Was there any discussion within RN FAA/ Carrier Force about angle landing decks before or the during the War?

[exkiwiforces]

Hi

I’m currently building a 1/700 scale RN WW2 Illustrious Class Carrier and while I was fluffing around on Sunday, I had this crazy idea of building angle landing deck as the flight deck requires a far bit of work done to it.

So the question I pose, was there any discussion within RN about angle landing decks before or the during the War or was it a nice have idea as there were important things to worry about ie the lack any decent FAA fighters etc etc?

 

[Archibald]

AFAIK nobody got the idea before 1952 when it popped out on both sides of the atlantic, RN and USN altogether.

One british guy used a desk and his wife lipstick and pocket mirror to make simulated "approaches" for what become the approach and landing mirrors system on all carriers.

A british carrier I can't remember the name was then modified - first with paint on a straight deck; then with a true angled deck - and then USS Antietam followed.

My source is Le Fana circa 2001.

Wikipedia

The angled flight deck was first tested in 1952 on HMS Triumph by painting angled deck markings onto the centerline of the flight deck for touch-and-go landings.[17] This was also tested on USS Midway the same year.[18][19]

Despite the new markings, in both cases the arresting gear and barriers were still aligned with the centerline of the original deck. From September to December 1952, USS Antietam had a rudimentary sponson installed for true angled-deck tests, allowing for full arrested landings, which proved during trials to be superior.[18] In 1953, Antietam trained with both U.S. and British naval units, proving the worth of the angled-deck concept.[20] HMS Centaur was modified with overhanging angled flight deck in 1954.[17]

 

[DWG]

There's a discussion of the history in Friedman's Fighters over the Fleet. The idea grew out of RN experiments with flexible decks and how to handle a deck park with them. It's credited to Rear Admiral D R F Campbell, Director of Naval Aircraft Development and Production, and prospective captain of Ark Royal, and independently to Lewis Boddington of RAE, both of whom proposed it in August 1951. A Lieutenant Commander K A B McDonald also got a smaller share of the innovation award for proposing a rotatable deck in 1949. The idea was passed to the USN a month later, on 7th September 1951.

 

[Brickmuppet]

The U.S.briefly considered an angled deck in the 1930s, though this was in a different context. The US designed a cruiser with a flight deck and the 'final' 1931 design had an angled deck, though instead of directing the landing planes away from parked aircraft it was intended to direct them away from the end of the flight deck and the main battery turrets ahead of it. The vessel was re-ordered as one of the Brooklyn class. Later when the concept was briefly revived around 1940 the designs contemplated had straight, albeit longer decks.it would be a small leap to recognize the utility of the arrangement but it was a leap the U.S.N. did not make.

 

[phil gollin]

..

No, the angled deck idea was gifted to the USN.

For the Illustrious Class, here is a November 1952 crude model of a proposal for an angled deck version

 

[andy_d]

What type do the model aircraft represent? They look like Scimitars with a butterfly tail.

 

[starviking]

What type do the model aircraft represent? They look like Scimitars with a butterfly tail.

That’s exactly what they were: Supermarine Type 508

 

[Hood]

Nope, they were generic models actually made in 1945 for illustrative purposes using an Illustrious-class model, probably the same one illustrated above before it was given the 'sticker'(?) to show the angled deck.
They were made by a member of the NAD at RAE Farnborough, Geoffrey Cooper who wrote Farnborough and the Fleet Air Arm, Midland Publishing, 2008.

In the book he mentions the aircraft models with a photo of the Illustrious model taken in 1945 with the normal axial deck. He made up a generic jet fighter shape which was a good guess to the later Supermarine 508. The purpose was probably to look at deck handling arrangements for jet-powered aircraft. He even pondered if his work may of accidentally inspired the later angled deck; he recounts how a plywood copy of the flight deck layout he made was left sitting on top of the model ship at a skewed angle, thereby looking like what would later become angled-carrier deck.

I presume in 1952 the model was given a lick of paint or some from of adhesive sticker to represent the lines of the angled deck.

Cooper was in NAD from 1940 until late 1945, and his account shows the concept of the angled deck was not earlier than 1951 (Campbell & Boddington) although its clear that the problem of running out of deck space for sufficient arrestor wire and safety barrier pull-out and catapult lengths was becoming a vexing issue by 1945. Oddities like double-decker arrangements, rotating decks and the flexible deck were among the earliest ideas to try and solve the problem, the flexible deck of course resulting in a lot of experimental work that was rendered obsolete by the angled deck. It seems strange perhaps that what now seems the easiest and obvious solution was overlooked, but sometimes it takes time for that inspiration for the "ah-ha" moment.

 

[Pirate Pete]

A couple more pictures of the model of the 'tentative' angled flight deck proposal for an Illustrious class carrier...
From the IWM website