Bearcat vs Corsair

[davparlr]

Well, since you seem to want to be pedantic, "Rarebear," as pointed out, was not so named until long after the 1972 event. I'd also point out that this aircraft was NOT a true F8F having been modified in both airframe and engine. Further, eyeballing performance charts does not count when you're talking about setting records. Flights for record require continuous monitoring and recording of the event, so any guestimate one might make from a chart is strictly a WAG.

So, you can contest to your heart's content whether the record breaker was an F-16 or an F8U or any other aircraft (and, frankly, jets versus pistons, who really gives a crap), but if the aircraft in question was not actually making a flight for record, then it doesn't count. And since every plane you seem to want to drag out is a jet powered fighter, exactly what are you trying to prove . . . that there was an airplane in competition for the record prior to the F-16 cited in the post? Okay, I'll buy that as long as the aircraft was actually in competition and you aren't just picking a point on a climb chart. I am sure that the jet aircraft you named could probably have beat a climb to time record set by a R2800 powered F8F in 1946, but to my knowledge none did actually so compete, i.e., making a monitored and recorded attempt to supplant the existing record.

It is still apples and oranges to compare jet fighter performance, even for record, to piston fighter performance, just as it is also apples and oranges to compare a military equipped F8F performance to some bastardized civilian hybrid.

And as for my numbers on the 1946 record . . . it helps when I have the pilots log book for one of the actual pilots.

Edit: I just looked something up on the bearcat. It held the world record for fastest climb rate (10,000 feet in 91 seconds) for 30 years before it was broken by the F-16 falcon! Now that's a major plus as a dogfighter.

I wasn't the one who started the comparisons between props and jets. All I said was that this statement is incorrect as noted below.

"21 February The F4H-l Phantom II established new world records for climb to 3,000 and 6,000 meters withtimes of 34.52 and 48.78 seconds. LieutenantCommander John W. Young and Commander DavidM. Longton piloted the plane on its respective recordflights at NAS Brunswick, Maine". 1962.

 

[Twitch]

The Bearcat was being used for climb demonstrations for a very long time. At the 1951 National Air Races in Detroit an F8F allegedly beat a F2H-1 Banshee to 10,000 from a standing start in less than a minute. I dunno?!?!

Kinert, Reed
Racing Planes Air Races Vol. 2
Aero Publishers, Fallbrook, CA 1969

 

[syscom3]

Thats quite possible. The early jets were not known as fast accelerators in those days.

 

[davparlr]

Thats quite possible. The early jets were not known as fast accelerators in those days.

They were real dogs. Most jets of this era were woefully underpowered. Also, props generate power at standstill, jets build as airspeed increases.

 

[the lancaster kicks ass]

Douglas Bader once commented that when sitting in the meteor putting the throttle forward with the brakes on he expected to accelerate like a rocket, upon releasing the brakes he went to comment it was more like a lorry, until you actually got into the air where she picked up serious speed..........

 

[evangilder]

The spool up time on the early jets was really slow. Watch a group of L-29s take off after watching an F-18 take off and you will see a huge difference. But we are also talking about a huge difference in engines.

 

[Ericson]

My dad flew all three birds (F8F, F4U, and F7F) as well as the F6F, F4F, and FM2 (the latter in combat.) In a number of discussions with him about their characteristics, it was clear that the F8F was his favorite because of its responsiveness. In a pure dogfight, I think it would have proven to be the best of the WW2 designs. However, the F4U, as mentioned previously, could do so many things well - in the early days in Korea it was the clear choice for a carrier fighter. My dad's younger brother commanded a squadron of Corsairs at that time and I know he thought highly of the plane's capabilities. Later he flew F9Fs and F3Hs, but he still regarded the Corsair as an outstanding performer. It was able to absorb punishment and return its pilot to the ship on many occasions, a not inconsequential quality. An interesting observation my dad once shared was that the F4U manufactured by Goodyear had the exhaust routed down and around the fuselage so that it exited underneath, and that was much easier on the pilot's hearing and made the plane more pleasant to fly, especially on long jaunts (he once flew a Corsair from Virginia to California in a day.) I did not know he had flown the Tigercat until relatively recently when I asked him, and he replied that they were nice planes but could not compete with the single-engined Grummans. On the subject of pilot training, keep in mind that the U.S. had so many young men in the pipeline during the war that they sometimes "washed out" guys for bogus medical problems because they had too many. Gas and ammo was also almost unlimited, so that many Ensigns and JGs had relatively many training hours when their squadrons reported to the fleets, unlike the fresh German and Japanese pilots later in the war who had comparitively little training.

 

[drgondog]

As a Dogfighter the F8F was arguably the best of the US fighters with reservation in comparing to P-51H which makes the discussion not so cut and dried. Having said that, The Spitfire and the last Yak and La series of fighters were also exceptionally agile.

 

[grampi]

As a Dogfighter the F8F was arguably the best of the US fighters with reservation in comparing to P-51H which makes the discussion not so cut and dried. Having said that, The Spitfire and the last Yak and La series of fighters were also exceptionally agile.

The Cat was probably better, or least equal to the P-51H and late model Spits at lower altitudes, but at higher altitudes it would be at a disadvantage...

 

[l'Omnivore Sobriquet]

Bearcat versus Corsair, ah, what a show.

I'm glad those things existed.

 

[BiffF15]

The spool up time on the early jets was really slow. Watch a group of L-29s take off after watching an F-18 take off and you will see a huge difference. But we are also talking about a huge difference in engines.

That's funny, I always thought the Hornet was slow to spool up!

 

[Ericson]

Some years ago I read an account of the only Bearcat vs Mustang encounter known to me. Shortly after hostilities ceased on VJ day, a carrier with a squadron of F8Fs was in the Gulf of Mexico and called on the port of New Orleans as a PR exercise. Nearby, on shore, was based a squadron of P51s. The guy relating the story was one of the Bearcat pilots. He said that several times both units would go up and "happen to" meet for simulated dogfights. He pointed out that no F8F was ever bested in these encounters. Who can say what the relative quality of the pilots was, flight time, etc., but it is the only example of such an encounter I'm aware of. Another account by a pilot who flew both planes said the 'Cat was clearly the stronger performer - that its throttle response was instantly felt seat-of-the-pants, while the Mustang first made more noise, then began to accelerate. The Bearcat would have been an excellent anti-kamikaze device, though that was not its initial designed purpose. The Mustang proved superb as a long range bomber escort and many B-17 aircrew survived the war because the P51 could go all the way there and back on the long missions. Hats off to William Overstreet, who passed in 2014. He flew 100 P51 missions, survived being shot down 3 times, flew a FW190 back to England for one of his escapes, and chased a 109 under the Eiffel Tower, shooting it down over Paris. Many eyewitnesses corroborated this event.

 

[GregP]

Of the pilots I know who fly both, all seem to prefer the Bearcat for outright performance at VFR altitudes, but all also love the P-51, particularly if they are paying for the fuel. You can fly a P-51 at 1 U.S. gallon a minute or very slightly less. You can't do that in a Bearcat, but the Bearcat will definitely thrill you with the available power.

One thing a P-51 will do that you can NEVER do in a Bearcat is to still be flying 6+ hours from when you start the engine without the benefit of refueling.

 

[tomo pauk]

A thing might also be that there is no privately own P-51H fighters around, but mostly the -D?

 

[GregP]

The P-51H was lighter than the P-51C/D by a bit, but not enough to make it into something the C/D units weren't. It was faster by about 10% climbed a bit better but not enough to climb with a Bearcat. It could roll about the same as a P-51C/D and the Bearcat was better at that, too. I very strongly doubt it could accelerate with a Bearcat, but it very certainly COULD fly higher and go farther.

 

[spicmart]

As a Dogfighter the F8F was arguably the best of the US fighters with reservation in comparing to P-51H which makes the discussion not so cut and dried. Having said that, The Spitfire and the last Yak and La series of fighters were also exceptionally agile.

Can one include the late war Doras as well? Or maybe even the late war 109s as classical dogfights occur at speeds where the 109 were the most agile. I guess..

 

[GregP]

The only people who wanted to dogfight at the best speed of a Bf 109 were Bf 109 pilots. Everyone else wanted to be faster. You can say the same for the Mitsubishi A6M Zero ... NOBODY would fight it while going slow by 1943. By then, EVEY pilot in the ETO knew what speed NOT to use to dogfight a Bf 109.

 

[tomo pauk]

The P-51H was lighter than the P-51C/D by a bit, but not enough to make it into something the C/D units weren't. It was faster by about 10% climbed a bit better but not enough to climb with a Bearcat. It could roll about the same as a P-51C/D and the Bearcat was better at that, too. I very strongly doubt it could accelerate with a Bearcat, but it very certainly COULD fly higher and go farther.

I'd venture to guess that the P-51H would out-accelerate the F8F-1 from 400-420 mph on without trouble. As far as the RoC, I don't believe that F8F-1 was able to out-climb the P-51H above 20000 ft, let alone if the fuselage tank of the P-51H was without fuel.

 

[grampi]

Some years ago I read an account of the only Bearcat vs Mustang encounter known to me. Shortly after hostilities ceased on VJ day, a carrier with a squadron of F8Fs was in the Gulf of Mexico and called on the port of New Orleans as a PR exercise. Nearby, on shore, was based a squadron of P51s. The guy relating the story was one of the Bearcat pilots. He said that several times both units would go up and "happen to" meet for simulated dogfights. He pointed out that no F8F was ever bested in these encounters. Who can say what the relative quality of the pilots was, flight time, etc., but it is the only example of such an encounter I'm aware of. Another account by a pilot who flew both planes said the 'Cat was clearly the stronger performer - that its throttle response was instantly felt seat-of-the-pants, while the Mustang first made more noise, then began to accelerate. The Bearcat would have been an excellent anti-kamikaze device, though that was not its initial designed purpose. The Mustang proved superb as a long range bomber escort and many B-17 aircrew survived the war because the P51 could go all the way there and back on the long missions. Hats off to William Overstreet, who passed in 2014. He flew 100 P51 missions, survived being shot down 3 times, flew a FW190 back to England for one of his escapes, and chased a 109 under the Eiffel Tower, shooting it down over Paris. Many eyewitnesses corroborated this event.

I'd be willing to bet the P-51s in these scenarios were "D" models, which were not on par with the Bearcats performance wise...if these scenarios would've taken place between the Cats and the "H" model, the outcomes would've been different...

 

[grampi]

I'd venture to guess that the P-51H would out-accelerate the F8F-1 from 400-420 mph on without trouble. As far as the RoC, I don't believe that F8F-1 was able to out-climb the P-51H above 20000 ft, let alone if the fuselage tank of the P-51H was without fuel.

Based on the climb charts I've seen, the F8F wasn't able to outclimb the P-51H at ANY altitude...