The First 'All-American' Bomber | Martin MB-1 

If you want details on the Boulton Paul turret, this video is excellent - ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-6wXHnSduf7g.html

Do you plan to cover similar airplanes from smaller nations, such as Czechoslovakia Aero A-24? Thanks

Zeppelin-Staaken R.VI please. And the gotha, off course. Basically, all the aircrafts used for strategic bombing in WW1. Very fascinating and relatively unknown history

I love your videos, I really look forevard to the Miles experimental aircrafts video, and the french flying boats.

That or the Sikorsky Ilya muromets as that was the first heavy bomber Or the b36 the largest plane ever built

I desperately want to make a dirty joke here, but I won’t.

*Boeing* WOULD have been ..... but *they couldn't find the door* ?

@@Farweaselbecause someone blew the bloody doors off.

@@Farweasel They were, but they were the Boeing Lumber Company at the time, and stuck to supplying the raw materials.

Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My!

*MB-1 chasing Fokker D.vii* *MB-1 firing 37mm cannon, with no hits* American pilot: *pulls M1911 and aims at German pilot* "Heave to and prepare to be boarded!!"

"Arrrrrr, flying matteys!"

Not that bad an idea with an airship, tbh. Now I want to write something about an aircraft designed to land troops on top of an airship, so they can abseil down the envelope and take it over.

@@Skorpychan the game or movie writes itself...

The British considered this for the German airship night attacks on the UK. The idea they focussed on was to fly above the airship and attack via the top mounted MG nests as access points. It took them a surprisingly long time to conclude that if you could get close enough to board then you might just as well shoot the thing down.

He's actually already done one Collab with drach 👍

​@@creativehorse7907 Doesn't mean a second long awaited collaboration with everyone's favorite naval historian wouldn't be appreciated

Drach mentioned he was working on another Rex collab during the latest Drydock. It'll be about British carrier aircraft development.

@@creativehorse7907 I like Drach and the Ocean Liners guy Mike Brady

The only navel historian I trust is TEX of the black pants legion.... Okay I jest but he is fun to listen to and more knowledgeable than a lamen... Like myself.

I really liked the air-to-air deflection sight on the gun. Look up Ian's Forgotten Weapons on that sight and how it worked. You see the same mechanism on the Lewis Gun in "The Mummy" 1998.

In fact,that would make a very interesting video Rex,on Howard Hughes & the whole making of the'Hells Angels' movie in fact,the Aircraft Hughes acquired for the mobie,the stunt pilots,special effects,etc.,or am I moaking far too much work for you?,be a great story though just the same,cheers

Or "boarding action ".

Err... yes, and yes. The problem is that modern materials are going to want a different aircraft; you don't build planes the same shape when you're building a wooden frame covered with fabric than when you've got a tube of steel or composites. That doesn't even get into the improvements in engine technology; 800 hp on 54 liters of engine is absurdly low powered.

And our very first bommuh had sufficient daka-daka on it in the form of 37mm cannon OR 5 MGs! Like that was almost the proto-YB-40. The entire "escort bomber" concept with all the usual suspects such as the YB-40 and the XB-41 would make for a great video, Rex.

The Glenn L. Martin company indeed built many "cutting edge bombers" especially their last production bomber they built for the USAAF, the B-26 Marauder. But it was this very aircraft in its early stages that created problems for the famous aircraft manufacturer and probably explains that "animosity." The B-26 at first had a high accident rate generally due to its fast-landing speed, around 150 mph, which many Army pilots failed to observe and consequently stall out and crash (flying on one engine was a problem too). During WWII there was a Senate Committee that looked into problems with the B-26 (as well as other military contractors), and it was headed by then Senator Harry S Truman who would later become Vice President of the U.S. and then President after the death of President Franklin Roosevelt in April 1945. Truman questioned Glenn L. Martin himself at a committee meeting In Washington D.C. asking why his planes (B-26s) were crashing so often. Martin responded saying that the wings were too short. In which case Truman asked what he was going to do about this. Martin said that the aircraft were pretty much already completed. Truman then said that the order for the Marauders would then be cancelled. Martin responded by lengthening the main wings by six feet on each side and increasing the height of the tail. The Martin B-26 would then go on to having the lowest loss rate for an American bomber during WWII. Martin later would do well with the USAF producing the licensed built, B-57 Canberra bomber, the Matador and Mace cruise missiles and Titan booster rockets at well. The company today is known as Lockheed-Martin and continues business with the U.S. Air Force to this day.

Point: The Army Air Force wouldn't exist for decades. Makes it hard to have direction. Heck, it wasn't even the Army Air Corps yet. The Army Air Service was almost three months old when the plane first flew.

No, we're at the B-21. We still use the BUFF like an old pickup truck because it runs and it's paid for.

"Mismanagement," is a bit harsh. You are talking about experimental technology. And experimental tactics.

Yes, and?

Well, better late than never?

19 months is "a few" to you?

"Nerd stuff"? It's the Yanks who are the outliers when it comes to not using Metrics, at least by your common population.

​@@owenshebbeare2999and? Deal with it

Little need was seen for remaining on the cutting edge i suspect. There wasn't interest in becoming entangled in European wars. A lot of people forget, even Americans, that the US long has a tradition of wanting to stay out of European issues largely. Many people seem to assume that US post WW2 "world policing" has always been the way of the US.