Worst aircraft of WW2?

[FLYBOYJ]

Originally Posted by Wespe

And shooting down Mig’s in Korea was 8 years later regarding the targeting instrumentation, (or Grabewskis? chewing gum targeting device)

Somewhat of a myth - the F-86 had radar computing sights and they did have some problems, but when rectified the sights worked fine making targeting highly accurate.

[Wespe]

You sure that it is a myth ?

"Gabby" Grabewski - Americas leading Europe WWII ace? And his bubble gum story in Korea ?

Quote: In July, 1951, now-Colonel Gabreski downed his first MiG, flying an F-86 Sabre jet, despite its unfamiliar new gunsight which he replaced with a piece of chewing gum stuck on the windscreen

[FLYBOYJ]

Originally Posted by Wespe

You sure that it is a myth ?

"Gabby" Grabewski - Americas leading Europe WWII ace? And his bubble gum story in Korea ?

Quote: In July, 1951, now-Colonel Gabreski downed his first MiG, flying an F-86 Sabre jet, despite its unfamiliar new gunsight which he replaced with a piece of chewing gum stuck on the windscreen

Not a myth but not typical of the radar computing gun sights on the F-86. He was flying an F-86A in late 1951, early 1952 when that allegedly happened. After that story got out the all the gun sights installed on the F-86 got a bad rap. The A4 gun sight was very accurate and it was recorded that F-86 drivers put every round on target using this sight, that's not to say that it did have problems during its early deployment.

[Civettone]

And that about 300 163's only can show for 11 attacks is no tale. Until today besides props. all aircrafts are jet propelled and the Americans and Russians abandoned all their rocket propelled projects (for combat planes). As I mentioned earlier I have never flown a jet or rocket propelled plane, but I could imagine that regulating the speed is the main issue which led to a focusing towards the jet turbines.

No 300 were ever operational. And there were more than 11 attacks. Perhaps you mean 11 kills.
And just because there were no rocket fighters after the war doesn't mean that it wouldn't have succesful during WW2. I think it would have been succesful until the turbojet would have matched its performance and far exceeded its endurance. But just because something isn't developed further doesn't mean it's a bad design at the time itself. Just think of biplanes. Outdated in the 30s but up till then a good design. IMO the rocket fighter was a good stopgap for interceptors until the arrival of supersonic interceptors. Post-war development of rocket fighters wasn't stopped because the rocket engine wasn't suited for it but because in the 50s the development of the turbojet had evolved so fast that there were no more advantages to the rocket fighter. That's not the case for WW2. You can build 4 Me 163s for the prize of 1 Me 262. And the Fw 190D was not the solution either, it could only hope to match the P-51, and was in no way better than the Bf 109K.

Junkers in Manchuria ? never heard, what was that about ? Something like the New York flight?

Yeah, similar.

Kris

[Wespe]

That the F-190D series could only “hope” to match the P-51 ??. What is so great or outstanding about the P-51. It looks good – fantastic range, okay – so what else ? Do you have any statistics about F-190D’s on P-51 kills or wise versa that makes you so sure to put up that statement?

[FLYBOYJ]

Originally Posted by Wespe

That the F-190D series could only “hope” to match the P-51 ??. What is so great or outstanding about the P-51. It looks good – fantastic range, okay – so what else ? Do you have any statistics about F-190D’s on P-51 kills or wise versa that makes you so sure to put up that statement?

The P-51 wasn't the best performer by any means. What made it great it was easily produced, competitive enough to combat the competition and was easy enough to fly that is made a mediocre pilot a good pilot and the end results were the final evidence of this.

[Wespe]

Hi Civettone,

let's hear what an expert had to say:

"Wolfgang Späte, ein guter Freund, flog die Me 163. Ich hörte, das Problem war, dass das Ding explodierte, wenn beide Treibstoffe zusammenkamen. Deswegen hatten sie hohe Verluste. Es konnte nur als, wie wir es nannten "Objektjäger" gebraucht werden. Sie konnten es erst aufsteigen lassen, wenn sie die Bomber bereits gesichtet hatten, und dann flog sie sehr schnell hoch. Die Haupttaktik, soweit sie mir bekannt ist, bestand darin, von oben anzugreifen, ohne Treibstoff, wenn möglich. Ich kenne keinen, der sie gerne geflogen hat, da sie ein verdammt gefährliches Ding zum Fliegen war. Ich würde sagen, es war eine verrückte Idee - das ist meine Meinung. Wenn du einen Jäger hast und zuerst den Treibstoff verbrauchen musst, dann angreifen und dann eine Segelfluglandung absolvieren musst, das scheint mir nicht besonders sinnvoll"
Luftwaffengeneral Walter Krupinski

Translation:
Wolfgang Spaete a good friend, flew the Me 163. I heard the problem was, that this Thing exploded if both propellants joint. That’s why they had high losses. It could only just as we called it be used as a object interceptor. They could only go up once they had already sighted the bombers and then they flew up very fast. The main tactic as known to me was to attack from above if possible without the liquid propellant. I don’t know anybody who liked to fly them, since they were a dam dangerous thing to fly. I would say it was a crazy idea – that is my opinion. If you have a fighter and you have to use up the propellant first, then attack and then to absolve a glider landing, then this doesn’t make much sense to me.
Air force General Walter Krupinski

Interesting is also that he refers to the Me-163 as a "thing"

Below are two photos; 1st photo was taken 20 min before the 2nd photo. And in the right background of the 2nd photo you can see what the Lw really needed: Fw-190D-12 or Ta-152 - the best props of WWII.

[Civettone]

Wespe, that's a pretty good translation.
I am not calling Späte a liar but there are certain things which are simply not true. His main claim is that they had hohe Verluste but the I/JG 400 received more than a 100 aircraft in 1944. Do you know how many were lost to non-combat? 11! And 6 due to enemy action. It's all BS... and I'm fed up with it!

It looks good – fantastic range, okay – so what else ? Do you have any statistics about F-190D’s on P-51 kills or wise versa that makes you so sure to put up that statement?

The Fw 190D wasn't better than the P-51D. You'll find dozens of discussions on the net which of the two was the best. But that in itself proves that both were rather close to each other performance wise.
I know the Dora quite well and think she was a great fighter. But based on official data I have to conclude that the P-51D still had the edge because it was faster, especially because the Dora still lacked the MW 50 system during 1944.

was easy enough to fly that is made a mediocre pilot a good pilot and the end results were the final evidence of this.

The problem was that the American pilots were the best trained and most confident pilots, and combined with the Mustang a far superior adversary to the average Luftwaffe pilot of 1944.

Kris

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

At what alltitudes are you talking about. There is more to the equation. Because the max speed obtained by a Fw-190D was 704kmh and the max speed obtained by a P-51D was 703kmh. That is fairly even rathre than the P-51 being faster.

The reason I ask is because at certain alltitudes I am sure the P-51 is faster and at certain alltitudes I am sure the Dora is faster.

There is more to what makes a great fighter than speed and numbers my friend.

[Wespe]

Hi Civettone

Well if you think the 163 would have brought any advantage to the Lw, I think you would still be wrong. Let’s face it the Me163 was just a “desperate” solution like Natter and Co.
Regarding Fw better then P51 and all these competitive discussions, I think they lead nowhere since it is still the pilot that makes the difference. And taking some off Germanys best pilots, put them in a Bf 109K and let them compete against a P51 flown by Americas best, would certainly still have ended in favor to the German pilots.
The Fw 190D-12 which my uncle flew had as you surly know a MW 50 charger and he didn’t have a problem to outrun or out fly a P51 or whatever. It comes back to what you pointed out very correctly, the inexperienced Lw pilots from 43 onward.
Quote my uncle; it was ridiculous to put those young pilots into the cockpits with a mere 2-6 hours flying experience. More of them crashed there planes whilst starting then flying. And there was no chance for a non experienced pilot to survive in face of being additionally outnumbered no matter how good the plane was. It was a crime what they did to those young pilots. It took experienced pilots 2-3 engagements to figure out practically (not based on the theory in Flying school) on how to keep the nerves and flight maneuver under control in order to attack a B-17 effectively. And those especially young pilots already got shot down during their fist combat or lost there nerves (understandably) shocked and shaking when they made it back to base. I had 3 years flying experience before the war broke out including the glider experience from the Flieger HJ. And in 44 those young fellows where put into High tec planes such as the Fw and Me 262’s which they could barley bring of the ground. Hitler and his gang never took into account that this war would go on for so long and therefore never paid attention to the flying schools and senior pilots who where demanding a drastic change in pilot recruitment and training procedures. Many times it was also proposed in 43 to rather retrain existing bomber and Zerstoerer pilots into fighter pilots allowing the new pilots to receive a proper basic training. We would have lost the war anyway but at least the lives of many young pilots would not have been wasted for nothing.
Quote my uncle: In the middle of 44 most German planes where shot down by the Americans whilst trying to land, start or being already damaged trailing smoke and being hunted down by 5-6 American planes. There was no honor amongst those cowboys; they just loved to shoot at anything that moved including civilians on the road. It was not comparable to the engagements we had with the English or French earlier, where most engagements were based on one to one and sometimes no shots where exchanged but pilots just flew and even waved at each other. It was just like this Assho…… Goebels proclaimed – total war, for which the Lw was not in a position to do.

Well so much for citing a veteran, so which was the worst plane in WW2?, how about the Gloster Meteor after 4 years of development – fast as a prop, not better then a Mossy and I think didn’t shoot down a thing (besides some V1’s), only the Meteor F.4 in 1947 (thanks to all the German know-how) managed to close in on the performance of the Me-262. And 6 years later in Korea it lost just as many in air combat as it shoot down (6).

Wespe

[FLYBOYJ]

so which was the worst plane in WW2?

The Breda 88....

[Civettone]

Wespe, what is your uncle's name. He's spot on! It was ludicrous that the high brass wanted to put pilots in the air before properly trained.
But there's definitely a flaw in your own reasoning: if you only put the best pilots in the best aircraft, it will lead to nothing. Remember JV 44? And enough of these Experten were shot down, so your claim that they will be victorious against American pilots is simply wrong. Don't think the German pilots like your uncle were superhuman, they were damn good pilots, but all sides had men like these!

The reason I ask is because at certain alltitudes I am sure the P-51 is faster and at certain alltitudes I am sure the Dora is faster.

I don't think so Adler, 704 kmh? Perhaps you're talking about the D-12? The D-9 had a max speed of around 685 km/h, and that's with MW 50.
Even with MW 50 the Fw 190D-9 was not faster than the P-51D, at any altitude!

FW 190 D-9 Flight Trials

There is more to what makes a great fighter than speed and numbers my friend

You want to talk about that too? Like I said, there are more than enough discussions on the net about which was the best, but the only conclusion is that there is not enough difference between them to say that one is definitely better than the other. In any case, the Fw 190D-9 was not better than the P-51D. But the Mustang was there in great numbers and flown by the best trained pilots in the world. So that's why I'm saying the Fw 190D wasn't the solution. And because the Bf 109K was at least as good as the Dora but easier to produce, I don't see any reason for the Dora. But that last bit is just my opinion. My main point was to prove that the "Dora could only hope to match the P-51D".

Kris

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

Originally Posted by Civettone

Wespe, what is your uncle's name. He's spot on! It was ludicrous that the high brass wanted to put pilots in the air before properly trained.
But there's definitely a flaw in your own reasoning: if you only put the best pilots in the best aircraft, it will lead to nothing. Remember JV 44? And enough of these Experten were shot down, so your claim that they will be victorious against American pilots is simply wrong. Don't think the German pilots like your uncle were superhuman, they were damn good pilots, but all sides had men like these!

He is doing what Lanc does and let national pride get in the way.

Originally Posted by Civetone

I don't think so Adler, 704 kmh? Perhaps you're talking about the D-12? The D-9 had a max speed of around 685 km/h, and that's with MW 50.
Even with MW 50 the Fw 190D-9 was not faster than the P-51D, at any altitude!

FW 190 D-9 Flight Trials

I am going to have to look more into that and look at that site you just posted more later because I have never heard of a D-9 flying only 685kmh in optimum conditions. However I am willing to look it up some more, and be proven wrong it is so. We are all here to further our knowledge.

Eitherway the P-51 could not fly 703kmh at every altitude. 703kmh was at its optimum altitude. The P-51 did not fly at its optimum altitude most of the time, because Combat never happens in favorable conditions all the time...

...I know this first hand...

Originally Posted by Civetone

You want to talk about that too? Like I said, there are more than enough discussions on the net about which was the best, but the only conclusion is that there is not enough difference between them to say that one is definitely better than the other. In any case, the Fw 190D-9 was not better than the P-51D. But the Mustang was there in great numbers and flown by the best trained pilots in the world. So that's why I'm saying the Fw 190D wasn't the solution. And because the Bf 109K was at least as good as the Dora but easier to produce, I don't see any reason for the Dora. But that last bit is just my opinion. My main point was to prove that the "Dora could only hope to match the P-51D".

Kris

The Dora was never meant to be the "solution". It was only a stop gap until the Ta-152 came on board.

[Gimmeacannon!]

Worst aircraft? Manchester.

[Gimmeacannon!]

The best fighter is the one with best manauverability, take the Falklands for instance where supersonic Mirage were useless because of lack of the abilty to manauvre effectively and were shot full of holes by the subsonic Harrier.
The Harrier has the ability to manauvre unlike any other aircraft and can even fly backwards, I would put a Mustang up against a Pitts Special anyday to see who would servive and I know which one my money would be on because you have to keep the enemy aircraft in your sights to shoot it down.