Apples to apples

[Gary R.]

Comparison.

Bac 1-11 vs. DC-9
Viscount 800's vs. L188 Electra
Tupelov 144? concordski vs. concorde
Trident vs. 727
Mig-29 vs. F-15
Lancaster vs. B-24 Liberator

Lets discuss very similar counterparts here.  Should be interesting, ;-)

[C]

Comparison.

Bac 1-11 vs. DC-9

BAC 1-11 - one of the only British jets to be successful in the States...

Mig-29 vs. F-15

Probably not. Su-27 family v F-15 would be a fairer comparison...

Lancaster vs. B-24 Liberator

Lancaster bomb bay - not many other WW2 bombers could've carried a 22,000lb bomb... (maybe the B-29, but didn't that have double bomb bay...) Lanc sounds a lot nicer too, but you could say thats down to Mr Curtiss and Mr Fairey....

[Woodlouse2002]

Dunno what Curtis and Fairey have to do with B24's and Lancs. But the B24 had that funny wing that made it able to fly quite high, quite fast and for quite far. The Lanc was merely better in every other way, for example, bombload, damage resistance etc etc.


And not even the B29 could lift a Grandslam, let alone fit one in the bomb bay. Another reason as to why the Lanc was superior.

[C]

Dunno what Curtis and Fairey have to do with B24's and Lancs.

All to do with the Merlin. I'd always thought of the Merlin as the direct descendant of the Kestrel and the Schneider trophy winning "R" series. What I didn't know was that the Kestrel and "R" were developed after Mr Fairey and his company very successfully license buit the Curtiss D-12, which was head and shoulders above British inline engines of the time. Hence a few D-12 ended up in Derby for RR's perusal...

[Gary R.]

Well, I'm not an expert on British engines but I know enough to know that the merlin still remains one of the most powerful pistons in history.  They had a real screamer there and when coupled with an excellent airframe like the p-51 it was magic.  I have Wing's of Power on my fs-9.  I can tell you that their lancaster flies wonderfully compared to the b-24 which is stiff and feels like a flying truck.  At least it takes the air better under a max loadout.  Why, even the b-29 requires much talent to safely get airborn with full load.  Yes, the lancaster was a good bird.  Great praise from the western shore of the pond, lol.

[Hagar]

The Griffon is far more powerful than the Merlin which is why it was used in the later marks of Spitfire. Contrary to popular belief the Merlin & Griffon bear no relation to each other, apart from both being developed by Rolls-Royce. The big Napier inline water-cooled engines like the 24 cylinder Sabre used in the Typhoon & Tempest were more powerful than both.

Going back to the topic I never saw any resemblance between the Viscount & the Electra. Maybe I missed something but the Viscount was the first successful turbo-prop airliner & one of the few British airliners that was popular in the US. Apart from both having 3 jet engines in a similar configuration I never saw any relationship between the Trident & 727. Not having much interest in jet airliners it's quite possible they were intended for completely different markets.

As the others have said, the Lancaster & B-24 were designed to two completely different concepts. Like the B-17 the B-24 was designed before WWII started so suffered from the same lack of experience with strategic bombing. If anything the comparison should be between them.
The Lancaster was a four-engined development of the unsuccessful Manchester (more due to the unreliable Vulture engines than the airframe) & produced with the knowledge gained from several years of bitter warfare. Unlike the US types it was mainly intended for use by RAF Bomber Command for long-range night bombing. I found this site with some very interesting information on the B-24 Liberator. http://home.att.net/~jbaugher2/b24.html Here's a short quote.

A comparison between the B-24 Liberator and the B-17 Fortress is perhaps inevitable. The Liberator was slightly faster than the Fort, carried a heavier bombload and could carry it farther and higher than the Fort. It was slightly more maneuverable than the Fort, and was much more adaptable to other missions. On the debit side, the Liberator was harder to fly, less stable, and much more difficult to hold in the tight bomber formations that were mandatory in the European theatre of operations. The Liberator was not capable of absorbing nearly the same amount of battle damage that the Fortress could handle. Any sort of solid hit on the wing of a Liberator was generally fatal, the high-aspect ratio Davis wing often collapsing and folding up when hit. In comparison to the B-17, there are relatively few photographs of Liberators returning home with half their wings shot away or with major sections of their tails missing. The Liberator was not very crashworthy, a "wheels up" landing generally causing the fuselage to split into two or three pieces, resulting in a complete writeoff. In contrast, a Fortress which had undergone a "wheels-up" landing could often be quickly repaired and returned to service. When ditching at sea, the Liberator's lightly-built bomb bay doors would often immediately collapse upon impact, the interior of the aircraft quickly filling up with water, causing the aircraft to sink rapidly. In spite of the Liberator's defects, Eighth Air Force records show that B-17 operational losses were 15.2 percent as compared with 13.3 percent for the B-24,which meant that a crew had statistically a better chance of surviving the war in a Liberator than in a Fortress.

[Tweek]

What about a TU-4 / B-29, or the VC-10 / Ilyushin Il-62?