drgondog
Major
absolutely correct - at 25K that would be 200-210 TAS. When a B-17 unloaded, it could fly faster home bound.
Hurricane IIc vs. B-17s B-24s
- Thread starter Jerry W. Loper
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absolutely correct - at 25K that would be 200-210 TAS. When a B-17 unloaded, it could fly faster home bound.
Never heard that reasoning anywhere before. Your source for that? Max. endurance of the Bf 109 G was over 3 hours. At cruise speed around 1.5 hours iirc. Surely not the best in this regard, but easily enough to time to climb to altitude and linger for quite some time.
Depending on situation vectoring in the defensive forces ranged from good to very poor. Sometimes LW units would need to scramble simply because Allied air forces were detected too late or the true target was not known.
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Agreed Vincenzo, but the affect is the same with the Hurricane. So, if the TAS for the B17 is 150 and the Hurris is running at 250, they both have the correction factor in their speeds. Kinda like the Altimeter being set without taking the local conditions (hence the reason why the tower always tells you the altimeter setting, so everyone has the same correction in).
In short, everybody is playing with the same localy based correction.
A really, really good point.
Yeah, that should do it. Goes back to the ability to get ahead and attack from the most vulnerable spot on both 4 engined bombers. Need to climb and go fast enough. Climb, your speed goes done. Level full power, you are not getting up to the bomber's level. Think the Hurricane would've been up against it to get ahead and above the formation. But, it has the speed. Maybe they adapt the tactics to not go below the formation after attacking.
Maybe the Luftwaffe did that anyway.
I think Timmo had the best point out there that nobody seems to bother with. That a lot of people just couldn't do it when it came down to attacking another airplane, regardless of the circumstances. Most people don't have the instinct to kill that is neccesary to attack another airplane, regardless of the aircraft performance. It's not an easy thing to develop. Most military training is geared to supress that desire not to hurt somebody else. Only 10%, roughly, are going to press in for the kill. Most are going to pull off early, evade or let themselves be pulled off to the side in a distraction. And a head on attack, on a heavy bomber formation, is the definition of hairy. Upwards of 70 machine guns firing tracer at you, man, that has got to make you flinch.
I don't know specifically where to go with it, but it seems it should be a factor to consider. If you have an airplane that is not good at getting ahead of the formation, and you donn't want to get ahead of the formation you should attack....
TIMSHATZ, I never heard of pilots having trouble shooting at each other unless they were just afraid of getting killed themselves. Everyone has heard of soldiers having trouble pulling the trigger, but that was a human being in the sights of a rifle, not a piece of machinery surrounding a pilot. I have always read that pilots detatched themselves from what was happening and convinced themselves that they were shooting at machinery and not trying to kill the pilot, except of course those that hated the enemy badly enough that they WERE trying to kill the other pilot.
no the hurry can't go 250 mph ias at 25k'
There is a good segment in a show called "Piece of Cake" about British fighter pilots during the Battle of Britian that pretty much covers it. The scene is where the Squadron Leader (a guy named Fanny, believe it or not) is talking to his intelliegence officer and one other guy about the pilots in the squadron. He says, and I'm going on memory but it was a well done scene so I kinda remember it, "We've got two good pilots, 3-4 average pilots and the rest aren't worth anything". The scene is composed right after gun camera shows one of the pilots in the squadron shooting down another RAF fighter (thought it was an ME109).
Only 5% of fighter pilots become aces. There are a multitude of reasons why. First, opportunity. A lot of pilots will fly a full tour without ever seeing an enemy aircraft. Second, (and this is a very rough list) determination. A pilot who sets out to shoot down another airplane is taking a pretty good risk that he himself will be shotdown himself. Most guys get shot down without knowing anyone else is there. There are a lot of reasons for it but the two most common are having a low SA (situational awareness, or not knowing what is going on and who's around) and they are committed to an attack when they themselves are attacked. The last point is very important as the determination to make a kill is difference between an ace and a good pilot. When you make an attack on somebody, you know the odds of getting shot down are increasing as you make your run. So, the old rule of get in, hit and get out is the standard.
A lot of pilots don't want to take that risk. 99% of the time, if you see the guy making a run on you, you can avoid him fairly easily. Most guys work from that perspective and spend as much time as possible covering their own and their buddies ass. Dogfights, while somewhat famous, are relatively rare. If one or the other guy doesn't want to fight and they both see each other from far enough away, there won't be a long fight. The one who doesn't want to take the chance will clear out. It's not cowardice, it's smart. It's the way to survive. And plenty of people did it and nobody though any less of them for it. For every ace, there have to be a couple of guys up there watching their tails.
Kind of a long and meandering post but I hope I covered some of the perspective.
renrich
Chief Master Sergeant
Tim, I think your post makes some good points. Two other factors which fit in with what you said is that most successful fighter pilots had very good eyesight and many of them were very good gunners. An example was Joe Foss who had a lot of experience hunting, especially wing shooting. Of course the good eyesight contributes to the good SA.
Thanks Ren. Hope it was helpful.
Good gunners and great eyesight are a must. Well, the great eyesight anyway. Hartman used to say the guy who sees the other first has won half the battle. Very true. And gunnery was hugely important. As the old saying goes, good flying never shot anyone down. You could be a great pilot but not get anything done while an average pilot who was a very good shot could produce. And if all else fails, do what Zempke used to say and get so close you can't miss. Then, there isn't any question of gunnery.
An interesting point that I read about from the Pacific war. I think it was an Intelligence Officer in one of the P38 groups who looked at the film from the gun cameras off all the pilots. He found that the aces tended to shoot at other airplanes about 2x more often than other pilots. Also, they tended to shoot in all sorts of odd attitudes (upside down, turning, ect) whiereas the average pilot was usually pretty close to straight and level.
Probably somewhere in the reasoning that basketball players have of 100% of the shots you don't take, won't go in.
TIMSHATZ, I agree with your whole paragraph. Everything you put in there I have read somewhere at sometime. One other thing that I have read, supposedly most WW2 American aces were farm boys, country boys, rural raised young men. Evidently they had learned wing shooting and shooting small game and deer on the run so they already understood the concept of leading the target.
Hmm.. I did not make any claim about the climbrates between American planes (let alone Spitfires)
But since you brought it up: P-47D w/ paddle blade propeller and ADI outclimbs P-51D above 25,000ft.
Also the climb rate is at least equal, if not better, than Bf109-G6 ( again above 25,000ft).
Bf109-K4 climbs better than P-47D through the whole height range. But compared to P-47M it is again inferior above 25,000ft.
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Agreed wholeheartedly. Familiarity with guns is very useful. Helps you think the right way to take the shot. Further, familiarity with hunting is very important. Stalking, shooting, angles, all that stuff comes into play when hunting. Getting the right shot at the right time. Also, something that doesn't come up, is the familarity with making a kill shot that hunting alows. First time I shot at a buck, I got a serious dose of buck fever. Couldn't believe it. My mind was clear but all the sudden I started to shake. Very, very odd, caught me totally offguard. Getting that first one is probably as important for fighter pilots, if not more. After that, you probably have that "I can do that" momment.
Breaking through a mental wall, so to speak.
renrich
Chief Master Sergeant
I do think I read that Erich Hartmann was not a particularly good gunner but that he waited until the target filled his windscreen until opening fire. Undoubtedly he had superior eyesight.
drgondog
Major
Nearly true Timppa. Both the 51B/C and D with 1650-7 outclimbed the P-47D-10 and subsequent variants of the D up to ~ 30,000 feet - and combat between German fighters and most USAAF fighters was from 25,000 feet to the deck.. where the P-47 increasingly was at a disadvantage in both the horizontal and vertical with the contemporary German fighters as the altitude decreased after the initial contact.. as well as the P-51B/C and D.
P-47 Performance Tests
P-51 Mustang Performance
I need to check but IIRC the 109G6-A/S outclimbed both the P-51 and P-47 at 30K.
The Luftwaffe (as well as all of Germany) never saw more than 60 P-47M's on any given day after Christmas 1944 as only the 56th FG had them. Further, the wiring harness issues with the M largely rendered it ineffective compared to its target performance until March 1945. So what might the point be to bring up the P-47M?
The point of my challenge to the Gabreski recollection (and Robert Johnson's) is that while they marvelled at the performance boost of the paddle prop ad WI - that combination did not close the gap enough between the P-47D and the 109G to match it in climb - I should have stipulated that was true only for the first 30,000 feet above sea level to make my statement clearer.
The P-47D was an excellent fighter but, until the M, it was never a world beater in the positive vertical at any useful combat altitudes.
drgondog
Major
I was at a Fighter Aces reunion in Dalls (~1967) with my father when WFAA (Channel 8) reporter questioned several aces including Rall and Olds and Foss and Yeager, etc, including my father - all of them gave the stock answers to 'what makes a fighter pilot'?? Except for one ace, Billy Hovde, all of them gave the same general answers. "know the capability of your airplane as well as the enemy a/c, have situational awareness, close until you are in range to shoot, keep your airspeed up, be aggressive,etc, etc"
When the reporter stuck his mic in front of Hovde, (who was feeling little pain), he thought for a couple of seconds and said'..
Well, the first god_______ed thing you have to have is a reminder that no one lives forever"
Hovde took 12 ships of the 358FS/355FG into a gaggle of 75+ Fw 190s with some escorting 109s on December 5, 1944 and personally shot down 5, shared a sixth while the squadron nailed 12 and completely broke up the attack over Berlin - with no losses. Distinguished Service Cross. He walked his talk.
The trials conducted with the G-6/U2 by the RAF performed concluded the Bf 109 was slightly superior in climb to the Mustang III with 18 lbs boost until around 20,000 feet. So that is in line with your observations.
I would be surprised if any contemporary P-47 was a faster climber than a Mustang III. Or that the advantages probably both held at anything beyond say 22,000 over a Bf 109 G would turn into a shorter time to climb to that altitude, which is what I was getting at.
And that is a Bf 109 G version with two underwing gondolas, so a version arguably already at least as good at bomber killing as the standard P-47. A later G with Mk 108 should be a bit faster in the vertical too.
As noone answered my question I searched a bit and found the Curtiss paddle blade propeller and WI to be used on most P-47s starting November-December '43. Right?
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for the WI i'm agree for the paddle blade propeller i remember late
Paddle Blade, Water Injection and 150 octane fuel:
P 47D Performance Test
Looks like about 2,375fpm at 25,000ft and 1,650fpm at 30,000ft.
P 47D Performance Test
Looks like about 2,375fpm at 25,000ft and 1,650fpm at 30,000ft.
OUTSTANDING! Great post.
