Stukas and HMS Illustrious.

[Birgir Thorisson]

Leon Venter:

Thank you, very informative.

Question: If each droptank fully loaded weighed about 240 kg, that is more than the bombload carried by the B on the wing racks. It is hardly compatible with extra internal tanks, as reported for R-1 in AI. But:

Basic Weight B-1 2750 kg, R-2 3450 kg
Gross Weight B-1 4300 kg, R-2 5600 kg
(The B-2 had trial tests up to 5500 kg gross)

If the empty weight of the R-2 is 700 kg. more than B1, the structure must be heavily reinforced. (The more appropriate comparison would have been with the B-2)

Birgir Thorisson

PS,
I am experiencing the disappearance of posts. E.g. the post #3 above is just a part of what I posted yesterday, which I actually saw in the full form when looking at the thread on my computer screen. Does anyone have similar experiences?
(I edited the piece twice, because I find it uncomfortable to read through my posts in the miniscule window offered by the "quick reply" option.)
Also, on the Polikarpov thread I started, two very long pieces disappeared when I tried to use the quote option to move paragraphs from previous posts into my reply. Apparently I was not doing something right there.
Is it possible in some way to go back and recover what was written in these windows, if one has lost it by some accident, before it got posted?

Edited.
PPS. when I posted this comment, the computer returned the message that it was a duplicate of a message I had posted few minutes before. Something is wrong.

Birgir