P-47 Thunderbolt Pt. 3 Armor and Protection 

I knew a pilot who flew P-47s over Europe. an old man during 1990s. when i asked him about his war days he used to tell me stories about his missions. sometimes he would get exited while telling his story and became very animated. then to my surprise a movie special effect like change would come over his face which became young and lively for few seconds. it was stunning experience to see a man in his mid seventies become young again

I served during the Korean conflict.What I do know is that ground crews that were in the my squadron loved the jug as they called,those veterans as well as pilots of the war swore by its rugged construction and toughness.

Thanks for all the info. I especially appreciate your thoughtful technical approach. My uncle was with the 9th AAF 371st FG and flew the P47. As you probably know the 9th AAF flew ground support and attack missions. My uncle was killed 3-19-45 after being hit by AAA on a mission and crash landing his ship, a P47D. Following the crash his 406th squadron mates were able to observe his nearly in tacked plane on the ground had a serious cockpit fire. He never got out. He was 21. Years ago I found 3 men that knew, trained and flew with my uncle. Two of them I have met in person. One of them was the flight leader that day and the other his best friend. As of Feb 2019 his best friend now 95 years old is still living in his home town of Knoxville TN. I call him regularly and will visit him for the 3rd time in 10 years. I will visit him in late March at his home there in Knoxville. I hope to be able to take him and visit the near by Tennessee Museum of Aviation in Sevierville TN. There are 2 flyable P47 hangered there. I have yet to see one fly in person. Maybe get to see one fly this time.

Most channels like the History channel are full of reality tv. The few documentaries that are being made today are full of cgi and explosions, glossing over details and little known facts.... it’s like people have forgotten how to research. Thank you for making quality content and sharing your knowledge! I’m so lucky they’re about the P-47... my favorite airplane!

It is beautiful to witness how the Internet is working to keep history alive. My dad was a B29 pilot in WWII and my psyche is steeped in early experiences of his frequent living room gab fests with his pilot buddies and being hoisted through the nose hatch of one of those winged war wagons and it's highly organized innards which certainly didn't resemble the living room, in fact imbued me with a love of logic, order and purpose. I congratulate you on this Channel and will hang around for a bit and see what else you got going on here. I often fantasize what it might have been like with my fist wrapped around a control stick in some high altitude field of battle. I'm a WWII junkie and relish explanatory videos such as this. We owe those guys our lives and minds and not a day goes by that I am not thankful for their sense of right and wrong. Don't stop. Walter

The P47 Thunderbolt has a Special place in Brazilian military aviation, in WWII the pilots from Brazilian Air Force ( First Fighter Squadron) received training in US and after that were deployed in the Italian front, main mission was bombing enemy convoys, rail roads, trains and Bridges. They also served as bombers escort (at list one time according a book I read). Very good content in your vídeo! Thank you for upload and share. Have a Great New Year! God Bless! Congratts from Brazil!!!

Man, your videos on airplanes are pure gold! Deep document digging and first of all deep UNDERSTANDING of processes and matters you talk about is beyond anything I saw on RU-vid or even Discovery or other "serious" TV channel. Well, maybe on par with Ian from Forgotten Weapons, he knows his shit too. Anyway, thank you and keep up this awesome channel!

Read the book 60 years ago and was just amazed at the airplane!! Thank you.

I really enjoy your content. Your channel is a hidden gem on youtube

When I was a kid, I loved the P-47 Thunderbolt. Read all kinds of books relating to this plane, and Pilot Gabby Gabreski became my hero. This pilot and airplane formed my love for ww2 air combat, and desire to join the Air Force.

Thank you for the P-47 series. This is a real treat not only learning so much about my favorite aircraft from WWII but also that you’re a fellow Oklahoman aviator as well. I’ve seen the painting before but didn’t know the story. How great.

I once read a comment of a wwII pilot that said something like this: want to show off, fly a Mustang, want to come back of every mission, fly a P-47

I was an AME [Aviation Structural Mechanic (egress/environmental)] in the US Navy. The systems you're talking about are right up my alley, Think Aviation life support systems. The Navy actually thought about changing our rate to ALSS. AME's and PR's (parachute riggers) were the only rates, I'm aware of, that required a specialized school (A school). We worked closely with the Naval Aviators (read, not pilots). Thank a vet. These men and woman gave it their best. Greg's Airplanes and Automobiles has added something unique to our RU-vid community. Thank you, Greg! Great job!

This plane is fast becoming my favorite.

The Thunderbolt is my favorite WWII fighter and I have a number of books regarding this plane and Republic Aircraft. I remember reading something like "If you want to impress the girl back home have your picture taken on a P-51 and if you want get back to the girl back home do on a P-47". This might have been form the book " Thunderbolt". Thanks for these great videos.

Good video. I'm gaining a greater appreciation for the 47 with each episode.

Great vid. You can be sure I'll hunt up the rest of them on the P-47s and then start on the rest. Years ago I read voraciously every book on WWII fighter pilots that I could lay my hands on. Here's some bits and pieces I remember that you might find amusing. -Immediately after WWII, the Russians getting difficult to deal with, LeMay withdrew the 51s and reintroduced P-47s for the projected ground attack role. -An episode (I think in Tumult in the Sky) was related that it was a court marshalling offense for a pilot to have a woman in BOQ room. The base commander made an unannounced inspection and as luck would have it, knocked and entered the room of his top ace and watched two women trying desperately to exit the room by the far window. At the end of the inspection the base commander mused aloud that the rule was one woman, nothing was said about two.

Your comments about the additional structure including the duct work make perfect sense. We had spaced armor in the tanks and sometimes on the APCs I served on. The concept is the same. The items you mentioned will absorb some energy as well as redirect some of the energy/direction of travel of the round. I was always of the opinion that I'd rather have something, anything, between me and a round than nothing.

Didn't the 51 drivers used to say that the 47 drivers idea of taking evasive action was to get out of the seat and run around the cockpit?

It’s good to see such a breakdown as the P-47 is one of those planes where many people make the mistake of overemphasizing ‘armour’ rather than construction. The armour did not make it the tough nut it was, in many ways the armour was standard (or even below it) and not special. The construction is what mattered and made it standout. Good point on mentioning that looking at only the return aircraft is risky, survivors bias is a thing. A few points: Regarding gun cam footage. These were stored in Dresden and were destroyed in the bombing. Hence a wealth of potential footage vs. P-47s was destroyed. This is also the reason why the same footage is also always looped in all documentaries, sometimes mirrored, zoomed etc. making it seem like different footage. There isn’t anything else left. Armour plating: The P-47 has, as you mentioned, a standard armour load-out pretty much typical for planes of the time, with a single plate for the pilot, some limited frontal protection and ‘armoured glass’. In a past video I made on this topic I compared it to the Japanese Ki-43 which has a thicker armour plate behind the pilot. As for the hardness, iirc I have seen something on a Japanese test versus a US plate in the Pacific of the same thickness as the P-47D. The Japanese 12.7mm AP rounds managed to penetrate it (although no intervening material/ angle was used affair), while the Japanese claimed their own plates would usually offer comparative protection from this calibre. Working on a project concerning this topic which will come to my channel soon. Will have something more definite then. Auxiliary armour tends to be armour that isn’t actually ‘armour’. It is not supposed to stop a bullet but rather take its kinetic energy, disfigure the bullet and/or make it change its trajectory. For example, the Bf 109 had a similar thin sheet set about a frame before the armour plate In essence, anything that is between the bullet and the armour could count as this, but auxiliary armour is the stuff that has no other use but this. I am in the office atm (yup, even on NY Eve) so I can’t check for a source atm, but I presume William Wolf or Francis Dean might have something on it regarding the P-47 (?). Robert Johnson was heavily hit as you said. The initial damage was made by 20mm cannons, this rendered his plane combat ineffective. The second FW190 fired only 7.92mm rounds (probably ran out of 20mm earlier in the ‘same’ fight). In his book Thunderbolt he recounts this. It’s important to make that distinction. Happy New Year and pardon the British spelling ;)

My Dad worked on P 47's during WWII and had stories that impressed me about the durability of the 47. He observed planes landing with large trees named in the wings. And they all made it home safely. What a tough plane.

Let's say that aside from the Wright Flyer that the P-47 is your favorite airplane for six decades. Then Greg does this. I musta been high.

Greg, You are the man. I've been involved in general aviation for my entire adult life, and was a WW2 warbird fan since I was a kid. You are definitely one-stop shopping for getting to intimately know the particulars of the aircraft you've covered in your series. Thank you for all your hard work! plane

Thanks for your very informative third video on my favorite fighter. One additional thing about the P-47 armor was that the head protection plate was angled forward on the bubble top to aid in deflection. I'll bet Johnson would have appreciated that feature in the razorback version that he flew against the 190. That was his first combat mission by the way. I remember reading his memoir of that event. He said that all he could do was to crank his seat down as far as possible and wait it out. I remember he said that he had his wrist watch shot off and that he tried to bail out when the plane was on fire, but couldn't because the sheet metal damage (shown by your photo) kept him from sliding the canopy back more than six inches. You can see in your photo that the side plexi-glass panel of the canopy was removed after his crash landing (after running into some parked Spitfires because the loss of hydraulic fluid left him with no brakes) allowing him to get out of the cockpit. This, by the way, is why we must keep these warbirds flying to honor these great men who flew them and there dedicated ground crews who kept them flying. One other potential hazard of the P-47 was that the pressurized return air from the supercharger had to pass through the cockpit to the engine. I did my flight training at the Spartan school of aviation in Jenks, OK in the 1970's right next to your home town of Tulsa. An old flight instructor there did some test flying of the P-47 during the war and said it was a concern, but never heard of it causing any damage. You can see these return ducts on your photo of the guys doing maintenance on a jug. Very good article. Keep up the good work!

ABSOLUTELY OUTSTANDING! Greg, I gotta stand and applaud you here... You are definitely an encyclopedia of knowledge and consummate WW2 warbird researcher - with a flair for masterful storytelling to boot. I fly RC warbirds for fun and you have clearly demonstrated in this series that the Republic P-47s were some badass planes! GREAT CHANNEL!

Systems redundancy, quality components, well thought out and proven design. Very resistant to catastrophic failure from virtually any cause. Many a pilot owed his life to this tough old bird.

Well done, thorough: the source drawings/documents/testimony is greatly appreciated. Thank you for sharing.

Wow... some of that battle damage. Certainly was a tough aircraft. Yep, you're not going to be shooting the wings off that in a single pass.

A few things to consider: 1) 20mm cannon shells fired rather low velocity projectiles with a bursting charge, and were chosen for their destructive capabilities on bombers at very close range. The fact they didn't penetrate the armor, especially after traveling through other parts of the fuselage, isn't terribly surprising. 2) Projectiles tumble quite readily when transitioning from one medium to another. Once destabilized, their penetrative capabilities are essentially nil. Given a well built and rather thickly skinned airframe like the P-47's, the armor is essentially never taking the full force of an incoming round. Look at the effectiveness of the German's Schutzen tank armor upgrades for a clear example. Take into consideration that any trajectory variation from perpendicular increases the armors relatively thickness, and that speed is the most critical factor in the ability of a projectile to penetrate, and it becomes rather easy to explain why field experiences will differ greatly from blasting at a solitary piece of P-47 armor with an MG 131 at 50 yds.

Thanks Greg for the quick response. I am a docent at the PS Air Museum and I have one of these beasts in my (European Theater) hanger, along with a still flying P-51 in Red Tail Sq colors. I just love the comparison that I can now afford visitors due to your videos. Also, quite possibly I am alive today because of a briefly clear sky above Bastogne when my father was on the ground getting ready to be overrun by some tanks....then along came a squad of P-47s....

Republic was always very well built, and thus quite heavy in comparison. But; I always said when people ask; "what if you were a fighter pilot during WW2, what aircraft do you want to fly?" While others talk about the P-51 or Spitfire or any other more nimble and famous fighter, I always maintained I rather fly a Jug; the p-47 always gave you the best chance of getting back home, air cooled engine and a strong build with good protection. More than one pilot survived a harsh landing due to the supercharger arrangement and the ducted channels working like a modern deformation zone on a car. Regarding ammunition and armour piercing I am not exactly an armourer but I used to clear unexploded ammunition and aircraft prefer to use nose fused high explosive high sensitive ammunition over armour piercing, that would only be on dedicated tank busting operation you choose an armour piercing round for an aircraft mounted automatic cannon.

This stuff is pure gold. Thank you for your hard work putting these videos together.

Spent my lunch yesterday watching this video. Certainly made that time much more enjoyable. Most informative as always.

I had never, ever, heard of the tail radar on the P-47! With autopilot and the EWS, the airframe design and power plant, it was an amazingly advanced plane for the time!

The American TigerTank of the Air ... ( plus 8 .50's) ...

The two armor plates talked about in the first part of the video. I have no source but my theory is, there are indeed two stacked plates. Maybe there's two plates instead of one because the rear plate is made of a different more expensive, better quality metal. Maybe the two type metal plate combo was a compromise between protection and weight over just increasing the thickness of the original plate with the same metal.

Greg, thanks so much for these awesome videos. They are a great addition to all the books I've been reading lately about WWII air combat and have satisfied many of the more technical questions that come to mind while reading them. I really can't tell you how much I appreciate your work. Keep it up! I just wanted to note that according to the American Air Museum in Britain website, 'Half Pint' (41-6235), Bob Johnson's P47C that made it back to base after absorbing a ton of damage, was not scrapped afterward, but was rebuilt and transferred to the 36th Fighter Group. It was apparently lost in combat over France on 13 August 1944. I haven't verified this independently yet, but if true, it's an even greater testament to the amazing durability of the P-47. Just an incredible aircraft.

Thanks Greg. I was oblivious to the 47 and its superior design and performance until now!

Possible answer for the auxiliary armor; In armor vehicles we would often have a thin sheet of steel spaced before/ exterior the main armor. This would break up an impacting round and by having the space it could not carry it's kenetic energy directly into the main armor plate. Great effectiveness with less material. Similarly we would often have a "spall liners" inside. This was a sort of sheet of kevlar or similar material to catch pieces of steel from the armor itself which could break away and go flying through the interior of the vehicle, even from the impact of a round which didn't penetrate.

great post Gregs i love to learn about p-47 p 38s and ENGLISH MOSQUITO three great planes that do not get the recognition they deserve god bless all the guys that flew them we owe them so much

WW2 ace Chuck Yeager said in an interview that our 50 caliber armor piercing incendiary rounds penetrated into the aircraft and destroyed internal machinery. He said that the German 20mm ammo exploded on the aluminum skin of the plane and did less internal damage.

Your knowledge.....your research..your calmness of voice, confidence. Fantastic ! really great work. Subscribing now.

6:41 Auxiliary Armor provides supplementary or additional help and support. (Source: Dictionary) ie, it's some bulk item to dampen fragments from slowed/burst shells if it is rearward of the armor plate it supports, or it is a spall liner if forward. If it is merely spaced armor, it could be on either or both sides. It's probably just a flack vest-like, or other utility thing like a seat back though.

Very good information, well done! An old friend flew Spitfires during the war. He reckoned a Spit was indestructible until he pulled the wings off one in a dive! To be a fighter pilot you need absolute confidence in the airframe. Any hesitation in performing a maneuvre and you will die. I understood this when I began chucking planes around. The Thunderbolt would have been a favourite in the war, it was so well constructed.

Great vid Greg, always fun to learn more about a the P-47. It was a super machine and my favorite modeling subject. Keep up the good work!

Greg thank you for a wonderful series of videos, solid data and knowledgeable commentary is so refreshing.

You have the BEST videos on WW2 aircraft. Fascinating material. Thank you.

I don't know if you covered this yet , The P-47 was shipped in a large box and could be assembled using the shipping box , simple hand tools and a number of men ...in a field. I smashed the thumbs up button with glee. Happy New Year.

Great video and very informative. Greg's voice and lack of accent and loud terrible music makes this video very enjoyable to watch and listen to. Very Well Done Greg. Thank you. All of your videos are First Class.

Excellent narratives once again. I love listening to your explanations and reading stories for our WWII aces. I "assume" in your upcoming videos about the P-47 you'll talk about the Skinny props vs the Paddle props used on the fighter - advantages/disadvantages etc... Great video!! Thanks again!

Thanks for another great and very technical video on WW2 aircraft

My Christmas present, thanks Greg!

Out of curiosity, clearly the P47 is rugged beyond all expectation, but aren't the Navy's 'Ironworks' (The F4U & The F6F) also pretty well blessed with damage resistance-I mean every carrier landing is a controlled crash and all that.

Holy crap that plane is tough.

Very informative and interesting video about the P47....It was one hell of a tough sucker. not to mention a very dangerous adversary...

I’ve always loved the P-47, the P-39 and the P-38 for aesthetic reasons in addition to their technical merits. Their design came out of the 1930s era of streamlining with beautiful rounded curves. Which is excellent for smooth subsonic airflow. They all looked sexy in the air. The P-39 was the ultimate example until they ruined it with the vertical stabilizer in the P-63. The bubble canopy P-47 is a close second only because of the vertical stabilizer/ fuselage junction. The tail of the P-38 is a work of art. Look how the sexiness was removed later in the P-61 tail design. Engineers were learning about intersection drag, clipped wings and other important aerodynamic advances. But the airplanes designed later in WWII just weren’t as sexy. The B-26 and even the B-29 exhibited a lot of the same sexy curved aesthetics.

Another great video from you. Very nice Greg. Can't wait for the next one. Thx for upload! :D

WOW! I live and work in Sand Spring on the edg of Tulsa. A gentleman named Gene Sawyer let me read a book that he had that was about a friend of his that was a P-47 pilot in World War II. Well needless to say I read that book. It was a total shock to just hear that on your video and to find out that you live in Tulsa I love your Channel. So keep up the great work.

Hey. I can fully respect the fact you referred to Chuck Hawks. Man, oh man.

Greg, The extra armor was Duralin or brass and aluminum and brass and copper alloy. This was used by the F4U Corsair as well. And other US warplanes.

Loving this series. I hope you get a chance to do a similar service to the P-38 - such a sleek good looking plane with such convoluted engineering. I'd love to get this kind of detail about it as well.

Greg, absolutely great video series. Love it!

Great artwork of the Robert Johnson victory. Thanks for all the great info. Big, beautiful Jug.

absolutely fantastic.... thanks again Greg for another amazing video about the best fighter of WWII.

The body of the plane wouldn't so much "slow down" bullets but do something similar to "Schurzen" spaced armour, it causes bullets to yaw and fragment. A bullet needs to hit the armour point first and all in one piece to be effective at punching through steel. The spaced armour on german tanks seems unusually thin compared to the main armour, that's because it's not trying to significantly slow down the incoming projectile, just by hitting something hard will cause the bullet to break up and lose it's This would happen when it hits the main body of the armour but over the few millimetres of the impact event the yawing is insignificant, but over the large distance between the first impact with the outer armour there's enough time for the yaw to continue and for the breakup of the bullet to increase. So when a very high velocity bullet hits the fuselage it comes out the other side (to hit the pilot inside) more like a shotgun blast, you wouldn't need much armour to stop this. This is why the German 13mm machine gun had a possible advantage with its relatively low velocity bullet (700m/s rather than 950m/s of .50BMG) quite a squat monolithic bullet. These are far less vulnerable to yawing and disintegrating on first contact with the body of their fuselage and other internal components so when the 13mm bullet reaches the internal armour plate or something very tough like an engine block it can punch through a significant amount of steel. Also 20mm-37mm explosive shells, if they hit the fuselage they will explode either just inside the metal skin or well inside the fuselage, so INSIDE the body of the plane you'll have many small and light fragments, these are very deadly to fragile human tissue but are easily stopped by even quite a thin piece of armour plate. They are at hypersonic velocity but their mass is low so if they encounter a larger steel mass they are easily stopped. The turbocharger of the P47 would be very vulnerable but once destroyed it would act as very effective "spaced armour".

Great video. Tough old bird from Republic. Thank you.

A couple of video suggestions; 1) the Paddle blade propeller 2) P38 performance vs Me110/210/410

A few things. I suspect that there are two plates there. The one to the back would be a hardened steel, the one directly behind the pilot would be a softer steel. Just having the hardened plate would be dangerous due to spalling. Stopping a round but bleeding out from the fragments spalling off of the armor would be just as bad so adding a softer steel that will deform and capture the splinters is a typical armor plating thing done in tanks. Second, you just GOTTA do a video on the Thunderbolt II after doing such a bang up job on the original beast!

The P-47 was the USA's fastest plane to see combat. The P-47M was crediting with a top speed in excess of 470 mph and the P-47N with a top speed of 460 mph. While 2 P-80's were sent to England and 2 to Italy at the end of the war, they did not see combat although one may have been sent out on patrols to hunt Arado 234 recon planes in Italy.

You are correct the “auxiliary armor” is most likely a second plate. When it comes to armor protection, 2 separate plates are more effective than 1 plate of equal thickness to the combined thickness of the thinner 2. There are other planes from this era that have a similar layout of 2 stacked plates for the pilots rear protection.

Really like your work. Excellent video and thank you for sharing.

Toughest plane ever built, Robert Johnson's early experience is proof enough for me. I never knew about the tail radar. Great vid, thanks. PS my Grandparents lived in Tulsa on Elm St. They told me not to play by the river because of quicksand. I don't know if it's true or not, but it kept me away from the river. That was back in late 60s early 70s. Thanks again, Happy Trails and good luck 🍀✌

5:30 '...the pilot is further protected by... the fuel tank'. I'm sure they were real happy to hear that!

I love this series. I can’t wait to get to the episode with the gun camera footage!

I first read "Thunderbolt" when I was eight, at the beginning of a four-week long family road trip vacation. It hooked me completely, made me forever interested in military history. So much so that I used a fair bit of the money I'd saved up for souvenirs to purchase a book on Midway along the way.

Geez Greg this could be a doctoral thesis… Great work…by the way my dad was in Stalag luft one with Hub Zemke. My dad was a B-17 pilot shot down over Amsterdam 1944.

Interesting and detailed documentary. I had no clue there was that much ducting for the turbo and superchargers in the aft and bottom fuselage.

I read "somewhere" that when RAF fighter pilots first saw a P-47 they were mislead by its chunky appearance and assumed it would be an easy kill for the slim and lethal 109s - they said it was a good thing the plane was so tubby since it would give the pilot a chance to "dodge about" inside to avoid MG and cannon fire.

Thanks for posting this part. Another excellent presentation and very thorough. Keep up the great work. ☺

Thank you very well done, This presentation answered a lot of P-47 internal structure questions and their Whys.

The P-43 was supplied to the Chinese Air Force. It of course was the forerunner to the P-47. The P-43 had a wet wing and apparently the stresses placed on the wing due to flying high in cold temperatures and then low in hot temperatures caused the seams to leak. An experienced Chinese pilot had his P-43 catch on fire and blow up on takeoff when leaking fuel reached the turbocharger. Fellow Chinese pilots refused to fly the plane afterwards and many had their engines removed for C-47 transport usage. Eventually they came up with a glue that solved the problem of fuel leakage but the P-43 saw very little use in the CBI theatre, mainly it was used for photo recon as it could fly above most Japanese fighters. With its high altitude performance it could have gotten up above the Japanese planes and attacked from above while the main Allied fighter, the P-40, usually had the disadvantage where altitude was concerned. But that was not to be.

For those further interested in Robert S. Johnson and additionally Aviation Art, I recommend the following book: Aviation Art of World War II by Paul Stillwell, James H. Kitchens and G.E. Patrick Murray (Fall River Press). Ace Johnson's encounter with the German FW 190 shows up on page 85 with a wonderful art piece by Jim Laurier depicting the FW 190's pilot saluting after his failed shoot down of "half pint".

Great videos, these really do good job of showing the trade-offs in designing military aircraft. Looking at the P47, it was a great plane but really suited to US needs. It was big and expensive, made of aluminum, and used huge amount of gas. The US had near unlimited money and oil and aluminum. This was not the best design for Germany, UK, or Japan. Survive-ability is an often overlooked point. The biggest factor in air-air combat is human, the skill and experience levels of the pilot, towards the end of ww2 Japan and Germany had shortage of skilled pilots. To me the most impressive stat is that 10/10 top p47 aces ended up surviving the war.

Regarding the two part numbers for the pilot's rear armor, maybe take a look at an older model P-47's parts manual? There may be either a single part number, or some sort of addendum notice. The newer manual may just have the same picture as an older one, perhaps the effort to update the drawing was more complicated than was thought worth it? Dunno, I'm basing that on my experiences rewiring a couple T-28s and noticing some drawing anomalies in the parts manual.

In the book, "The Aces Talk" by Edward H Sims, Luftwaffe pilot Georg-Peter Eder describes an attack on B-17 bombers protected by P-47 fighters. Eder was flying a Bf 109sG6 with four 20 mm guns and two 30 mm guns. After shooting down a B-17 a P-47 crossed in front of him and he hit the plane with all his weaponry and as he stated "My fire was so heavy his left wing came off almost at once and I saw him go down." I remember Galland mentioning that he had championed equipping the Messerschmitt with more cannons and considered it unsuccessful as the heavily laden fighters fared poorly against enemy fighters.

amazing, not only did they sustain the battle damage and get back, they were able to put the landing gear down, in the one case even with only half a wing!

Thanks for the video Greg!

I think I have an answer for you on two points about the armor plates behind the pilot, first being the two part numbers for the auxiliary and the regular armor plate, having fabricated steel in fab shops (and being in the military and understanding how they do things) and looking at the information you show I'd say that the auxiliary plate was an add on after they upped their game for the armor protection, if there's holes that have to line up for mounting purposes the holes will not line up if they're located on the same dimensions because there's a bend in the plates, if you fabricate an order of plates that have holes in them and a bend like the one you see in the armor plate behind the pilot in a P47 (approximately behind the pilots shoulders) and stack them up on top of each other after you put the bends in them (you would have already drilled or punched the holes out) you'll notice that the holes don't perfectly line up, it's more noticeable the more of them you stack them on top of each other, so any plate that bolts onto or through the one in front of it that has a bend at one point would have to have the holes located on a slightly different dimension to line up correctly, also the auxiliary plate might have less holes because it only has to bolt to the other plate which might have other mounting concerns, also the auxiliary plate could be a different thickness, or maybe the top and bottom are actually 2 different pieces, I'd say that's most likely the answer/answers to that question, secondly, about the 20MM hits on Johnson, I used to be a Vulcan gunner in the Army, from what I've come to understand about the ammo used for the destruction of aircraft on both sides of the ETO is that they were pretty close to what we were still using in the 80's, explosive rounds like the 20MM that are used against aircraft do not have a point contact fuse, instead they have a slight delay in the fuse because a point contact would likely just blow a panel off of the aircraft where the anti-aircraft style delayed fuse will drive itself inside of the plane and then explode to cause internal damage instead of just superficial damage, seeing how Johnsons P47 was the razorback variant I'd say the fuse started it's detonation process upon contact with the aircraft's skin and detonated behind (probably immediately behind) his armor plate, lucky him, I hope he wrote a nicely worded letter to the Republic Aircraft Company after that one, I'd also be interested in knowing what the specification was for the steel used for the armor plate because I'd lay odds it wasn't regular mild carbon steel that it was made of, most likely it was something along the lines of United States Steel T-1 which was developed for armor plate for the military by US Steel, the "T" stands for tank, I've worked with a lot of it, it's used for wear liners in coal and gravel chutes and wear plates in front loader buckets in stone yards. Also it should be noted that the FW190 pilot who attacked Johnson when he was flying home in his damaged P47 was German ace Egon Mayer and Johnson would have been his 67th kill but the mighty Thunderbolt denied him that, it should also be noted that Mayer was later hammered out of the sky by Thunderbolts and killed, I hope my semi-educated guess on the reason for the two plates helps, if it's not that they're top and bottom assemblies I'd say the mounting hole and or plate thickness explains it, anyways I send this to you in the final minutes of 2018 so HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!👌👌👌

13:48 this is true in online play in GB (BoX) series games, 80-90% of planes downed dont even see you untill you either hit them, miss and they notice traicers or destroy them in first pass. Having good SA online keeps you alive long time, having bad SA and you think everyone is just showing up on you 6 from nowere :D

Excellent, as usual, Greg, and - also as usual - containing some bits of information I knew nothing about, though I've been reading about WW II combat aircraft for half a century. The rear-facing radar was a complete surprise - well done! When you get around to the most successful naval fighter plane ever - the F6F - I have some photos of combat damage to my Dad's Hellcat on one mission that are at least comparable to the ones you included here for the P47. Fortunately for my Dad, the cockpit was largely spared, unlike Robert Johnson's Jug, and interestingly, the damage was from Japanese flak, not a Japanese fighter. I'd be happy to share those images when the time comes - assuming you can't find others that are even more graphic.

Also a fan of Martin Caidin, @Greg's Airplanes and Automobiles I'd highly recommend reading his book "Fork-Tailed Devils" on the P-38

The ol' jug won't go down without a fight. It's also surprisingly fast for a prop driven behemoth.

11:08 You can bet those FW109 shots where keyholing before they hit that armor plate or also hitting at obtuse angles.

Love your videos! Just a side note DCS does model the turbo fire i know this because i have caused a few by sneaking up on the underbelly of a few Jugs that unfortunately for them, sercame to a fire they didnt even know they had until it was to late. Pretty cool feature and i love how much detail they have now added!

I appreciate your channel!!! After a long day at the track I watch your vids to decompress !! Thank you

What a tank, the Jug is!

Fantastic, thank you.

Great Videos! Information is top-notch, but I really like the info about the pilots. A plane is only as good as the man behind the stick. Keep making these awesome videos!

Greg, your videos are awesome! Professionally done, informative and nicely arranged. If you put some effort into video editing and background music, you will smash Great Planes series into the ground. You can offer so much more and from professional standpoint. Thank you man, thank you!

One P-47 group refused to transition to P-51s. They referred to the Mustangs as "Spamcans".