Worst aircraft of WW2?

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Vincenzo said:
it's very important know if this are IAS or TAS speed
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It is no guarantee but usually such limitations were given in terms of IAS. This way the limitation would remain relatively constant regardless of altitude and air density.
An allied pilot, having been given this knowledge in a briefing (or passed to him by other pilots) could simply check his airspeed indicator to judge if the Zero was getting into the trouble area with it's ailerons.

True airspeed would require a bit of mental calculation (or lots of experience) to figure out for each altitude.

I could be wrong though
 

You are correct.

A "whiz wheel can be used to figure out TAS but in the middle of combat or conducting a test flight, that would be impractical. In those situations one could probably record altitude and outside air temp and figure out TAS later
 
Armor? Have you got concrete examples?

Do you have statistics? It seems that life expectancy of a P-39 was much longer in soviet service..




C) all the above mentioned points are backed up by raw numbers. German fighters did shoot down russian planes in droves and a lot of them were P-39s.
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Maybe you speak english. They certainly claimed in droves, just as the opposite side. How do you prove that the claimed planes were shooted down. Have you got numbers?

Unstable? Where is it taken from?


As you said...

Regards
 
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One thing I have noticed is a lack of Japanese aircraft on this list. Whilst they did have some pretty mediocre designs are there any you would say stood out as terrible? I'd say the Ki-115 would come closest, but since it never flew on operations I'm not sure if you can count it. The G3M Nell was highly vulnerable to fighter attacks, but was successful in the Sino-Japanese War and the early stages of WW2
 

I'd have a hard time figuring where to place either the Ki-115 or the MXY-7 in such a list. These were planes that would inevitably kill their pilots, so by that measure they were horrible aircraft. Neither were they "good" airplanes from the handling/performance perspective. But since they were designed to be cheap manned missiles, that is not a fair judgement. They need to be judged by how well they acheived the goals set for them. As noted, the much simpler Ki-115 was never used on operations so it's impossible to evaluate its effectiveness, but it had the advantage of versatility. It was not dependent on a carrier plane so could be deployed from all sorts of land bases, which would have suited it well if an Invasion of Japan was ever attempted. Operationally, the Ohka was a mixed bag. It was certainly a faster target and harder to shoot down than normal kamakazi planes, but its extreemly short range and dependence on being launched by slow G4Ms meant that most never got within effective range of their targets before their carriers were destroyed.

If I had to name one Japanese plane as a "worst" it would be the Ki-49 Donryu. A lot of design and production effort went into this JAAF bomber, which was underpowered and hardly an improvement on the Ki-21 it was intended to replace (think Fairey Albacore). The G3M, on the other hand was simply obsolete when needed in WW2. Not a fault in itself. It was also a JNAF plane, which makes a difference. Actually, the JAAF might just qualify as the one major modern airforce in WW2 that, on average, deployed the worst aircraft. Among major types, only the Ki-84 (which appeared after the war had been lost and had its own faults), the Ki-61 (which owed a lot to German influence and its DB engine - and which when introduced in 1943 could best the Bf-109E and P-40 in mock combat - wow!) and the Ki-46 recon plane (a certifiably good plane) came close to matching their western or German competitors. All other JAAF planes were under gunned, underpowered, and underprotected machnes that seemed better than they were in 1941-1942 because they were arrayed against outnumbered, demoralized and dispirited enemy pilots flying obsolete or obsolescent desgns. It says a lot that the Ki-43, which was the mainstay of the JAAF throughout the war was maybe as good as the Brewster Buffalo, and less capable overall than the Hurricaine Mk1.

But back to suicide planes, to me one stands out as even far worse than the Japanese duo. That would be the manned Fi-103 missile, another example of WW2 Germanic "what on earth were they thinking". Here we have a country that was well its the way to introducing a number of sophisticated guided bombs and stand-off missiles and had already introduced a ballistic missile that decided to waste effort and time turning a lousy robot pulse-jet powered cruise missile into an even worse manned pulse-jet powered cruise missile. Plus they were so wishy-washy they trumpeted the thing as a vehicle for Loyal Nazis to kill themselves in if necessary to destroy Allied targets, but provided them with a means of bailing out! Make your minds up people! Are you supposed to die for the furhrer and make sure your target is destroyed or just take ridiculous risks for the furhrer and hope that your now unguided missile hits its target?
 
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What about the Ki-100? That was capable of meeting the P-51D on fairly equal terms
 
Negative Creep said:
What about the Ki-100? That was capable of meeting the P-51D on fairly equal terms
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True, sort of. It is more accurate to say that the Ki-100 was an amazingly successful adaptation of the Ki-61 to take a radial engine and provide a fighter at least as good as the Ki-61 and an effective opponent to US fighters. It is in essence a re-engined Ki-61, which is why I didn't mention it separately. I am unconvinced the Ki-100 was truly the equal of the P-51D, however.
 
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Vincenzo said:
the combats don't give this result
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True, but as I said, the well-trained and aggressive JAAF pilots in their Ki-43s were facing an outnumbered and frequently demoralized allied force. I am always suspicious of combat result alone as the mark of aircraft capabilities.
 
zoomar said:
True, but as I said, the well-trained and aggressive JAAF pilots in their Ki-43s were facing an outnumbered and frequently demoralized allied force. I am always suspicious of combat result alone as the mark of aircraft capabilities.
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type 1 vs hurricane outnumbered? you talkingof actual engagements or on theatre fighters?
 
Hello, since i did not have any answer:

Armor? Have you got concrete examples? Except the gear box and the oxygen bottle's one, it seems the the back' seat armor plate was finally maintained, for firewall rule despite TsAGI considered the engine as being a good protection by itself.




Do you have statistics? It seems that life expectancy of a P-39 was much longer in soviet service.
About 220-230 hours for Alisson (250 h TBO), and 70-80 (100 TBO) for Klimov 105 PF from 5th Air Army statistics. I agree that a soviet 3200-3300 kg P-39 si very different from a 3800 kg british one.

The undisputed tittle of "Hangar Queen" is for the AM-35A with only 35 hours. It explains why the P-39 played a major rule in the VVS and MiG-3 did not!



C) all the above mentioned points are backed up by raw numbers. German fighters did shoot down russian planes in droves and a lot of them were P-39s.
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Maybe you speak english. They certainly claimed in droves, just as the opposite side. How do you prove that the claimed planes were shooted down. Have you got numbers? Life expectancy being about 160 war missions for the P-39 on eastern front from memory, (0.6% loss rate, compare with the B-17 one...) that means a rather poor Luftwaffe and Flack success.




Unstable? Where is it taken from? An old urban legend, like it was a P-26 copy. The CG of the I-16/M-22 was about 30% on the MAC and the I-16/M25 about 28% the AF being placed aft and CP even after, so no unstability phenomenum was observed until some 1939's planes before 36% position and +2° positive tail angle.

So even if the pitching moment was sometimes light for the I-16 and inartia moments very small, the plane was ttwitchy, i. e. prone to react not unstable, never...
It's not the same thing


Not all the statistics being the same, naturally:
>Там же приводится и статистика вырабатываемых ресурсов и по другим самолетам 5-й Воздушной армии.
>Аллисон - 220-230 часов, ВК-105ПФ - 70-80 часов

Also:
В августе 1944 года из 67-го гвардейского полка в отношении Р-39 "Аэрокобра" сообщали: "Мотор положенные ему по ресурсу 250 ч. но норме не вырабатывает... За два года эксплуатации не было, чтобы мотор в боевых условиях нарабатывал хотя бы 60-70% от положенного".

From 67th guards regiment in 1944, august: after 2 years of intensive use no more that 60-70% of the planes reach the official 250 hours of work...but mainly to WEP overuse and abuse and low quality soviet oil and fuel B-78 ranges from 78 to 92/94 octane rate, and B-70 from 70 to 85...The last one was used during Leningrad siege.

The last Allison 83-85 series were also repported as being much more reliable than first ones of 63 family.

Regards
 
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zoomar said:
It says a lot that the Ki-43, which was the mainstay of the JAAF throughout the war was maybe as good as the Brewster Buffalo, and less capable overall than the Hurricaine Mk1.
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Hi,

the Ki-43 was way better than the Hurri1a and Buffalow.

The climb, the turn and the Vmax even of the Ki-43-I was much better, the Ki-43-II and III was lightyears away.

The Ki-43´s flight performence was at least as good as that of the A6M Zero, most probably better, its main disadvantage was missing or poor protection and to bad guns.

Still, by the time of 1941 the Ki-43 was outdated in relation to the Ki-61, Ki-44, SpitVb, 109F after 1942, when the P38, SpitIXc, P47 and later P51 came, the Ki-43 was absolut hopeless.


Greetings,

Knegel
 
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I have the impression that the ki-67 was a quite capable bomber, and though the ki-45 was hopeless as an escort fighter, it proved usefull in ground strikes and arguably as night fighter.

As for bad japanese planes I would suggest Q1W. Though its handling was adequate, it was far to slow and underarmed to have a chance to survive in an hostile air environment, and its radar was hopeless for its purpose.
 
Just Schmidt said:
As for bad japanese planes I would suggest Q1W. Though its handling was adequate, it was far to slow and underarmed to have a chance to survive in an hostile air environment, and its radar was hopeless for its purpose.
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There was actually nothing wrong with this aircraft. It was designed to be an ASW platform which means it was supposed to fly low and slow. In this type of environment it's obvious that the aircraft either has to be adequately armed or be operating in an aircraft where it has aerial superiority. Although this aircraft was not heavily armed, it performed as advertised.
 
FLYBOYJ said:
In this type of environment it's obvious that the aircraft either has to be adequately armed or be operating in an aircraft where it has aerial superiority..
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The problem was that at the time it entered service it neither had good defensive armament, nor did the japanese have any kind of air superiority anywhere. Setting aside the problems of fullfilling its role as an asw, it was (in its environment) suicidal to take it to air when it neither had the speed nor the armament to give it any chance of surviving interception.

Of course this stemmed from the low power it had available, but I still think it compares unfavourably to fx an aircraft as the Fw 189 (though that one wouldn't often be oncountered at sea).
 
Bottom line is it flew as designed, that should be a key factor. Its sole purpose was to hunt for submarines.

Now the Breada 88 never flew as designed and had a dismal operational record.
 
Just Schmidt said:
Agreed it was more misplaced than bad. Do you know if it had anything like protection for the crew and fuel tanks?
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Probably not - it did use early radar and MAD equipment, which was state of the art for that period. I read the radar unit in the aircraft was pretty poor and the crew usually relied on their eyeballs to look for subs (not too uncommon for WW2 ASW). It was supposed to get better radar but that never happened.

It was the first aircraft specifically designed for ASW warfare but there is no record of the aircraft actually sinking a sub.

I found a photo of a captured one
 

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