, and during war the aesthetic of an aircraft was immaterial to what it was capable of doing. We might have been operating aged biplanes during the war but they performed as well as could be expected and more besides, look at the attack on Taranto harbour, the disabling of the Bismarck and the exploits of three aircraft which were nicknamed “Faith Hope and Charity”, please take a look at these examples of how our torpedo bombers and “string bags” faired for yourself, and whilst your at it look at the biplanes the United States 🇺🇸 Navy were operating at the time, they were not exactly pretty. I really do wish people would stop comparing the British and Commonwealth aircraft with the United States aircraft, there are very many variables between the two countries that direct comparison is worthless and invariably wrong. As for not having a designer who could design a good looking torpedo bomber the answer is yes there was but unfortunately they were busy designing and building aircraft for the Battle of Britain and the battle of the Atlantic.

[@uingaeoc3905]

What I loved about the Swordfish was its continued development whereby it got both radar and rockets! As for a 'good British torpedo bomber .... Fairey Gannet! The only Sub Hunter Killer

[@alexsis1778]

I can't believe how many things they have sticking off the wings of the Barracuda. My god. Have they never heard of drag? There's no less than 3 items sticking up and 1 down PER WING and one of those is an entire antenna mast.

[@richardarcher7177]

A big problem with with Britosh carrier aircraft was the fact that from April 1918 until just before the outbreak of World War 2 was that everything pertaining to aviation was controlled by the Air Ministry. At a time when the USN and Japanese Navies (controlling their own aviation) were working out just what could be done and what aircraft were needed the RN was hamstrung by a disinteresed Air Ministry which tended to make up their minds about naval aviation often without checking facts. For instance the Ministry believed that the USS Langley couldn't possibly operate more than 20 aircraft when they were operating over 30 and even up to 40. They all but forbade the Admiralty from learning ANYTHING about naval aviation and whenever the Admiralty took up the matter all successive governments could do was shrug and say that when it came to aeroplanes the Air Ministry were the experts and so the Admiralty should shut up and listen. Read 'The Dawn of Carrier Strike.' by David Hobbs. It is about the trials and tribulations of the inter war Fleet Air Arm regarding equipment, dictrine and all the political nonsense affecting the FAA. Given we know what ended up happening it's almost a tragic read - but well worth it.

[@foreverpinkf.7603]

I have never heard of ether being used in hydraulic oils. Ether is extremely volatile and has no lubricating effect whatsoever. Does anyone know the reason for this use?

[@moosifer3321]

The `T` Tail has since proved to be a risky idea. The reason the Swordfish was SO successful is because so much of it was unable to trigger incoming AA and TOO(?) Slow. Just put a Band Aid on the holes, good to go.

[@zoperxplex]

If the Swordfish had to face the teeth of the Japanese fleet in 1941 and her Zero fighters it would have been torn to pieces

[@moosifer3321]

@@zoperxplex Just like US Aircraft at that time? Taranto, a warning unheeded, ONE YEAR BEFORE? The Stringbag had been participating for over 2yrs. Check out Skynea`s opinion of Japanese AA (Morale Boosters)

[@zoperxplex]

@@moosifer3321 Even the Devastator was a superior aircraft than the Swordfish and that was considered obsolete by the start of the war.

[@moosifer3321]

@@zoperxplex Remember Midway? How many Biplanes lost against Bismarck. There is a difference between Obsolete and Obsolesence, when in adversity, use what you have - Big shout for Taffy Three and USS ENGLAND (using British Hedgehog/RADAR ) Guessing you are American, good luck with your Politics. Great chat. As to WHO won the war ......American Industry? PS How many Devs are still flying or are they still recovering Sable and Wolverine`s quota?

[@zoperxplex]

@@moosifer3321 Had the German or Italian navies in 1941 been as well equipped in terms of air power as the Japanese navy we wouldn't be discussing Swordfish.

[@mebeasensei]

The Fleet Air Arm in WW2 is famous for having ancient, awkward-looking, ungainly beasts that. arguably, should never have been made. Blackburn Roc and Skua, Gloster Sea Gladiator, Fairey Swordfish and Albacore. Supermarine Walrus. This beast fits in nicely. I think the ugliest of them all was reserved for the post-war turboprop beast. It is amazing that a thing like the Swordfish kept going. But think about this. The Swordfish was introduced in 1936! not 1916!

[@nerd1000ify]

Hey, the Skua wasn't that bad as a dive bomber (it even inexplicably held its own as a fighter early in the war) and the Walrus was excellent for its intended function, even if it was a little awkward looking. Also you missed the other crappy FAA aircraft: the Fulmar and Firefly.

[@davidmcintyre8145]

One has to remember that the primary requirement for FAA TSR(torpedo/strike/recon)aircraft such as the swordfish was to be able to lift off the small pre WWII and experimental carriers such as Eagle and Argus hence the high lift biplane layout. We should also remember that the RN had a working night strike doctrine using Swordfish in 1938 some 7 years before the USN could manage that on a wide scale and was widely using ASV by 1942

[@jimroberts3009]

That high tee-tail looks like a good target for the rear gunner! 😂

[@nicolatesla9429]

The barracuda has a design that you either love, or you hate it with a passion. Personally I'm in the former category and I especially like the flap system (same with the Firefly). What does strike me as odd however, is that it seems that during the war the Barracuda (save for the Mk.V's appearantly) didn't carry nationality markings on the underside of the wings. I wonder if there was a specific reason for that.

[@randomvariable1836]

Great song. Great video.

[@yuuzyerbrejn9603]

Oooo...Barracuda! Next up; The Hawker Hart? Can't wait to see what the "radio" has next for us...

[@jollyjohnthepirate3168]

Sadly the FAA eventually started using Grumman's Avenger torpedo bombers in the form of TBM's from lend lease.

[@massmike11]

Why sadly? The avenger was a good beast. Not like the SB2C

[@johnfisk811]

But only as a bomber as the Royal Navy torpedos would not fit in the internal bay.

[@IncogNito-gg6uh]

According to Armoured Archivist the FAA got used Grumman TBFs as the US Navy reequipped with the more powerful General Motors built TBM.

[@moosifer3321]

I used to work from Aerodrome Way Heston, one of Fairey Aviation`s sites, one of the original Hangers still being present. The Stringbag was probably Fairey`s BIGGEST contributions in WWII. Bring on the Gannet, not proven in Combat, but...? Don`t mention the Fairey (whimp) Battle!!!

[@rastarn]

Yet another excellent video. Bravo! As an aside, despite how it may look with the spelling, the company name for Boulton Paul Aircraft Ltd, is pronounced, "Bolton Paul", not, "Boolton Paul". Say it like the, "u", doesn't exist.

[@OliverSchroeder]

Yes, I did learn something about the Barracuda's narcotizing hydraulic system. Enjoyed the pitch-black humour. Perhaps it is fair(ey) to mention the Gannet, a successful descendant of the Barracuda and Spearfish?

[@michaelhilger8638]

Very informative but the robo-voice (if it is such) sounds like it's shorts are a bit tight...

[@RoderickMcDuffie]

Your voice is golden sir

[@alan-sk7ky]

9:43 'ang on a moment, that's a Battle, completely different aircraft IHYLS... tut.

[@williammagoffin9324]

The reason the F/A-18 breaks the rules by having F/A is that it was meant to be two different planes. At one point there was an A-18 Hornet in development to replace the A-7 Corsair II & A-4 Skyhawk (it was competing with an improved A-7 variant); while the F-18 was competing with a navalized F-16 jointly developed by General Dynamics and Vought. Eventually computers got good enough that one set of avionics could do both jobs so the two planes were merged in to one.

[@TheWombat40]

The Rolls Royce Vulture was an X engine fitted to the Avro Manchester and the Hawker Tornado. It had one major problem. It was crap

[@vipertwenty249]

Higher atmospheric temperatures don't so much hurt the engines as hurt the wings. Warmer air is less dense so the wings generate less lift at any given airspeed, and with an engine of marginal performance at altitude the Barracuda just couldn't generate enough lift to get over the mountains reliably. A more powerful engine would have solved this problem of course, as would extended wings, but since neither of these were available the crews suffered losses that they shouldn't have had to sustain in an aircraft that wasn't suitable for the mission profile required. Also: You suggest in the video that the "X" engine - actually the Rolls Royce Vulture - did not have any particular reliability issues. This is the opposite of the truth. The Vulture had significant overheating problems along with lubrication issues that made it too unreliable to continue in service. Amongst other things this led to the redesign of the Avro Manchester (2 Vulture engines) into the Avro Lancaster (4 Merlin engines), and the discontinuation of the Hawker Tornado project in favour of the Hawker Typhoon - and if the Napier Sabre engine of the Typhoon was better than the Vulture that should really seriously tell you something about how bad the Vulture was!

[@philhawley1219]

I think you are confusing the X engine layout of the Exe (like the river) with the similar but much larger Vulture.

[@vipertwenty249]

@@philhawley1219 Yes you're right. Learn something every day!

[@allandavis8201]

The naming conventions of the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 and/or RAF are not “LAX”, lax implies that the rules are not adhered to by anyone, the word you are looking for would be “RElaxed” meaning that anyone who comes up with an appropriate name could have it introduced as the given name, please don’t be offended by my comment, I would say the same to anyone.

[@davidwoods7408]

11:34 Did the pilot really sit that low?

[@Deviation4360]

5:45 Wow!! (This section of the vid has videos within itself to be made) Supermarine just made any aircraft type look awesome. I had no idea there was a maritime prototype between the Sea Otter and Seagull. The Type. 322 just looks like what Mike Patey would dream up if some Elon Musk type could bring him a tired old Cessna 190 and say do what you want to it but put a Merlin engine in it. As for the Barracuda it is an aircraft that is much more visually confronting than it's animal counterpart.

[@dennismason3740]

...bomp-diddy-bomp diddy-bomp diddy - bop-ba-da-daahhhh - wooh-ooh-ooh, now wouldn't ya, Barracuda.

[@johnfisk811]

As far a British dive bombers are concerned it was the RAF who set against it. The Royal Navy were keen on dive bombing and had the Osprey, Skua, Roc, Swordfish, Shark, Albacore, Fulmar and Firefly built as dive bomber capable and in the Battle of France it was FAA Swordfish, Skuas and Rocs who were dive bombing the German army approaching Dunkirk and their Albacores in the Western Desert did sterling work dive bombing the Italian army and their Swordfish dive bombed the Italian heavy naval shipping oil storage tanks at Taranto at night illuminating them with flares.

[@CraigLYoung]

Thanks for sharing 👍

[@ronaldbyrne3320]

No wonder Barracuda pilots flew with the canopy open. 🤣 Love that they are trying to rebuild one for a museum display.

[@glennsimpson7659]

Apparently the cooling intake flaps on the Barracuda’s Merlin engine had to be closed in order to reduce drag sufficiently to take off - any delay lead to engine overheating, which must have made being tail end Charlie in the take-off order rather interesting. The Albacore failed to replace the Swordfish mainly because of the Albacore’s engine - the sleeve valve Bristol Taurus - being unreliable, hardly ideal for a single engined naval aircraft. The Bristol Perseus on the Swordfish was by contrast a real sewing machine in its reliability.

[@johnfisk811]

The Swordfish remained in service for its short takeoff run for small escort carriers in the bad weather of the North Atlantic. Fairey ceased production of the Albacore and ir’s spares to turn to making Barracudas but Blackburn continued to make Swordfish and their spares in their purpose built shadow factory. Once in the air the Albacore could carry more war load further and faster than the Swordfish.

[@Bob-b7x6v]

Narrow-gauge landing gear on a flat-top is often a recipe for disaster. Roy Grumman seemed to be the only aircraft engineer that could buck this trend.

[@johnfisk811]

Wartime FAA pilots I have spoken to rated the Hurricane and Barracuda as the easiest to land on a carrier.

[@mfree80286]

@@johnfisk811 Looking at the gear config, it looks like under compression the track widens greatly. Hell on tire tread, but probably aided in stability.

[@gregforrester4851]

There was a ditty about the barracuda written by some air man during the the war "It weighs 10 tons no front gun and fuck all to rely on" how it went.

[@womble321]

They were biplanes for short take off. The Swordfish was contemporary with the spitfire. This thing had gigantic flaps.

[@mattheide2775]

❤ Barracuda by Heart is one of my favorite songs. Check it out if you're into good music from 1977. Wicked Awesome for anyone that loves a really odd time signature, especially drummers. Seriously check it out kids😊

[@eric-wb7gj]

TY🙏

[@mathewkelly9968]

One of those British aircraft that suffered from over ambitious engine programs , that they just couldn't get to work as we where entering "you're pushing it" territory technologically

[@shawnmcauliffe5072]

"Give me a sign!" , dum dada dum, dum dada dum, Barracuda.... "Ah, a sign!"

[@stevenread1676]

Problem they had was that while the Swordfish was .... well, really out of date, it was just so damn reliable and a sturdy and stable torpedo platform. Sure it was slow and underarmed and the Swordfish really did need an update, for the previous reasons it was more popular as a torpedo bomber than it's successors, save for when we finally got the Avenger from the Americans, which really was better than anything else we had. Even then we carried on using the Swordfish... the Barracuda... well I think IHLYS is being rather generous here- it wasn't a good plane, and it had, IMHO- a bloated service life. Any plane that KOs it's own pilot isn't a good plane, no matter the cause.

[@cdfe3388]

Fairey really was a one-hit wonder with the Swordfish.

[@WALTERBROADDUS]

Actually, they had a very long line of successful aircraft.

[@uingaeoc3905]

Can anyone say if a rear gunner in a Naval bomber ever had any job to do?

[@buttole]

the dive brakes got the plane caught in its own prop wash, it's not an uncommon phenomenon when it comes to aircraft designs (sorry I can't name any examples at the moment)

[@alan-sk7ky]

Ah yes the Fairey Baccaruda...

[@alancritchley5901]

"Barracuda" is my ringtone... (the song, not the plane).

[@skswig1]

Looks like a flying tv station

[@petesheppard1709]

For a really complex but logical nomenclature system, dig into the US Navy aircraft system up until 1960 or so. 😉

[@irishrover4658]

It's got a fat fuselage. Was it a crew of three and six passengers??

[@tanknick22]

Names of aircraft are not named by the manufacturer but named by the military service

[@ABrit-bt6ce]

15:40 If Supermarine was making those in 1940 then the Battle of Britain would have been a bit one sided.

[@chris_hisss]

The brits sure were nuts. They built a plane around an engine and when that engine wasn't ready or working, they just fit whatever was handy and shipped it out. I wonder why or if they could have got avengers from us? Considering by that point we were moving onto the helldiver. Could have saved so much time and money and lives in development. This looks like it needed another 3 years. This is why they were flying swordfish in 44. Too proud to just accept reality.

[@longrider42]

I believe the US solved the tail problem, by using perforated flaps on the Dauntless Dive Bomber.

[@Bob-b7x6v]

YAAAAAS, Ultimate Heart song joke...

[@michaelnaisbitt7926]

Never understood why Britain persisted with this clunker of an airplane which had no specific need for existing WHEN the Grumman AVENGER was superior in all ways ?.

[@malcolmlewis5860]

18 = 118, F111 was last to use the 100 number up front.

[@tommclaughlin5872]

Oohh Barracuda ❤😂

[@osmacar5331]

It's towns cities and counties for bombers. But we had more cities than counties at the time.

[@stephenmeier4658]

"Fun" fact: The song by Heart had nothing to do with the plane, but they did rip off the main riff from Led Zeppelin, who were British, so

[@dmunro9076]

The Avenger was not stressed for dive-bombing and is not really comparable to a Barracuda.