Italian series 5/6 fighters really better?

[spicmart]

Were the Italian series 5 fighters really as good or better performing as the German Me 109 G-4 and Fw 190 A-4 with a licensed DB 605 engine with 100 PS less?
What features made them so good?

 

[tomo pauk]

Fw 190 was probably the fastest of the lot, with MC.205 and 109G-4 being close (and probably faster once the DB 605 engines were fully rated).
Lighter weight of the Italian fighters made them climb well when compared with the Fw 190. Big wings of the Re.2005 and G.55 were providing lower wing loading and thus better horizontal maneuvering, with the trade off being the increased drag that hurt the speed a bit. Bf 109(G) was in disadvantage if/when the increase in firepower was required, since the extra and/or bigger guns increased drag a lot, ant thus lowered the speed (and the RoC a bit).

So it is basically the 'battle of trade offs', with neither of the fighters having all the advantages IMO.

 

[GregP]

I've seen reports from pilots who flew them, and everyone who flew them liked them a lot.

I didn't see any combat flyoff comparisons, just a pilot report from MC.202, MC.205, and RE.2005.

Used to be easily available and findable online, but I've noticed things are generally harder to find these days than they were 15 years ago, and I haven't seen these pilot reports anywhere in maybe 10 years. They were generally very complementary of the Italian airplanes. That is, nothing but good things to say. If it were a combat comparison, there would be some sort of negative somewhere, so maybe the pilot reports I saw were just general impressions from a familiarization flight ... I can't really say.

Taking a nice, casual flight in a military fighter is not the same as trying to evaluate the combat potential of it, and I don't recall there being a mock dogfight in there.

 

[Just Schmidt]

Fw 190 was probably the fastest of the lot, with MC.205 and 109G-4 being close (and probably faster once the DB 605 engines were fully rated).
Lighter weight of the Italian fighters made them climb well when compared with the Fw 190. Big wings of the Re.2005 and G.55 were providing lower wing loading and thus better horizontal maneuvering, with the trade off being the increased drag that hurt the speed a bit. Bf 109(G) was in disadvantage if/when the increase in firepower was required, since the extra and/or bigger guns increased drag a lot, ant thus lowered the speed (and the RoC a bit).

So it is basically the 'battle of trade offs', with neither of the fighters having all the advantages IMO.

What about range?

 

[tomo pauk]

What about range?

Drop tanks were very rare on the Italian ww2 fighters.