Was the P63 King Cobra a missed opportunity in NW Europe post D-Day?

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Yes, according to Dean's AHT P-63 was the best climbing late war USAAF fighter.

There is info on P-63 testing on Mike's and Neil's site P-63 Performance Tests
 
P63 was probably a decent short range fighter aircraft. Could replace P-40 in that role. Just don't confuse it with a proper late war CAS aircraft.

USN had the right idea for CAS. Late WWII USN employed F4U in that role. Which were replaced by A-1 Skyraider during Korean War.
 

Interesting article here:
Early Cobra's in Soviet Aviation
 
The Skyraider didn't so much replace the Corsair in Korea as supplement it. As to why the US didn't fly the P-63 in combat, there was neither the need nor the supply. The P-51 was clearly a better escort fighter. The P-47 was a competent escort fighter and a top-notch close-air-support fighter. The P-47 could carry a heavier load farther or longer, was more survivable in the face of enemy fire, and Republic was delivering them in massive quantities. Further, by mid-1944, when the P-63 became available, the P-47 had already been in theater for a year. The limited capacity that Bell had to deliver the P-63 was mostly taken up by Soviet allotments. The training command could make better use of the leftovers than to assign the planes to combat in Europe (and establish an overseas logistics network for parts and service).
 
First hand accoutns from pilots who flew it tell me it was a GOOD fighter. Where did I GET the first hand accounts? From people who came through Joe Yancey's shop when I was helping overhaul Allisons for a year and a half.

The P-63 flew quite well against ANY US fighter according to it's pilots, and had a lot in common with the P-39 as far as great roll and good handling, but could fly and fight much higher. People who put it down are NOT experienced with the aircrfaft.
 
P-63 simply arrived too late and was too short ranged for USAAF liking. Maybe also the overadvertisement of P-39 had spoiled somewhat the reputation of the Bell Co in the eyes of the USAAF top hierarcy.
 
I am a big P47 fan also, it was an absolutely exceptional aircraft against ground targets.
 
From Greyman's article:

" ... It is not an exaggeration to say that Soviet pilots and engineers, front-line troops and researchers, gave their maximum effort to turn the Airacobra into a fully capable combat aircraft. And in doing so they saved the Bell firm from great unpleasantness associated with the production of a series of "unfinished" aircraft. But more about this in the following chapters..."

That's the Soviet story .... I wonder if the pilots and crew at Henderson Field shared the same low opinion ... they also flew P-400's.
 
michaelmaltby said:
That's the Soviet story .... I wonder if the pilots and crew at Henderson Field shared the same low opinion ... they also flew P-400's.
Click to expand...


I don't know about the pilots and crew at Henderson Field but lets remember why the Russians got P-39s in the first place. The British tried them, tried to equip one squadron with them and said "thanks but no thanks, please don't even bother to unload them at the dock, just send them on to Russia." This is in the fall of 1941 and these are aircraft paid for by the British pre-lend lease.
There were a number of serviceability issues in addition to the aircraft failing ( by a large margin) to meet it's "advertised" performance numbers. The plane as "all-electric" flaps, landing gear and prop pitch which meant a major electrical failure doomed the airplane. The forward bulkhead wasn't sealed well and let a dangerous, if not lethal amount of gun gas fumes into the cockpit when the nose guns were fired, Firing the nose guns would also knock out the compass (not good anywhere, but over France??) and a few other "little" problems
I don't think there is much dispute that the Russians had their hands full with the P-39s but then a few of their own aircraft were a "little less" than finished by western standards.
 
The P-400's earned, and richly so, the moniker "Iron Dog" at Guadalcanal.

As to the excellent climb rate for the P-63, it was the equivalent of the P-51B at low altitude but fell far short above 20,000 feet and in particular when the P-51B acquired the 1650-7 and 150 octane fuel to boost to 72".

Having said that Yeager is one of those that admired the P-39 and P-63 and indicated that he would have had no problem going to war in either. I never had the chance to ask him about that comment or put it into context of going to ETO and fighting LW in it at 25000 feet. I would hope he would have reconsidered in that context.
 
Hello Bill
thanks for pointing that, checked Mike's and Neil's site for P-51B and you are right. Dean seems to have used Bell's data for P-63A-8 in his USAAF late-war fighters' climb comparison and in the P-51 part of his book the 61" MP graph for P-51B.

Juha
 
Juha - you're right about Dean. He didn't account for performance increases due to the 150 Octane. IIRC, even the 61" would be correct only for the P-51B-1 with the 1650-3 which was great at 29,000 FTH but not so great from SL to 24000 per the 1650-7 and 67"
 
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I think the success in the Airacobra with Russia is that the airplane was what they needed, when they needed it. Despite any mechanical problems with the early aircraft. The P-39 was used by the Russians in the altitudes it performed best. It also allowed Russia to have a first rate aircraft, for that theatre, and allowed them the time to develop aircraft of their own designs that ultimately were very capable themselves.

I love the Airacobra, still one of the sweetest looking planes to me.

Getting back to the original question though, I do not think the P-63 would have helped the U.S. in anyway. Mostly because it had no range compared to other designs.
 
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If you're going to open another supply chain, probably better off doing it for the F4U.
 
I think the P-63 would have been a good addition if it was used to its strengths. It would have needed a supply chain but, then again, ANY aircraft would. There were NONE which were effective with no spares. A great example is the Ta-152.
 
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michaelmaltby said:
"....overadvertisement of P-39 had spoiled somewhat the reputation of the Bell Co in the eyes of the USAAF top hierarcy."

The same hierarchy had no trouble entrusting the development of the first jet - the Airacomet - to Bell.
Click to expand...

Remember that the UK gave the job to Gloster whose most recent in production design was the Gladiator. I sometimes think they were looking around for a design team that didn't have much on, instead of which design team is likely to do the best job or has the most experience of designing high speed aircraft.
 

Gloster Aircraft were part of the much larger Hawker Siddeley Group with Armstrong Whitworth, a bit like Supermarine was part of Vickers.
 
michaelmaltby said:
"....overadvertisement of P-39 had spoiled somewhat the reputation of the Bell Co in the eyes of the USAAF top hierarcy."

The same hierarchy had no trouble entrusting the development of the first jet - the Airacomet - to Bell.
Click to expand...

The contract for the P-59A was actually signed in October 1941. Hap Arnold gave bell a "no-bid' contract for 3 aircraft. All this happened before the shortcomings of the P-39 were realized.
 
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