Aviation without WW-II

[carmelo]

Hitler is killed during WW-I, Weimar republic survives,Mussolini remains quiet with his little Empire,Stalin is busy to kill communists,Japan alone not challenge the great powers. WW-II not happen.

In a timeline without WW-II or others major conflicts,how is the aviation around 1950 ATL?

In particular:
We have large passenger aircrafts of type of Lockheed L-1049 Super Constellation or transatlantic flights are dominated by large flyingboats as Boeing 314 "clipper" and its successors?

 

[Michel Van]

Like we Germans say "War is the mother of all things"
and here without WW2 there gonna be differently.

Not Jet Plane
Frank Whittle, Hans von Ohain and Nathan C. Price will not find financier for those exotic ideas
The RAF, Luftwaffe and USAAF have no interest in those fantastic Sci-Fi ideas.
There a illite chance that engineer György Jendrassik manage to build a turboprop engine Jendrassik Cs-1, because it's got a propellor.

No advance Aerodynamic on high-speed
they say that the Luftwaffe wind tunnel R&D on High speed aerodynamic in 1945, catapulted the US aero industry 16 years into the future !

so what fly in a No WW2 World ?
Next to propeller aircraft also Airship filled with Helium (US monopole)
the US Navy will not focus on Aircraft carrier ships, but more on Patrol Reconnaissance seaplane, maybe still experiment with Airship Aircraft carrier.

next Lockheed L-1049 Super Constellation, there also other building super aircrafts
Boeing "Stratocruiser"
Republic Aviation "Rainbow" the fastest propeller airliner in world
Junkers Ju-390 (original as passenger plane)
Bristol "Britannia"
Northrop "flying Wing"

Helicopter they will experiment with them
but it's depended if they used Pistonengine or Jendrassik turboprop engine?
if not turboprop engine, they will be small helicopters for long time

 

[martinbayer]

Like we Germans say "War is the mother of all things"
and here without WW2 there gonna be differently.

Not Jet Plane
Frank Whittle, Hans von Ohain and Nathan C. Price will not find financier for those exotic ideas
The RAF, Luftwaffe and USAAF have no interest in those fantastic Sci-Fi ideas.

The British Air Ministry placed an order for a flyable version of Whittle's engine in June 1939 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Whittle#Development_of_the_turbojet_engine. The He-178 and its engine were developed as a private venture funded by Ernst Heinkel, and it made its first successful flight on August 27, 1939 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heinkel_He_178. The generally accepted "official" beginning of WWII was Germany's invasion of Poland on September 1, 1939 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II. Jet engine and aircraft development would almost certainly have been slower without the war, but the basic technology was already there or in work when it started and would in all likelyhood have been further pursued even if the war never happened.

Martin

 

[Jemiba]

I agree with Martin, the jet engine probably would have been in service some years later, but
principally irresistible. The same for the turboprop engine and the land based long range
aircraft. That old say "War is the mother of all things" is more or less a myth, I think. Maybe
even more funds could have been available for mayn new developments, if there haven't been
the need to develop proven technologies to theri limits because of the needs during the war !

 

[royabulgaf]

I think airship history without WWII would be pretty much the same. The great airships tended to fall down and go boom a lot. Shenandoah, R-101, Akron, Macon, Hindenburg. There may have been some blimp use in the US as cargo and rescue helicopters are used now. I think the semi-jets like the Caproni-Campini would provide a development bridge in the military between prop and true jet aircraft.
\]

 

[Jemiba]

Well, without increasing tensions between Germany and the US, maybe the German rigids would have used helium
and survived longer, maybe as a kind of flying cruise liner, not just for standard passenger transport. And propulsion
concepts, like that from Campini may have lasted a little bit longer, but the pure jet engine already was at the corner.
As said before, to my opinion, the war didn't really led to speeding up new developments, but just to refinements of
the then "classic" aircraft, as those were needed in numbers. Just have a look at the debates about the Me 262
production in the RLM and even by Willy Messerschmitt himself, who wasn't that keen to spend production capacities
for that unproven bird, instead for the Me 109, or the Me 209, which was his favoured alternative for a long time.

 

[MrT]

What is a shame is that R100 was genuinely a good airship, and what's more Yorkshire through and through, making it even better! But even said airships are just not the way forward. I guess we could see the Saro Princess flying boats though.

 

[mz]

Wouldn't fundamental development in many cases have been faster actually? For example Rolls Royce had to put off more "out there" projects and concentrate design and test and manufacturing resources on increasing Merlin power?

Jet engines, VW Beetle, Citroen 2CV and many other things were already in large part developed before the war - the war and the post-war austerity just delayed progress a lot (or moved the weight to america).

The social change of farm boys going to war and meeting people and experiencing things that they would not have otherwise, or women working in factories changed society a lot more.

You can look at the pre war and post war period, the aircraft technology developed very rapidly every year until the sixties. It was not a constant hot war.

 

[Bill Walker]

You can look at the pre war and post war period, the aircraft technology developed very rapidly every year until the sixties. It was not a constant hot war.

But most of the rapid advance you talk about can be directly traced to one Mr. A. Hitler. The advances of the 1930s (monoplane fighters, strategic bombers, etc.) were a result of an anticipated world conflict, brought on by German actions. We all know the UK was a few years late invoking their "ten year rule", but it still brought about massive industrialization and technology advancements in the UK prior to the outbreak of war. What would have happened if they NEVER invoked The Rule?

The Cold War driven advances would not have happened without the Cold War, which might not have happened without the World War bringing the Western countries into global competition with the USSR. And would China have become Communist without the World War? Just as one example, would there have been a switch to land based long ranged commercial aircraft without the experiences and long runways from the War? And what would long range airplanes (land based or otherwise) look like without wartime engine development? Yes, the pressurized commercial airplane was a prewar development, but it fed off military research in high altitude flight. If you slow that military development, the civil development would slow as well.

The one driving force that could have driven aircraft development in this time period could have been racing. Look at the winners of the Bendix Trophys and the long range races to Australia for signs of what commercial aircraft development might have been.


Another point to consider is what world politics would have been like without nuclear weapons for, say, another 50 years. Maybe you would not have needed Hitler to bring about a World War of some description.

A very interesting topic, with more questions than answers.

 

[Jemiba]

Not sure, that we aren't using somewhat different basic assumptions here .
"Without WW II" could be interpreted as mean "complete freedom on earth".
Quite a lot of developments may have been postponed for a really long time,
I think, with passenger transport and maybe air racing as the onlydriving forces
then.
But with severe political tensions still existing, I think, developments may have
been slower, but probably in the same fields as they actually were. And maybe
with no immediate and urgent need, more difficult and revolutionary developments
could have started earlier and with more thoroughness. Maybe the wish to accelerate
intercontinental passenger flights could have been a more important starting point for
the use of jet engines then, so that the passenger a/c with big, relatively efficient engines,
but hampered by slow responsiveness would have been the first use of that technology.

 

[royabulgaf]

Thanks for some ideas, Jemiba. I don't know about commercial aircraft driving jet interest. The early jets required a lot of high temperature alloy research, were maintenance intensive, and unbelievable fuel hogs. Only a "cost is no object" military can afford such uneconomical engines.
Let's also assume that the US would still be the driver of airliner advancement. New York-LA nonstop above the weather would be the airline's holy grail. Landplanes would obviously be the best answer. If you can do that nonstop, you can do New York-London or Paris. Germany would be interested in some sort of Berlin-New York nonstop for prestige, and again pressurized landplanes would be the answer. You would see something from the Fatherland along the lines of the Republic Rainbow. Yes, seaplanes would be around, but I do not think there would be much of a follow up to the Boeing 314-Latecore 631 generation. Either way, the Saro Princess would be an idea whose time came and went before production.

I could see the Germans building some sort of expensive but subsidized high speed transport along the lines of the Republic Rainbow, the US going for the DCs and Connies, and perhaps the british and French sticking with larger slower aircraft such as the Short Solent and Bristol Brabazon for leisurely Empire flights with stops at every colonial outpost. If you can't fly nonstop to New Delhi or Canberra, what do a few more stops matter? You are going to be in the airplane for several days, so you might as well be comfortable.

Piston engines would still be the main powerplant far longer than in the real world. Probably the turbo-compound would be more developed, with perhaps a touch of afterburning, at least for bombers. This I think is where the real turbine research and experience would be done, perhaps allowing a generation of jet engines to be skipped.

 

[Sea Skimmer]

No war doesn't slow down research that much, it just avoids massive production of transitional designs. Massive technological advancements took place in aviation in the 1920s with very little government subsidy and very low production rates. A lot of development of piston engines during the war meanwhile was based on the use of gasoline over 100 octane, and that simply never carried over into civilian development, nor lasted long after the war because of the high cost of the fuel. Fuel cost was one of many factors that did and would drive rapid development and adaption of jet engines. Its easier to make high grade kerosene then 130 octane AVGAS.

One thing that would hurt is slower development of airfields with large concrete runways. The war got those built all over the world and ready to accept a new generation of large airliner which were not flying boats.

 

[Pioneer]

I would think -no war, would slow aircraft development somewhat. Most countries - France, Britain and U.S. seemed very reluctent financially to conduct a high tempo of R&D, let alone production and operational service of modern combat aircraft, if it had not been for the gearing up of Nazi Germany (so I guess it depends if the 'Allies' are persuaded by German propaganda? Does the Spanish Civil War still produce and emphasis the new war fighting and technologies - i.e blitzkrieg, combined arms, bombing of cities ........?, which emphasised the likes/technology of dive bombing, faster and more powerful armed interceptors??

If WWII never happend, it makes me wonder:
- would Germany have continued and mastered it's aircraft carrier building plan under it's 'Z-Plan'
- Would the Russian's continue with the emphasis of heavy long-range bomber development, which was curtailed for tactical aviation with the advent of WWII?
- It was widely recognised that the American inception of fighter/persuit plane design and manufacturing was down the wrong path, until the advent of 'combat experiance' gained from France and Britain. So does this mean that the likes of the heavy, under-powered P-40, P-39 and the likes of the Bell YFM-1 Airacuda be the mainstay of the USAAC?
- If Britain never went to war, then the likes of the North American P-51 Mustang would not have been designed - which in itself revolutionised U.S. fighter development.
- Would the likes of the long-range Boeing B-29 been developed, let alone fielded, say nothing of the later Consolidated B-36! In fact it begs the question would the USAAC be allowed to purchase any substanicial number of B-17's (let alone the longer range B-24, which itself, was spured on by the need/purchase of British war needs!)

Just some thoughts!

Regards
Pioneer

 

[royabulgaf]

My dear Pioneer- I am afraid that the Bell FM-1 was a technological failure. However, the multiplace fighter was held in high regard by everyone at the time. We would probably have something based along the Curtiss A-18 and Douglas A-20. The problem in this whole scenario is that the continental USAAF was a military without a real mission. Absent a threat from Britain via Canada, there was simply no aerial threat from the technology of the day.

 

[pathology_doc]

Even without Hitler, IMO we would likely have had a major war in the Pacific theatre. However, that might not have lasted as long, since without a European threat to concern it, the Royal Navy could have put much of its strength into the Far East sooner (for the war it had expected to fight prior to the recrudescence of Germany), and the Japanese might have found themselves significantly overstretched far sooner than they were in actual history.


The effects might be interesting to postulate, but one might hypothesise a greater effect on the development of naval (carrier-based) and tactical light attack aircraft than on strategic bomb trucks, at least in the first instance. So, no Lancaster or possibly even no Halifax; no late models of B-17 (Boeing ordered to concentrate efforts on getting the B-29 ready); fighter development skewed towards long-range general-purpose fighter-bombers with reliable powerplants and high power lower down (goodbye Hawker Sabre-based fighters, hello carrier-based Griffon Spitfires). Likely no jets. Fuel-thirsty, short-ranged and not really suited for carrier operations - who needs them?


The question then arises of what happens afterwards. With the Brits and the Yanks firmly in control of Japan and who knows, maybe liberating large swathes of China, with occupation forces crawling all over both, does Uncle Joe suddenly get nervous and lash out? At which point, we essentially have a two-front Eurasian land war and the spur to develop truly long-range strategic bombers in the B-36 class.