Best Pacific Fighter? (1 Viewer)

I am speaking of the time period between the end of Guadalcanal and the beginning of the invasion of the Gilberts.

The carriers did not engage in any systematic day to day operations untill late 1943.

Land based fighters are what wiped out the best of the IJN, and in this case, it was the P38 and F4U. If you have a case for the F4F as being the ebst, lets hear it.

syscom3 said:

I am speaking of the time period between the end of Guadalcanal and the beginning of the invasion of the Gilberts.

The carriers did not engage in any systematic day to day operations untill late 1943.

Land based fighters are what wiped out the best of the IJN, and in this case, it was the P38 and F4U. If you have a case for the F4F as being the ebst, lets hear it.

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Syscom - why are you hung up on 'systematic' operations? So what? and what does that mean to you? How many IJN fighters did the P-38 or F4U shoot down over Rabaul or Gilberts or Truk or Santa Cruz or Coral Sea or Midway? Or more importantly, Guadalcanal.

Where do you want to make a case that the F4F wasn't the most important sea based and land based fighter in 1942?

Nobody is arguing that land based airpower was a major contributor to the decline of IJN - but the USN was the point of the spear except for Darwin and Port Moresby in 1942... and the last time I checked the USMC was still part of USN.

If you have read any of my posts you might recall that I am ambivalent about F4U vs P-38 as 'best', and lean toward the F4U. Why do you think I regard the F4F as even a consideration?

I am glad the F4F was in-theatre but I don't rank them as a candidate for either Best or Most Important...at least not after mid 1943, nor do I rank the F4U or P-38 or P-40 in the category of Most Important in 1942 in the ultimate defeat of the IJN airpower.

For that period the F4F and P-40 are the only real US candidates and the F4F was more important at Coral Sea, Midway, Guadalcanal, Rabaul, Truk and Gilbert Islands than the P-38 and F4U... the more I think about it, the P-40 was probably more important through early 1943 out of Port Moresby than the P-38...at least through mid to late 1943.

IIRC the 475th, 8th, 18th, 35th and the 49th were the top USAAF PTO groups.

The 49th wasn't fully converted from P-40's until mid 1944. The 475th wasn't in combat w/38 until May 1943 and not out of New Guinea Until Oct, 1944 when it moved to to Phillipines.

The 8th didn't convert to P-38s until June 1943. the 18th didn't convert to P-38s (from P-40's) until after they moved from Guadalcanal in mid 1943, and the 35th had only one squadron of 38's in nov 1942 (two P-40) but all three converted to P-47s in Nov 1943, then 51s in late 1944.

The IJN foes based in New Guinea were important at both Lae and Salamaua (?) and defending against Rabaul strikes, in the New Guinea campaigns but the P-38 was far less a factor than the P-40 until July/Sept 1943 timeframe.

When do you stipulate the IJN airpower was defeated? Before or after mid 1943?

The primary source for TO&E is Olynyk's Stars and Bars

So how important was P-38 to destruction of IJN in 1942-1943? Close to zero relative to P-40 until mid to late 1943 and early 1944.

Good posts Bill.

But when talking about raw performance lets not forget the Me-262A-1a, which left everything else in the dust in that department. Not letting it operate as an airsuperiority fighter from the beginning as intended was one of Hitler's biggest mistakes in the war. Its success rate when operated as intended was excellent, achieving a kill/loss ratio of ~10/1 in the air if not more.

Still at that point it couldn't have won the war for Germany, they were simply too few to late, but it could've drawn out the war to a point where the Allied invasion progess would've stalled completely and negotiations were a possibility. However for there to be any chance of repulsing the Western Allies back out of mainland Europe the Germans would've needed not only the Me262 in the fighter role from the start of their deployment, but they'd need the Jumo 004D engine, as that would allow them to hunt down the Allied bombers over British soil. Now fuel would've always been a problem, but less so had the Allies been robbed of their ability to strike the German fuel industry from early 44 and onwards.

PS: Sorry for the OT stuff, back on topic;

IMO the best fighters in the PTO were the F4U Corsair and Ki-84 Hayate. Too bad for the Japanese that nearly only rookies were flying the Ki-84's. Still the Ki-84 did prove the most successful Japanese fighter in the late war years, along with the N1K2-J.

I think you over estimate what the 262 could do Soren there is not a hope in hell that the allies would have negotiated on the basses of heavy air losses . Can,t stop troops with a fighter even if it is the 262 the logistics of Germany had been destroyed to all intense and purposes by the time the 262 was about.
You needed ground, sea and air power dominance to win WW2 and Germany had lost all three, even if the 262 had regained the air upper hand it would have not been enough to push the allies into negotiating terms.

Soren said:

Good posts Bill.

But when talking about raw performance lets not forget the Me-262A-1a, which left everything else in the dust in that department. Not letting it operate as an airsuperiority fighter from the beginning as intended was one of Hitler's biggest mistakes in the war. Its success rate when operated as intended was excellent, achieving a kill/loss ratio of ~10/1 in the air if not more.

Soren - I'm on record as saying the Me 262 was the Best, and Ta 152 as Best Piston - independent of contribution - Fighters in WWII

I have no idea what the theoretical score/loss rate was for the 262 simply because German records are basically missing from a claim/review/award standpoint from late 1944 forward. Whether 10:, 5:1 or 20:1, it still was the best



PS: Sorry for the OT stuff, back on topic;

IMO the best fighters in the PTO were the F4U Corsair and Ki-84 Hayate. Too bad for the Japanese that nearly only rookies were flying the Ki-84's. Still the Ki-84 did prove the most successful Japanese fighter in the late war years, along with the N1K2-J.

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I tend to agree that also. Nobody wanted to dogfight a Ki 84 in the hands of a good pilot.. The reason I favor the F4U over the 38 is simply it was the best Air/land air superiority fighter of the war and that was a requisite in the PTO...
and the same applies when compared to the Ki 84 and the Shiden.

If someone gives me just one choice to fight the entire war as escort fighter, carrier fighter, night fighter, air superiority - if it is only one choice for all theatres and opponents, then for me the F4U-1 to start and F4U-5 to finish.

trackend said:

I think you over estimate what the 262 could do Soren there is not a hope in hell that the allies would have negotiated on the basses of heavy air losses . Can,t stop troops with a fighter even if it is the 262 the logistics of Germany had been destroyed to all intense and purposes by the time the 262 was about.
You needed ground, sea and air power dominance to win WW2 and Germany had lost all three, even if the 262 had regained the air upper hand it would have not been enough to push the allies into negotiating terms.

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I disagree trackend, the Allied bomber offensive would've been halted which would've helped the German ground forces immensly.

You're seriously downplaying the effect Allied airforces had on the German war effort on the ground. The Germans were pretty much forced to move by night or risk getting shot up by marauding allied fighter bombers.

Bill,

I rate the FW-190 F4U Corsair as equals, with the late 190's holding a slight advantage in performance but the Corsair being carrier capable.

Soren said:

Bill,

I rate the FW-190 F4U Corsair as equals, with the late 190's holding a slight advantage in performance but the Corsair being carrier capable.

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I really don't disagree but would point out a.) that the Fw 190 (any series) have to add the extra 600 pounds for carrier qual, or add 100+ plus gallons of fuel to be competitive on range..

imagine the F4U as USAAF 'P-42' early in the war with existing racks for external fuel early in 1943 (and 600 pounds+ lighter for same mission, instead of the P-47 - but capable of getting to middle Germany early 1943 and all the way by late 1943 with combined external and internal fuel? The P-51 may never have been near as important as it was.

It might have forced an earlier intro of the Me 262 but at the same time probably would have cut deeper into pilot staff of LW even earlier... who knows? - all great airplanes. What we do know is what 'coulda happened' did happen - the rest is speculation.

On another note, I have sorted out Gene's model and have had a couple of exchanges on how to treat Thp variations with altitude and now debating whether to use the same factor for EAS (sqrt(RHOalt/RHOsl) versus an obscure P&W formula from an old design handbook from long ago and far way

I posed on Thp factor of ((RHOalt/RHOsl-.1)/.9) to be applied to Bhp for altitudes under consideration.

EAS = TAS*Sqrt(RHOalt/RHOsl) which will get us 'corrected' values for q.

There is enough difference in the two approaches as to make the Thp NOT linear with EAS - no big deal at SL - very significant at 25,000 feet as far as predicted 'actual values' -

He does have me converted to EAS as the baseline for calcs.

I have gone into The Performance Charts from Flight Tests on the P-51B-15 with both the 1650-3 and 1650-7. The reason I am looking at this one is a.) flight test values for 44-1 fuel, Hp table, Speed Tables vs Altitude for both 67 and 75" boost. I propse that the results for the May 1944 test be used and discuss the weight conditions later.

The early model F4U's didnt have the high altitude performance that the P38 and P51 had. So forget about effective high altitude bomber escorting.

The contemporary Fw 190's had even worse high altitude performance than the F4U... And I think performance would have been sufficient for escort. (particularly for B-24's)

And the early P-38's had their own problems at alt. (intercooler, cockpit heating, turbocharger, compressibility; the latter two worse in the colder conditions of the ETO)

A related discussion: http://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/aviation/battle-over-germany-january-1944-a-13336.html

kool kitty89 said:

And the early P-38's had their own problems at alt. (intercooler, cockpit heating, turbocharger, compressibility; the latter two worse in the colder conditions of the ETO)

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The P38's in the MTO didnt have the problems. And enough of them in the 8th worked to provide escorts.

And then again, the P38 was a magnitude better than the F4U when it came to a photo recon plane.

syscom3 said:

The P38's in the MTO didnt have the problems. And enough of them in the 8th worked to provide escorts.

And then again, the P38 was a magnitude better than the F4U when it came to a photo recon plane.

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Very true

syscom3 said:

The early model F4U's didnt have the high altitude performance that the P38 and P51 had. So forget about effective high altitude bomber escorting.

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F4U-1 was just fine at 20K and by mid 1943 it was just fine at 25-30K so it had all it needed to compete with 109s and 190s at either altitude in all performance dimensions, including specifically Dive.

IIRC the F4I-1 tests in Fighter config had the airplane at ~ 430mph at 24K and that seems 'competitive' to both the Merlin 51 and the P-38L but a year earlier.

In my opinion, I agree it was not as good as either the 51 or the 38 above 20,000 feet (after 38 got dive flap/brake and 51 was Merlined') but also in my opinion it was better than both the 109G2-G5 and Fw 190A3-A5 (and P-38F and P-51A) at 20-25,000 feet in early 1943.

The 38 was neutered as 'high altitude' escort until it got dive brake/flap simply because it couldn't chase anybody in a dive - and as KK mentioned the ETO winters were hard on the Pre P-38J/L Allison/Intercoolers.

It had by far the lowest air to air ratio in the ETO for those reasons. When the late J and L emerged it was a great fighter - but not until then

Bill,

I think the F4U-1 would've struggled abit against the Bf-109G-2 6 in dogfighting as both could outturn outclimb the Corsair. The FW-190A was also faster at low to medium alt, and climbed faster as-well, and dogfighting capability was similar. What the Allies needed was a fighter which did esp. well at high alt and was fast, the P-51 fitted that bill.

But you proposed that it [F4U] replaced the P-47 P-38, which I think would've helped I agree.

Soren said:

But you proposed that it [F4U] replaced the P-47 P-38, which I think would've helped I agree.

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The F4U never had the extreme range capabilities that the P38 had. And in the Pacific, range was everything.

I was talking in the ETO syscom3, not the PTO, the P-38 did well enough in that theatre.

Hellcat for me. Good gun platform, large production, excellent protection for the pilot, and it brought you home after damage more often than not.

Not a Corsair fan are we Bandit??

Well, as I have said in another thread

"...War is...about being in the right place at the right time.."

Now on paper AND in flight the corsair (apart from the view over the nose) was better than the Hellcat, with the exception of gun platform steadiness. BUT numbers, man, numbers! The Hellcat design worked so well right off the bat that large numbers zoomed out of the factories without a hitch..whereas the corsair had a lot of production hiccups before some sort of steady output could be achieved.

Also, let's not forget ease of learning and carrier deck landing safety. When you add that into the equation package, the Corsair loses by a slight margin.

And the air to ground capability of the Corsair vs the Hellcats makes the Hellcat lose by a slight margin...