[Boomerang]

Gentleman:

I have previously read about wooden propellors fitted to late war LW aircraft, such as the Fw 190D, without giving the matter too much thought -it struck me as a rational response to the shortage of strategic materials and the desirability of dispersing manufacturing to sites not reliant on the complex facilities needed to manufacture large metal components.

However, I noted in Caldwell and Muller's excellent The Luftwaffe Over Germany - Defense of the Reich the comment: '..The decline in manufacturing standards was strikingly evident. The Fw 190D currently displayed at the U.S. Air Force Museum has a wooden propellor.'

I read this as meaning that the use of wooden propellors necessarily represented a decline in aircraft quality, but I'm not clear whether the use of such propellors resulted in a decline in aircraft performance compared with metal propellors, a reduction in service life, increased vulnerability to damage, or other factors.

Clarification would be most welcome.

Thanks

Don W