Best Grumman 'Cat' II

[kool kitty89]

Probably the FH Phantom: FH Phantom - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (withdrawn from USN and USMC service in 1949, used by the USNR until '54)

 

[Emon_Essex]

The F4F has always been my favorite WWII aircraft... but the F8F is very nice too!

 

[Burmese Bandit]

Well, in importance to the War effort the F6F of course. But the best cat was the one with my vote, the F8F!!!

 

[Messy1]

Wow, this is a tough call. For me, The F-14, F7F, and F8F are among my favorite aircraft of all time, but to be fair I want to key in on just WW2 or Korean era planes. I'd have to say the F8F just for it's performance capabilities, but if I was judging on war record, it would have to be the Hellcat!

 

[noelchan127]

I am going to go with the F4F because it held the line in the early going and pretty much had a draw with one of the most innovative fighters in the war, the A6M. The USN and Marine fighter pilots of course contributed heavily with their skills and training but that tubby little fighter from 1941 until early 1943 was practically all the Navy and Marines had as a fighter and it did yeoman service. The Wildcat in the form of the FM2 served until the end of the war in both the Atlantic and Pacific.

I Wildcat fought the Zero resulting in more than just a draw, in fact more Zeros were destroyed by the Wildcats than Wildcats destroyed by the Zeros

 

[ratdog]

well going with the best combat records i would say the F6F but favorite is the Bearcat cause if it was introduced early enough then that would have effectively ended the Japanese rule in the Pacific

 

[Soundbreaker Welch?]

Hellcat, Hellcat, Hellcat!!!! It's da best Navy plane evaaarrrr!

 

[Thunderbolt56]

My favorite is the Wildcat.

It wasn't even close to the best, but that's unimportant to me. At a time when the US was struggling to get its military machine up to speed, there were guys like Butch Voris, Butch O'Hare, Joe Foss and John Thach towing the line and making a difference...in their Wildcats.

 

[drgondog]

I liked the F8 with the F7F as a close second - two fighters that I believe would have performed well in combat in any theatre. The problem for both is that they also followed the deployment of the He 162 and Me 262 - rendering both obsolete except in carrier based role.

 

[Lucky13]

F4F Wildcat, maybe not the best, but.....Coral Sea, Midway, Guadalcanal....nough said! 8)

 

[renrich]

TB56, that is a really good picture you posted of the F4F. It shows how good the view over the nose is for carrier landings and for deflection shooting. Thanks!

 

[Thunderbolt56]

You're absolutely welcome. That was taken at the Chino airshow last year by Bernard Zee. Here's a couple more:

and sticking with the "cat" theme:

 

[Lucky13]

Maaaan....I can almost hear the engines and I LOVE the Chrome Yellow machine, what a beauty!

 

[fly boy]

ww2 hellcat

modern f-14

i like the design and look of the f-14 and done a sim at the boeing field and it was there for like a week then they changed it to a f/a 18