Sustained investment could give the Fleet Air Arm 1,000-horsepower engines by 1930

How quickly could naval aircraft engine power grow under a retained and well-funded Fleet Air Arm?

About 1,000 horsepower by 1930 was plausible, with much higher outputs possible by 1939 under sustained investment.

Starting from roughly 450-horsepower service engines in the early 1920s, a retained Fleet Air Arm could fund a deliberate sequence of stronger designs. Plausible steps run through roughly 700 and 900 horsepower before reaching about 1,000 to 1,100 horsepower around 1930. Continued compounding improvements might approach 2,000 horsepower by 1939. That path depends on naval control, steady investment, and learning carried from one engine generation into the next.