What were aircraft like in World War 2?

Answer 1

They were big, stinky, noisy, greasy and dirty. The seats were made out of canvas or wood. When the engines were running you couldn't hear yourself think and the whole thing shook like a washing machine with a rug in it. When it came to design, maintenance, and repair, safety and comfort took a back seat to battle-readiness and mass-production. It was not uncommon for the airplane to kill you before you ever got to battle.

There were no ejector seats, and in the unfortunate event of a bailout, you had to undo your belts, release and slide back the canopy, and climb out on the wing to jump. All while the aircraft is spinning burning and filling your eyes and lungs with smoke.

There were no hydraulic controls, the pilot controlled the aircraft with manual controls which in the larger planes could be very heavy. You could tell who the bomber pilots were by their huge forearms.

The engines where huge monstrous affairs. Many airplanes were still using radial engines which belch fire and smoke on startup and puke a gallon of oil on shutdown. There wasnt a battery in the world big enough to start them, so most had to be started by plugging into a generator. Some planes required a poor hapless ground crewman to start the engine by turning a crank, others you had to actually turn the prop to start, and still others used a shotgun shell blast to turn over the engine.

Most WWII planes seldom got to land on concrete. Much more commonly they had to land on grass runways often referred to as "mud pits." And so they required large balloon tires and very sturdy landing gear. Nearly all of them were tail-dragger type aircraft which puts the plane in a nose-up configuration when on the ground. It was often impossible for pilots to see directly in front of the plane while taxiing, and so they would either zig-zag back and forth, or have a spotter ride on a wingtip.