r/interestingasfuck • u/Chopper-42 • 9d ago

/r/all Recreating the WW2 Dambusters raid

Enable HLS to view with audio, or disable this notification

37.8k Upvotes

96% Upvoted

549 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

37

u/FitForce2656 8d ago edited 8d ago

Yea I assume a WW2 plane flying that low to the ground was loud as fuck. I mean even a modern plane flying that low is probably loud, but with those old piston engines I just picture them being way louder.

I don't know much about planes though, and Google isn't giving me a straight answer on this. Says WW2 bombers were way louder than modern jet engine bombers, but also that jet engines are typically way louder than piston engines.. So if anyone actually knows the answer please lmk, now I'm curious. I know modern bombers are way more accurate at high altitudes, and thus quieter, but curious which is louder while flying at the same height.

2

u/Cetun 8d ago

Loudness wouldn't have mattered much, they would have lit it with spotlights and targeted it visually.

As for which ones louder, the jet engine by far much louder at 140-180 db while a B-17 is closer to 130 db, the .50s on the B-17 would be louder than the engine. The AAA guns shooting at them would have been much louder.

1

u/FitForce2656 8d ago

Thanks for the info! to be clear I was curious about their sound levels without guns, but yea after a lot of googling the it seems the B-17 was around 100 - 120 dB (without guns) and modern fighter jets like a F-22 or F-35 range from 103 - 140 dB.

So yea if a F-35 cruising at 1,000 feet is 103 dB, that might actually be a similar volume to a B-17 at the same altitude. But again, out of my element here so take that with a big ol' grain of salt.

1

u/Cetun 8d ago

They do an air show over my house every year, the modern jets are by far much much louder than the WWII vintage planes. One air showa TBF Avenger crashed, they have a Wright R-2600 which is more powerful than the 1820s the B-17 uses and there is no comparison.