FLY OVER...WWII Corsair Fighter

[Norske3]

:D http://www.compass.dircon.co.uk/cors_n.jpg

[ 04-12-2005, 10:55 AM: Message edited by: Norske3 ]

[Bark]

Beautiful airplane. What was the thinking behind the Corsair's wing shape, i.e. the unique downward sweep from the fuselage?

[Don Z.]

If you look closely, the landing gear is positioned at the lowest part of the wing.

Carrier landings are controlled crashes, they are very hard on landing gear. Thus, the shorter the gear, the stronger and stiffer it can be for its weight.

But that huge radial engine and huge prop need to be held up high... thus, the wing root reaches down to where the landing gear is, in effect increasing the overall length of the gear (i.e. keeping the center of the prop up high) without reducing strenght. That's the bend down. Then, there's the bend up to give it the right "flying shape" (some dihedral is good).

Also, the radiators for the oil coolers are in the wing root, which gave the plane a very distinct sound... It was known as "whistlilng death". As an added bonus, the exhaust from the 18 cylinders actually provided some (not much, but some) thrust as well.

The F4U4 is my favorite piston engined fighter.

[Stu Fyfe]

Wasn't there some kind of visability problem reported with the positioning of the wings?

[Norske3]

Gull wing..what Don Z said...because of it they could but on a bigger prop...visibility was a problem on the ground 'cause of a long cowling...so as they taxied they would need to turn aside frequently so they could eyeball the the taxi way.I think that was true of the P51 Mustang also. file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/kenneth%20moe/My%20Documents/My%20Pictures/F4Uprofile.jpg

[ 04-12-2005, 01:09 PM: Message edited by: Norske3 ]

[Lurch]

Almost all taildraggers have to be s-turned when taxiing because of poor forward visibility on the ground. Old films of WWII airfield activity often show AAF fighters taxiing with a ground crew member sitting on one or both wings, near the tip, to guide pilots in close-quarter areas where s-turning wasn't possible.

Landing visibility in a Corsair was the worst of any Navy fighter. IIRC, poor visibility, high landing speed, and high sink rate convinced the Navy to forego carrier landings until late in the war, after the Brits had shown it could be done consistently. Most Corsairs were assigned to Marine units and were flown from land bases.

Don

[Norske3]

So what technique did the Brits have that the US didn't?...or was it just more guts. smile.gif

[Lurch]

Originally posted by Norske3:
So what technique did the Brits have that the US didn't?...or was it just more guts. smile.gif Could be. ;) Maybe someone with a better memory than mine will tackle that one. It might have been a matter of necessity. I don't think the Royal Navy had a home-grown carrier fighter in the first half of the war that could stand up to what the enemy flew, so they relied to some extent on American planes like the Corsair and Wildcat, the latter flown mainly in the Atlantic theater. I think the Seafire became operational late in the war, well after the Corsair had been proven carrier capable.

Don

[Don Z.]

The problem was that when you're on the glide path, the cowling obscures the deck... the Brits figured out how to approach the glide path from the side, and drop in on the deck. That was a technique that had not been tried previously, and it worked well. It was counterintuitive. I spoke once with a pilot who flew them over Korea, and he said that once you "got over" the counterintuitive method, it was a sweet plan to bring aboard.

Also over Korea, the F4U had two confirmed... MiG 15s. Not bad for a set of pistons!

[Tom Lathrop]

I used to watch the Corsairs, Avengers and Panthers while my Destroyer was on duty behind the carrier off Korea to rescue any pilot that survived a mishap on landing or take off. Managed to pick up one, but only parts of another.

The Brits did make the Corsair carrier-worthy out of necessity since they had nothing as good of their own that was carrier based. They also perfected the guidance landing system consisting of mirrors and lights that everyone used for a long time. They also came up with the angled deck configuration that saved lots of planes and deck crew from destruction. Also the ski jump deck used with VTOL Harriers that allow them to take off with more fuel or ammo loading.

Since we have so many more carriers and planes than the Brits do and have used them in more actions, it's a puzzle why they beat us to all this stuff.

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

Thank you. British Forumites swell with pride!

We also invented the armoured flight deck, and now I think of it we invented the carrier itself!

We're building a couple of big new ones; I hope our ingenuity is still up to scratch!

[rbgarr]

About a week ago I was sitting outside and saw a Corsair and Mustang go screaming by, nose to tail. Airshow at the nearby airport.

If anyone is ever driving down I-95 through Savannah, GA, stop at the Rte 80 exit and visit the Eighth Air Force Museum. You'll see it from the highway because there's a B-47 Stratojet sitting outside.

[P.I. Stazzer-Newt]

And the "angled Flight Deck"

[Norske3]

Tom already smile.gif mentioned that....

[Meerkat]

Originally posted by Andrew Craig-Bennett:

We also invented the armoured flight deck, and now I think of it we invented the carrier itself!
You guys had a carrier that predated the "Langley"? It was in service so early that they where using Curtis Pushers for flight testing!

[Lurch]

Originally posted by Don Z.:
Also over Korea, the F4U had two confirmed... MiG 15s. Not bad for a set of pistons!Was that due to the MiG pilots laughing so hard they forgot to watch their six ...?
:D :D :D

Don

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

Originally posted by Meerkat:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Andrew Craig-Bennett:

We also invented the armoured flight deck, and now I think of it we invented the carrier itself!
You guys had a carrier that predated the "Langley"? It was in service so early that they where using Curtis Pushers for flight testing!</font>[/QUOTE]HMS "Furious", operational, as a carrier, 15th March 1918.

Seven Sopwith Camels flew off the "Furious", bombed the Tondern Zeppelin sheds, destroying two Zeppelins, returned to the ship and landed on, in July 1918.

(I seem to recall that Eskine Childers, Irish patriot, yachtsman, and author of "The Riddle of the Sands", was one of the pilots)

The USS "Langley"'s conversion was authorised in 1919, and she flew off her first plane in 1922.

HMS "Furious", much rebuilt, survived WW2 and was scrapped in 1946.

http://www.battleships-cruisers.co.uk/images/hmsfurious10.jpg

[ 04-12-2005, 02:04 PM: Message edited by: Andrew Craig-Bennett ]

[rbgarr]

I love the names you British give your ships: 'Warspite', 'Dreadnought', 'Ark Royal', etc.

[Don Z.]

Originally posted by Lurch:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Don Z.:
Also over Korea, the F4U had two confirmed... MiG 15s. Not bad for a set of pistons!Was that due to the MiG pilots laughing so hard they forgot to watch their six ...?
:D :D :D

Don</font>[/QUOTE]Could have been that... or it might have been that the F4 pilots had a little bit of experience chasing things like Zeros... Great planes are good. Great Training is better...

[paladin]

I got's to fly lotsa planes at least once but never a Corsair......and Pappy Boyington wuz wunna my heros.....

[John E Hardiman]

F4U's were very high scoring in Korea, mainly the F4U-5N's operated by the Navy. This is because they were equiped with RADAR and hunted at night at a time when most planes didn't carry RADAR. Lt Guy Bordelon was most likely the last US prop Ace...all 5 in a F4U-5N.

www.acepilots.com/korea_bordelon.html (http://www.acepilots.com/korea_bordelon.html)

[Tom Lathrop]

Lurch,

Most warplanes don't regularly fly at anywhere near top speed. If a P51 got in the right position with height and surprise, no reason he couldn't shoot down just about any jet. 51s got several ME262s. Of course, I would not want to be the pilot of a P51 against a competent pilot in a MIG15. Especially since I'm not a pilot :D

[paladin]

Tom...done lotsa sunday afternoon dogfighting against U.S. sabrejets...my old B model p-51 had the latest engine and prop but minimal armor...it was a former photo recon ship...they could outrun me in a straight line but could not outmaneuver me....and if they slowed down when on my tail i would chop the throttle, dump gear and flaps and turn inside and 'fire" my guns as they overshot...neat thing wuz to then hit the throttle to almost war emergency...the safety wire....and get 'em from behind as it took 6-10 seconds for the turbine to spool back up....
on sundays I flew a tiger moth with wing man Mitchy Barcia against similar aircraft..with 75 feetz of crepe paper on the tail skid....we had a machine gun endless loop tape recording that played when the gun trigger was depressed and a 'propane gun' for effects......the idea was to cut the other guys paper with your prop.....we could fly 85 mph in any direction.....

[Lurch]

Originally posted by Tom Lathrop:
Lurch,

Most warplanes don't regularly fly at anywhere near top speed. If a P51 got in the right position with height and surprise, no reason he couldn't shoot down just about any jet. 51s got several ME262s. Of course, I would not want to be the pilot of a P51 against a competent pilot in a MIG15. Especially since I'm not a pilot :D Tom,

I was joking. I know that early in the "police action" several piston-engined fighters managed to surprise and knock down a few MiGs. The night fighter kills were all apparently WWII era Soviet piston engined fighters and bombers. The MiG was a day interceptor and probably didn't see much night action.

Over Germany, 262s were sitting ducks on landing approach and takeoff, which is where most AAF kills happened. Piston-engined fighters cruised at considerably less than full power because the engines couldn't take prolonged flogging. Jets don't have that problem. A 262 was over a hundred mph faster than a Mustang, so I don't think many "Schwalbes" were shot down at 30,000 feet, unless the pilot was busy reading "Mein Kampf." ;)

Don

[N. Scheuer]

Does anybody remember tales of the Marine Corsairs that used to fly over N.Korean lines at night with their gear down and the canopy open so the drag would slow them down, just to make the enemy troops nervous with the constant noise? I believe they used to a drop samll bomb (small so they could carry a lot of them) now and then. equipped with auxiliary fuel tanks (another contributoe to the slowing effects of drag) a Corsair had a really long loiter time over a target. I also seem to remember them varrying the prop pitch in and out so that the crazy rpm would REALLY keep a Gook awake.

I've got a solid molded plastic model of the F-4U that mas given to people (my Father, in this case) by Chance-Vought. It hasa wingspan of about 14-inches, about the same size as the popular polystyrene Revell kit from the 1950's.

In landing on a carrier, the Brits may have also introduced some side slip into the glide path. This manuever effectively slows the landing speed, while moving the nose off to the right while the pilot enjoys a great view of the deck over his dipped left wing. Side slip also increases the angle of the glide path, and one does not have to "straighten up" untill just seconds before touch-down, or more realistically, "slam-bang-down".

One good thing resulting from the US Navy's reluctance to use Corsairs for Carrier operation in WW-2 was that they gave a whole squadron of them to "Pappy" Boyington's Black Sheep where this great airplane could be flown by Marine pilots equal to the task, operating off island airfields.

About cranking the wings down so the main gear might be shortened, remember that the Corsair was the first airplane to use the new Pratt & Whitney 2000-hp "double row" engine which was fitted with an inordinately large propeller.

I'm not sure which Corsair Moldel aopears in the photo, above, but you may remember that the original Corsair design incorporated a "greenhouse" (multiple panes) cockpit canopy which was lower in profile, putting the pilot's seat lower into the fuselage.

When the Navy Dept objected to the accident record concurrent with landing on Carriers, Chance-Vought raisded the pilot's seat about 4-inches, and reconfigured the canopy to hump up high enough to still give a generous clearance.

This was another bonus to us who never had to fly one of these things, simply because they look so much better with the one-piece, humped-up canopy.

The big 2000-hp P&W engines (increased to something like 2300-hp for the Korean War) had another huge benefit not generally acknowleged. When combined with the Corsair and the Republic P-47 Thunderbolt, they could carry enough ordnance to develope a whole new mission we know as that of the "Fighter-Bomber".

Moby Nick

[seafox]

in ralph zumbos "iron calvery" he wrote of being told by a korean war tanker the story of a fight where a corsare saved them from having to expose their side armor to a russan t34. the t34 was under a bridge so the only way their tank could get a shot would be to drive down into the river and hope they could shoot faster than the comunists did.
some saber jets had tried to bomb the bridge but missed when a corsare returning with some unused rockits from a mission farther north said h'd give it a go if they could guide him in. they described the location and could here the engine but couldn't see the guy.
they knew he was seeing the right bridge becasue he described the suroundings but the stilll couldn't see him till just before he started firing his machine guns. he was flying up the river below the tree lines. firing his machinegunes alowed the pilot to zero in on the taget and when he had a steady impact in the t34 he fired his two rockits and blew it up.

about the angled deck thing wasn't the prime advantage was to land and launch planes at the same time?

in the picture of the HMS furious it looks like the deck stops short of the bow could it also land planes on top and launch from the hanger deck at the same time?

the japaneese carriors lost at midway had origionally deen designed so that plane could fly off from either hanger or top deck or launch from hanger deck while retreaving on the top deck. however they were rebuilt in the late 30s doubling their number of planes per ship but lost the ability to do both flight operations at the same time..and thus could not launch more fighters when attacked

[John E Hardiman]

Originally posted by seafox:
about the angled deck thing wasn't the prime advantage was to land and launch planes at the same time?
Angled flight deck is to prevent somebody that does a hot run or misses the wire from slamming into the parked planes forward. There is a good film around of that happening with several of the old straight decked ships by some F6Fs

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

Seafox writes:


in the picture of the HMS furious it looks like the deck stops short of the bow could it also land planes on top and launch from the hanger deck at the same time? "Furious" got rebuilt quite a lot. You are quite right - flying off deck forward, landing deck above and aft.

She started life, along with her sisters, "Glorious" and "Courageous", as a shallow draft 31.5 knot battle cruiser with 2 x 18" guns, built as one of Jacky Fisher's less brilliant notions, with the idea of forcing the entrance to the Baltic.

Fisher resigned, over the Dardanelles, and nobody else liked the idea of these ships. The three were nicknamed "Curious", "Spurious" and "Outrageous".

"Furious" was launched and entered service in 1917 in a modified form with the flying off deck forward and an 18" turret aft. It was very quickly decided that the big guns were a waste of time and a flying off deck was more use if planes could also land on... after some pioneering experiments proved that this was possible... so she had the turret removed and the landing deck added.

Besides launching the first carrier borne air raid she also was the first ship to fight off an air attack by using anti aircraft guns and by launching fighters.

Later she was rebuilt again.

She actually lasted long enough to take part in an attack on the "Tirpitz" in 1944.

Here she is in 1917, half battlecruiser, half aircraft carrier: http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/images/h60000/h60606.jpg

Here are some pictures of the 1918 arrangements:

General view:

http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/images/h42000/h42236.jpg

The flying off deck, with Sopwith Camels:

http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/images/h42000/h42238t.jpg

The landing on deck, pilot's eye view:

http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/images/h42000/h42237t.jpg

[ 04-13-2005, 02:07 AM: Message edited by: Andrew Craig-Bennett ]

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

Here is "Furious" pretty much as she went through WW2; she was 28 years old and starting to fall to bits when she attacked the "Tirpitz". She never did get a regular island, etc:

http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/images/h85000/h85717.jpg

[Norske3]

Andrew...how many large carriers remain in the British Navy?

[Dave Hadfield]

Jeez, Paladin, you've done everything! Cool! But how did you find a "B" model P-51 to go up against F-86s? I would've thought those would all be long gone, replaced by P-51Ds with their bubble canopy. Even in the Guard.

And where did you fly the Moths? Good fun those! I fly one currently for a local museum...

http://www.classicaircraft.ca/images/tiger_flight1.jpg

It too has a skid instead of a tailwheel. It's an unmodified English Tiger, a DH 82a. Nothing like it!

[John Hastie]

Speaking of the Corsair...

I was driving around the edge of the Cam Ranh airbase (Vietnam - 1970) one day and as I headed back towards the other side of the peninsula in my jeep, I looked up and skidded to a stop.

Coming in for a landing was a whole squadron of Corsairs. My god, I thought I had gone through a time warp or had entered a John Wayne movie.

They were landing on a metal landing strip away from the largest runway in the world at the time.

I found out that they had been taken out of mothballs and donated to the Vietnamese Navy (Cam Ranh Bay was the home of the Vietnamese Training Center) for use in ground support missions.

Wow, that one so young as me could have seen these real combat airplanes.

As an aside, I was standing on the beach north of Cam Ranh and got to watch the battleship "New Jersey" firing over my head.

Awesome!

[martin schulz]

Well in this regard I have hardly anything to offer except this piece of "relic":

http://www.deutsche-kriegsschiffe.de/Schiffe/flugzeugtraeger/fotos/graf-zeppelin02.jpg

http://www.geschichtsthemen.de/Graf-Zeppelin.jpg

http://www.messerschmitt-bf109.de/pics-andere/traeger-graf-zeppelin.jpg

Graf Zeppelin was an aircraft carrier of the Kriegsmarine, named in honor of Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin. Her construction was ordered on 16 November 1935, and her keel was laid down 28 December 1936 by Deutsche Werke of Kiel. She was launched on 8 December 1938, but was never commissioned.

In 1935, Adolf Hitler announced that Germany would construct aircraft carriers to strengthen the Kriegsmarine. The keels of two were laid down the next year. Two years later, Grand Admiral Erich Raeder presented an ambitious shipbuilding program called the Z Plan, in which four carriers were to be built by 1945. In 1939, he revised the plan, reducing the number to be built to two.

The first German carrier, laid down as "Carrier A," was named Graf Zeppelin when launched in 1938.

A review of the Führer's conferences on matters dealing with the German Navy, the minutes of which were captured after the fall of the Third Reich, reveals Hitler's vacillating interest in the carriers. Marshall Hermann Göring, Commander in Chief of the Luftwaffe, was resentful of any incursion on his authority as head of the country's air power and he frustrated Raeder at every opportunity. Within his own service, Raeder found opposition in Admiral Karl Doenitz, a submarine man.

By May 1941, the strain on manpower and raw materials was being felt in Germany. Raeder was still optimistic, however, and informed Hitler that Graf Zeppelin, then about 85 per cent complete, would be completed in about a year and that another year would be required for sea trials and flight training.

Though Hitler continued to assure Raeder that the carriers would be built, the Admiral's war with Göring had no truce and became increasingly bitter. Göring showed his contempt for the naval air arm by informing Hitler and Raeder that the aircraft ordered for Graf Zeppelin could not be available until the end of 1944. Göring's delaying tactics worked.

Manpower and material shortages plagued the Graf Zeppelin.

Prodded by Raeder, Hitler ordered Göring to produce aircraft for the carrier and under this pressure, the air marshall offered redesigned versions of the Junkers Ju 87B and the Messerschmitt Bf 109E-3 which were at that time being phased out of the Luftwaffe first-line squadrons. Raeder was unhappy, but he had to accept them or none at all. This forced another delay in the construction of the carrier: the flight deck installations had to be changed.

By 1943, Hitler had become disenchanted with his Navy. Raeder was relieved at his own request and Doenitz, the submarine admiral, took the top naval post. Work on Graf Zeppelin stopped completely.

Sounds like the old Navy vs AirForce quarrel, not unusual in other countries, no?

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

Originally posted by Norske3:
Andrew...how many large carriers remain in the British Navy?None at present. We have the three little "Harrier Carriers" and a fourth, slightly larger, called HMS "Ocean" which is officially a helicopter carrier (although she can and does operate Harriers, particularly when the politicians are not looking!). We have two big ones under construction to replace the three little ones; these will fly the JSF when and if that aircraft is ready.

The RN was told that Britain was No Longer An Imperial Power and did not need carriers back in the 1960's - the replacements for Ark Royal and Eagle, our last big carriers, were accordingly cancelled. When the Ark and the Eagle wore out in the mid-70's they were scrapped.

The Admirals then announced that they had something "much more appropriate for the Cold War" coming along, in the form of a "through deck cruiser". Since these ships seemed to be quite small, and the Navy were scrapping the Tiger and the Blake, our last two big gun cruisers, at the time, the politicians said "Fine, carry on!".

This was in fact a masterpiece of low cunning and high stakes political risk taking. The Navy had correctly guessed that nobody , not a single politician, newspaper man or television journalist, would ask "What's a through deck cruiser?" for fear of looking stupid.

Only when the first one was launched did they notice that the "through deck cruiser" was in fact a baby carrier.

Meanwhile the Fleet Air Arm, who were meant to have handed over their Buccaneers, F4's, and Gannets to the RAF and more or less packed up and gone home, had furtively ordered sea versions of the Harrier. Since the Harrier was meant to be a close support ground attack aircraft and the Sea Harrier was an interceptor, this also needed some ingenuity!

What nobody knew, until literally just before the Falklands War, was whether the Sea Harrier, launched from the "through deck cruisers", would actually work. Indeed as the RN Task Force steamed off to the Falklands only one Fleet Air Arm lieutenant commander was quite sure... however, he was quite right.

So, the Fleet Air Arm, which was first abolished in 1919, just as it produced the first carrier (see above!) lives to fly another day. If Admiral Raeder had gone in for this degree of low cunning, the "Graf Zeppelin" would have had quite an impact on events...

[ 04-13-2005, 05:52 PM: Message edited by: Andrew Craig-Bennett ]

[paladin]

Dave....some friends and i purchased 5 tiger moths from an australian flying club in the early/mid 60's....only two were flying...sorta...they were rebuilt by PATS (Philippine Air Transport Service) owned by WWII Colonel Henry (Hank) Meider....who escaped from Corregidaor. He married the daughter of a British "lord" serving in India after the war and retired in the Philippines...and started PATS, which was the forerunner of Philippine Airlines. We managed to get 4 of the aircraft operational with a few parts like the Gypsy Major engines...and would put on shows at the clark Air Base Aero club and also at the end of the civil runway in Manila...about once a month during the summer..
The P-51 went for $5000 ...was found still in the crate at the back of a hangar in Melbourne. I don't know if the rules have changed in Australia since the 60's, but then the civil aviation rules were similar to u.S. rules about flying former military jets in U.S. airspace....extremely difficult...so the plane was sold for export only. The Philippines was transitioning from P-51's to super sabres so the parts..brand new..were cheeep.....and labor was cheep....i hired two p-51 mechanics, military, to work part time and rebuild the ship....biggest problem was pinhole corrosion in coolant lines...alcoa made new lines...ripped out the 400 pound camera...moved battery for weight and balance...upgraded engine and prop ($3000) from local chinese junk dealer and about a year of everything including new control surfaces...ripped out all the WWII radios and replaced all with King Silver Crown...donated old stuff, after rebuild, to Confederate Air Force...At the time i owned the aviation Electronics facility that did maintenance for Bird and sons, Inc....The pacific Corp, and Continental Air services......

[Dave Hadfield]

You know, Paladin, there's a whole book behind that one post. You gotta get all that stuff written down.

I had no idea your wanderings took you in so many directions...

If you ever make it up to Toronto, I'll take you up in the Moth. And for you, I'll sit up front.

[paladin]

naw...fer your own safety I wouldn't do that...put the CG too far aft....i've gained a few pounds since those days....... :D

[Norske3]

Keep talkin' Paladin .........many of us are all ears I'm sure. smile.gif

[ 04-16-2005, 07:57 PM: Message edited by: Norske3 ]

[formerlyknownasprince]

Keep talking....

I'm about to do a trip on June 12 with the kids as a result of putting my hand up at a charity auction. Learjet to the aviation museum at Temora and a trip for my eldest son and I in their Dragonflies (Vietnam era ground attack jets).

Anyone flown the Dragonfly?

Ian

[paladin]

uh...are you referring to those underpowered toy cessna large scale model airplanes?

[Jack Heinlen]

What was the fastest prop plane in regular service during WWII? The Mustang or the Thunderbolt or? How fast wuzit?

Would the ME 262 have made a difference if it had gotten into service a year earlier? Them Nazi bastards were tricky. If they hadn't had a command structure like they did - all trails of crumbs leading back to uncle Adolf - I think we might have been in serious doo doo.

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

Don't know about the US planes; the fastest British fighters towards the end of WW2 were probably the Hornet (a long range twin engine single seater descended from the Mosquito) and the late model Spitfire.

The Hornet had a top speed of 472 mph and a rate of climb of 4,500 feet/minute. The mark 14 Spitfire had a top speed of 448 mph and a rate of climb of 5,000 feet/minute.

[ 04-18-2005, 09:49 AM: Message edited by: Andrew Craig-Bennett ]

[Jack Heinlen]

I believe the P-51 Mustang, after fitted with a Rolls' engine, out performed anything else driven by prop, in both climbing rate and top speed. But I'm waiting to be corrected. ;) And, with superchargers and oxygen for the pilot they flew really high.

Remember, regular service.

I'm really jealous of Chuck, he having flown one.

[Dan McCosh]

Top speed is something that needs to be qualified--i.e. top speed in level flight at such and sucn an altitude. Several WWII prop planes were encountering compressability in dives, and the planes that could survive this condition ended up the winners. The horspower was also exceeding the ability of a prop to absorb it, without the diameter making the prop tips to supersonic. The counter to this was smaller diameter counter-rotating props, and I think the last model Spitfire used these, and maybe the Bell Aircobra. The fastest plane in WWII, as far as I know, was the ME 262.

[N. Scheuer]

Read an account severa;l years ago in an Aviation Mag about a staged dogfight between a P-51 and an F-4U. Though each had strengths, it was reported as a draw.

The P-38 should be listed as one of the top performers, too.

It is interesting that of all the aircraft that saw service in WW-2, only the Mustang and Corsair were around in Korea. The Gruman Tiger (twin radial engines) also saw some Korean service, though it was too late for WW-2.

Moby Nick

[Lurch]

Originally posted by Jack Heinlen:
What was the fastest prop plane in regular service during WWII? The Mustang or the Thunderbolt or? How fast wuzit?

Would the ME 262 have made a difference if it had gotten into service a year earlier?Jack,

These numbers are from "A Handbook of Fighter Aircraft" by Francis Crosby of the Imperial War museum Duxford.

P-38J Lightning, top speed 414; ceiling 44,000; ROC 2500
P-40N Kittyhawk top speed 378; ceiling 38,000; ROC ~2200
P-47D Thunderbolttop speed 433; ceiling 41,000; ROC 3200
P-51D Mustang top speed 437; ceiling 41,900; ROC 3475

The P-38 had the highest ceiling. The ROC numbers for the P-38 and P-47 seem a tad low, and the number given for the P-40 ceiling is suspect. IIRC, they would start wheezing around 18,000-20,000 feet. Speed and ROC aren't the only criteria for defining overall performance.

The Me-262, if it had been assigned the fighter role from the start, would had a major impact on the air war, but Hitler decreed it would be used as a bomber. The subsequent delay in deploying the 262 as a fighter was fortunate for the good guys. By the time the Luftwaffe began using them as interceptors, they were too few to matter, though they did prove worrisome.

Don

[Lurch]

Originally posted by N. Scheuer:
Read an account severa;l years ago in an Aviation Mag about a staged dogfight between a P-51 and an F-4U. Though each had strengths, it was reported as a draw.Nick,

I read/heard a similar version years ago involving a Mustang and a Bearcat. The two pilots decided to settle their argument over who flew the better plane via a dogfight. They lined up side by side on the runway and firewalled the throttles. The Bearcat took off, sucked up the gear, turned around and made a firing pass on the Mustang before the P-51 could get its gear up. Don't know if its true, but it makes a good story. The F8F was a point-defense interceptor meant to get up in a hurry to protect against kamikaze attacks.It had a climb rate over 4500 fpm and it had to take off from short carrier decks, so on the face of it, it's plausible.

Don

[paladin]

ya gotta qualify fastest...
In a power dive...the wings stayed on the P-38 and the P-47.....on others the fuselage kept going and wings stayed behind...sorta like t-6's in Vietnam.....with pods under wing on the T-6 there wuz too much weight pulling outta deep dives on the Ho chi minh trail 'specially..
The P-38 would go through the sound barrier in a power dive..they lost a couple of test pilots before they discovered control reversal.....

[ 04-18-2005, 12:05 PM: Message edited by: paladin ]

[Krueg]

Later versions of the P-61 Black Widow, with twin 2,800 hp engines, were said to have had a top speed of 440 mph.

http://www.wpafb.af.mil/museum/research/p61-2.jpg

[N. Scheuer]

Your mission statement, Lurch, on the Bearcat probably tells the whole story about why they didn't use them much by the time Korea got hot. The other two I mentioned could carry lots of ordnance as "fighter bombers".

I've seen internet photos of the first Blue Angels lined up in font of Bearcats. Would've liked to have seen that; the Angels were flying Panthers when I first saw them perform.

Moby Nick

[martin schulz]

Don't forget the first rocket-plane that took part in WWII, the ME 163 Komet.

http://www.data-develop.de/lwp/jaeger/me163.jpg

October 2nd, 1941 during tests the Komet was hooked under a Messerschmitt BF 110 taken up to 4000m, was then released, started the "engine" and flew with 1002 km/h (0,78 Mach). The pilot, Heini Dittmar experienced a dense airpressure during the flight.

http://www.data-develop.de/lwp/jaeger/me163hd.jpg

The problem with this, partly built with wood, jet was that they were just abit to fast, so aproaching enemy B-17 they came up with 930 km/h (being 550 kmh faster than the bomber) but had to end the attack 200m before the object to be able to sheer off. leaving the pilot 2-3 seconds to fire (because the 30mm canon only had a range of 600m).

http://www.data-develop.de/lwp/jaeger/me163ab.jpg

[ 04-18-2005, 01:20 PM: Message edited by: martin schulz ]

[John Bell]

On Saturday I happened to be down in Smyrna, GA not far from the end of the runway at Dobbins ARB when I heard a hug noise and looked up to see an F-22 chased by an F/A-18 roaring overhead. The F-22 snapped smart a 360-degree roll then banked hard to the north and out of sight. The air positively crackled with the power of this aircraft, even after it disappeared from sight. Gawdamighty!

Fighters of ANY era are a rush to see up close.

[paladin]

just wait 'til the X-35 becomes operational...

[formerlyknownasprince]

uh...are you referring to those underpowered toy cessna large scale model airplanes? Yep..... guess that means you haven't been in one?

[paladin]

been in one......it's like a 10 year old and a friend trying to ride a 3 year olds tricycle....they are training aircraft and when you put anything other than a 100 pound soaking wet VNAF pilot innitt itz to heavy...then they add a minigun and ammo....and the damn thing does it's best to point itz nose at the ground in any attitude.....

[formerlyknownasprince]

So... my 5'11"daughter and I - at 6'5" are going to have trouble getting into these two?

http://www.aviationmuseum.com.au/aircraft/images/Sa375.jpg

and .....

http://www.aviationmuseum.com.au/aircraft/images/T-XVA.jpg

[paladin]

dunno bump yore haid........my first daughter izz 5'11 1/2".......

[sawcutmill]

the P-51 mustang could actually acheive a top speed of 500mph, i believe.

[Tim B]

Back in the late 1970's when I was still in high school I remember reading an article in Popular Mechanics about an aircraft manufacturer offering a modernized P51 as an anti-tank aircraft. The article went on to explain that it was offered in a fly-off competition against what later became the A-10. Benefits in the article were same top speed, 1/4 of the cost. Anyone else remember that article or was I just asleep in class?

The A-10 is an great plane by the way. I've seen pictures of them return from a mission with most of the tail shot off.

[DougWilde]

Of course the US Navy's first steel-decked aircraft carrier was the USS SABLE, a coal-fired sidewheeler sailing out of Chicago during World War II.

http://dbwilde.home.comcast.net/NavalScans/sable3.jpg

She (above) and her cohort (below), the USS WOLVERINE, also coal-fired and a sidewheeler were aircraft training vessels, rather than true aircraft carriers, hence their IX (eye-ex) designation.

http://dbwilde.home.comcast.net/NavalScans/wolverine1.jpg

Doug Wilde

[Lurch]

Originally posted by Tim B:
Back in the late 1970's when I was still in high school I remember reading an article in Popular Mechanics about an aircraft manufacturer offering a modernized P51 as an anti-tank aircraft. Google Piper Enforcer:

http://www.wpafb.af.mil/museum/annex/pa48.jpg

Flew in the early '80s. It was derived from the earlier (1970s) Cavalier Mustang, which replaced the piston engine with a turboprop:

http://www.geocities.com/koala51d/photo/Enforcer.jpg

AF wasn't interested in either variant. Top speed was just over 400 mph.

Don

[N. Scheuer]

Ive read that P-51's in Korea, loaded to the gills with stuff under the wings, were difficult to handle on the runway; too close to ground looping.

Maybe the AF knew the scoop on these planes. Carring the fuel out at the wingtips only makes it worse.

Moby Nick

[paladin]

actually putting fuel at the wingtips improves performance and reduces concentrated loading to some degree.

[ahp]

If my memory serves the "Sable" and "Woverine" were originally the "City of Buffalo" and the "City of Detroit", overnight car and passager ferries that shuttled between those two cities. I didn't realize that both were converted to A/C carriers, for training only. I believe they never left the Lakes.

When I was a kid my parents and I took one or the other from Buffalo to Detroit, just before WWII. I can still remember looking thru windows in the fidley and watching three huge cranks and connecting rods turning the wheel shaft.

"Life" magazine may have had an article about their conversion to A/C carriers.

[Dan McCosh]

The Sable and Wolverine were converted to carriers from the Seeandbee and City of Greater Buffalo, to train pilots out of Chicago in WW II. The bottom of Lake Michigan still yields restorable Hellcats, etc. on occasion. The City of Detroit was tied up downtown through much of the 1950s, eventually scrapped in 1957. It was an extravagant luxury liner. A section of its pilothouse is in the Great Lakes museum, along with photos of it in its heyday. These ships were among the largest sidewheelers ever built, the propulsion chosen because the route to Cleveland across Lake Erie was so shallow. The configuration also made it relatively easy to add a flight deck.

[DougWilde]

Dan is correct. The SS Seeandbee (actually C&B) and SS Greater Buffalo provided the main carrier qualifications for Navy and Marine pilots, including Bush 41 aboard the USS SABLE.

And to bring this thread full circle, the Kalamazoo Air Museum recently completed restoration of an SBD that crashed off the USS WOLVERINE. This particular 'plane also dropped a bomb on the French battleship JEAN BART in Casablanca.

The AirZoo also has a complete collection of Navy 'Cats, in flying condition, save for their Tomcat (hence the "zoo" in their name). Very much well worth a visit if in that part of the country. They have a Tigercat that is one nasty looking machine.

Doug Wilde

[Tom Lathrop]

I was in Kalamazoo on business some 20 years ago and visited the Air Museum. While there there we noticed a pink Curtis P40 landing. The pilot got out and walked over and we were introduced to her. If my memory serves (and maybe not), it was Jackie Cochran. The P40 was painted pink since this particular plane was flown in North Africa and the desert sun faded the camoflage tan to pink.

[N. Scheuer]

Wingtip tanks may improve aerodynamic performance, but in regard to a tendancy to "ground loop" they further increase the Moment Of Inertia in all axies. (that's not a good thing)

Jet fighters, going clear back to the F-80 could get away with it because their tricycle gear is much more tractable than is a "tail dragger's".

Moby Nick

[N. Scheuer]

Correction:; Increases "I" in both roll and yaw, but not pitch.

[paladin]

ground loops wuz invented as excuses fer bad pilots that never learned to fly an airplane with the tailwheel on the correct end of the aircraft....

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

It is apparently possible to ground loop a Spitfire from a standing start, simply by selecting too much supercharger boost.

[N. Scheuer]

A C-B? Aren't the main gear spaced sort of close together on Spitfires? Generally, the closer the wheels are, the easier is becomes to "ground loop", simply because the CG can get situated outside the wheelbase quicker.

All that notwithstanding, the P-51, in spite of it's widely spaced main landing gear, became more dangerous from a ground loop standpoint when ever increasing loads were hung under the wings.

I almost ground looped a J-3 Cub during my first couple of hours as a Student Pilot. Later I soloed and did most of my other training in a Cessna 140, a tricky airplane to land due to its "springy" landing gear. Much later, logging an hour in the same Cub, it proved to be an exceeding tame aircraft compared to the 140 in which I had over a hundred hours.

Moby Nick

[paladin]

a J-3 ain't an airplane...it's a lawnmower powered kite.....flew one once.....damn thing wouldn't land.....

[Stiletto]

Tony, was the Tempest the carrier version of the Hurricane?

[John B]

It was the development of the Typhoon ,Stiletto.had the big air inlet " chin". a good book to read is Typhoon Pilot by Desmond Scott. A kiwi who flew both Typhoons and Tempests in Britain. Full of little gems .. like the propensity for the tails to fall off the early typhoons.
The ultimate development of the type was the Hawker Sea Fury with the big radial engine.IIRC, the Sea Fury was just too late for WW2.

[John B]

I remember spending a christmas day with some friends about 15+ years ago. they were right into flying and warbirds in particular. one of the guys there was a shareholder in a sea fury. I asked him how they decided who should fly it. (It was 1980 something don't forget). He said something like... ' well it costs $1000 an hour in fuel, and that helps decide'.
Ian, whose house I was at, was killed at Warbirds over Wanaka. We were out in Waione for the easter break.I'll never forget hearing that over the news.He always said that it was pilot error that caused crashes.

[paladin]

just a note......There were 3 F8F-1's at Nha trang airbase when we left Vietnam...I sent an e-mail to a friend a couple of days ago and they izz still there...they were operational when we left....they were captured with the french at Dien Bin phu......

[Bayboat]

It would have made warbird buffs weep. Coming into Guam not long before WWII was over, we saw fighter planes being shoved off barges into the deep six. They were already surplus and not wanted.

[Lurch]

Originally posted by Bayboat:
It would have made warbird buffs weep. Coming into Guam not long before WWII was over, we saw fighter planes being shoved off barges into the deep six. They were already surplus and not wanted.And in Korea in the late '40s, hundreds of P-38s were hacked up and buried, to make sure, IIRC, that none would fall into North Korean hands.

Don

[Bob Adams]

Reminds one of the PTs burned on the beaches in the Pacific don't it. Painful.