1944: the best fighter under 15000 ft?

[spicmart]

The Yak-3 and La-7 did take on the fight against german fighter even if they were outnumbered and in an inferior position.
The Yak-3 was slightly superior to the Fw 190D-9 in terms of vertical and horizontal manoeuverability. The Dora-9 climbed and dived better.

 

[Juha]

Really i dont want to take part anymore in discussions but i cant allow the truth to be mis presented like this
LIPFERT WAS NOT IMPRESSED BY LA7. He was impressed by YAK3 while he was flying Bf109G6 with out MW50.

Oh, where I claimed that Lipfert commented La-7? Read messages before getting agitated

You said II/jg54 lost 20 Fw1920As in Deceber 1944 . What you dont bother to mention is against what odds were they fighting? 1:20 ? 1:30?
I am sure you know well the force balance of that battle. Were their airfields under constant attack? What was the state of the aircrafts? You know well the answer ...

No Idon't I just checked the losses, I don't have time to study airwar situation around Libau in Dec 44 just now.

Soviets planes may performed exceptionally in Soviet test centers, but Mr DonL is correct. Germans,at the front, were not terrifeid by them at any time.
Lipfert himself was flying without orders in April 45 to score his 200 kill ( I know you dont believe these numbers) .Obviously not impressed enough...

First of all, my understanding is that Lipfert was a reliable claimer, secondly you seem to be fairly ignorant on the mindset of many aces. Many Finnish aces, who were impressed on the performance of new Soviet fighters sought combats against orders in 1943-44. They were agressive bunch of men.

It s easy to produce a very manouverable aircraft. If you dont care for the pilot, you cut instruments, wings strength, landing gear strength and the weight is low. Now if the plane brakes during combat ,who cares.Anyway no one will dare to protest. If it reqiures great pilot work load because of fully manual engine controls ( that leads to sub performance during the heat of the battle) thats again ok. On paper looks good.
If you also cut radios, again the weight goes down. Now the enemy may be radar directed because of great radio equipment but again,on paper you look good.
The amazing light guns are great for the performance as well. Now for how much they shoot straiht is a detail.
Give up the high altitude performance so you improve low altitude engine performance.. The enemy may bounce at you from altitude but you dont care. You have countless fighters and expendables pilots. The ground attack planes are even lower and thus protected
Also accept lower engine life, greater acceptance tolerance in production examples, and you have a super fighter. On paper.

Heh, Yak-3 had one cannon and 2 HMGs concentrated in nose, not very strong armament but adequate for eastern front, wait a minute, there is something familar with that armament, what was the normal armament of 109G? Have I heard that some early 109Fs broke in the air? Ok early 109Fs were an exception and Soviet fighters were mostly sparingly instrumented but it might be new to you that also Soviets used radar directed fighters, sometimes even to hunt lonely enemy a/c in enemy airspace. And IIRC the practical TBOs of 605s and 801s were not strickly brilliant.

I agree that LW fighters had an advance over VVS fighters in that they were more automaticed.

Juha

 

[bobbysocks]

how close is wiki on these specs??? i rounded the lengths and weights....OOOPS that should be 30' for the spit.

my guess would at the beginning would have been on the La and yak. but if these numbers are close then i am surprised how light the tempest is. its wing load is so close to the vvs ac but it has a hell of a better rate of climb. what couldnt find and would like to see is the rate of roll for each of the ac. a good rate of roll can even things up...so at that point it would be a pilots duel....but the tempest is better armed and armored...so can give and take a little more punishment...if these #s are close

 

[parsifal]

Germans did not win air superiority over the the battlefields of the eastern Front at any time from the beginning of 1944 on. They did manage to shoot down a lot of aircraft, but the definition of "air superiorty" is the control of the airspace to allow your own forces uncontested use of that airspace, and also to make using that same airspace by enemy forces prohibitive. Air Supremacy is one step higher, bordering on total denial of the air space.

The Germans never achieved that to any significant extent after 1943. And that was thanks largely to the capabilities and numbers of the Soviet fighters. Soviet fighters were never tasked with achieving full air superiority over wide sections of the front. Shooting down a German fighter was a secondary bonus for the Soviet air doctrine, not a focus. They were there, simply to prevent LW strike aircraft frojm having any appreciable effect, and also to make sure their own strike aircraft were able to live long enough to complete their mission. They did that.

Mind you, the Red Air Force was designed and structured to be loss resitant. It took a lot to stop a Soviet offensive. Their aircraft were designed to be cheap and expendable, their pilots were trained with as little as 20 hours experience (at the time of Kursk...as time progressed they gradually improved on that). It was very much a case of learning the hard way.

Its true that generally the LW fighters were untroubled by Soviet Fighters. Neither were they ever the main target for such losses. It is completely untrue that the LW fighters were able to win (in a strategic sense) any meaningful level of air superiority during the period of the great Soviet counteroffensives.

 

[davparlr]

Comparisons of airspeed and climb of some possible candidates taken at SL, 5k, 10k, 15k ft. List shows best at top, starting with airspeed in mph.
SL
Tempest II 416
Tempest V 391
Spitfire XIV 389
P-51B 386
FW 190D-9 385
La-7 383
Bf 109K-4 376

5k
Tempest II 425
Tempest V 412
P-51B 410
Bf-109K-4 406
Fw-190D-9 405
La-7 405
Spitfire XIV 391

10k
Tempest II 440
Bf 109K-4 423
P-51B 420
Fw 190D-9 413
Tempest V 409
La-7 408
Spitfire XIV 387

15k
Tempest II 449
Bf-109K-4 438
Fw-190D-9 432
P-51B 428
Tempest V 416
La-7 402
Spitfire XIV 383

Climb (ft/min)
SL
Bf109K-4 4822
La-7 4784
Tempest II 4700
Spitfire XIV 4580
P-51B 4430
Fw 190D-9 4429
Tempest V 4380

5k
Bf-109K-4 4763
P-51B 4420
Spitfire 4400
La-7 4331
Tempest II 4200
Fw 190D-9 4134
Tempest V 3500

10k
Bf 109K-4 4822
Fw 190D-9 4134
Tempest II 3900
P-51B 3900
La-7 3661
Spitfire XIV 3600
Tempest V 3000

15k
P-51B 3820
Fw 190D-9 3740
Bf 109K-4 3691
Spitfire XIV 3600
Tempest II 3259
La-7 2952
Tempest V 2785


Just looking at this limited data, the Tempest II is by far the fastest aircraft but slacks off in climb. The Bf 109K-4 starts off very slow but airspeed picks up quickly as altitude increases. Climb is superior up to 15k where it starts to slide. Fw 190D-9 and P-51B are always rated close together and behave admirably. Tempest V airspeed start off good but sags quickly with altitude. Climb is always in lower half of group. Spitfire XIV starts off well in speed and altitude but drops off quickly with altitude. The La-7 is a poor in airspeed in this group but does well in climb up to 15k where it drops off. Looking at this data, I would say the Tempest II and Bf 109K-4 are the cream of the crop, although the K-4 endurance may be an issue. A note here is that many of these numbers are well within error of measuring and manufacturing so differences and rank could be different in the real world. All seem very capable. I am not really sure how much operations the Tempest II did in 1944.

Of course I like to point out that while the P-51B/D is well noted for its high altitude performance and range, it still measures well in the mix of these great aircraft at low altitude at the end of 1944. It was a formidable plane at any altitude.

 

[CobberKane]

I like the tempest here. It at least matches the other contenders in terms of outright performance and outguns almost all of them. Furthermore it has outstanding dive, zoom and high speed handling characteristics and is an exceptional high speed gun platform. That gives the pilot a good escape option and the opportunity to operate at the edge of the performance envelope where other fighters might struggle. All that said, a Tempest that got caught low and slow by something like a Yak 3 would be in real trouble.

 

[tyrodtom]

how close is wiki on these specs??? i rounded the lengths and weights....OOOPS that should be 30' for the spit.

my guess would at the beginning would have been on the La and yak. but if these numbers are close then i am surprised how light the tempest is. its wing load is so close to the vvs ac but it has a hell of a better rate of climb. what couldnt find and would like to see is the rate of roll for each of the ac. a good rate of roll can even things up...so at that point it would be a pilots duel....but the tempest is better armed and armored...so can give and take a little more punishment...if these #s are close

View attachment 221491

You're over 6000 lbs light on the Tempest V, You've wrote lbs for kgs. I have't checked the others, but some others don't look right also.

 

[davebender]

I agree.

I have my doubts about late war Spitfires with Griffon engines. Might be fast but I suspect handling was nowhere near as good as Merlin powered Spitfires.

 

[wuzak]

I agree.

I have my doubts about late war Spitfires with Griffon engines. Might be fast but I suspect handling was nowhere near as good as Merlin powered Spitfires.

Mk XIV was said to handle as good as the VIII on which it was based. Except on take-offs, where it could be a handful.

The all-round performance of the Spitfire XIV is better than the Spitfire IX at all heights. In level flight it is 25-35 m.p.h. faster and has a correspondingly greater rate of climb. Its manoeuvrability is as good as a Spitfire IX. It is easy to fly but should be handled with care when taxying and taking off.

http://www.spitfireperformance.com/spit14afdu.html

 

[Jabberwocky]

Those low-altitude speeds for the Spitfire Mk XIV seem excessive, particularly for an engine running at standard +18lbs boost. They appear to be for an Mk XIV running at +25 lbs, which the Griffon 65 was tested at, but not used operationally (or at least never approved for operations ).

The trials and tests I've seen generally have the Mk XIV at 359-363 mph at sea level, 382-390 mph at 5,000 ft and 390-410 mph (highly variable between tests due to where the supercharger 'kink' starts with varios Griffon 60 family engines) at 10,000 ft.

The Mk XIV does appear to have been used operationally at +21 lbs, albeit relatively briefly and mostly for V1 chasing. The extra power added about 7-9 mph to top speed.

I'd propose that more representative Mk XIV speed figures would be:

Sea level: 361 mph at +18 lbs / 369 mph at +21 lbs
5000 ft: 386 mph / 394 mph
10,000 ft: 405 mph / 416 mph
15,000 ft: 410 mph / 410 mph

That's the problem with Spitfires. There's so much primary evidence with so much conflicting information, you can happily argue 'facts' until you're blue in the face (or fingers).

 

[Shortround6]

The amazing light guns are great for the performance as well. Now for how much they shoot straiht is a detail.

I am not sure anybody ever complained the Russian guns wouldn't shoot straight. The Receivers wore out quickly ( everybody's barrels wore out) but if you make enough spare guns to counter that what is the problem? Gun wears out in 2500 rounds instead of 5000-10,000 but you make twice as many to begin with ( and many guns are lost before reaching the end of their lives). Russians had low powered engines for the most part and needed to make up what they could.
Good gun sights may be another matter but the weight of the gun sight makes little difference in the performance of an airplane.

Also accept lower engine life, greater acceptance tolerance in production examples, and you have a super fighter. On paper.

Russain quality control did leave a bit to be desired but as far the engines go, the German engines were well behind the allied the British/American engines in engine life. Where the Russian engines fell compared to the German engines I don't know. Russian engine good for 50 hours instead of 100 hours for DB engine?

Russians were fitting armor and protected tanks to their aircraft so they weren't in total disregard of pilots lives.

Pilots are a much more restricted item that bayonet wielders. Only a certain percentage of the population can become pilots (in the US many bombardiers and navigators were "washed out" pilots) and even the Russians put more effort into training them than practically any other personnel combat role.

 

[tomo pauk]

Until the B-20 arrived, no Russian gun was exceptionally light.
So while maybe in Westerner's eye the Shvak seems light (while neglecting the fact that it was firing a far less powerful cartridge than Hispano), Russians obvoviusly thought they can go an extra mile
Soviet artillery was the best what their industry was capable of, plenty of ZiS cannons (the featherweight ones) were employed in late 20th century in former brotherly republics. Even by Serb forces, not lacking the then-modern artillery.

 

[Timppa]

Count it all in - raw performance figures, maneuverability (that's going to be a grey area), weaponry, protection, etc.
No prototypes, one-offs, just in-service planes. Combat range and carrier capability yield no points here

I wonder why the Me-262 has not been mentioned, as it was a 1944 fighter. Perhaps not enough raw performance for our jury

But range did/does count in real life. So my choice for the 1944 propeller fighter champion: The P-51D.

James A Goodson, 4th FG:

The P-51 could catch up with the Me109 straight and level, or in a dive, and it could hold on its own in a dog-fight where I would say the the best pilot would win; but most important, the P-51 had this superior performance from 30,000 feet down to the deck, and 750 miles from its base. The Luftwaffe fighter pilots rated it the best, and most agreed with Hermann Göring that when Mustangs escorted bombers over Berlin, they knew the war was over.

 

[Juha]

Jim's complain on the lightness of Soviet guns is really fanny, the weights of ShVAK and MG 151 happened to be exactly same and MG 131 was significantly lighter than UB (Berezina).

Juha

 

[bobbysocks]

You're over 6000 lbs light on the Tempest V, You've wrote lbs for kgs. I have't checked the others, but some others don't look right also.

no wonder the temptest looked light...lol. that is why i asked how close they were. i dont have all the reference books a lot of you guys have....and various sources gave me various answers for the same ac. like it had the 109 air speed +/- 20 mph...a pretty big margin. so i settle on wiki hoping someone would have made corrections....i do realise a lot of factors werent taken into consideration...speed changes with altitude..etc. i figured these would be close enough to get the conversation rolling. i would still like to know the roll rates for those ac. actually i didnt even consider the temptest II but reading the specs and evalaution on http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.org/tempest/tempest-II-cfe.html i would probably change my vote to it.

 

[parsifal]

I wonder why the Me-262 has not been mentioned, as it was a 1944 fighter. Perhaps not enough raw performance for our jury

But range did/does count in real life. So my choice for the 1944 propeller fighter champion: The P-51D.

James A Goodson, 4th FG:

The 262 was not included in the original comparison.

 

[drgondog]

I agree Timppa's point about including the Me 262 fo consideration as Best (at all altitudes) fighter in 1944 but this is about piston engined fighter. . Independent of any consideration except maintainability and range is that it may simply engage or run, with impunity, as long as it doesn't bleed energy in sustained high AoA flight.

The quote from Jim Goodson is one which focuses on the P-51 as a crucial LW adversary over Germany - in the battle for air supremacy and the arena that USAAF dictated - namely high altitude where the P-51 started with an advantage in most cases because of its primary optimal flight regime. At 15000 feet it was still in a very nice place because of speed and overall performance but it was also in the crossover point between low and high blower for the Merlin and in a better strike zone for the fw 190 and Me 109 so its relative advantages against say Tempest, Spit, F4U-1, P-47, Ki 84 109 and 190 at 25K became a mixed bag of positives and negatives.

It might be interesting to note that all Goodson's air to air scores in a Mustang was in the P-51B but he was shot down by flak in a P-51D on June 20 raid to Stettin. He is a true gentleman and one that leaves a lasting impression.

As much as I respect the Mustang, there were more 'cautions' expressed relative to picking a fight against the above named fighters below 15000 feet than above 20000.

 

[CobberKane]

I wonder why the Me-262 has not been mentioned, as it was a 1944 fighter. Perhaps not enough raw performance for our jury

But range did/does count in real life. So my choice for the 1944 propeller fighter champion: The P-51D.

James A Goodson, 4th FG:

It's hard to argue against the P-51 as the best overall fighter in WWII, because even if it may have been outperformed by other aircraft in specific roles, it was at the least competitive with any of them and it had that ace in the hole - range. But this thread poses a specific question - best fighter below 15000 feet - and within those parmeters there are aircraft that were somewhat superior to the mighty 'stang.

 

[Aozora]

It's hard to argue against the P-51 as the best overall fighter in WWII, because even if it may have been outperformed by other aircraft in specific roles, it was at the least competitive with any of them and it had that ace in the hole - range. But this thread poses a specific question - best fighter below 15000 feet - and within those parmeters there are aircraft that were somewhat superior to the mighty 'stang.

Including, ironically, the original Allison engined Mustangs!

 

[drgondog]

"Originally Posted by CobberKane

It's hard to argue against the P-51 as the best overall fighter in WWII, because even if it may have been outperformed by other aircraft in specific roles, it was at the least competitive with any of them and it had that ace in the hole - range. But this thread poses a specific question - best fighter below 15000 feet - and within those parmeters there are aircraft that were somewhat superior to the mighty 'stang.

Including, ironically, the original Allison engined Mustangs!

I wonder what your thoughts are on this comparison? The V-1710-81 was outperformed by both the V-1650-3 and 1650-7 for the P-51B, ditto V-1650-7 in the D.

The two airframes, P-51A and P-51B, when loaded to same fuel loading had about 450+ pounds (engine weight plus extra 50 cal ammo) difference. Reference NAA specs and Dean's America's Hundred Thousand and Gruenhagen's Mustang.

From Mike Williams April 1943 tests of sanded down, light loaded P-51A with water injected V-1710-81.
This P-51A with sanded surfaces, GW at TO of 8200 (100 of 180 gallons of fuel for this test) pounds and WEP did achieve 374mp on the deck. AFAIK the performance dropped considerably with standard camo and full fuel load, but this is only placeholder for a speed advantage over the B and only against the P-51B-1 with the Merlin 1650-3 at MP/61". The comparable top speed of the B-7 was 371mph BUT at 500 extra pounds of fuel and no special surface treatment and had external racks!! Additionally reference the P-51A and B-5 flight tests in the Mike Williams link below,

P-51A Climb rate was ~ SL = 2200 fpm, MP/52" at 8600 pounds GW at TO:

At WEP/57" the climb rates were = 3000, 3140, 3260 and 3400 at Sl, 5, 10 and 15K for V-1710-81 sanded and test weights at ~7800 pounds (which is 900 pounds below TO GW Combat load without drop tanks). This ship was tested with only 100 gallons of fuel.

Contrast the test results of the P-51B-1 with full internal wing tank fuel (no fuse tank) with Merlin 1650-1 engine, no surface prep, racks, per link below

At MP (not WEP) 61" the P-51-1 ROC at 8430 pounds was 3600, 3570, 3540, 3520 at SL, 5, 10 and 13K - full wing but no internal fuel..all Low Blower MP to 14000 feet - this is closest comparative test with the aforementioned P-51A w/-81 and WEP

P-51B-7 Climb rate was for 9200 pound GW at TO, at WEP/67" ~ 4400, 4300, 3800, 3450fpm at SL, 5, 10 and 15K for 1650-7 standard production ship with 80 gallons of fuel more (180) on take off - but fuselage tank empty.

You probably should infer that the P-51B was not only faster with an equivalent load, but proved it climbed a great deal faster despite carrying 500 extra pounds of fuel. Both Gruenhagen's Mustang and Dean's America's Hundred Thousand will supply an excellent cross section of data to use with P-51 Mustang Performance.

Additionally the P-51A Roll rate was substantially below the P-51B by ~ 15 degrees per second at 200mph, 20 dps at 300mph then closing gap at 390. Curiously the XP-51 had much better roll rates than both, peaking at 130 dps at 235mph with beveled trailing edges on ailerons (pg 328 and 329 "America's Hundred Thousand").

So, the P-51B-1 through -15 with the high and 'medium' altitude Merlins with equivalent combat loading were faster, climbed much faster, rolled better until 400 mph (which was about as fast as the 51A could go, while the P-51B continued to roll responsively through 500 mph. The only possible advantage for the 51A is initial turns.

I suspect at equal loading WEP to WEP on the deck that the P-51A might slightly out turn the 51 because of slightly lower WL - but Certainly not at MP where the decided extra muscle of the Merlin will pull the 51B with more authority as energy bleeds speed in high AoA flight.

Where do you 'feel' the P-51A was better?



The 1710-81 had a better supercharger than the 1710-39 which gave it 1200 hp at TO, 1330 Bhp at WEP w/57" at 14,000ft.max continuous.

The weaker of the Merlins for low altitude is the -3 which 1380 bhp at TO, 1600 hp at WEP for 11,800 ft at 67" and 1480 bhp WEP at 13,750 ft for Low Blower Critical Altitude at 61"

The 1650-7 produced 1490 bhp at TO power/61", 1720 at CA of 6200 feet WEP/67", 1590 hp MP at CA 8500 feet

The best single source for performance in which the side by side

So - same aerodynamics and drag, 300+ pounds heavier but Hp differences of ~ 300 Hp at SL,