Australian Beauforts

These mods fed on through the Beaufighter, I guess through experience with the Beaufort. The flap quadrant mechanism was really beefed up, I guess through flap failures. The engine mount brackets to the spars were machined out of solid instead of being a piece of bent steel plate. Wing pickup points were changed as was the thickness of some wing skinning, and on & on!

Hi Me again

Talking to Ralph cusack the other day he said there were hundreds of improvements and design changes carried out to improve the Aussie Beaufort which made them better but take time to implement on a restoration.

Regards
John P

Dave,

Will contact Stewart and see if I can fax you the relevant page. Can U pm or whatever a fax #?

G’day F#3

Hi Dave

The Beaufort was a moderately sucessful aircraft at the best of times wherever it served and in whatever version and it is true that there was trouble with early production issues with Aussie aircraft including a very deadly problem with the empenage (caused by the mis specification of material in a washer apparently) which resulted in the deaths of a number of crews until a test pilot found the cause.

The US engines were in fact a good idea and gave the Aussie version better reliability and performance. The real downfall of the Beaufort was the availability of the Beaufighter which was better suited to a number of roles undertaken by the Beaufort – particularly as a torpedo bomber and attack aircraft. The plentiful supply of US bombers such as the A20, B25 and B26 and A26 also spelt the end for the Beaufort – in the long run there was not much to pick between the UK and aussie Beaufort.

Regards
John P

Feather, I don’t have access to the book (though I have a copy of Wolson’s book on Hudson, Anson and Sunderland in RAAF service). Can you please give some synopsis of what the book says on this issue? Is it different from what George Gudsell said?

Thanks

Dave,

Have a look at Stewart Wilson’s book for a slightly more historically correct view of the Beaufort introduction.

G’day 😉

Sounds an interesting chap, but I do wonder about the statement that 100 Sqn had Vincents rather than Vildebeests. As you say, every source I can think of states that they had Vildebeests. Whilst photos post 1940 are not plentiful, there are quite a few photos of 100Sqn planes in the 30’s and they are clearly Vildebeests. I cannot see any reason why they should have exchanged Vildebeests for Vincents. 100 Sqn together with 36 Sqn were there in an anti-shipping role to which the Vildebeest was far more suited. The nearest Vincents were in the Middle East and East Africa where they were still operational, so why transfer them to Singapore?

Further, I recollect that before Endau when 100 and 36 Sqns were sent in against Japanese shipping, there was a discussion as to whether they should attack with torpedoes or bombs. In the end it was decided to bomb as it was believed that the ships were not in open sea, but the discussion would have been pointless if they had been equipped with Vincents as they could not carry torpedoes.

It is true that the Vildebeest were not used operationally against the Japanese in a torpedo -carrying role, rather all operations were bombomng operations using bomb racks which were either very similar or identical to those used on the Vincent. Might this be a source of confusion?

I will check tonight to see if I can find anything that sheds further light on this.

I do feel that the men of 36 and 100 Sqn who flew Vildebeests against the Japanese, especially those that went in in daylight at Endau, deserve to be remembered far more than they are. Personally I have little doubt that if they had been in Europe rather than in the Far East in the opening days of the war there, there would have been the odd VC or two awarded.

Paul

Cheers Mark. He did state they were not assembled correctly, but I guess if it was a different engine that it was designed to have, yes, teething troubles are bound to occur. It’s a pity it wasn’t tested better before they were forced into squadron service but I guess circumstances with the impending war from Japan forced early entry. No matter who was at fault, and for whatever reason, it probably saved George’s life and his five Kiwi mates. No. 100 Sqn was decimated by the Japanese in January just after he left for Aussie.

Another interesting point, George has an astonishingly sharp memory, recalling exact dates etc without even looking it up, and when I mentioned 100 Sqn having Vildebeests (which is recorded in several noted sources, both books and websites) he corrected me. He says the squadron never had Vildes while he was there, they were Vincents. Interesting. One thing he was very thankful of, he didn’t have to fly them against the Japs like his friends did.

Dave,

the RAF received @ 7 of the first “Australian” built Beauforts, although these were in fact Australian assembled Bristol built, but they did have the Australian pratt/whitney engines fitted in place of Taurus engines so I suspect it was in this area that problems arose in the early production.

regards

Mark P