Some cockpits were a bit too snuggly fitting, some pilots flew with their canopies slid back to allow for an expedite egress in case they where shot down. That was pretty common on russian planes like the Lavochkins and Yakovlevs, in fact many pilots at the beggining of the war removed the canopy alltogether.
Also during the Battle of Brittain Spitfire and Hurricane British pilots used to patrol around with the canopies open in case they were bounced by the enemy and shot down. The German Messerschmitts didn´t have that option since their canopies hinged open to the right side
David, obviously you have much more experience with that than me, but I´ve flown on an open cockpit Stearman at well over 100 mph and I didn´t get my head riped off by the slipstream while peering out one side, heck, I even stuck my arm out holding a camera for a shameless self portrait!.
250 mph would be… stressing for your neck, but there where open cockpit fighters going that fast and faster with some gravity assistance anyway, like the russian I-16 for example.
And for the exact opposite reason, a shitload of FPS action games like F.E.A.R. have all the enemies wearing gas masks or fully enclosed combat helmets, because the developers half-assed it and didn’t want to make individual facial models for all the enemies. In real life, gas masks cut off your peripheral vision heavily and guys would never be deployed with them unless absolutely necessary. But if you play the average action shooter, you’d think that every single terrorist entity, evil corporation or rogue paramilitary group on earth forces their soldiers to wear gas masks or full-face helmets 24/7.
I recall reading (possibly in Reach for the Sky) that the British fighter ace Douglas Bader (he flew with false legs) would return from missions with the canopy open so he could smoke his pipe. This I understand was not permitted (he was a bit of a rebel).
Yes. Actually part of it. I still haven’t been able to catch it from the beginning or stay through to the end. I can’t surf past things like this and The Longest Day and ToraToraTora without stopping.
Not really. A lot of the war movies took a lot of pain for accuracy. I didn’t think for a moment that they would make such a glaring inaccurate portrayal just to get good shots of the pilot.
I’ve seen guys flying Spitfires and Mustangs with the canopy open. Generally only for photo shoots or, in one memorable case, when Ray Hanna, who did a lot of the flying for Empire of the Sun, recreated one of the final scenes from the movie by flying past low and slow with the canopy open and waving.
I have made the mistake of sticking my arm out into the airflow at 140 kts, I was pointing out something of interest to my passenger, nearly amputated the damn thing.
Lordy, the screwups in that movie are legendary. Especially the little number of a pilot taking off in one type of dive-bomber, attacking the Japanese in a second type, and finally landing in a third type. Tom Garth takes off in a Wildcat, lands in a Hellcat, and crashes in a Korean War-era jet.
The producers of Midway just slapped together footage from wherever for their shots. Accuracy wasn’t real high up on their list.
David Simmons was there, so I’ll defer to him as to the reason his ‘Little Friends’ flew (or did not fly) with open canopies. But I can tell you a Cessna can get pretty hot in the sun. (I learned to fly in the Antelope Valley.) And it’s a high-wing. I imagine that a canopy like on a fighter makes an excellent greenhouse. (Incidentally I had the window pop open on a 172 at 120 knots. Noisy, but no problem. And I’ve seen photos of people flying their Grumman/American AA-1s and AA-5s with open canopies.)
The pilots wore cloth or leather helmets with earphones, so they would be able to hear. And cockpits are pretty noisy anyway. (Many/most/some) American pilots had throat mics, so I’d guess talking wasn’t an issue. As I said, cockpits are noisy – even in a closed-cockpit Cessna. And helicopters are so noisy that you wouldn’t fly one without a headset. (We never used headsets in the Cessna when I was training. Dad’s 182 had intercom though, so we used them there.) Even in a noisy helicopter the mic is effective, so it should be effective in an open cockpit.
The RCAF Golden Hawks used to fly the their Sabres by the crowd with open canopies all the time. This was, of course, the 1950s, when “ejecting” could still mean just opening the canopy and doing a roll.
And as far as noise goes, throat mics were the most common to use during the war, because they keep out the ambient noise. So even if you had an extremely loud cockpit, you could definitely stilll use the radio. Even if you had a stong wind right on you, they don’t suffer the way “normal” mics do.
RAF/RAAF/RNZAF pilots operating in the Middle East and Pacific Theatres during WWII often flew with the canopy open. It was hot, so having the canopy open cooled the pilot down, gave them a better view, and if they were suddenly attacked & shot down, it was a lot easier to bail out.
Interestingly, the British S.E. 5 (from WWI) was initially equipped with a plexiglass canopy when it was first introduced. The pilots hated them and routinely took them off the planes, to the point where the S.E. 5a was introduced without them. Early pilots preferred the “wind in their hair” feeling, I’m told.
Cockpits can get beastly, awfully hot. That said, there is a limit to how fast you can tolerate flying with open canopy. Some canopies block the airstream better than others. I will defer to those who have flown the actual airplanes in question as to whether or not it’s practical to fly in a such a manner in a particular airplane.
I will say, however, that at 80 mph the airstream can really leave you feeling beat up after a time, and personally I’d rather not go above 100 mph hanging out in the breeze. A good windshield that really does re-direct airflow can make a higher speed tolerable, but there are limits.
Hell yes.
It depends on the particular design. Some are better than others.
No, it’s a lot like driving down a freeway with your windows open. If anything there is even more noise.
If by “talk” you mean YELL AT THE TOP OF YOUR LUNGS, yeah. Well, actually, it depends (again) on speed and design details, but in my experience in various open cockpits you wind up doing a lot of yelling at at higher speeds/more power you may not be able to hear/speak intelligibly. And that’s with modern radios, mikes, and headset, which are probably better than the WWII equipment.
I’ve seen people flying WWII warbirds around with open canopies. I do not see them doing this at high speeds or (of course) during actual combat these days.
Interestingly, they had the opposite problem flying over Europe (Europe, of course, being way the hell north of most other places they were fighting in during WWII). Many of the planes could get quite cold, though the single-engine fighters could at least warm their cockpit with the heat from the engine (I’m not sure if they had a dedicated heater, or if it just happened by nature of the engine being right there). P-38 pilots, OTOH, had to wear really warm underwear, because the engines were nowhere near the cockpit in that plane.
