CAC Woomera
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The CA-4 Wackett Bomber and CA-11 Woomera were prototype twin-engine light bombers, including torpedo and dive-bombing capabilities, developed by Commonwealth Aircraft Corporation (CAC) in Australia, during World War II. While two prototypes were completed and flight tested by the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), was an order for the Woomera was cancelled before it went into production.
Design and development
Background
In early 1939, the Australian Government ordered large numbers of Bristol Beaufort bombers, with major components to be built by its Department of Aircraft Production (DAP) in a variety of locations, including railway workshops, and in doing so it by-passed the local aircraft company, the Commonwealth Aircraft Corporation.
CAC, under Sir Lawrence Wackett, began work on its own design, hoping to out-perform the Beaufort by building a machine that could serve as both a torpedo-bomber and dive bomber.[1] To keep down weight, Wackett dispensed with traditional self-sealing fuel tanks and opted to make the wing cavities liquid-tight, and thus serve as fuel storage. The Australian Government was initially uninterested in the CAC design. However, in mid-1940, cut off from the supply of British-made components for the Beaufort program (due to a British embargo on the export of aviation products, due to the need to maximise British production), the Australian Government ordered a prototype of the CAC design, even before the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) had expressed a view about the machine.[2]
CA-4
This prototype, known as the CA-4 Wackett Bomber, took to the air on 19 September 1941.[3] The CA-4 was a low-wing, twin-engined, multi-role bomber with a crew of three. It was armed with four nose-mounted .303 calibre machine guns and two remote-controlled twin machine-guns barbette mounted at the rear of the engine nacelles.[3] It could carry either Script error: No such module "convert". bombs, Script error: No such module "convert". bombs or two torpedoes. It was originally powered by two Pratt & Whitney Twin Wasp R-1830-S3C3-G radials.
Faced with the crisis caused by the Japanese entry into the war in December 1941, the RAAF accepted the design even before testing was complete, and ordered 105 examples of the CAC bomber on 8 March 1942. However, production was postponed until further testing was complete and also to allow CAC to focus on ramped-up production, for the Pacific War
On 15 January 1943, the prototype CA-4, A23-1001, crashed on a test flight to assess powerplant performance and evaluate aerodynamic effects of a new fixed leading edge slat. During the return to the CAC airfield at Fisherman's Bend, the pilot, Squadron Leader Jim Harper, had detected a fuel leak in the port Pratt & Whitney R-1830 engine. As the problem worsened he attempted to shut down the engine, feathering the propeller; however, the actuation of the feathering switch caused an explosion and uncontrollable fire. The three-man crew subsequently attempted evacuation at Script error: No such module "convert"., yet only Harper succeeded in parachuting free, while the CAC test pilot Jim Carter and power plant group engineer Lionel Dudgeon were both killed. The airframe subsequently impacted Script error: No such module "convert". south-west of Kilmore, Victoria. The wreckage was recovered and used for components.[4] In part, the incident was attributed to the novel fuel tank design.[3]
CA-11
After various aspects were re-designed, including the tail and rudder, and an improved nose armament of two 20 mm cannon and two .303 (7.7 mm) calibre machine guns, the project was officially redesignated the CA-11 Woomera.[3]
The CA-11 did not fly until June 1944. By the time production was due to commence, the dive-bombing concept had fallen into disfavour and the RAAF was filling the light bomber/reconnaissance/strike role with the US-built Douglas Boston and the Beaufighter – a derivative of the Beaufort – was being built in Australia by DAP. Consequently, the original Woomera order was reduced from 105 to 20. After the first CA-11 flew, the whole program was cancelled and the production capacity set aside for Woomeras at CAC was switched to P-51 Mustang fighters. The only completed CA-11 Woomera, A23-1, was stripped for parts and scrapped in 1946.
Operators
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Specifications
See also
Script error: No such module "Portal". Aircraft of comparable role, configuration, and era
- Arkhangelsky Ar-2
- Junkers Ju 88
- Kawasaki Ki-48
- Martin Baltimore
- Petlyakov Pe-2
- Savoia-Marchetti SM.85
- Tupolev Tu-2
- Yokosuka P1Y
Related lists
Notes
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Bibliography
- Ewer, Peter. Wounded Eagle: The Bombing of Darwin and Australia's Air Defence Scandal. Sydney: New Holland, 2009. Template:ISBN
- Green, William. War Planes of the Second World War: Bombers and Reconnaissance Aircraft, Volume Seven. London: Macdonald, 1967. Template:ISBN.
- Isaacs, Keith. "Wackett's Wonder". Air Enthusiast Quarterly, No. 1, n.d., pp. 52–65. Template:Catalog lookup linkScript error: No such module "check isxn".Script error: No such module "check isxn".Script error: No such module "check isxn".Script error: No such module "check isxn".Script error: No such module "check isxn".Script error: No such module "check isxn".Script error: No such module "check isxn".Script error: No such module "check isxn".Script error: No such module "check isxn".
External links
- adf-serials.com, 2003, "ADF Aircraft Serial Numbers RAAF A23 CAC CA-4/CA-11 Woomera"
- War Time Plane Crash, Bylands, Vic. 1943
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