Talk:Hawker Tempest

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Contents 1 Units 2 speed records 3 Clarity 4 Production numbers

[edit] Units

Why are standard units used at all in this article? Obviously it's a British plane so using feet and miles per hour makes absolutely no sense. Ryan Salisbury 01:02, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure I understand you. All instruments in British WW2 aircraft were in pounds, feet, and miles per hour. Imperial units first for British and American aircraft, metric first for everything else. - Emt147 ^Burninate! 03:56, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

Really? Any particular reason they didn't use metric for that? Ryan Salisbury 13:09, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

It was the 1940s and metrication didn't start until the 1960s GraemeLeggett 14:26, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] speed records

Whoever wrote the section about the Tempest V and mentioned speeds doesn't understand the concept of true airspeed. Rare Bear's records are around a closed course (i.e. a loop) and at low altitude - no higher than 5,000 ft - while the figures quoted for the Tempest are likely at altitude. The higher you fly, the higher your true airspeed. Most of the fast piston-engined fighters could reach 25,000 or 30,000 ft easily, and maintain full power output the entire time. ericg ✈ 05:42, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

Our over enthusiatic American is also plain wrong - as is the entry for Rare Bear, (which incidentally seems to be a plagarism of [1]). That Bearcat is not the fastest propeller propelled aircraft - standard airline configuration 1950s 541mph Tu114s stroll past it at 528 mph - though I note Rare Bear claims a top speed of 540mph at altitude), but the 575mph Tu95s trumps that, (okay, again they are at altitude, not quasi-ground effect racers, but while I'm at it, @#$%^& Howard Hughes was always slower than floatplanes :-P). As far as I can work out Rear Bear may be the fastest piston engined type, so have corrected it to read that, pending anyone getting a souped up De Havilland Hornet off the ground :-). Not sure that JF-E's claims about Tempest speed were't a little hopeful though - I remember reading some very enthusiastic comments, (?in Tempest Pilot, Sheddans autobio?) about MkVs with more advanced Sabres - but again from poor memory and without the book to hand, I think they were talking 470mphs not 500+. Winstonwolfe 04:57, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

p.s. Realistically I am not sure that the claims about performance from either Rare Bear or Clostermann add much to the article. What do people think about removing them?

[edit] Clarity

I'd like to clarify the author's meaning in this sentence from the beginning of the article:

"While Hawker and the RAF were struggling to turn the Typhoon into a useful aircraft, Hawker's Sidney Camm and his team were rethinking the design at that time the Hawker P. 1012 or Typhoon II."

It doesn't make sense to me. Does anybody understand it well enough to reword it?

(And apologies to the author if it originally made sense, but no longer does. I've not gone through every historical instance of the page because there are quite a few.) – Kieran T ^{(talk | contribs)} 17:38, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Nice one, User:GraemeLeggett, it's perfectly clear now, thanks :) – Kieran T ^{(talk | contribs)} 19:03, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Production numbers

The British Aircraft Directory entry production values tot up to only about 1,300. What's the source for 1,700? GraemeLeggett 14:40, 25 July 2006 (UTC)