Hellcat vs Spitfire - which would you take?

[GregP]

Best one for me was one night in the 1980's when I went to an "invitation only" event at Doug Champlin's Fighter Museum in Mesa, Arizona. They had an art show and I bought prints signed by Erich Hartmann and Saburo Sakai (who was the guest speaker at the event). Later they fired up the Fw 190D they had. It is the same one now in Seattle.

Sounded wonderful once it warned up and settled into a loping idle.

Here's the same aircraft in Seattle ... years later:


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCKd3CHQzUY

 

[Clayton Magnet]

Are you sure thats not an A5?

 

[GregP]

Actually I'm not. I googled "Fw 190D" and this came up. The paint scheme LOOKS like the A-5 now that you mention it. Damn ... I'll look for a video of that Fw 190D running up. Don't lknow if they started it again and made an assumption ... never a good idea, I suppose.

 

[GrauGeist]

Yet another great sounding radial!

 

[Clayton Magnet]

A cool video none the less, thanks for sharing

 

[USS Enterprise CV-6]

Just noticed something: The question says: "Which would you take as a pure fighter?". As a pure fighter, a would take the Spit, mainly because I don't know how a plane deigned for a carrier is more of a 'pure fighter' than a land based plane

 

[pbehn]

Just noticed something: The question says: "Which would you take as a pure fighter?". As a pure fighter, a would take the Spit, mainly because I don't know how a plane deigned for a carrier is more of a 'pure fighter' than a land based plane

It is a pure fighter that can survive repeated take offs and landings off a carrier and be able to stow below deck so generally heavier.

 

[GrauGeist]

...mainly because I don't know how a plane deigned for a carrier is more of a 'pure fighter' than a land based plane

Regardless of it's intention as a naval or land-based design, a fighter's qualifications are to primarily engage in battle with like-designed enemy aircraft as a primary role.

Technically, there is no difference between a Fw190 and a F4U in their intended role, for example. The only difference between a navalized aircraft and a land-based aircraft falls in it's equipment, the naval aircraft generally being equipped with such things like a tail-arresting hook, folding wings (not always) for below-deck storage, certain max-weight airframe criteria, landing gear that dampens the "bounce" on landing and in many cases, the ability to remain afloat for a period of time if they are forced to "ditch".

 

[l'Omnivore Sobriquet]

Hellcat or Spitfire ? which one, hm, would I take ?
Well, being not a Sobriquet but a real flesh and blood amateur pilot, I think a proper English attitude would induce a polite step away from the Griffon Spitfire...
With admirative "no thanks" and a good spotter's place to look at, and listen.

Safe, large, powerfull, slippery aerobatic, comfortable, usable even as a Vip transport, I would naturally lean for that Grumman cat. Always welcome by the ground crew too... A complete high sport sweater.
Obviously, no competition for the one i'd actually choose.

Spitfire of course.

 

[USS Enterprise CV-6]

It is a pure fighter that can survive repeated take offs and landings off a carrier and be able to stow below deck so generally heavier.

I thought it meant which was designed specilly for air-to-air, not just for air-to-air but able to survive ditching.

 

[pbehn]

I thought it meant which was designed specilly for air-to-air, not just for air-to-air but able to survive ditching.

Look at a Spitfire landing on terra firma then look at a hellcat landing on a carrier. To cope with a carrier deck landing a fighter has to be reinforced in many areas so it is heavier. There are other areas like sink rate which others can explain better than I The spitfire was an interceptor with few equals but it took years to make it an effective and safe carrier plane the seafire. However living on the worlds larges aircraft carrier (Great Britain) I can say all Spitfires were excellent carrier planes its just USA carriers were constructed about 400 miles too short.

 

[parsifal]

Look at a Spitfire landing on terra firma then look at a hellcat landing on a carrier. To cope with a carrier deck landing a fighter has to be reinforced in many areas so it is heavier. There are other areas like sink rate which others can explain better than I The spitfire was an interceptor with few equals but it took years to make it an effective and safe carrier plane the seafire. However living on the worlds larges aircraft carrier (Great Britain) I can say all Spitfires were excellent carrier planes its just USA carriers were constructed about 400 miles too short.

This is simply based on some rather dubious assumptions. The Zeke was one of the most lightly constructed aircraft of the war, along with the strike aircraft that it fought alongside. These aircraft were all successful designs that could operate equally from land or sea platforms despite their light construction . Heavy bracing was essentially an American, more specifically a Grumman idea, that they moved away from in their post war designs anyway. The japanese lightweight designs did not show any signs of break up gear failure or the like of which i am aware.

The nearest comparable type to the zeke for a land based plane was the JAAFs Ki43. There is not a lot of difference in the weights of these two aircraft, apart from the increased weight of armmament and tankage for the zeke.

The problems with the Seafire were specific to that type, which were addressed in the later marks, as you suggest....but although admitedly the type was always a handfull on the deck. Early marks of the seafire had weaker landing gear, narrow track landing gear, horrible stall characterisitcs, and poor forward vision that all added up to making it a mule when it came to carrier operations. Some of these issues were never addressed, but the later marks of the type sort of addressed what they could, and then there was a change to the Griffon engine, which opened up a whole new range of issues. . The Griffon powered Seafires had a tendency to swing badly on take off, but apprently this vice was dealt with in the Seafire 47 series (Ive forgotten exactly how, but its deck handling was much better than the Seafire XV)

 

[Shortround6]

Seafire 47 used contra-rotating props which went a long way to reduce swing and torque effects.

 

[tomo pauk]

... However living on the worlds larges aircraft carrier (Great Britain) I can say all Spitfires were excellent carrier planes its just USA carriers were constructed about 400 miles too short.

That was an excellent one

This is simply based on some rather dubious assumptions. The Zeke was one of the most lightly constructed aircraft of the war, along with the strike aircraft that it fought alongside....)

The Zero was not that lightly constructed. From here:

This weight-saving design would indicate that the craft is flimsily built but such is not the case, for its strength compares favorably with many American-built planes.

 

[davparlr]

For pure dog fighting, its hard to beat a Spitfire. Comparing contemporaries, it appears the Spit is superior to the F6F in almost every important respect, except, maybe, ruggedness. Both the Spit IX 66 and the Spit XIV were substantially faster over the envelop, climbed better, and probably out turned the equivalent standard F6F-3 and the F6F-3 w/water/F6F-5.

 

[Glider]

Totally agree and the differences were not marginal. In climb there was almost a 2,000 ft min advantage to the Spit IX at low level. With that sort of advantage you don't need to rely on the turn, the Spit would happily fight in the vertical

 

[stona]

The only difference between a navalized aircraft and a land-based aircraft falls in it's equipment, the naval aircraft generally being equipped with such things like a tail-arresting hook, folding wings (not always) for below-deck storage, certain max-weight airframe criteria, landing gear that dampens the "bounce" on landing and in many cases, the ability to remain afloat for a period of time if they are forced to "ditch".

Navalised as in Spitfire to Seafire or specifically designed for carrier operations?

They are not the same. Both will have an increased weight due to the sort of equipment you mentioned and this will impact performance. However aircraft designed for carrier operations typically had different flight characteristics, particularly in a landing configuration which might (or might not) have an effect on performance as a 'pure fighter', whatever that is.

Cheers

Steve

 

[Shortround6]

Things tended to diverge or change with time. In the early 30s there wasn't much difference between a land fighter and a carrier fighter (just how much bigger was that cow pasture than the carrier deck? except the extra weight of the carrier equipment but with 600hp engines every pound counted. In the late 30s and the coming of monoplanes the difference still wasn't that great as many land based fighters still landed at around 80mph and big wing ones ( Hurricanes and Spitfires) tended to "float" onto runways anyway.
AS power, speed and weight all increased with longer land runways being built the carrier planes became more specialized, their take-off and landing space didn't increase as much (if at all) compared to the land based planes and now they needed not only "just" attachment points and arrestor hooks and flotation and extra paint, but structural reinforcing to handle the arrestor landings and different sink rates and larger wings or different airfoils, etc.
How close the carrier plane came to land based plane performance varied with time and what other sacrifices one or the other made ( in the early .30s the armament was pretty much a constant. two rifle caliber machine guns with 500-600rounds per gun)

 

[stona]

Other aerodynamic devices were fitted to carrier aircraft. An example would be wing fences to intentionally stall a section of wing during landing. These were not required on most land based aircraft and add drag.

Cheers

Steve

 

[GrauGeist]

Navalised as in Spitfire to Seafire or specifically designed for carrier operations?

They are not the same. Both will have an increased weight due to the sort of equipment you mentioned and this will impact performance. However aircraft designed for carrier operations typically had different flight characteristics, particularly in a landing configuration which might (or might not) have an effect on performance as a 'pure fighter', whatever that is.

Cheers

Steve

If we look at my entire post, we'll see how my comment was intended:

Originally Posted by USS Enterprise CV-6 ...mainly because I don't know how a plane deigned for a carrier is more of a 'pure fighter' than a land based plane

Originally Posted by Graugeist Regardless of it's intention as a naval or land-based design, a fighter's qualifications are to primarily engage in battle with like-designed enemy aircraft as a primary role.

Technically, there is no difference between a Fw190 and a F4U in their intended role, for example. The only difference between a navalized aircraft and a land-based aircraft falls in it's equipment, the naval aircraft generally being equipped with such things like a tail-arresting hook, folding wings (not always) for below-deck storage, certain max-weight airframe criteria, landing gear that dampens the "bounce" on landing and in many cases, the ability to remain afloat for a period of time if they are forced to "ditch".

So when we view the entire comment, we'll see that this was intended to make the point that Naval or Land-based fighter aircraft had the same mission objective in regards to the statement of: "I don't know how a plane deigned for a carrier is more of a 'pure fighter' than a land based plane"