Which was the best night fighter?

I hope I'm not repeating anything, I've read through this thread pretty good and may have some trivial information that might help. I read some aircraft project history files. I wanted to look at it as a project manager would. What was right and what was wrong. In the case of the He 219, Heinkle used engines that were adequite for the job but had planned on converting to jet engines when enough of them became available. Unfortunately for the plane, higher command decided not to support this project in favor of the Ju 88's. Another factor against this plane is that the material supply flow was widely dispersed in three locations if my information is correct. This caused some serious delays in the build of this plane. They also suffered from feature creep. Everytime someone had an idea, they tried it without going through a process control causing more delays and lots of confussion as to the definitive product.

For the P-61, one of the reasons pilots in the Pacific theater liked the plane was because the lead test pilot for the Black Widow project flew to units in the Pacific to teach them how to fly it. There was an aritcle in the Smithsonian magazine honoring the man call the "Meistro." His actual name escapes me for the moment. It was said that he loved the P-61 so much, he later bought one for himself. In the article it states that many pilots were apprehensive about flying this plane because it was about the size of a medium bomber. They didn't believe it could maneuver like a fighter. According to the ariticle, the Meistro proved that it was very nimble and could be flown like a fighter. It was because of this he was given the Meistro monicor. I didn't find any information saying that this was done with the pilots in Europe. It is my hypothesis that this may be one reason that pilots in the Pacific did better with the plane than their counterparts in Europe.

I believe the Mosquito NF.30 was the best operational NF of the war. The qualities of the aircraft are well known, the British radar installations always seemed to be neater and less draggy than the German ones, at least until near the end of the war when radomes began to appear on LW types. I am also given to understand that the radar on the NF.30 had a range of 10 miles compared to the 4 miles of its LW rivals. That would make it decisive I would imagine.

Earlier in the thread taildragger pilot wrote a far more comprehensive and coherent explanation than mine though, which I feel got fewer replies than it merited. Maybe due to attention being diverted by the actions of another member at the time, now banned? (not criticising anyone, just an observation having read back through the thread this morning)

Could have been something...

Wow, that's something new for me

That looks like a modified FW observation plane.

Fokker G.1?

You are right Vb, its Fokker on that picture, but Fw 189 was also used as auxiliary night fighter on the Eastern front to counter Soviet night harassment aircraft.

Wow, I check into this thread and before long people are throwing things at each other over the He-219. I never expected nightfighters to be so controversial. Before reading most of the thread, my knee would have reflexively jerked toward the He-219, but now I have to think about this. Erich presents a lot of apparently solid information to give one pause...but frankly there is so much information, misinformation, and disinformation regarding the whole topic of late war Luftwaffe warplanes that I'm not sure we will ever know the straight poop abot planes like the He-219, Ju-388, Ta-154, Do-335, Me-262, etc.

I think a lot depends on what the mission of a "nightfighter" is. I may be wrong, but I've always assumed the main purpose of a nightfighter was to intercept and destroy enemy night bombers, and only secondarily to engage other nightfighters in combat. Thus, extremely high performance is far less important than powerful armament, good endurance, and an effective radar suite. By this standard, I'd go with the entire Ju-88 nightfighter series, and maybe secondarily with the P-61. I have my questions about the P-61, however. I presume that it saw most of its service in the Pacific, where the Japanese really lacked equivalent radar equipped types. Can its success really be compared with the Bf110, Ju-88, and Mossie, etc, or is a matter of apples and oranges?

zoomar if we can ever get out Kommando Welter-Mossie-jagd book completed you for one will get a much better picture of how the Me 262 did as a night fighter, as my friend and really the writer of our book is going through stomach cancer treatments it will be still be awhile to get the volumes completed.

due to the technology of text messaging and emails we have found the info hidden far away in east Germany to come to light like it has never been lost, old archiv's are coming about and new research is being found.

sure myths are still abounding for both sides of the conflict, and trying to compare which is the best is still a strong struggle. I have been studying and researching the LW night fighters for one well over 40 years and much info has changed just the last 10 years

Great news about the newly found informations; really sorry your friend has the cancer

I found some information in regards of a flyoff between the P-61 and the Mossie. In this case, the Mosquito Mk 17. This is from a book called "Northrop P-61 Black Widow, The Complete History and Combat Record," Pg. 73. Section entitled, The P-61 Versus the Mosquito. This took place around July, 1944. There was to be a combat evaluation to determine if the P-61 should be replace with the Mosquito. This evaluation took place at the Hurn Airdrome near the Normandy beachhead. Col. Oris B. Johnson was placed in charge of the combat evaluation. This account was from Jim Postlewaite of the 422nd NFS. Upon hearing of the possible change to the Mossie, Jim relates..."We took our wings off and went into O.B. and laid them on the table and said, 'If we don't fly the '61, we all quit,' and walked out." The flyoff between the two aircraft came shortly afterward..."The Northrop technical representative took O.B.'s airplane and screwed the props down so they wouldn't fly off and put Norm Williams and Donald Doyle in as the crew. They went up and they took that Mosquito apart."
Further in the account was written, "On the 5th, the long awaited test with a Mosquito was laid on at 1600. Squadron Leader Barnwell of 125 Squadron and his R/O versus Lt. Donald J. Doyle and F/O Norman N. Williams. The P-61 more than exceeded even our wildest hopes, being faster at 5K, 10K, 15K, and 20K ft.; outturned the Mossie at every altitude and by a big margin; and far surpassed the Mossie in rate of climb. We could go faster and slower up or down. Faster than the pride of the British - a most enjoyable afternoon!"

Further on in this section was written that other flyoffs were done between the two aircraft. A Lt. Gen. Carl Spaatz was against the Widow being produced in quantity and wanted a flyoff done so it was arranged at Eglin Field Florida. At this place they said the Mossie did better. A Col. Kratz didn't agree with the Lt. Gen. so another flyoff was done. This time the P-61 did better. Another flyoff was done this time using test pilots for both planes. The result was the P-61 flying better and a requisition for more P-61's. This section finishes with this, "I'm absolutely sure to this day that the British were lying like troopers. I honestly believe the P-61 was not as fast as the Mosquito. The British needed the Mosquito because by that time it was the one airplane that could get into Berlin and back without getting shot down. I doubt very seriously that the others know better.... The P-61 was not a superior night fighter. It was not a poor night fighter; it was a good night fighter. It did not have quite enough speed." Just thought I would share this little tidbit of information with all.

the accont is different depending on what source(s) you access. I have said this before the account affirms my thoughts and also with interviews from the 425th nfs vets that the US NF crews wanted "their own" aircraft not to fly an RAF one.

Here is your best night fighter or certainly one of the best. One needs to remember that this was a single seater using the AN/APS -6 radar. This is an old U.S. Navy photo and in the public domain so feel free to share.

<IMG SRC="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ef/F6F-3N_NAS_Jax_1943.jpg">

skeeter said:

Here is your best night fighter or certainly one of the best. One needs to remember that this was a single seater using the AN/APS -6 radar. This is an old U.S. Navy photo and in the public domain so feel free to share.

<IMG SRC="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ef/F6F-3N_NAS_Jax_1943.jpg">

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Why would you consider it better than the Mossie, Ju 88 or P-61?

For one thing, it was shipborne, and as such, very versatile. And effective in the hands of a skilled pilot. Naval pilots, as we all know, were among the best. This is not to say that land based pilots were not. But try navigating back to a a spot on the ocean in the dark and see what I mean, with or without navigational aids, then land on a carrier. I've got to run something has come up.

Erich said:

the accont is different depending on what source(s) you access. I have said this before the account affirms my thoughts and also with interviews from the 425th nfs vets that the US NF crews wanted "their own" aircraft not to fly an RAF one.

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I agree with you on the different accounts. Pilots were biased then as they are now. The account I put was from interviews of those actually there. The impression I walked away with was the British didn't try to beat the P-61. They needed that plane to hit Germany and any orders by the U.S. for Mossie's would subtract planes that could have been put with their own forces. IMO I believe the British pilots may have blown the competition on purpose so that the U.S. wouldn't order Mossie's. In the end, it's just an interesting bit of information with some historical value.

The F6F-3N is ok but it didn't have the ability to stay on station for great amounts of time like the Mossie, Ju 88, or the P-61. It was also only due to the fact that the radar was made smaller that it even got to be a night fighter in the later half of the war. In the beginning, AI radar had to be used on two engine planes because it was so heavy. No one is questioning the skill of Navy pilots but to run the old radars and fly the plane as a fighter was more practical with the larger planes than with the smaller ones.

How many night kills did it achieve during WWII?

The fighter pilots have to rove in the area alotted to them in any way they like, and when they spot an enemy they attack and shoot him down, anything else is rubbish.

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Manfred von Richthofen

The AFDS wanted to do a test to compare the P61 to the Mossie but it didn't take place as the aircraft supplied by the US wasn't representative of a front line aircraft. I believe that it was lighter than a front line machine missing a number of pieces of equipment amongst other changes.

The difference was such that they didn't go ahead with the test, not even accepting the P61 for an indicative comparison.