Fulmar vs. Zerstörers of 1940

[Admiral Beez]

Can the Fairey Fulmar (entered service May 1940) best the Zerstörers in service in 1940, the Bf 110, Fokker G.I, Fiat CR.25, Potez 630 and Bréguet 693?

As for blue on blue, I'd put my money on the Beaufighter (introduced two months after the Fulmar).

 

[Schweik]

The slower ones, like the Potez, Fiat and the G.1, probably. I don't think the Fulmar held up well to a Bf 110, the Bréguet 693 was basically a bomber / strafing aircraft and I think too fast for a Fulmar to catch.

 

[Admiral Beez]

The slower ones, like the Potez, Fiat and the G.1, probably. I don't think the Fulmar held up well to a Bf 110, the Bréguet 693 was basically a bomber / strafing aircraft and I think too fast for a Fulmar to catch.

I agree the Bf 110 may be tricky, but the Fulmar did well in this case, with the help of radar vectoring, The Fulmar's finest hour?

 

[Schweik]

Sounds like they did very well indeed in that incident, I'll have to look that one up in MAW.

There are quite a few match-ups of Beaufighter vs. Bf 110 in there and I think the Beaufighter usually makes out best, they seem to always wreak a lot of havoc every time they were deployed (they had a night fighter squadron there in the Med but it was routinely used for daylight maritime operations) though some days they took heavv losses.

 

[Glider]

To be honest in a battle where there is no tactical advantage I would back the 110 against the Fulmar. Its a lot faster and climbs better. As long as it doesn't turn and lose energy then eventually the 110 should take it.

 

[Schweik]

The Fulmar did seem to have fairly good luck in a few dogfights in the Med, though also some incidents where it couldn't catch only moderately fast bombers (SM 79 etc.). All in all though it's combat record was a bit better than you might expect. Definitely not a good idea for a Bf 110 to turn with one.

 

[Admiral Beez]

...the Beaufighter usually makes out best, they seem to always wreak a lot of havoc every time they were deployed....

I'm a big fan of the Beaufighter. Put a hundred Beaufighters into Malaya (with proper base defence and operational planning, d'oh) and the IJAF will have trouble on their hands.

And you don't want to be on a troopship in the Gulf of Thailand when these guys arrive.

 

[Schweik]

It took a while to get them out there, but once they did they had quite an impact. They were very effective in the Battle of the Bismarck sea, especially working in conjunction with A-20 and B-25 skip- and masthead- bombers, as you are probably well aware.

 

[K5083]

Armoured Aircraft Carriers

Fairey Fulmar: An overview of the combat history and performance of the Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm fleet fighter

www.armouredcarriers.com

In the final accounting, the Fulmar proved a worthy aircraft. It was credited with 122 kills.

A total of 40 Fulmars were lost to enemy action. About 16 of these were in air-to-air combat. Only three Fulmars were lost to single-seat fighters: The 5-to-3 kill-to-loss ratio shows the Fulmar giving as good as it got against its single-seat opponents.

Making it as good as any British day fighter in kill/loss terms. And surely the best two-seat single-engined day fighter, shipboard or not. (The only other one I can think of is the Roc!)

 

[MikeMeech]

The Fulmar did seem to have fairly good luck in a few dogfights in the Med, though also some incidents where it couldn't catch only moderately fast bombers (SM 79 etc.). All in all though it's combat record was a bit better than you might expect. Definitely not a good idea for a Bf 110 to turn with one.

Hi
Some information from Norman Friedman's book 'Fighters over the Fleet', page 114, reference air defence over 'Pedestal' in August 1942, using Fulmars, Sea Hurricanes and Martlets:

Mike

 

[fastmongrel]

I think the Fulmars main advantage was it's range and ammo capacity. It had the ability to defend more than one attack giving the fighter controller flexibility to land and refuel the other fighters.