Hi Karnak,
>Now, due to the Mosquito's construction and the way in which the MK108 does damage I do think the structure of the Mosquito is significantly more durable than a similarly sized aluminum aircraft would be.
The opposite is true. Wood was especially vulnerable against explosive damage.
In the 1930s Winter and Tschischwitz examined aircraft battle damage focusing on 20 mm shells in their report FB505. They used the old MG C30 shells as the more effective mine shells hadn't been developed yet.
"The trials proved that plywood only has little resistance to hits by explosive shells. Reinforcing the plywood by applying cloth covering, integrating wire mesh layers, using smaller segments and using bakelite-impregmated layers did not result in any improvements. In comparison to plywood, the materials Duralumin and Electron show very much superior behavior.
[...]
4) Extremely heavy damage was observed for plywood-covered stabilizers. The extensive cracking of the skin that hardly seems to absorb any energy is remarkable."
However, I'd guess wood still may have been superior in the way you indicated against the machine gun rounds which made up the main defensive firepower of the Luftwaffe night bombers and night fighters."
I'm sure you're aware of the famous "missing wingtip" Mosquito photograph. It clearly shows just the kind of crack mentioned in the Winter and Tschischwitz report that caused the loss of the skinning on the underside of the wing. You won't see this kind of extending damage on metal aircraft.
Wood is vulnerable. A metal Mosquito would have been a lot tougher.
Regards,
Henning (HoHun)
