World War II pushed manufacturers to improve engines already in production because switching powerplants would interrupt output and force airframe redesign. That industrial lock-in kept the new 2,000-horsepower class from shaping the early-war Fleet Air Arm. If those engines had been available in quantity during 1938, the naval air arm might have been largely Sabre-powered, leaving more Griffons for Air Ministry projects. The same thought experiment produces Griffon-powered Spitfires and Hurricanes and even a twin-engine Mosquito. These outcomes are possibilities rather than predictions, but they show how combat performance depended on when power became available and reveal the opportunity cost of preserving established production lines. By the time high-power engines became essential later in the war, the initial design and procurement window had passed.
Notable Point · 7:36-10:14
Wartime production lock-in and the missing high-power engine
The war rewarded incremental refinement of engines already in production, delaying new powerplants and the airframes needed to exploit them.