103-607: The Curtiss SB2C Helldiver is a dive bomber developed by Curtiss-Wright during World War II . As a carrier-based bomber with the United States Navy (USN), in Pacific theaters , it supplemented and replaced the Douglas SBD Dauntless . A few survivors are extant. Initially poor handling characteristics and late modifications caused lengthy delays to production and deployment, to the extent that it
206-572: A 100 percent mission completion rate. Scout crews repeatedly proved the Viking to be the platform of choice for conducting Surface Warfare and Electronic Surveillance. The movement of VS-24 and its eight S-3B Viking aircraft on 27 Oct 1997 began the relocation of VS-24 from NAS Cecil Field to NAS Jacksonville , ten miles east. This move was in compliance with the 1993 Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) Commission, which ordered NAS Cecil Field be closed by 1 Oct 1999. The remainder of VS-24's parent S-3 wing
309-670: A deliberate tactic. At the Battle of Cambrai on 20 November 1917, 320 Mark IV tanks and 300 aircraft, mostly Sopwith Camels and Airco DH 5s with 20 lb (9.1 kg) bombs, were used to suppress artillery and machine guns. The cost in pilots was very high, with casualties on some days reaching 30 percent. The initial impact at Cambrai was highly successful. The staff officer to the Royal Tank Corps Lieutenant-Colonel J. F. C. Fuller published findings which were later taken up by Heinz Guderian to form
412-419: A dive bomber and was used extensively in this role during World War Two. The British Air Ministry issued Specification 4/34 in 1934 for a ground attack aircraft with dive bombing capability. The Hawker Henley was a two-seat version of the Battle of Britain -winning Hawker Hurricane . It was fast, at almost 300 mph (480 km/h) at sea level and 450 mph (720 km/h) in a dive, but development
515-555: A dive bomber. It had dive brakes that doubled as flaps for carrier landings. The Hawker Henley had a top speed only 50 mph (80 km/h) slower than the Hawker Hurricane fighter from which it was derived. The American and Japanese navies and the Luftwaffe chose vertical dive bombers whose low speed had dire consequences when they encountered modern fighters. The Royal Naval Air Service developed dive bombing as
618-723: A few North American P-51 Mustangs from a British order but, as there were no funds to buy more fighters, they were modified as dive bombers with a new wing and with dive brakes. First flown in October 1942 as the North American A-36 Apache , they arrived in Morocco in April 1943 to assist with driving the Afrika Korps out of Africa. The aircraft was very fast at low altitude. It was also accident-prone, achieving
721-413: A horizontal bomber veers offline while approaching the bomb release point, turning to the angle that would correct this also changes the speed of the aircraft over the ground (when there is a wind) and thereby changes the range as well. In the 1930s and early 1940s, dive bombing was the best method for attacking high-value compact targets, like bridges and ships , with accuracy. The forces generated when
824-520: A limited number of aircraft available for attack, each with only a small bomb load. Targets were often likely to be small or fast-moving and the need for accuracy made dive bombers essential. Ernst Udet , a German First World War ace, persuaded Hermann Göring to buy two Curtiss Hawk IIs for the newly reformed Luftwaffe . Udet, then a stunt pilot, flew one in aerobatic displays during the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games . Due to his connections with
927-602: A name later reused by Curtiss for other dive bombers. The Imperial Japanese Navy ordered the Heinkel He 50 in 1931 as a floatplane and carrier-based dive bomber and embarked some on new carriers from 1935 in a developed form as the Heinkel He 66 , from which the Aichi D1A was further developed in Japan. The Luftwaffe confiscated a Chinese export shipment and ordered more. Navies increasingly operated carriers, which had
1030-455: A second set of eyes. A Helldiver also has a significant advantage in range over a fighter while carrying a bombload, which is extremely important in naval operations. The advent of air-to-ground rockets ensured that the SB2C was the last purpose-built dive bomber produced. Rockets allowed precision attack against surface naval and land targets, while avoiding the stresses of near-vertical dives and
1133-816: A single day. Rudel co-wrote a post-war book about his experiences and consulted with the US Air Force. When Italy joined the war (10 June 1940) on the Axis side, the Regia Aeronautica shipped Breda Ba.65s to North Africa for use against the British but they also proved vulnerable. By February 1941 British fighters had shot down most of the Italian planes. In Morocco on 11 November 1942, American Curtiss P-40 Warhawks shot down 15 Ju 87Ds in one encounter. The United States Army Air Forces took delivery of
SECTION 10
#17327916882631236-529: A staff officer, and Basil Liddell-Hart (a military journalist) propounded the concept of mobile tank forces supported by ground-attack aircraft creating a breakthrough. These were eagerly studied by the German army officer Heinz Guderian , who created the combination of Panzers and dive bombers that later proved so potent in Poland and France. The Ju 87 Stuka could be used as aerial artillery moving far ahead of
1339-560: A steep angle, normally between 45 and 60 degrees or even up to a near vertical dive of 80 degrees with the Junkers Ju 87 , and thus requires an abrupt pull-up after dropping its bombs. This puts great strains on both the pilot and aircraft. It demands an aircraft of strong construction, with some means to slow its dive. This limited the class to light bomber designs with ordnance loads in the range of 1,000 lb (450 kg) although there were larger examples. The most famous examples are
1442-439: A straight line directly towards the defenders. At higher levels, this was less of a problem, as larger AA (anti-aircraft) shells were fused to explode at specific altitudes, which is impossible to determine while the plane is diving. In addition, most higher-altitude gunners and gunnery systems were designed to calculate the lateral movement of a target; while diving, the target appears almost stationary. Also, many AA mounts lacked
1545-423: A straight line of sight to the target. This was simplified as the aircraft was pointed directly at the target, making sighting over the nose much easier. Differences in the path of different bombs due to differing ballistics can be corrected by selecting a standardised bombing altitude and then adjusting the dive angle slightly for each case. As the bomber dives, the aim could be continually adjusted. In contrast, when
1648-473: A student took a model of the new Curtiss XSB2C-1 to the MIT wind tunnel. Professor of Aeronautical Engineering Otto C. Koppen was quoted as saying, "if they build more than one of these, they are crazy". He was referring to controllability issues with the small vertical tail. The first prototype made its maiden flight on 18 December 1940. It crashed on 8 February 1941 when its engine failed on approach, but Curtiss
1751-621: A tactic against Zeppelin hangars and formed and trained a squadron at Manchester for this task. On 8 October 1914, a Sopwith Tabloid with two 50 lb (23 kg) bombs attacked a hangar at Düsseldorf after a dive to 600 ft (180 m). On 14 November 1914, four Avro 504s attacked the Zeppelin factory at Friedrichshafen on Lake Constance , diving from 1,200 ft (370 m) to 500 ft (150 m) to ensure hits. As Zeppelins were tethered close to stores of hydrogen, results were often spectacular. The first use of dive bombing by
1854-574: A tank-buster Stuka with 20mm cannon, he claimed over 100 Soviet tanks destroyed, mostly at the Battle of Kursk in July 1943. The Ju 87G Kanonenvogel , equipped with two 37mm BK 3,7 anti-tank guns, as suggested by Rudel, proved to be a lethal weapon in skilled hands. In the Soviet counter-offensive, Operation Kutuzov (July to August 1943), which concluded Kursk, the Luftwaffe claimed 35 tanks destroyed in
1957-447: A virtually straight line between release and impact, eliminating the need for complex calculations. The aircraft simply aims at the target and releases its bombs. The primary source of error is the effect of wind on the bomb's flight path after release. As bombs are streamlined and heavy, wind has only a slight effect on them and the bomb is likely to fall within its lethal radius of the target. Bomb sighting becomes trivial, requiring only
2060-405: Is a bomber aircraft that dives directly at its targets in order to provide greater accuracy for the bomb it drops. Diving towards the target simplifies the bomb's trajectory and allows the pilot to keep visual contact throughout the bomb run. This allows attacks on point targets and ships, which were difficult to attack with conventional level bombers , even en masse . After World War II ,
2163-485: The Battle of Britain (July to October 1940). Losses were such that the Luftwaffe rapidly withdrew Stukas from operations over the United Kingdom. A similar fate befell unescorted RAF Fairey Battles over France. The Stuka had 7.92mm machine guns or 20mm cannons mounted in the wings. Some were modified to destroy tanks with heavy calibre, 37mm Bordkanone BK 3,7 autocannons mounted in gun pods below
SECTION 20
#17327916882632266-524: The Battle of the Coral Sea , and fought in every US battle involving carrier aircraft. An alternative technique, glide-bombing, allowed the use of heavier aircraft, which faced far greater difficulties in recovering from near-vertical approaches, though it required greater use of sophisticated bombsights and aiming techniques, by a specialised member of aircrews, namely a bombardier/bomb aimer . The crews of multi-engined dive-bombers, such as variants of
2369-853: The British resembled Australian experience with the type. A total of 26 aircraft, out of 450 ordered, were delivered to the Royal Navy 's Fleet Air Arm , where they were known as the Helldiver I . After unsatisfactory tests by the A&;AEE that pinpointed "appalling handling", none of the British Helldivers were used in action. American aid provided the Royal Hellenic Air Force with 48 Curtiss SB2C-5 Helldivers from surplus U.S. Navy stocks. The aircraft were delivered by
2472-797: The Douglas A-20 Havoc , first flying in January 1939, for a similar role, although originally ordered by France. Many were also supplied to the Soviet Air Force, which also used the Ilyushin Il-2 Sturmovik ground-attack aircraft in huge numbers. None of these were dive bombers. No Allied air force operated a modern dive bomber at the outbreak of the Second World War, although both the Royal Navy and
2575-562: The Fairey Swordfish from 1936 and Blackburn Skuas from November 1938. The Skua had a secondary function of intercepting attacks by unescorted long-range bombers. With four .303 Browning guns and another rear-facing gun, it was expected to defend against air attack with a top speed of 225 mph (362 km/h) at sea level, which was a low-altitude speed comparable with other navies' carrier borne fighters in 1938–39. The Royal Navy's dedicated, pre- and early-war, fleet fighter
2678-647: The First Indochina War from 1951 to 1954. Built at Curtiss' St. Louis plant, 900 aircraft were ordered by the USAAF under the designation A-25A Shrike . The first ten aircraft had folding wings , while the remainder of the production order omitted this feature. Many other changes distinguished the A-25A, including larger main wheels, a pneumatic tailwheel, ring and bead gunsight, longer exhaust stubs, and other Army-specified radio equipment. By late 1943, when
2781-465: The Junkers Ju 87 Stuka , which was widely used during the opening stages of World War II , the Aichi D3A "Val" dive bomber, which sank more Allied warships during the war than any other Axis aircraft, and the Douglas SBD Dauntless , which sank more Japanese shipping than any other allied aircraft type. The SBD Dauntless helped win the Battle of Midway , was instrumental in the victory at
2884-492: The Junkers Ju 88 and Petlyakov Pe-2 , frequently used this technique. The heaviest aircraft to have dive-bombing included in its design and development, the four-engined Heinkel He 177 , also utilised a glide-bombing approach; the requirement that the He 177 be able to dive/glide-bomb delayed its development and impaired its overall performance. Dive bombing was most widely used before and during World War II; its use declined during
2987-586: The Marianas , Philippines (partly responsible for sinking the battleship Musashi ), Taiwan, Iwo Jima , and Okinawa (in the sinking of the battleship Yamato ). They were also used in the 1945 attacks on the Ryukyu Islands and the Japanese home island of Honshū in tactical attacks on airfields, communications and shipping. They were also used extensively in patrols during the period between
3090-529: The Nazi party , he became the development director of the Ministry of Aviation , where he pushed for dive bomber development. Dive bombing would allow a low-cost Luftwaffe to operate effectively in the tactical role. Against small targets, a single-engine dive bomber could achieve four times the accuracy at one tenth of the cost of a four-engine heavy bomber, such as the projected Ural bomber , and it could reach
3193-586: The Oise River to block rapidly advancing German armour. Stukas quickly broke the defences, and the Wehrmacht forced a crossing long before German artillery arrived. On 12/13 May 1940, Stukas flew 300 sorties against strong French defensive positions at the Battle of Sedan . This enabled German forces to make a fast and unexpected breakthrough of the French lines, eventually leading to the German advance to
Curtiss SB2C Helldiver - Misplaced Pages Continue
3296-594: The Royal Flying Corps (RFC) found its biplane two-seat bombers insufficiently accurate in operations on the Western Front . Commanders urged pilots to dive from their cruising altitude to under 500 ft (150 m) to have a better chance of hitting small targets, such as gun emplacements and trenches. As this exposed the aircraft and crew to destructive ground fire in their unprotected open cockpits, few followed this order. Some recorded altitude at
3399-581: The SB2C Helldiver in its combat debut, attacking Rabaul on 11 November 1943. VB-17 formed part of Carrier Air Group 17 (CVG-17) and operated from USS Hornet from February–June 1945. VS-24 became the first fleet squadron to operate the AF-2S/W Guardian , receiving its first aircraft on 27 September 1950. VS-24 was re-established in 8 Apr 1960 at NAS Quonset Point , Rhode Island as Air Antisubmarine Squadron TWO FOUR, nicknamed
3502-515: The Wehrmacht 's lightly armed parachute and airborne troops. The invasion of Poland (September to October 1939) and the Battle of France (May to June 1940) saw the Stuka used to devastating effect. German blitzkrieg tactics used dive bombers in place of artillery to support highly mobile ground troops. The British Expeditionary Force had set up strong defensive positions on the west bank of
3605-528: The 37 Salamanders produced before the end of October 1918, only two were delivered to France, and the war ended before those saw action. Whether the Salamander counts in more modern parlance as a fighter-bomber or as a dive bomber depends on the definition of "dive". It had armoured protection for the pilot and a fuel system to attack at low level, but lacked dive brakes for a vertical dive. Heavy casualties resulting from air-to-ground attack on trenches set
3708-785: The A-25 Shrike, became available in late 1943, the Western Allied air forces had abandoned dedicated dive-bombers. A majority of A-25s delivered to the US Army Air Forces were transferred to the US Marine Corps , which used the type only in one side campaign and non-combat roles. The British Royal Navy and the Royal Australian Air Force also cancelled substantial orders, retaining only a few aircraft for research purposes. Nicknames for
3811-769: The A-25A was being introduced, the USAAF no longer had a role for the dive bomber, as fighter aircraft such as the Republic P-47 Thunderbolt had shown their ability to carry out tactical air support missions with great success. The USAAF transferred 410 Helldivers to the US Marines . The A-standard 25As were converted to the USMC variant, SB2C-1 and one squadron, VMSB-151 , based on Enjebi (a.k.a. Engebi/Enjibe; part of Enewetak Atoll) conducted bombing missions on bypassed Japanese strongpoints nearby. Otherwise,
3914-743: The Air Service United States Army , arranged tests with captured German and obsolete US ships in June and July 1921 and repeated over the next two years using Royal Aircraft Factory S.E.5as as dive bombers and Handley Page O/400s and Martin NBS-1s as level bombers carrying bombs of different weights up to 2,000 lb (910 kg). The SMS Ostfriesland was sunk and so later were the USS Alabama , USS Virginia and USS New Jersey . Opposite conclusions were drawn by
4017-1109: The COMNAVAIRLANT Battle Efficiency Award, the Silver Anchor Award for retention, the Golden Anchor Award for 1996, the Arleigh Burke Award for the most improved squadron, and the Carrier Air Wing EIGHT ( CVW-8 ) Santa Barbara Shrine Award for ordnance excellence. VS-24 alsi received the Conventional Weapons Squadron of the Year, the Electronic Warfare Squadron of the Year, and the Commander, U.S. Sixth Fleet's Hook 'Em Award for 1997. The squadron
4120-564: The Channel and the cutting off of much of the Allied army. The skies over Sedan also showed the Stuka's weakness when met with fighter opposition; six French Curtiss H-75s attacked a formation of unescorted Ju 87s and shot down 11 out of 12 without loss. The Stuka was even more vulnerable to the Hawker Hurricane with its 100 mph (160 km/h) speed edge and eight machine guns, which it first met over France and then in larger numbers in
4223-482: The German battleship Tirpitz which lay protected by torpedo nets in a Norwegian fjord during 1944. On 3 April 1944, in Operation Tungsten , 42 aircraft flying from the carriers HMS Victorious and HMS Furious scored 14 hits with 500 lb (230 kg) and 1,600 lb (730 kg) bombs and put the battleship out of action for over two months. VS-24 Sea Control Squadron 24 (VS-24)
Curtiss SB2C Helldiver - Misplaced Pages Continue
4326-772: The Helldiver from 1951 to 1958. Some of these aircraft were allotted to flottilles 3F and 9F stationed on board the carriers Arromanches , Bois Belleau , and La Fayette , during the First Indochina War . The Helldivers were used to support French troops on the ground during the Battle of Dien Bien Phu in 1954. NOTE: All surviving aircraft identified by original US Navy Bureau of Aeronautics (BuAer) Bureau Numbers (BuNo). ;;SB2C-5 Data from United States Navy Aircraft since 1911 General characteristics Performance Armament Related development Aircraft of comparable role, configuration, and era Related lists Dive bomber A dive bomber
4429-448: The Helldiver was underpowered, had a shorter range than the SBD, was equipped with an unreliable electrical system, and its manufacturing quality control was often poor. The Curtiss-Electric propeller and the complex hydraulic system had frequent maintenance problems. One of the faults of the aircraft throughout its operational life was poor longitudinal stability, resulting from a fuselage that
4532-706: The Helldiver, even though the Avenger had begun its development two years later. Nevertheless, production tempo accelerated with production at Columbus, Ohio and two Canadian factories: Fairchild Aircraft Ltd. (Canada) , which produced 300 (under the designations XSBF-l, SBF-l, SBF-3, and SBF-4E), and Canadian Car and Foundry , which built 894 (designated SBW-l, SBW-3, SBW-4, SBW-4E, and SBW-5), these models being respectively equivalent to their Curtiss-built counterparts. A total of 7,140 SB2Cs and equivalent models were produced in World War II. The U.S. Navy would not accept
4635-525: The Luftwaffe. Udet was impressed with the Stuka's performance in Spain, so he ordered that the Junkers Ju 88 medium bomber should also be retrofitted as a dive bomber. He also insisted, against the advice of Ernst Heinkel , that the Heinkel He 177 bomber, ordered in November 1937, be able to dive bomb. Lack of a sufficiently powerful, reliable powerplant fatally compromised its utility, it never performed in
4738-465: The RAAF had decided that dive bombing was an outmoded tactic. Vultee Vengeance dive bombers, which were already in service with the RAAF , were being replaced by light bombers. As a result, the order for the remaining 140 Shrikes was cancelled. While the 10 aircraft received were taken on strength, with the RAAF serial prefix A69, only one of these Shrikes officially took to the air in RAAF service. A69-4
4841-500: The RAF and USAS, from two very different tests regarding the usefulness of dive bombers, with the RAF concluding that the cost in pilots was too high to justify the results and the USAS considering it as a potent anti-ship weapon. Both naval staffs opposed the view taken by the respective airmen. In 1919, United States Marine Corps (USMC) pilot Lt. L. H. Sanderson mounted a rifle in front of
4944-764: The RFC, which had been urging its pilots to drop bombs at heights below 500 ft (150 m) in order to hit within 150 ft (46 m) of the target since February 1915, was later that year. On 27 November 1915, Lieutenant Duncan Grinnell-Milne arrived in his Royal Aircraft Factory B.E.2c over railway marshalling yards near Lys in Northern France, to find the target already crowded by other bombers. He dived from 10,000 ft (3,000 m) to 2,000 ft (610 m) before releasing his 20 lb (9.1 kg) bombs. A few weeks later, Lieutenant Arthur Gould dived to just 100 ft (30 m) to hit buildings near Arras. The Royal Flying Corps developed strafing with diving aircraft using both machine guns and small bombs as
5047-440: The S-3B Viking, VS-24 was re-designated as Sea Control Squadron TWO FOUR (VS-24) to better reflect the multi-mission role of the S-3B. In 1995 the Scouts deployed aboard USS THEODORE ROOSEVELT (CVN-71) for operations in the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf supporting Operation SOUTHERN WATCH, and in the eastern Mediterranean in support of NATO strikes against Bosnian-Serb military targets. During Operation DELIBERATE FORCE, VS-24 became
5150-482: The SB2C until 880 modifications to the design and the changes on the production line had been made, delaying the Curtiss Helldiver's combat debut until 11 November 1943 with squadron VB-17 on Bunker Hill , when they attacked the Japanese-held port of Rabaul on the island of New Britain, north of Papua New Guinea . The first version of the SB2C-1 was kept stateside for training, its various development problems leading to only 200 being built. The first deployment model
5253-416: The SB2C-1 variant never saw combat, and was used primarily as a trainer and target tug. At an early stage of World War II, the Australian government noted that the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) lacked dedicated dive bombers and ordered 150 Curtiss Shrikes. These aircraft were paid for by the US Government as Lend Lease aid. By November 1943, when the first shipment of 10 Shrikes arrived in Australia,
SECTION 50
#17327916882635356-407: The Scouts deployed to the Persian Gulf in support of Operation DESERT STORM; VS-24 crews were responsible for the first S-3B land strike over enemy territory and the first sea strike against a hostile patrol craft. Following the war, Sea Control Squadron TWENTY-FOUR participated in Operation PROVIDE COMFORT rendering aid to Kurdish refugees fleeing Iraq. In 1993, having transitioned from the S-3A to
5459-433: The Scouts, flying the S-2 Tracker and deploying aboard ESSEX / HANCOCK class aircraft carriers of the Atlantic Fleet. With the 1974 closure of NAS Quonset Point due to post-Vietnam War force reductions, the squadron relocated to NAS Cecil Field , Florida and transitioned from the prop-driven S-2G Tracker to the jet-powered S-3 Viking for deployment aboard FORRESTAL, KITTY HAWK and NIMITZ class aircraft carriers. In 1991
5562-425: The Spanish Civil War. Several problems appeared, including the tendency of the fixed undercarriage to sink into soft ground and an inability to take-off with a full bomb load. Condor Legion 's experience in Spain demonstrated the value of dive bombers, especially on the morale of troops or civilians unprotected by air cover. The aircraft did not encounter opposing modern fighters, which concealed its vulnerability from
5665-416: The U.S. Marines and United States Army Air Forces, the manufacturer incorporated features of a "multi-role" aircraft into the design. The Model XSB2C-1 prototype initially suffered development issues connected to its Wright R-2600 Twin Cyclone engine and three-bladed propeller; further concerns included structural weaknesses, poor handling , directional instability, and bad stall characteristics. In 1939,
5768-404: The US Navy had shipboard dive bombers. On 10 April 1940, 16 British Royal Navy Blackburn Skuas flying at extreme range from the naval air station at Hatston in Orkney led by Lieutenant Commander William Lucy sank the German cruiser Königsberg in Bergen harbour, whilst trying to prevent the German invasion of Norway . On the German side Stukas augmented or replaced artillery support for
5871-405: The ability to fire directly up, so dive bombers were almost never exposed to fire from directly ahead. Dive brakes were employed on many designs to create drag which slowed the aircraft in its dive and increased accuracy. Air brakes on modern aircraft function in a similar manner in bleeding off excessive speed. It is difficult to establish how dive bombing originated. During World War I ,
5974-417: The aircraft can time the drop of its bombs at the instant when the target is lined up in the sight. This was only effective for "area bombing", however, since the path of the bomb is only roughly estimated. Large formations could drop bombs on an area hoping to hit a specific target, but there was no guarantee of success, and huge areas around the target would also be hit. The advantage to this approach, however,
6077-401: The aircraft carrier USS Sicily (CVE-118) in the spring of 1949. From the 48 aircraft, 6 were used for ground instruction or spare parts and 42 were given to 336th Fighter Squadron ( 336 Μοίρα Διώξεως ) to replace Supermarine Spitfires and the squadron's name was changed to 336th Bomber Squadron ( 336 Μοίρα Βομβαρδισμού ). Greek SB2C-5 Helldivers had minor changes for their COIN operations :
6180-558: The aircraft included "Big-Tailed Beast" or just "Beast", "Two-Cee", and "Son-of-a-Bitch 2nd Class"; the latter nickname was derived from the name SB2C and the aircraft's reputation for having difficult handling characteristics. The Helldiver was developed to replace the Douglas SBD Dauntless . It was a much larger aircraft, able to operate from the latest aircraft carriers and carry a considerable array of armament. It featured an internal bomb bay that reduced drag when carrying heavy ordnance. Saddled with demanding requirements set forth by both
6283-405: The aircraft levels out at the bottom of the dive are considerable. The drawback of modifying and strengthening an aircraft for near-vertical dives was the loss of performance. Aside from the greater strength requirements, during normal horizontal flight, aircraft are normally designed to return to fly straight and level, but when put into a dive the changes in forces affecting the aircraft now cause
SECTION 60
#17327916882636386-444: The aircraft to its combat role resulted in a 42% weight increase, explaining much of the problem. The solution to these problems began with the introduction of the SB2C-3 beginning in 1944, which used the R-2600-20 Twin Cyclone engine with 1,900 hp (1,400 kW ) and Curtiss' four-bladed propeller. This substantially solved the chronic lack of power that had plagued the aircraft. The Helldivers would participate in battles over
6489-419: The aircraft to track across the target unless the pilot applies considerable force to keep the nose down, with a corresponding decrease in accuracy. To compensate, many dive bombers were designed to be trimmed out, either through the use of special dive flaps (such as Fairey Youngman flaps ) or through changes in tailplane trim that must be readjusted when the dive is completed. The Vultee Vengeance , which
6592-432: The basis for the blitzkrieg tactics of using dive bombers with tanks employed by the Germans in 1939–40. Second Lieutenant William Henry Brown , a Canadian from British Columbia serving with the RFC and flying a Royal Aircraft Factory S.E.5a , made the first attack on a vessel on 14 March 1918, destroying an ammunition barge on a canal at Bernot near St Quentin, diving to 500 ft (150 m) to release his bombs. He
6695-501: The battlefield well ahead of field artillery. Soon the Luftwaffe issued a contract for its own dive bomber design, resulting in the Junkers K 47 , which, following extensive trials, would in turn result in the Junkers Ju 87 Stuka (a contraction of Sturzkampfflugzeug , literally 'diving combat airplane'). Several early Junkers Ju 87 dive bombers, which first flew on 13 September 1935, were shipped secretly from Germany to Spain to assist General Francisco Franco 's Nationalist rebels in
6798-430: The bomb to accelerate after it is dropped. The combination of these two forces, drag and gravity, results in a complex pseudo- parabolic trajectory . The distance that the bomb moves forward while it falls is known as its range. If the range for a given set of conditions is calculated, simple trigonometry can be used to find the angle between the aircraft and the target. By setting the bombsight to this "range angle",
6901-447: The demanding performance requirements that they placed on dive bombers. The SB2C remained in active postwar service in active duty US Navy squadrons until 1947 and in Naval Reserve aviation units until 1950. Surplus aircraft were sold to the naval air forces of France , Italy , Greece , Portugal , and Thailand . Greek SB2Cs served in combat in the Greek Civil War with additional machine guns mounted in wing pods. French SB2Cs flew in
7004-405: The dive bomber role, and the requirement was eventually dropped. Some 23 Breda Ba 65s were flown by Italian pilots also in support of Nationalist forces. First flown in 1935, it was a single-seat dive bomber carrying the same bomb load as the Stuka with a 30 mph (48 km/h) speed advantage in level flight. As the Royal Navy again took control of the Fleet Air Arm , it began to receive
7107-749: The dropping of the atomic bombs and the official Japanese surrender , and in the immediate pre-occupation period. An oddity of the SB2Cs with 1942 to 1943-style tricolor camouflage was that the undersides of the outer wing panels carried dark topside camouflage because the undersurfaces were visible from above when the wings were folded. In operational experience, it was found that the U.S. Navy's Grumman F6F Hellcat and Vought F4U Corsair fighters were able to carry an equally heavy bomb load against ground targets and were vastly more capable of defending themselves against enemy fighters. The Helldiver, however, could still deliver ordnance with more precision against specific targets and its two-seat configuration permitted
7210-493: The end of the war. Colonel, later general, Billy Mitchell arrived in France with the first US Army and Air Force units soon after 6 April 1917 and began to organise the US Army Air Force flying French Salmson 2s , a spotter plane. The later Salmson 4 was to be a ground attack and dive bomber, but production was cancelled at the end of the war. Mitchell became a strong advocate of dive bombers after witnessing British and French aerial attacks. Mitchell, by now assistant chief of
7313-452: The first S-3B squadron to launch Tactical Air Launched Decoys (TALD) in support of overland strikes. In 1997 VS-24 returned to the Red Sea and Persian Gulf to support the ongoing efforts of Operation SOUTHERN WATCH, and participated in Operation DELIBERATE GUARD in the Mediterranean and Adriatic Seas. During this deployment, the Scouts were the most heavily utilized squadron in the air wing accumulating over 2,300 flight hours while maintaining
7416-493: The hard rubber tailwheel (for carrier use) was replaced by a bigger pneumatic tire for use on landing strips; and the rear gunner station and its twin MGs were deleted, as no aerial opposition existed and weight reduction was used for bombs and extra machine guns. Curtiss SB2C-5 Helldivers, Supermarine Spitfires, and North American T-6D/Gs were used in ground-attack missions against Communist ground forces , camps, and transports during
7519-771: The highest casualty-rate during training of any USAAF aircraft and was officially restricted to no more than a 70-degree dive. The Apache did not fly with the RAF, but served with US squadrons in Sicily, Italy and, by late summer of 1943, was based in India for use over Burma and China. It proved to be an excellent dive-bomber and a good fighter: one ace in Italy shot down five German fighters. The Royal Navy's Fairey Swordfish and Fairey Albacore torpedo-dive bombers and Blackburn Skua fighter-bombers were replaced by Fairey Barracuda torpedo-dive bombers, which made repeated diving attacks on
7622-606: The increased casualties from ground fire. Again, the angle of dive in these attacks was not recorded. Beginning on 18 June 1918, the Royal Air Force (RAF), successor to the RFC, ordered large numbers of the Sopwith TF.2 Salamander , a single-seat biplane. The "TF" stood for "Trench Fighter", and the aircraft was designed to attack enemy trenches both with Vickers .303 machine guns and with 25 lb (11 kg) bombs. Of
7725-683: The last stages of the Greek Civil War . Curtiss SB2C-5 Helldivers saw a relatively brief combat service and were gradually phased out by 1953. A few were in use until 1957 as photographic aircraft. One Curtiss SB2C-5 Helldiver was restored in 1997 and is displayed in the Hellenic Air Force Museum . Between 1949 and 1954, France bought 110 SB2C-5 Helldiver aircraft to replace their aging SBD-5 Dauntless that had been flying in combat in Vietnam. The French Aeronavale flew
7828-474: The main forces with Panzers to smash enemy strong points without waiting for the horse-drawn artillery to catch up. It was central to the concept of Blitzkrieg , which required close co-ordination between aircraft and tanks by radio. The RAF had chosen the single-engined Fairey Battle and the twin-engined Bristol Blenheim as its tactical bombers. Both were level bombers with similar bomb-loads and entered service in 1937. The US Army Air Corps (USAAC) adopted
7931-624: The minds of senior officers in the newly formed RAF against dive bombing. So not until 1934 did the Air Ministry issue specifications for both land-based and aircraft carrier -based dive bombers. The RAF cancelled its requirement and relegated the Hawker Henley dive bomber to other roles, while the Fleet Air Arm's Blackburn Skua was expected to do double duty: as a fighter when out of reach of land-based fighter support, and as
8034-468: The problems of inaccuracy were amplified by the fact that the target could be moving, and could change its direction between the time that the bombs were released and the time that they arrived. Successful strikes on marine vessels by horizontal bombers were extremely rare. An example of this problem can be seen in the attempts to attack the Japanese carriers using B-17s at altitude in the Battle of Midway , with no hits scored. The German battleship Tirpitz
8137-511: The production model. Fin and rudder area were increased, fuel capacity was increased, self-sealing fuel tanks were added, and the fixed armament was doubled to four 0.50 in (12.7 mm) machine guns in the wings, compared with the prototype's two cowling guns. The SB2C-1 was built with larger fuel tanks, improving its range considerably. The program suffered so many delays that the Grumman TBF Avenger entered service before
8240-517: The rise of precision-guided munitions and improved anti-aircraft defences —both fixed gunnery positions and fighter interception—led to a fundamental change in dive bombing. New weapons, such as rockets, allowed for better accuracy from smaller dive angles and from greater distances. They could be fitted to almost any aircraft, including fighters , improving their effectiveness without the inherent vulnerabilities of dive bombers, which needed air superiority to operate effectively. A dive bomber dives at
8343-419: The target ship HMS Centurion . Tests against a stationary target showed an average error of 49 yd (45 m) from a release height of 1,300 ft (400 m) and a dive angle of 70 degrees. Tests against a manoeuvring target showed an average error of 44 yd (40 m) from a drop height of 1,800 ft (550 m) and a dive angle of 60 degrees. The Fairey Albacore was also designed to act as
8446-425: The target visible, but true dive bombers have not been a part of military forces since the start of the jet age. When released from an aircraft, a bomb carries with it the aircraft's trajectory. In the case of a bomber flying horizontally, the bomb will initially only be travelling forward. This forward motion is opposed by the drag of the air, so the forward motion decreases over time. Additionally, gravity causes
8549-513: The top and bottom of their dive in log books and in squadron records, but not the steepness of the dive. It was certainly not near-vertical, as these early aircraft could not withstand the stresses of a sustained vertical dive. The Royal Naval Air Service was bombing the Zeppelin sheds in Germany and in occupied Belgium and found it worthwhile to dive onto these sheds to ensure a hit, despite
8652-477: The training of mechanics. The Japanese introduced the Aichi D3A Val monoplane as a successor to the biplane Aichi D1A in 1940, with trials aboard the carriers Kaga and Akagi . It was to prove a potent weapon against surface ships. Only the Wehrmacht learned from the Battle of Cambrai (1917) in using dive bombers in conjunction with tanks. The writings of Britain's Colonel J. F. C. Fuller ,
8755-586: The use of the Aldis gunsight , which had been invented in 1916 to aid pilots to calculate the deflection required to hit a traversing enemy aircraft. In principle, it obviated the need for a vertical dive. The results showed that a vertical dive into the wind sighting along the top of rather than through the sight was best. But they were not considered good enough to justify the expected casualties. The Royal Air Force, which took over both army and naval aviation in April 1918, retired its Sopwith Salamander dive bombers at
8858-407: The war, when its vulnerability to enemy fighters became apparent. In the post-war era, this role was replaced with a combination of improved and automated bombsights , larger weapons and even nuclear warheads that greatly reduced the need for accuracy, and finally by precision guided weapons as they became available in the 1960s. Most tactical aircraft today allow bombing in shallow dives to keep
8961-578: The windshield of his Curtiss JN-4 (a training aircraft) as an improvised bomb sight , loaded a bomb in a canvas bag attached to the aircraft's underside, and made a solo attack in support of USMC troops trapped by Haitians during the United States occupation of Haiti . Sanderson's bomb hit its target and the raids were repeated. During 1920, Sanderson familiarised aviators of USMC units on the Atlantic coast with dive bombing techniques. Dive bombing
9064-712: The wings. They were very successful in this role in the early days (1941) of Operation Barbarossa before the Red Army Air Force countered with modern fighters, such as the Yakovlev Yak-1 and later the Yakovlev Yak-3 . The most successful dive-bomber pilot, Hans-Ulrich Rudel , made 2,530 sorties. He contributed to the sinking of the Soviet battleship Marat at Kronstadt on 23 September 1941 using 1,000 kg (2,200 lb) bombs. Later, flying
9167-433: Was a squadron of the United States Navy . Originally established as VB-17 on 1 January 1943, it was redesignated as VA-5B on 15 November 1946, redesignated as VA-64 on 27 July 1948, redesignated as VC-24 on 8 April 1949 and redesignated as VS-24 on 20 April 1950, it was disestablished on 1 June 1956. It was however reestablished again before being decommissioned in 2007. VB-17 based on USS Bunker Hill , used
9270-530: Was also used during the United States occupation of Nicaragua . As aircraft grew more powerful, dive bombing became a favoured tactic, particularly against small targets such as ships. The United States Navy overcame its hostility to Mitchell's findings and deployed the Curtiss F8C Falcon biplane from 1925 on carriers, while the Marine Corps operated them from land bases as the Helldiver,
9373-401: Was asked to rebuild it. The fuselage was lengthened and a larger tail was fitted, while an autopilot was fitted to help the poor stability. The revised prototype flew again on 20 October 1941, but was destroyed when its wing failed during diving tests on 21 December 1941. Large-scale production had already been ordered on 29 November 1940, but a large number of modifications were specified for
9476-550: Was assigned to No. 1 Air Performance Unit , for performance testing, between December 1943 and April 1944. The RAAF and US Fifth Air Force already operated a joint pool of aircraft types common to both services in the South West Pacific theatre and, by mid-January 1944, the other nine Shrikes had been transferred to USAAF units. A69-4 was also transferred to the USAAF in December 1944. The Helldiver's service with
9579-810: Was awarded the Military Cross for this and other exploits. Brown's technique was emulated by other British squadrons. But the heavy casualties to unprotected pilots cast a pall over the results and influenced RAF thinking for 20 years. The Royal Flying Corps was initially impressed with the potential of the dive bomber, but was aware of its suicidal nature. It ran a series of tests at the Armament Experimental station at Orfordness in Suffolk. Sopwith Camels and Royal Aircraft Factory S.E.5as were used in early 1918 to dive bomb targets from various heights, with different bombs and with and without
9682-561: Was delayed when Hurricane development took priority. Just 200 were built and it was relegated to target towing. The RAF ordered the US-built Vultee A-31 Vengeance in 1943, but it, too, was similarly relegated to target towing after a brief operation period in secondary theatres. The Curtiss SBC Helldiver was a biplane dive bomber that had been taken aboard the USS ; Yorktown (CV-5) in 1934, but it
9785-601: Was investigated by the Truman Committee , which turned in a scathing report. This contributed to the decline of Curtiss as a company. Neither pilots nor aircraft carrier skippers seemed to like it. Nevertheless, the type was faster than the Dauntless, and by the end of the Pacific War, the Helldiver had become the main dive bomber and attack aircraft on USN carriers. By the time a land-based variant, known as
9888-453: Was mostly used by the RAF and RAAF in Burma, was designed to be trimmed for diving, with no lift to distort the dive. The drawback was that it flew nose up in level flight, increasing drag. Failure to re-adjust trim made the aircraft difficult or impossible to pull out of a dive. A dive bomber was vulnerable to low-level ground fire as it dived towards its target, since it was often headed in
9991-511: Was scheduled to relocate to NAS Jacksonville before the end of December 1997. A total of 48 aircraft in six VS squadrons comprising the entire Atlantic Fleet VS wing ultimately moved to NAS Jacksonville, along with nearly 2,000 military and civilian employees. Over the years, VS-24 received numerous awards for excellence in operational readiness. These included the Captain Arnold J. Isbell trophy for antisubmarine warfare (ASW) excellence,
10094-462: Was slow, at 234 mph (377 km/h). Fifty ex-US Navy examples were flown to Halifax, Nova Scotia , by Curtiss pilots and embarked on the French aircraft carrier Béarn in a belated attempt to help France, which surrendered while they were mid-Atlantic. Five airframes left behind in Halifax later reached the RAF, which quickly relegated them to the status of ground instructional airframes for
10197-428: Was subjected to countless attacks, many while in dock and immobile, but was not sunk until the British brought in enormous 12,000 lb (5,400 kg) Tallboy bombs to ensure that even a near miss would be effective. An aircraft diving vertically minimises its horizontal velocity component. When the bomb is dropped, the force of gravity simply increases its speed along its nearly vertical trajectory. The bomb travels
10300-412: Was that it is easy to build such an aircraft and fly it at high altitude, keeping it out of range of ground-based defences. The horizontal bomber was thus ill-suited for tactical bombing, particularly in close support. Attempts at using high-altitude bombing in near-proximity to troops often ended in tragedy, with bombs both hitting their targets and friendly troops indiscriminately. In attacking shipping,
10403-644: Was the Gloster Sea Gladiator . The Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) Mitsubishi A5M and USN Grumman F3F were nominally faster than the Skua but this speed was achieved at much higher altitudes; at low altitudes the Skua was quite comparable in speed and was also better armed. The Swordfish was also capable of operating as a dive-bomber and in 1939 HMS Glorious used her Swordfish for a series of dive-bombing trials, during which 439 practise bombs were dropped at dive angles of 60, 67 and 70 degrees, against
10506-685: Was the SB2C-1C. The SB2C-1 could deploy slats mechanically linked with landing gear actuators, that extended from the outer third of the wing leading edge to aid lateral control at low speeds. The early prognosis of the "Beast" was unfavourable; it was strongly disliked by aircrews due to its size, weight, and reduced range compared to the SBD it replaced. In the Battle of the Philippine Sea , 45 Helldivers, most of which had been launched from extreme range, were lost when they ran out of fuel while returning to their carriers. Among its major faults,
10609-460: Was too short due to the necessity of fitting onto aircraft carrier elevators. The Helldiver's aileron response was also poor and handling suffered greatly under 90 kn (100 mph ; 170 km/h ) airspeed; since the speed of approach to land on a carrier was supposed to be 85 kn (98 mph; 157 km/h), this proved problematic. The 880 changes demanded by the Navy and modification of
#262737