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Subject: Best All-Around Fighter of World War II
sentinel28a    10/13/2009 3:38:03 PM
Let's try a non-controversial topic, shall we? (Heh heh.) I'll submit the P-51 for consideration. BW and FS, if you come on here and say that the Rafale was the best fighter of WWII, I am going to fly over to France and personally beat you senseless with Obama's ego. (However, feel free to talk about the D.520.)
 
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Nocturne       10/18/2009 4:39:38 AM
Macchi Mc-205 would be interesting choice.. but it's hard to concider it hasn't fought so much or in great numbers.  Mig-3 is not really worth of it. "An attempted interception of an high-altitude German reconaissance plane was made by three MiGs of 31th IAP, based at the Kaunas airport in Lithuania, on April 10, 1941, before the official beginning of the war. It was a failure, because all three interceptors entered into spin during the combat and were lost, killing one pilot. "Several citations like that all over.. its amazing 3/3 lost in one short 'battle' without any german help. 
 
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sentinel28a       10/18/2009 4:57:43 AM
I agree; let's not forget the Russians.  Kozedub was the top Allied ace of the war, and he was deadly with the La-5/7 series.  (As I recall, he liked the fact that they were heavy; you could use P-40 tactics with them.)  The Yak-9 could hold its own too.  The real shortcoming with Russian fighters were their half-trained pilots, but Barkhorn went half an hour with a Lavochkin without laying a glove on him.  If you ran into a half-decent Russian pilot, you were in for a fight.
 
 
 
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LB    P-51 vs F4U   10/18/2009 6:01:11 AM
Mustang production ended in 1945.  The Corsair was produced till 1952.  The Corsair was faster with a higher rate of climb and carried a greater load and was a much better ground attack platform.  The Corsair was a carrier aircraft and the Mustang was not.
 
The Mustang was too dangerous to fly from carriers.  The design had poor low speed handling and easily spun out of control during wave off; moreover, the stall speed was far too high in relation to the max landing barrier landing speed.  See Project Seahorse.
 
If "all around" includes air to air, air to ground, and carrier operations then it's not even close as the best all around fighter is clearly the F4U. 
 
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sentinel28a       10/18/2009 6:48:55 AM
I wouldn't say too dangerous.  If you were looking at the same article I was, the test pilot cited that the P-51 was as good as any aircraft on catapult launches, and that visibility on landing was better than the Corsair.  As long as a pilot was careful with the throttle, waveoffs were risky but not excessively so.  The Corsair was clearly better as a carrier aircraft--after all, it had been designed for that--but it's worth remembering that there were so many problems with the F4U-1s that the Corsair units were beached until the problems could be solved, so the Corsair gained its enviable rep by flying from shore bases. 
Had the situation been desperate enough, the Navy might have taken a chance on the P-51, but since the US Navy almost never used water-cooled engines on carriers (water being at a premium), that may have been more of a telling reason.  From a carrier, you'd want a Corsair or a Hellcat anyway.
 
Definitely agree that the Corsair deserves some consideration, though.  I did some digging to see if Corsairs ever fought German aircraft.  Sure enough, some FAA Corsairs took on Fw-190s over Norway in late 1944.  The Corsairs won hands-down.
 
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Heorot       10/18/2009 7:20:42 AM
From h*tp://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/aviation/f4u-corsairs-raf-faa-3370.html
 
On 8 May 1944, the only fighter-to-fighter FAA F6F action took place. F6F's from 800 Squadron, off HMS Emperor, while escorting a flight of Barracudas off Norway was attacked by a mixed group of Me-109's and FW-190's. Two F6F's were lost, one, probably, to anti-aircraft fire (one source indicates that both F6Fs were lost in a mid-air collision, not to any German fire of any kind); the Hellcat pilots claimed two Me-109's and one FW-190. Available Luftwaffe loss listings show three Me-109Gs lost in this action. On the Luftwaffe side, claims were three F6Fs.
 
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RockyMTNClimber     Subjective-ism   10/18/2009 11:14:50 AM

Mustang production ended in 1945.  The Corsair was produced till 1952.  The Corsair was faster with a higher rate of climb and carried a greater load and was a much better ground attack platform.  The Corsair was a carrier aircraft and the Mustang was not.

 

The Mustang was too dangerous to fly from carriers.  The design had poor low speed handling and easily spun out of control during wave off; moreover, the stall speed was far too high in relation to the max landing barrier landing speed.  See Project Seahorse.

 

If "all around" includes air to air, air to ground, and carrier operations then it's not even close as the best all around fighter is clearly the F4U. 




There are some purely subjective criteria and there are factual issues of performance to consider when discussing "all around" best. The Corsair had it's issues in the way it handled as well. You will recall the USN didn't approve it for carrier operations until the advent of the Essex Class carriers. because of its high approach speeds and the long nose (an interesting aside is that the RAF were happy to operate them off of their tiny escort types. Even after they clipped the wings down to fit on them. The USN wouldn't accept that though since they had the F6F already). Later models had modified wings and tails that allowed them to be flown at lower approach speeds and it was only after that that they were approved for use on smaller/older USN carriers and escort carriers. The USN was so disappointed in it in the1941-1942 time frame that they relegated the Corsair to second tier duty, with the USMC. Marines being the happy warriors that they are, went on to cheerfully chew up the IJN & IJAAF with them. But then again, Marines sleep in leaky tents and drink home made hooch, what the hell do they care if they aren't allowed to fly off of ships with the squids?
 
I have already explained that all of these aircraft were all difficult in their own way, the Corsair is no exception. The Mustang was better at altitude and better in a turning engagement than the Corsair. The Corsair is a classic zoom and boomer with speed and rate of climb being its only strength. Get it slowed down in a knife fight and it was very vulnerable. Those big wings gave it a relatively lower roll rate than the P-51 and I seriously doubt it could sustain a high angle of attack turn against the Mustang (IMV that means the Mustang was arguably a better "all around" combat platform but you don't have to agree with that, we can leave it up to others to consider for themselves). The fact that the Corsair remained in production longer is a mute point because we know that the Mustang remained in service through the Korean war and later with ANG units (just like the F4U). In fact the USAF chose the Mustang over the P-47 as the piston powered airplane to retain after WWII. The late model Corsairs existed because the Navy was having problems transitioning to pure jets, not because they were the biggest whiz bang plane on the block. It was a compromise. Their Banshee's and Phantom I's were too short ranged and had insufficient bomb loads to carry out their CAS missions, and the Douglas A-1A wasn't out there in big enough numbers yet at the beginning of the Korean conflict. That is a problem the USAF didn't have with the F-86, F-84, & F-80. Nor would my subjective opinion particularly require that the best all around aircraft be a carrier based aircraft, after all not everyone operated carriers.
 
I have already conceded that the Corsair was a candidate to compete with the Mustang for the trophy, however, in my subjective view the Mustang was a better all around aircraft because it could perform the Corsair's mission, except for flying off of ships, but it was about 35% of the Corsair's cost. That allowed US to build more to start with, replace them easier when they wore out, and provide them to our allies for the same cost as the old P-40.
 
Check Six
 
Rocky
 
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RockyMTNClimber    Moot, not mute...   10/18/2009 12:23:36 PM
...the test pilot cited that the P-51 was as good as any aircraft on catapult launches, and that visibility on landing was better than the Corsair.  As long as a pilot was careful with the throttle, waveoffs were risky but not excessively so. -Senty
 
Senty, I know we agree that to the extent that Operation Seahorse is relevent to this thread, it only demonstrates that the Mustang could have been used as a carrier aircraft, if required. This makes the argument for the Mustang not against it.
 
Check Six
 
Rocky 
 
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Hamilcar       10/18/2009 1:42:30 PM
First rule of cowboy, learn your horse.
 
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StevoJH       10/18/2009 2:23:16 PM
Two aircraft that stand out in my opinion are the Bristol Beaufighter and the De Hallivand Mosquito.
 
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Hamilcar    Ki-84 "Frank" or "Hayate"    10/18/2009 5:13:44 PM
 
 
The Japanese produced it in numbers, but were unable to exploit or maintain it in the field. Fortunately the wrong prop was fitted to the Honare engine, or the performance disparity between it and the American planes it faced would have been worse.  

Then there was "George".
 
Ka N1k2-J Shiden kai was the violet Lightning. Not built in any numbers at all, it was an easy technical over-match for the Hellcat.
 
 
 
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