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The Staff of SOH
Avenger aux fuel
- Thread starter Hiede
- Start date
UncleTgt
SOH-CM-2025
Excerpt from "Grumman TBF/TBM Avenger" by Terry C. Treadwell
"The TBF/TBMs carried a maximum of 352 gallons of fuel in three self sealing tanks. The three main tanks, centre main & left and right main, were built as part of the integral wing section. ...."
"For Reconnaissance & scouting missions an additional 270 gallons could be carried in a special tank fitted in the bomb bay. This tank was constructed ..." The description of construction suggests this tank wasn't droppable.
"A further 100 gallons was sometimes carried in two 50 gallon droppable fuel tanks. These were suspended just inboard of the folding wing axis..."
"Each of the 50 gallon tanks could be dropped individually by ...."
Looks like a different airfile is needed if you want to model the scouting loadout, using WEP_internal_tank in the DP to call up the bay tank - unless someone knows if you can simply redesignate Airfile Record 532 "Center Tank 2" as an external tank & its contents wont be counted unless a droptank is also present in the DP (like records 534 & 535)?
Hiede
Members +
UT,
According to the people who actually installed to 270 gallon tanks in the bomb bay they carried 2 of them and they drop them.This from the book"The Big E" and people who actually served on her including the servicing crews and pilots.Wiki and other links don't always give you the full story.
Hiede
UncleTgt
SOH-CM-2025
Maybe the Enterprises crew did some "proof of concept" work that resulted in the 270USG bay tank.
However I struggle to understand why you would put droppable tanks inside the bomb bay when you already had two hardpoints under the wing (leaving the bay empty for other ordnance). Unless the tanks used were too big/heavy to fit under the wing hard points (ie larger than the 50-60USG tanks already used by SBDs,F4Fs & TBFs).
And the bomb bay simply isn't rated for or physically large enough for 2 x 270USG tanks (3240lbs of fuel, plus the tanks themselves). So the tanks used must have been smaller - perhaps they used F6F tanks then? (2 x 150USG = 1800lbs fuel)...
Hiede
Members +
UT,
The Big E was copyrighted 1962 which only 17 years after the war and that would put the ages between mid to late 30's to mid 40's,maybe some older.Now when they did the research of the book they probably were a few years younger.Here
's what they said about the extra fuel tanks.
Torpedo Ten, with 2 x 270-gallon droppable tanks installed in their bomb bays by eighteen men
working from midnight to 7:00 A.M., flew a 325-mile search to the westward in an attempt to
locate the Mobile Fleet, but found nothing in five-plus hours in the air.
So that's 325 miles out and same back for 650 miles,but they also did a search pattern which would add 100's of miles.They flew 10 degree sectors.
They only did this at the Marianas because of the distances.The extra fuel was in case the found the IJN Fleet and had to shadow it.The Avengers flew in pairs and did searches for days until submarines sighted the IJN Fleet.
For shorter searches it was an Avenger and 2 Hellcat with drop tanks,Helldivers were also used at times with Hellcat escorts.
Hiede
