American claims credit for Battle of Britain success

I.Lloyd/P.Pugh,Hives & the Merlin,Icon,2004,P.139: “By 1937 (A.M), convinced that 100 octane fuel (developed and tested by USAAF) could boost the power of aero-engines, began importing small quantities…The first full cargo of ‘BAM100’ was shipped in June,1939 from the Esso refinery in Aruba…Most shipments came from Esso and Shell refineries in USA, but fortunately some came from Aruba and Curacao (Neth. W.Indies) for, when war was declared (3/9/39) Congress invoked the Neutrality Act”.

Looks like its time for me to dig out my copy of Shell’s 100 year history book, unfortunately I’m in Norway right now and the book’s in the UK. large amount of Shell’s crude came from the far east, Anglo-Iranian (BP) from the middle east and AGWI (Esso) from the states (I think)

US certainly did deliver refined fuel (produced from nice sweet crude from Texas and California), and that is most likely the source of the news item in the original post in this thread.

I think we are coming at the same point from opposite sides. The automatic Claudel-Hobson carburettors and Rotol props were ‘production standard’ items, but special for the Wellesleys on that flight, and in fact the Rotol props of this kind never became standard on Wellesleys.

I agree the fuel wasn’t ‘experimental’ perhaps, and it was not widely available (and was certainly not available in Australia for the aircraft after arrival). Without engines (any systems to take advantage of it, it wouldn’t be much use (cf – Aus) and vice versa, the higher-performance engines and their props, carburettors etc. also needed it to get best result. In that sense it was a low availability part of a developing and incomplete ‘system’ to enhance performance.

The actual oil (refined in the UK) was, I understood, from either the Far East (British Empire) Canada likewise or the USA. Does anyone know how much came from where? Did the US deliver refined 100 octane in 1940?

Thanks, an interesting answer, appreciate it.

Having just published an article on the Wellesley flight, my impression (I’d not researched beyond the point you mention) was that it wasn’t a standard product, but another element in the super-weapons and tools the RAF was ‘getting soon’. Rather like the ‘Empire-wide’ deployment the Wellesley record was touted as offering, but didn’t, I think there was a lot of window dressing…

As ever, data needed, I guess.

Indeed not standard, you wouldn’t get it down your local dealer, but not a special brew either. After all the Air Ministry spec. had come out the year before so it is only natural that suppliers would be gearing up, albeit slowly. Also in Dec 1938 Rolls-Royce were quoting power outputs for the merlin VIII and X using 100 Octane, so they were experimenting with the stuff too.

Thanks, an interesting answer, appreciate it.

Shell advertising in Dec 1938 says that the RAF non-stop flight from Egypt to Australia used Shell 100 Octane Petrol, implying that it was standard product, although I guess production quantities would have been low.

Having just published an article on the Wellesley flight, my impression (I’d not researched beyond the point you mention) was that it wasn’t a standard product, but another element in the super-weapons and tools the RAF was ‘getting soon’. Rather like the ‘Empire-wide’ deployment the Wellesley record was touted as offering, but didn’t, I think there was a lot of window dressing…

As ever, data needed, I guess.

UK refineries in the 1930s obtained their crude oil from many sources, depending on where the oil company owners were active, and the grade of the fuel they produced was to a very large extent governed by the consituents of the oil as refining techniques were not too advanced. I believe that the RAF maintained a relatively low octane standard through the ’20s and first half of the ’30 as the quality of supplies in the more remote corners of the Empire was not so good.
The discussion regarding the imminent availability of 100 Octane fuel, by Fedden, Bulman, Banks and others, seems to kick-off around late 1935. Shell advertising in Dec 1938 says that the RAF non-stop flight from Egypt to Australia used Shell 100 Octane Petrol, implying that it was standard product, although I guess production quantities would have been low.

? Don’t you mean A
more Propre, to regard oeself with conceit, Ar our Propare is an american sprInter

The correct term is ‘armour propre’, FWIW. Beyond that I’m at a loss for comment, in response.

Luckily history’s a lot more robust than the ‘new angle’ of the press and the armour propare of some forumites.

? Don’t you mean Amour Propre, to regard oneself with conceit, Armour Propare is an american sprinter

Deja all-over-again…

The Narrow Margin of Criticality: The Question of the Supply of 100-Octane Fuel in the Battle of Britain
Gavin Bailey

University of Dundee

Aviation historians have advanced the supply of 100-octane aviation fuel as a critical and recognisably American contribution to the Battle of Britain during the critical events of 1940.

A study of the contemporary Air Ministry records in the Public Record Office indicates that this assertion can be challenged. This challenge can be made both on the grounds of the aircraft performance benefit involved, as indicated by contemporary RAF testing, and on the national origin attributed to 100-octane fuel supplies. These records demonstrate that, contrary to the assertions of aviation history, the supply of 100-octane fuel to the RAF in time for use in the Battle of Britain must be attributed to pre-war British planning and investment during the rearmament period of the late nineteen- thirties.

http://ehr.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/cen007v1

Note: “published online on April 15, 2008“

Unfortunately you have to subscribe for more…

Greater US contribution (apart, that is, from volunteer citizens with us), was BSA’s licenced Colt Browning MG. Does anyone trace UK’s 1940 props to Hamilton or Reed? Or aerofoil sections to NACA? Or Merlin to Curtiss D-12? (Or DB 601A to Kestrel?) To coin a phrase…Oneworld.

Genuine question – where did the fuel actually come from? Not the North Sea, obviously, so British sources, or as I understood, at least in part, American?

Again, happy to be factually corrected, but British variable pitch and constant speed propellers (DH & Rotol) were licensed from the US designs. There was no indigenous British designed alternative, and the Watts props on the fighters would’ve lost them the battle – surely.

The guns were American-designed Brownings, ‘recalibrated’, as Alertken says; it remains an enduring mystery to me why Britain, a major arms producer (Vickers alone) couldn’t come up with a reliable tough aircraft machine gun in the pinch?

Power and thus speed gives you options in air combat. The faster aircraft can dictate.

As for borrowed (history) reputations, it’s something that’s been going across the Atlantic since first contact. Everyone’s a bit prone to remembering the bits that reflect well on their preferred history, and quick to gloss the less palatable bits we’ve all got in the past.

And a trivial one, let’s remember the armoured glass was famously expedited by Dowding’s reference to Chicago gangsters having it – so why couldn’t his boys?

The wooden bits of the Hurricane – spruce? From the ‘Pacific North West’ – that is Canada (and the USA…). I don’t think the Weald was much use. 😀

So what’s wrong with using the best you can get from where you can get it? The ‘island alone’ bit was a convenient myth, not even subscribed to by Churchill. Perhaps a bit more honesty in origin, failures etc. might throw the unarguable achievements of the few into greater prominence?

e.g. Castle Bromwich’s pre May 1940 failure – (an often carefully-forgotten disgraceful debacle, and, IMHO, symptomatic of British allergy to real mass production). However one might argue the case (and I can accept other views) more Spitfires earlier would’ve been rather ‘a good thing’.

But in fact it was a close run-thing, as the saying goes – any one factor could have been decisive in the air battle (but, very hard to make a watertight case to prove its decisiveness) probably not the course of the war, which is where the RN comes in and the unlikelihood of a successful, completed invasion.

Luckily history’s a lot more robust than the ‘new angle’ of the press and the armour propare of some forumites.

Regards,

According to ‘Flight’ June 7th 1945 the Air Ministry issue the specification for 87 Octane fuel in August 1933 and for 100 Octane in March 1937. 100 Octane was available for fighter use from the outbreak of war and generally available throughout the RAF from August 1940.

Cheers

The irony is that Standard Oil supplied IG Farben with the tetraethyl lead technology in 1936 when the RLM ordered an expansion of synthetic aircraft fuel production in Germany. In return, Standard got IG Farben’s synthetic rubber technology under their patent swap agreement.

No one can question the value or need of the American contribution in terms of materials, PETROL, or manpower and I think they deserve credit for it but it came with a price to Great Britain, There were many other contributors to the Battle of Britain however and a sole credit for the US is a bit far fetched, but that is my opinion.

Greater US contribution (apart, that is, from volunteer citizens with us), was BSA’s licenced Colt Browning MG. Does anyone trace UK’s 1940 props to Hamilton or Reed? Or aerofoil sections to NACA? Or Merlin to Curtiss D-12? (Or DB 601A to Kestrel?) To coin a phrase…Oneworld.

Gooday All

Here in Australia, we have two fuels available 100LL and 100/130. I have been using 100LL in my Tiger for some time, however it comes at a price. The lead compounds erode the cylinder heads(bronze) and the also there is some burning of the exhaust valves.

The manuals for a lot of old aero engines state “a high grade of motor spirit, 72 octane or higher” from memory that is a quote from the Gipys Major engine manual of the 1930’s.

As you can deduce running an engine designed for low octane “straight” as opposed to high octane “cracked” fuel has caused some problems. It used to be that there was 87 octane avgas that was well suited to Gipsy Majors and a lot of other older aero engines but that became unavailable in the late 1980’s.

For a while people used “standard” MOGAS, however that too was eliminated as LL MOGAS became the norm (typically 93-94 octane). The problem with using MOGAS is that it’s blend changes winter to summer (more volitile components in winter to make cars easier to start) and its formula varies from country to country. Also scavenging agents are put in it to help keep the cylinders and pistons “clean”, some of these agents when burnt produce compounds that affect the alloys that older aero engines are made of.

AVGAS on the other hand is belnded to a specification and thus is constant in its composition.

Most aero engines have low compressions < 7:1, the problems come with turbo supercharging and engine driven supercharging when the cylinder pressures at compression are much higher (can elaborate if required). Won’ go further on the technical side, save to say a merlin has engine driven supercharging and that generates the requirement to prevent pre-detonation (which can destroy the engine) hence the need for higher octane fuel.

cheers

The reason I used 100LL in my drag bike rather than pump fuel was that it enabled me to run a much higher compression ratio….15-1 instead of the 10.5-1 you could get with the pump stuff. More compression means more power.

Conversly, during an engine rebuild, I had the compression ratio in my 1963 GT car lowered from 10.25-1 to about 9-1 because of the lower octane and quality of today’s auto fuels.
I’m not expecting a big drop in performance…but for a casual driver/show car, it shouldn’t really matter.

The reason I used 100LL in my drag bike rather than pump fuel was that it enabled me to run a much higher compression ratio….15-1 instead of the 10.5-1 you could get with the pump stuff. More compression means more power.

Tim Palucka contends that the fuel gave our planes superior altitude, manoeuvrability and rate of climb, enabling them to dodge the Luftwaffe.

Since when did higher octane fuel improve manoeuvrability ?, more power tends to reduce manoeuvrability not increase it.
Also I dont think many of our Pilots managed to dodge the Luftwaffe our casualty rates were enormous.
I think the problem is that the US really doesnt have much history when its compared to Britain its hundreds of years as compared to thousands of years. There are so many US made films which steal British achievements this report is nothing new. Thank God that Peter Jackson is doing Dambusters and not Micheal Bay.:)

Much of the groundwork on high octane fuels was done by FR (Rod) Banks, (he of the Associated Ethyl Co), was responsible for the fuel mix used in the Rolls Royce “R” in the S6 and S6b, and also I believe (post schneider trophy) the Italians twin engine Machi. (Hopefully on topic enough, for inclusion by the censor).

They will be making claims about their contribution to the history and development of Carrier operations next :diablo:

Yes, they may have supplied a significant proportion of the fuel early in the war, but the rights to make that high octane fuel that way were sold to them several years before by BP’s forerunner as they invented it in their labs in west London. This is alluded to on BP’s website, although other publications of theirs have told the story in more detail

“The British Air Force turned to Anglo-Iranian, which had recently found a way to improve aviation fuel’s efficiency”

Anyway, as others have said there was much more to it than fuel alone.