The Secret Horsepower Race by Calum Douglas (and piston engine discussion)

Calum,

I do appreciate your posting those document excerpts here. And there are those who look no further when they are told something does not exist. Or check the 'obvious' places and look no further. I prefer reading 'norse saga' sources of technical information which can't be read in any other way.
 
Calum Douglas said:
Some pre-publication critisism has appeared on 12-O'Clock high forum, which is it seems not open to new registrations so
I cant address it. Apparenly:

a) Dr Kolllmann wasnt in charge of design at all, he was just a designer and Friedrich was chief designer

Ref: a:

Friedrich was in charge of Design & Development a far broader role, not Design - Kollmann WAS, and his responsibities
covered piston engines, superchargers AND Jets.

Kollmann did not ascend to this role until late 1944 (prescise date is difficult to ascertain), hence any
paperwork predating about October 1944-ish will indeed not show the correct info.
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This is a perennial problem with research. Regarding an aeroplane - who is the "designer" of this aircraft? What was their job role?

There was the guy who drew the basic configuration. There was his boss (the head of his department) and the Chief Project Engineer who headed the team who did the proposal. Then there was the Chief Engineer who's job was to turn the drawings into an prototype aeroplane. Then there was their respective deputies who may or not have been promoted to take over their bosses jobs at some point. Then there's the Chief Project Engineer who lead the team making the proposal for a production design, and the Chief Engineer who actually led the detail design of the production version. All of these people had bosses, who might take the credit, and subordinates who might feel they did the lions share of the work. People who were deputies at the beginning and subsequently became the Chief seem to often forget when they got promoted.

So when any one individual is claimed to be "in charge of design", or claims to be "the designer of the F-16"....
 
Ref: 12O'Clock High Forum: I went through the DB files I have and just for anyone interested in proclaiming "Kollmann was never chief designer"

05/05/1939 = Dr Kollmann (Engineer in Design Dept.)
30/07/1941 = O.I. Dr. Kollmann (~Senior Engineer in Design Dept.)
4/08/1944 = Prok. Dr. Kollmann (~General Manager of Design Dept.) - At that point the only stations above that in the firm are Dir. i.e Director. like Nallinger. By that point Friedrich (In charge of the "Design & Development" office as a whole above Kollmann) was also a Director, which he reached in about May 1942).

O.I. = Oberingenieur
Prok. = Prokurist

Interestingly you can see when the panic sets in because often in late 44 onwards they dont bother typing out the titles of anyone under
Director level on the paperwork.

His son told me he ended the war in charge of design, the DB distribution lists say the same, and so do the British Intelligence files.

(the lists seem to take about a month before they are all in agreement, this must be just around
his promotion to Prokurist as you can see it had to be altered by hand. Later ones are not.

I`m suspecting an incredibly dull case of semantics is responsible.

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I'm not sure why you can't get on the 12O'Clock High forum. In any case, the information you've posted should put things to rest.
 
SleeperService2 said:
All too often people do just that and then go off half-cocked as they haven't read the related stuff elsewhere. That can be a tad irksome.
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Like reviewers, you mean. :rolleyes:

But seriously, after all the strongly indicative evidence posted here, any challenge that he was not in effect chief designer needs to produce unequivocal contemporary evidence as to who was.
 
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I spent years getting to know his son in Germany, and interviewed him at length - so having this
very rudely questioned irks.

Oh, I and nearly forgot:

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SOURCE:

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One could if one wanted to also infer who was senior from looking at who the Allies chose to fly to England and have interrogated.

Interrogations:

USSAF-A480 (above - Location, Germany)
BIOS-ER-538 (Location probably in Germany)
BIOS-ER-539 (Location, St Johns Wood, London - building is still there as a Hotel)
BIOS-ER-540 (Location unknown, but probably at the R.A.E. Farnborough, interestingly the interrogators included Beatrice Shilling)

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Looking forward to reading this because I like reading fiddly technical report excerpts and development histories even if I don't understand them. Is there much on the USAAF hyperengine program of the 1930s?
 
As a poster here and on other forums, including being a moderator on the one owned by my company, I see poorly informed people posting fragments. A failing of the internet is the lack of civil, polite conversation in some cases. That problem would be solved if people met face to face. In the alternative, encouraging a bit of thought before posting. Yet some people will continue regardless of warnings to do otherwise.
 
Sherman Tank said:
Looking forward to reading this because I like reading fiddly technical report excerpts and development histories even if I don't understand them. Is there much on the USAAF hyperengine program of the 1930s?
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I do cover a little of the Chrysler program during the war itself, but I`m sorry to say probably only... 2 pages of text. It has been a tremendously difficult balance deciding what amount of "failed by fascinating experiments" and "the main operationally relevant engines" to cover. In order to not end up with another horribly superficial book which tries to cover everything and says nothing, I decided to cut back the experimental stuff, omit duplication of "Vees For Victory" on the V1710 or White`s R2800 book, and try to go all-out for what (I felt) nobody really knew as much about. What I tried to do is tease one narrow "thread" out of the bottomless pit of data & papers (I will never live be able to read even the RLM conference records, which are in the order of 80,000 pages) which at least means the reader can understand what happended and why in the broad sense. This book despite its size is in no way, shape or form a "complete" history of each interesting aviation engine of the 30` and 40s, but it is I think, at least ONE contigous solid (and referenced) path across a very treacherous historical quagmire.
 
As someone with their own book being published next year I understand completely about having to cut things out or put them out of focus.

You don't happen to know any good summaries of the program, do you? I'm just curious how all the apparent effort devoted to "hypers" ended up going to waste because Allison and Packard produced something better unprompted.
 
Sherman Tank said:
As someone with their own book being published next year I understand completely about having to cut things out or put them out of focus.

You don't happen to know any good summaries of the program, do you? I'm just curious how all the apparent effort devoted to "hypers" ended up going to waste because Allison and Packard produced something better unprompted.
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Hmmm well I do make comment on that in the book, the only good book (which I know of) on some of that programme is by Kimble McCutcheon

Tornado: Wright Aero's Last Liquid-Cooled Piston Engine: Amazon.co.uk: McCutcheon, Kimble D.: 9780971084704: Books

Buy Tornado: Wright Aero's Last Liquid-Cooled Piston Engine by McCutcheon, Kimble D. (ISBN: 9780971084704) from Amazon's Book Store. Everyday low prices and free delivery on eligible orders.
www.amazon.co.uk

Broadly the effort on the hypers went to waste because they were too big, too complicated, too expensive, too heavy and too late. (and in many cases also just not very good). Thats a bit of a generalisation, and of course several of them had some very nice features, but basically the argument I make in the book is that you cant win wars with very complex designs because (if we ignore money, weight and size)

a) Whatever you make needs to be constantly improved once you start building it
b) If your engine takes 2x longer to develop, by the time you have done that, your competitor will (even with an arguably inferior
basic starting point) have developed himself ahead of you through having been able to run and test the product in the real
world much sooner.
c) The more complicated it is, the less of "a" you can do once its built.

I write a bit about the Chrysler 2220 in the book, even in the middle of the war they were still deciding which supercharger to use, and
discussing if they could develop a 2-stage one, etc etc etc, they just ran out of time and ended up with something
that basically wasnt better than a Griffon. Just too much diluted effort, too many firms doing double-work and
too much time on the weird and wonderful instead of just getting something that had all the basics right and
developing it quickly. (sorry that does sound rather generic and dull, but broadly thats still what I think !)

If someone wants to pay me a small fortune, I`ll spend the next 6 years writing another book about it - as I`m sure it would be incredibly interesting to try to work out in detail why the management of those projects didnt produce the goods, it certainly wasnt because they were stupid.

Oops I`ve derailed my own book thread !
 
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I should also mention that if you register on my website a new tab appears,

Calum Douglas – my personal website

www.calum-douglas.com

Click here:
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Then you can login and see the "interviews" tab


and there are four video interviews and one transcribed interview available.

Dr.Ing Kollmann (Karl Kollmann's son, and also a piston engine designer at Daimler-AG, where retired from in the 1980`s)
Dipl-Ing. Udo Hafner (well known technical document collector in Germany and former fuel injection expert at Bosch)
Professor Goddard (former chief designer at Cosworth)
Chris Starr (responsible for restoring the engine of the RAF Bf109G "Black 6")
Elly Hanitsch (engine drawing office at Junkers-Jumo from 1942-1945 - text only as her heath was not good on the day we visited and
her voice was very faint)

From 2:20 > 3:15 Kollmann describes his fathers career trajectory.


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Calum Douglas said:
... Just too much diluted effort, too many firms doing double-work and
too much time on the weird and wonderful instead of just getting something that had all the basics right and
developing it quickly. (sorry that does sound rather generic and dull, but broadly thats still what I think !)
Oops I`ve derailed my own book thread !
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Not at all, OK maybe it rocked the train a bit.
The First World War taught the British many lessons most of which were forgotten, thankfully they did remember all the weird and wonderful ideas that they'd experimented on so when they all reappeared in WW2 a letter of thanks quickly dealt with that item.
The most noticeable area was in artillery equipment and tactics, a common thread in most intel reports is the awesome firepower that could be called down. According to Dad who used it post-war the kit was pretty good and kept your feet dry and happy. The one thing that caught us was the tank, and it's engines. A very very sad tale. Fortunately the aircraft guys managed to produce the goods despite Ministry intentions (for the most part).

It was ever thus.
 
Amazon dot ca reports the book as in preorder.
It's more critical in a history like this to discuss the processes by which development occurred than the technical specs of the things being developed. I have put this on my Amazon wishlist and it will probably constitute my Christmas present from the dogs.
 
pathology_doc said:
Amazon dot ca reports the book as in preorder.
It's more critical in a history like this to discuss the processes by which development occurred than the technical specs of the things being developed. I have put this on my Amazon wishlist and it will probably constitute my Christmas present from the dogs.
Click to expand...

If thats what you want from a book on this subject, this is a book you will enjoy a lot. Its EXACTLY why I wrote it, so that the reader understands WHY.
Your book is probably on a container ship right now as they are shipped by bulk to Amazon on the various continents.
 
Just got to the end of Chapter 2, on the eve of war, and I feel like I have already read a whole book. Totally absorbing, though there is so much detail I have to take it in short bursts.

Only one comment really, on Halford's role at Napier.
Montague Napier had designed the Lion, mainstay of British civil aviation for a decade. He led the company's design side into a complacent decline, fiddling with new projects but achieving nothing useful. They had become a one-product company and its days were clearly numbered. In 1928 he was persuaded to bring in Major Frank Halford, an independent engine design consultant with a reputation second to none (he had the ADC Cirrus and DH Gipsy lines to his credit, among others). His and other engine projects, such as license-building Junkers Diesels, proliferated.
When Napier died, HT Vane took over. Halford had three promising projects going, a modest straight-six which became the Javelin and two more advanced and much bigger H engines of 16 and 24 cylinders respectively the Rapier and the Dagger. During the development of the Rapier, Halford became unhappy with the bearings. He visited America and Napier's consequently become deeply involved in the development path to the revolutionary copper-lead-indium thin-wall bearings. Intriguingly the Dagger had auto-adjusting hydraulic tappets.
Against Vane's better instincts, the company would not wait. It diversified into industrial tractors and wanted to start making cars again. With Halford's engines still under development, Vane had no immediate alternative to offer. Matters came to a head and Vane resigned.
Sir Harold Snagge, a banker by profession, was then wheeled in from outside. He found the company living off very comfortable financial reserves but with no manufacturing income. He was as unimpressed by the motor vehicle side as had been Vane and quickly sold off what assets he could find. Far from being vain, Vane had been right all along. For a while Snagge ran Napier as an investment company which channelled some of its profits into aero engine development.
Halford joined the board of Napier's in 1935. (It is a delicious irony that at this point in time his counterpart at Cirrus, now Cirrus-Hermes, was one C.S. Napier of the same family.)
About this time the Air Ministry became interested in the Dagger, and all other projects, Halford and Junkers alike, were dropped. But Napier's knew the Dagger could only be a stopgap, based as it was on Halford's old 1928 roadmap. He immediately began work on a successor, still with the same H 24 configuration but bigger and more powerful and water-cooled, which would become known as the Sabre. As a part of this work, Halford sent a pile of Dagger data to his old sparring partner Harry Ricardo and this initiated a long period of Ricardo's involvement in the design.
(Principal sources:
Wilson & Reader; Men and Machines: D Napier & Son 1808-1958, Weidenfeld & Nicholson, 1958.
Taylor; Boxkite to Jet: The Remarkable career of Frank B Halford, Rolls-Royce Heritage Trust, 1999.)

Now, time to get into Chapter 3, methinks.
 
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steelpillow said:
Just got to the end of Chapter 2, on the eve of war, and I feel like I have already read a whole book. Totally absorbing, though there is so much detail I have to take it in short bursts.

Only one comment really, on Halford's role at Napier.
Montague Napier had designed the Lion, mainstay of British civil aviation for a decade. He led the company's design side into a complacent decline, fiddling with new projects but achieving nothing useful. They had become a one-product company and its days were clearly numbered. In 1928 he was persuaded to bring in Major Frank Halford, an independent engine design consultant with a reputation second to none (he had the ADC Cirrus and DH Gipsy lines to his credit, among others). His and other engine projects, such as license-building Junkers Diesels, proliferated.
When Napier died, HT Vane took over. Halford had three promising projects going, a modest straight-six which became the Javelin and two more advanced and much bigger H engines of 16 and 24 cylinders respectively the Rapier and the Dagger. During the development of the Rapier, Halford became unhappy with the bearings. He visited America and Napier's consequently become deeply involved in the development path to the revolutionary copper-lead-indium thin-wall bearings. Intriguingly the Dagger had auto-adjusting hydraulic tappets.
Against Vane's better instincts, the company would not wait. It diversified into industrial tractors and wanted to start making cars again. With Halford's engines still under development, Vane had no immediate alternative to offer. Matters came to a head and Vane resigned.
Sir Harold Snagge, a banker by profession, was then wheeled in from outside. He found the company living off very comfortable financial reserves but with no manufacturing income. He was as unimpressed by the motor vehicle side as had been Vane and quickly sold off what assets he could find. Far from being vain, Vane had been right all along. For a while Snagge ran Napier as an investment company which channelled some of its profits into aero engine development.
Halford joined the board of Napier's in 1935. (It is a delicious irony that at this point in time his counterpart at Cirrus, now Cirrus-Hermes, was one C.S. Napier of the same family.)
About this time the Air Ministry became interested in the Dagger, and all other projects, Halford and Junkers alike, were dropped. But Napier's knew the Dagger could only be a stopgap, based as it was on Halford's old 1928 roadmap. He immediately began work on a successor, still with the same H 24 configuration but bigger and more powerful and water-cooled, which would become known as the Sabre. As a part of this work, Halford sent a pile of Dagger data to his old sparring partner Harry Ricardo and this initiated a long period of Ricardo's involvement in the design.
(Principal sources:
Wilson & Reader; Men and Machines: D Napier & Son 1808-1958, Weidenfeld & Nicholson, 1958.
Taylor; Boxkite to Jet: The Remarkable career of Frank B Halford, Rolls-Royce Heritage Trust, 1999.)

Now, time to get into Chapter 3, methinks.
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Thank you for your input, I am extremely sad that I didnt get to elaborate more on Halford. Whilst I am reticent to "blame" anything on it as it has become the new "dog ate my homework" for many people, due to Covid measures I was prevented from reviewing a lengthy biographical document on Halford at the London Science Museum before publication due to museum cutbacks. Similarly I was equally angry to be stopped from a visit to Germany in April for a trip of equal importance on fuels. (I am very annoyed on both counts). However, I`m also told that the book is so massive that by the time you get to the end, you forget what you missed in the middle.;):eek:
 
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Calum Douglas said:
Ray said:
Just order my copy of the book. Amazon (USA) said they would ship it at the end of the year. Anyone else have this issue?
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The books come to the publisher in the UK in bulk on a ship from the printer. These are now with the publisher, and they are already sending out books to customers who ordered with them. Amazon and other wholesalers buy bulk from the UK pubisher to be distributed in their own networks. Thus, these bulk orders (many, many hundreds of books) are sent to the USA by surface vessel (i.e boat) in one big consignment, which is then all unboxed and individually sent to US customers in the Amazon US distribution centres. This means it takes longer for people like yourself to actually GET the book, because of how the commercial distribution networks function.

So the books ARE being shipped to you right NOW, its just that its a longer and more convoluted journey. Amazon dont tell customers about the supply network before THEY get the bulk consignment, so it "appears" as if they`re just sitting in a warehouse doing nothing. However, this is not the case.

Some books, which are more cheaply produced (i.e. "print on demand") dont always have that problem because there are many different sites worldwide which can print them (or at least one on each continent), so the books in that case are turned from digital to real in multiple locations. This would result in a considerably more expensive book, and of lower print fidelity, than you get if you work with one very good print-house and do large bulk print-runs. So its all a compromise.

Its all very annoying, but sadly not anything I can accellerate.

Rest assured, all 2000 copies are printed, and are right now being shipped to everyone who bought one.

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Thank you. I am looking forward to receiving your book.
 
That would be great but let's get on with what we have and see how the future goes? I am also looking forward to reading about the high tension 8 band rubber motor and seeing how much lube it takes to keep tension manageable...... I know, nail biting.
 
steelpillow said:
Calum Douglas said:
I am extremely sad that I didnt get to elaborate more on ....

However, I`m also told that the book is so massive that ....
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So post-Covid we can look forward to a revised and expanded second edition in three volumes? ;)
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Absolutely zero chance of more volumes in the near future. I`ve got to get my life back together after six years of writing this thing.

A few very small additions/refinements to future editions are probable if I can get my hands on the missing files I wanted.
 
Calum Douglas said:
pathology_doc said:
Amazon dot ca reports the book as in preorder.
It's more critical in a history like this to discuss the processes by which development occurred than the technical specs of the things being developed. I have put this on my Amazon wishlist and it will probably constitute my Christmas present from the dogs.
Click to expand...

If thats what you want from a book on this subject, this is a book you will enjoy a lot. Its EXACTLY why I wrote it, so that the reader understands WHY.
Your book is probably on a container ship right now as they are shipped by bulk to Amazon on the various continents.
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Order is placed. We shall see how long it takes for pre-order to become box-on-my-desk.

If there's one thing that's always fascinated me, it's how the same company that turned out a God-tier winner in the Merlin could turn around and produce an atrocity like the Vulture. Whether or not the book answers that, it will be interesting to see what else you have to say.
 
The first in depth review I`m aware of:

www.standingwellback.com

Book Review - The Secret Horsepower Race - Standing Well Back

Is there a more complex piece of machinery in history than a WW2 fighter engine combining dozens of technologies- with demands on it from 0, to 35,000 feet, and when life or death is the outcome?
www.standingwellback.com
 
I received my copy yesterday.
Just browsing through it my first impression is that it contains a lot of text.
The images are mostly small but very sharp, so not a problem although for some I need a magnifying glass.
For example: the DB 608 engine on page 107 at first glance looks printed too small but it is no problem using a magnifying glass. The same with the blue prints, for example on page 207.
I prefer it this way as it leaves more room for text.

On the other hand, I wonder why the photo on page 150 is full page, making it the biggest photo in the book.
I found it funny that the power curve on page 143 was clearly altered by rubbing out the previous wrong lines, so that decades later we can still see that somebody made mistakes. Apparently graph paper was also scarce in 1940.

I also have Graham White's book 'R-4360 Pratt & Whitney's Major Miracle', which is exactly the opposite. That book has a lot of images that could have been printed half size or even less, and consequently it has only a third of the text that I would expect from a 607 pages book. Don't like that.
 
Dagger said:
I received my copy yesterday.
Just browsing through it my first impression is that it contains a lot of text.
The images are mostly small but very sharp, so not a problem although for some I need a magnifying glass.
For example: the DB 608 engine on page 107 at first glance looks printed too small but it is no problem using a magnifying glass. The same with the blue prints, for example on page 207.
I prefer it this way as it leaves more room for text.

On the other hand, I wonder why the photo on page 150 is full page, making it the biggest photo in the book.
I found it funny that the power curve on page 143 was clearly altered by rubbing out the previous wrong lines, so that decades later we can still see that somebody made mistakes. Apparently graph paper was also scarce in 1940.

I also have Graham White's book 'R-4360 Pratt & Whitney's Major Miracle', which is exactly the opposite. That book has a lot of images that could have been printed half size or even less, and consequently it has only a third of the text that I would expect from a 607 pages book. Don't like that.
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Image size was a huge issue for this book, and massive compromises were made. The pre-edit version has 130 images MORE than the printed one.... so descisions had to be made. Add 100 pages to the book and increase the print cost so much that we`d have to use a cheaper print-house ? - Or cut tens of thousands of words? - Or have the images all so small you will never see anything at all. In the end I chose to cut 130 of the "non critical images" and do a massive rework of the text (because there was a lot of text now referring to images which didnt exist anymore) - and using the best print-house possible to get sharp resolution and then increase the size of images to the maximum possible. This was all a compromise - but I felt we could not cut the text any more, and even if it has 260,000 words they were almost all important. The image on 150 is big because: a) it happens to be the perfect aspect ratio to fit on a page, most are not, b) It was an incredibly HI-RES TIFF image, about 150MB ! - Most images I had you cannot blow up that large at 300DPI and retain full clarity. So image quality is a key factor in the size - I also thought it was a great image. So there you go.

I didnt cut anything which was really critical images wise, all the "gold" is in the book.
 
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Calum Douglas said:
..... The pre-edit version has 130 images MORE than the printed one.... so decisions had to be made. ........ In the end I chose to cut 130 of the "non critical images" and do a massive rework of the text (because there was a lot of text now referring to images which didnt exist anymore).................... The image on 150 is big because: a) it happens to be the perfect aspect ratio to fit on a page, most are not, b) It was an incredibly HI-RES TIFF image, about 150MB ! - Most images I had you cannot blow up that large at 300DPI and retain full clarity. So image quality is a key factor in the size - I also thought it was a great image. So there you go.

I didnt cut anything which was really critical images wise, all the "gold" is in the book.
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Maybe you did not realize, but that photo of page 150 is also shown on the back cover of the book, which made me wonder what special person or special details are to be seen on the photo.
If I now hear that you had to cut 130 images (and rework associated text) then you might have used page 150 for four or even six of those deleted images, and refer to the back cover if the present photo is referred to in the text.
Maybe the other two photos from the back cover are also in the book, but just browsing I did not notice them.

I'm just nitpicking to tease you. It's a great book, you can be proud of the result!
 
Dagger said:
Calum Douglas said:
..... The pre-edit version has 130 images MORE than the printed one.... so decisions had to be made. ........ In the end I chose to cut 130 of the "non critical images" and do a massive rework of the text (because there was a lot of text now referring to images which didnt exist anymore).................... The image on 150 is big because: a) it happens to be the perfect aspect ratio to fit on a page, most are not, b) It was an incredibly HI-RES TIFF image, about 150MB ! - Most images I had you cannot blow up that large at 300DPI and retain full clarity. So image quality is a key factor in the size - I also thought it was a great image. So there you go.

I didnt cut anything which was really critical images wise, all the "gold" is in the book.
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Maybe you did not realize, but that photo of page 150 is also shown on the back cover of the book, which made me wonder what special person or special details are to be seen on the photo.
If I now hear that you had to cut 130 images (and rework associated text) then you might have used page 150 for four or even six of those deleted images, and refer to the back cover if the present photo is referred to in the text.
Maybe the other two photos from the back cover are also in the book, but just browsing I did not notice them.

I'm just nitpicking to tease you. It's a great book, you can be proud of the result!
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Yes at first glance that appears to be an obvious way to save space, and indeed if we did it all again we probably would have. However, many of these changes were made iteratively as we went through the editing in the final page-layout graphic design software, wayyy past the point where the book was my MSWORD document anymore. It gets REALLY complicated in a book with 1250 references by the point all the pages have been "paginated", and by that stage deleting one page from say 150, doesnt actually give you another half page on pg 27 and a half page on 300 because you`ll kill all the page layout and references, which took a vast effort for a book this size. Once its at that stage its really limiting what you can do without having to redo days and days of work - by that point we had about 500 pre-orders for a book six months late and people were getting upset. Eventually we all just had to look at eachother and say "is that pretty good now y/n ?" and just press "go".

Thanks, I always appreciate recieving any well intentioned comments on potential improvements. Glad you liked it. Depending on prevailing "world circumstances" and book sales, if we get a chance to do a 3rd edition we might try to slot in some improvements. At the moment we`ve just correcting some small slip-ups which despite massive proofreading efforts by three people still slipped through in the 2nd printing we`ve just entered into.
 
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I would like to suggest a part two book done in the Luftwaffe im Focus style: quality paper stock for images and text. Looks like a magazine and might satisfy requirements without doing a hardcover volume two or 3rd edition. By the way, the largest publishing houses use four people for editorial, while we use three.

Personally, I find an expanded 3rd edition appealing but the cover price will be the limiting factor.
 
Wearing my 15-year-long Tech Author hat, and being only 4 chapters in, but I cannot resist offering some suggestions for improving this already-superb book.

Calum Douglas said:
I felt we could not cut the text any more, and even if it has 260,000 words they were almost all important.
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There is a lot of repetition that you could cut. It is all important points, but you do tend to repeat them more often than necessary. I'd estimate that it would take me a week to proofread and, among other things, I would red-pen at least1%, which is around 5 pages worth, all in little scattered bits. Judicious use of additional/enlarged images could minimise disruption of cross-references.
That's actually something where the rigid two-column format could be bent a bit more, and some images squeeze the neighbouring column a bit.

Calum Douglas said:
... if we get a chance to do a 3rd edition we might try to slot in some improvements. At the moment we`ve just correcting some small slip-ups which despite massive proofreading efforts by three people still slipped through in the 2nd printing we`ve just entered into.
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Maybe better to call each run an impression or reprint rather than a new edition? Those last usually have significant changes to substance or typography/layout.
 
I would suggest that reprints without many changes be referenced as such on the copyright page. Something more substantial can have the words: Revised and Expanded on the cover.
 
Key Publication's current reprint of their bookazine on the Vietnam air war says "2nd Edition" on the cover, which would lead one to assume that some revisions were made to the original edition. I understand that there are no changes to the original, so I think something like "Reprint" or "Reissue" on the cover would have been less confusing and less misleading.
 
Got my copy a couple of days ago. Great stuff. It is very rare to have a technical history of this level of detail that you can actually read like a novel.
 
Another copy at its new home here - just arrived a couple of minutes ago, so I can't comment on the contents. But when took the package in my hands I could not help but notice that on a "pounds per pound" basis alone this is already shockingly good value!

Very much looking forward to reading it!
 
So the problem of de Havilland propeller hydraulics freezing at high altitude was known back in 1940/41. Combine that with a high-pressure glycol coolant system and Ouch! Several shiploads of these Spitfire Mk Vs, mostly second-hand from the European and African campaigns, were subsequently shipped out to Australia where three squadrons were formed to defend the northern areas from Japanese attacks following Pearl Harbour and a lesser-known simultaneous raid on Darwin. Many pilots and planes were lost over the Timor sea when, seeing a Jap fly past below, they opened up full throttle and dived over-hastily. The prop then failed "safe" to fine pitch. The engine immediately over-revved, sprung pressurised coolant leaks and began spewing toxic glycol fumes into the cockpit. The pilot had just seconds to bale out before being overcome. But even if you did get out in time, you landed in the middle of the Timor sea.
 
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