Piston engine and Jet Engine: Martin P4M

[Abilene Slim SASS 81783]

In the “Devotion” thread, UB posted a video of the Ryan Fireball. Rather than hijack the thread, here’s more on the topic. The Martin company developed a twin engine patrol plane in a competition for the US Navy. Ultimately, the Lockheed P2 Neptune won the contract, but 21 examples of the P4M Mercator were built. Most went to my dad’s ELINT/SIGINT* squadron VQ-1, and to another recon squadron, VQ-2.

 

These were unique with the jet engine in the same nacelle as the radial engine. The plane shown below is from VQ-1 over Iwakuni. The jet intakes under nacelle are visible in this image. Note the lack of squadron markings that were removed by censors for this photo. 

 

The second photo was taken by dad on the flight line at Iwakuni. It shows up on the web because I posted it a number of years ago to a Navy patrol plane assn. site. There you can see appropriate markings. 
 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_P4M_Mercator

 

*Electronic intercept/Signal intercept 
 

[Subdeacon Joe]

Pretty bird.

[Abilene Slim SASS 81783]

1 hour ago, Subdeacon Joe said:

Pretty bird.

Yup! However, I’m partial to the P2V Neptune. My dad flew these more than the P4Ms. Note the outboard jet engines on pods which were shut down in cruise flight. 

 

[Finagler 6853 Life]

So what was the purpose of the jet engine?  To give it more get up and go because of lack of fire power?

[Abilene Slim SASS 81783]

2 hours ago, Finagler 6853 Life said:

So what was the purpose of the jet engine?  To give it more get up and go because of lack of fire power?

The jets were a boost for takeoff when heavily loaded. They were also used to increase speed when needed. 

[Blackwater 53393]

I recall seeing heavily loaded C130s equipped with “JATO bottles” for takeoff on short runways.

 

JATO= Jet Action Takeoff.  I wonder if they were actually rockets or were they actually small jet engines!

[Abilene Slim SASS 81783]

28 minutes ago, Blackwater 53393 said:

I recall seeing heavily loaded C130s equipped with “JATO bottles” for takeoff on short runways.

 

JATO= Jet Action Takeoff.  I wonder if they were actually rockets or were they actually small jet engines!

Rockets. I never understood why they called it "jet". Maybe it just sounded better than "RATO".  

 

They used them on P2Vs before they had jet engines. The jets on pods were a late modification.