Best Piston Engined Fighter Ever...

Best Piston Engined Fighter Ever...

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'back in the day' these figures were conservative because mission planners were to seek guidance within the handbook for profiling the missions on loads and range - before factoring in weather and wind.
 

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check out this web site, i think after reading including pilot's report (one p-51 pilot said the 51 was better at just about everything from combat experience), i think it should change a lot of minds about the FW-190.
WWII Aircraft Performance

while at the site, read the comparison of the P-51B and F-4U, I was surprised the F-4U is more manuverable.

also read an article somewhere that statistically the P-47 was the best fight, the said that the damage it could take and still get the pilot home was a lot of it, the P-51's cooling system the weak part of the 51's (my dad had to bail out over germany because of flak in the radiator)

read this, the TA-152H was nothing more than a prototype, with lots of work before you could consider it the best fighter of WWII.

Operational history
By fall 1944, the war was going badly for Germany, and the RLM pushed Focke-Wulf to quickly get the Ta 152 into production. As a result, several Ta 152 prototypes crashed early into the test program. It was found that critical systems were lacking sufficient quality control. Issues arose with superchargers, pressurized cockpits leaked, the engine cooling system was unreliable at best due in part to unreliable oil temperature monitoring, and in several instances the landing gear failed to properly retract. A total of up to 20 pre-production Ta 152 H-0s were delivered from November 1944 to Erprobungskommando Ta 152 to service test the airplane. It was reported that test pilots were able to conduct a mere 31 hours of flight tests before full production started. By the end of January 1945, only 50 hours or so had been completed. The Ta 152 was not afforded the time to work out all the little quirks and errors plaguing all new designs. These problems proved impossible to rectify given the situation in Germany towards the end of the war, and only two Ta 152C remained operational when Germany surrendered.[citation needed]

P-47 was a much better high altitude machine, and in full production
 
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Glad you quoted wikipedia for those stats on the Ta152, Mike...but did you read the rest of the Operational section...especially about Willy Reschke's engagement with the Tempests YaKs? The Ta152 was designed for high-altitude yet Willy got down in the weeds and beat one of the Allies' newest and most dangerous fighters in it's own element.

The Ta152 was one of those machines that didn't have a chance to come to full maturity, but the machines that did make it to the front, performed beyond expectations and their statistics clearly speak for themselves.

The P-47 was a far better ground attack aircraft than the P-51D for a number of reasons, mostly because it could handle a tremendous amount of damage. It could also deliver a brutal payload of mixed ordinance and still defend itself aggressively if attacked by enemy fighters while conducting ground attack missions. The P-51D was better suited for long range escort and CAP missions, although it did deliver big hurt to enemy forces on the ground, but in doing so, placed itself at risk. Even though the P-51D is a remarkable machine, I think it's rather over-rated...but that's just my personal opinion, for what it's worth.

As far as the Fw190 is concerned, there's nothing to reconsider about it. It was a ground-breaking design for it's time, it had great speed, good firepower and plenty of manouverability. The A-8 with it's Rüstsätze was a sight that Allied bomber crews dreaded...
 
I've said it before ... the Ta 152H was the best high altitude fighter but except for that well document combat report with the Tempest, there's really no reason to consider it the best at all altitudes.

Better to have the best at 1,400 m than at 14,000 m.

Kris
 
the Ta was a last gasp, there is much new information that will come out shortly and yes there are combat reports available you just need to dig further, it was no prototype but an operational fighter used with success in the closing waning days it needed to be in sufficient numbers to the other JG's to make a difference and in a word it didn't.

as to op history it has not been written ..................... yet !
 
I'd be very careful with using www.wwiiaircraftperformance.com as a reference on German aircraft performance if I were you Mike. I can tell you for a fact that A LOT of German documents are ignored and left out by the site's author Mike Williams, who btw seems to put his entire focus on documents showing poor performance and mechanical unreliability when it comes to German a/c.
 
The only problem I have seen with Mike William's site is that the German reports are in German and I can't read German. Seriously though I have his site on my favorites list and have found it to be a gold mine of information. The interesting and educational thing to me about his site is that it shows, among other things, that AC are individuals, just like people and they don't all perform alike among identical models. Also, if one is just getting started in the business of comparing and debating performance of WW2 AC, the figures one sees about popular AC on line or in even well regarded books mostly show only the performance of a certain AC under the very best conditions such as altitude, load, etc. Also most of those peak performance figures are usually in Combat power which would only be available for a short time and if overused would possibly cripple the engine. One has to be careful when comparing performance numbers to make sure that the numbers are achieved with normal, military or combat power. It seems to me that the ability of a fighter to climb or achieve V max under military power might be more important than the comparable performance with combat power and the all important "what altitude does this take place at?" and" with what load?" are other variables. Anyway, IMO Williams' site is the mother lode for many of us enthusiasts.
 
Not being slanderous Les, just telling it how it is. I really don't understand how Mike leaves out so many other performance documents which are readily available from many published works. Why is it left out ?

I like all the info on Allied aircraft, it seems as complete as can be. Sadly however the same can't be said about the information about the German a/c, it is as if he tries to inforce a negative view on them. It's completely unnecessary.

Just my two cents on the subject..
 

First off Soren I would heed Les's warning, second instead of blasting him why dont you ask him in a PM and not in the tone you used here. I agree with Les, you sound slanderous.

You could ask me the same thing on this board in the technical section. Frankly I have an easy answer. I cant read German. Dont have the time and such. Its taken me over 2 years to build what we have here now. You want to add to it feel free. Thats what this area is for but dont nock others who have built a site.

Im not sure whats the case with Mike and the documents but your approach in this one is border line.
 
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just my POV but I think Soren said his piece in a calm and modest way, not trying to be slanderous but just asking for some caution using this site. He is not the only one criticizing that site, so I too am taking those data with a grain of salt.

Of course I am aware of the past problems with criticizing specific parts of that site ...

Kris
 

Kris I under stand what you are getting at. Problem is no one else take's the incentive to start there own site to counter act that one. Its easy to pick on some one else but to create your own is alot tougher. The technial area is just one I started. Frankly if Soren or you or a combination of any one want to add too it and make it alot better please feel free. Get creative and start posting your own reports. Some one starts to critizing your posts in every thread or it gets out of hand thats what we are here for.

Ive had questions on why I dont have more of this and or that. Mainly on Soviet Aircraft. Its really a simple answer. I cant read russian. German Im very dangerious with. I can make out certain words and stuff but thats about it without a translator.

Frankly I would love to see more civil pro's and cons on German aircraft. Any one and I do mean any one that needs help I will help them if they need it.

Hope it helps
Paul
 
If I knew how to make website I probably would, but I have no clue how to do so. I have a wealth of documents as-well, many of which I'm surprised aren't on Mike's website in the German a/c section, I only see the documents with the lowest published performance on his site, which is odd to me.

I am a firm believer of the philosophy: credit where credit is due. And Williams does a wonderful job at documenting the performance of Allied aircraft, I just wish I could say the same about his effort concerning German aircraft. The way he carries on with his comparisons between Allied Axis aircraft just all seems very biased to me.

Anyway if anyone wants to put up another aircraft performance website then I'd be more than willing to supply them with all the documents I've got, no problem.
 
Have you ever thought of donating documents that you might have for his website?

Of course only if he would source them to you.

You could even post them up in our technical section here on the forum. Paul would be glad to help expand our technical section with them.
 
Micdrowe said:
ve had questions on why I dont have more of this and or that. Mainly on Soviet Aircraft. Its really a simple answer. I cant read russian. German Im very dangerious with. I can make out certain words and stuff but thats about it without a translator.l
Click to expand...

Why don't you publish them all if you have them.
You may not know what they are all about, but somebody will. There are some German and Russian members in this board. They can sort it out. I can help with the German stuff.
 
Timppa said:
Why don't you publish them all if you have them.
You may not know what they are all about, but somebody will. There are some German and Russian members in this board. They can sort it out. I can help with the German stuff.
Click to expand...

Most of the time I do Timppa, As I search web for more info is usually when I run across some of the more unusual items. What I really would like to see is more and more people add to what Ive started to make a huge data base for all to use.
 

I'd be happy to, I've already posted a lot of them here before.

And no need sourcing them to me, they are mostly from already published works, which is why I'm surprised none are on Mike's website. The only thing I'm worried about is copyright laws, I don't want to violate any of them.
 
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