Best Overachiever Aircraft?

[Gnomey]

Yep, I would also agree with both Amsel and Soren. Given what the reputation of the Buffalo was in service the modified versions were used by great success by the Finns who did a remarkable job with it.

The Swordfish also deserves a mention but despite my patriotic preferences for it and the great success it had in combat it didn't have the unfavourable reputation that the Buffalo has in US service and the great success that was had by the Finns. The Swordfish would be my second choice in this poll though.

 

[Yerger]

I voted Buffalo, mostly for its record in Finland

 

[BombTaxi]

I went for the Buffalo - the Finns in particular acheived great things with it against an enemy with massive numerical superiority.

Just an aside about the Bismarck - another reason it took the RN so long to sink her was because their gunnery was appalling. Even at point blank range some British BBs were struggling to hit the German ship. Another piece of Bismarck trivia; the first Stringbag strike launched against her was a farce that almost degenerated into tragedy, as the Stringbags mistook the 10,000 ton light cruiser HMS Sheffield for the German battleship and attacked her. The cruiser was saved by a combination of skillful handling and faulty torpedos. Fortunately, Sheffields gunners did not open fire on the Stringbags...

 

[trackend]

The Stringbag by a mile. It did everything from mine laying to rocket attacks to dive bombing to smoke laying. Sunk a big chunk of the Italian navy and was very close to getting the most shipping tonnage sunk for a single aircraft make. .All that not forgetting the Bismark and Dunkirk (keeping the E-boats at bay) in a plane that on a good day could clock 140 knts. Bloody amazing

 

[badbear]

Stringbag for certain .BB

 

[Negative Creep]

What about the Hurricane? Technically it was inferior to the 109 in the battles of France and Britain yet still achieved a good combat record. The airframe was obsolete by 1941 yet it still proved very useful as a tank buster and against the Japanese as late as 1944

 

[trackend]

I see where you are coming from NC but it still had an up to date power plant in the Merlin so the performance differential between the Spite, Hurry and 109 was never so pronouced as that of the Stringbag and its advesaries indeed the nine pot Bristol Pegasus 690hp engine was designed in 1930
Even up graded it only clocked a tad over 750hp

Open cockpit only two machine guns and one of those a throw back from the first world war.
No fancy optical sights for torpedo launching just a row of fairy lights on a pair of bars.
Long rang fuel tank was just a big can sitting above were the gunner was supposed to be so on long distant flights which because of the Stringbags slow speed took for ever (and mostly consisted of mine laying in the same spot every night so was hated by the crews) it only had 1 machine gun to give any sort of protection.

Yet dispite all these disadvantages the Swordfish was a real punching above its weight plane.
On its first trip out armed with the new anti submarine rockets (just a solid cast iron war head designed to punch through a subs pressure hull) a Stringbag made its first sub kill which by the end of the war totalled 15 kills and several probables.

Merchant shipping losses suffered in the Med from Swordfish both sea and land based by the axsis forces ran at nearly 40 thousand tons a month at the height of the north African campaign and even in the desert war the bag was a surprisingly effective dive bomber agreed it was more of a steep decent than much of a dive, as anything over 200 knts and the wings had a nasty habit of folding.
But it was steep enough that the pilot would be almost standing on the rudder bar.
Its slow speed also made it a fantastic weapons platform able to fly very low and very slow which made htting the target much easier but it also made you very vunerable and it needed a steady nerve to go against a target like the Bismark at only 100knts. The old adage about the fire control only being calibrated to faster planes is a bit tongue in cheek and all the smaller calibre AA guns had open sights.

So overall I stay loyal to the out of date plane that lead the way in how to attack a harbour it may not have been behind the planning of the Pearl habour attack but two days after Taranto members of Japanese ambassadors staff in Italy visited Taranto and took notes.

(Sources The Swordfish Story By Ray Surtivant, Swordfish by David Wragg and War in a Stringbag by Charles Lamb)

 

[lingo]

According to the Pilots Notes for the Swordfish the limiting speed was 206 kts IAS clean or 135 Kts flaps fully down. Although they don't say so I should imagine that the elevator or the elevator cables were more likely to fail than the wings. They were built like bridges!

 

[Waynos]

Yes I'd say the Swordfish too. The Finns did remarkably well with the Buffalo and that is fine testimony to the men who flew it , but that shameful little beast ( (c) waynos whenever I mention the F2A )was at least 'supposed' to be able to tangle with current fighters. A replacement was being designed in 1939 for the Swordfish' own replacement as they were BOTH obsolete already, but the stringbag fought on until 1945.

The F2A's record with the Finns does fly in the face of its popular image, but the original TSR II is still the winner for me.