P-47 vs P-51 on a dive

[GScholz]

Oh Eugene Walsh. I figured it had to be an unlucky German that got his jacket snagged on a V2 or something.

[Red Tail 444]

Originally posted by GScholz
Oh Eugene Walsh. I figured it had to be an unlucky German that got his jacket snagged on a V2 or something.

LOL....best one in a while

[GScholz]

[lasersailor184]

Aww, that would suck lol.


Would the excess weight on one side give it a looping path?  I.E. It turns around mid canal and heads for berlin?

[joeblogs]

I have a book somewhwere that claims a test pilot put an F86 prototye into + Mach 1 dive at the sam time Yeager was tooling around in the X1.

Don't know if I beleieve it.

-blogs

Originally posted by GScholz
Then who was?

[frank3]

Well the P-47 could be superior on the Mustang

P-47 Reigns Supreme over P-51 Mustang
Don Whinnem  B-17 Escort Mission  
352nd FG  ETO -  

We were escorting B-17s. I was flying Al Marshall's wing. We got into a mixup and got separated from the Group. I looked over my left shoulder and saw something coming in. I called , 'Al, there's a bandit coming in at 7 o'clock high'.

We did a scissors. Al broke left, I broke right and when I completed my circle it looked like Al was being shot up by an ME109 I put the throttle to the firewall, poured on the water injection and got on his tail. When I got within 200 yards I started firing and got strikes all over the plane. But as soon as he was hit he broke up sharply, and only then did I see the square wingtips and square tail. It was a P-51!

I called our Group Commander, Col. Joe Mason, a real tiger, and said 'Sir,there are some P-51s in the area'. He came back, real caustic, 'The hell they are. They're 109s. Shoot the bastards down'. 'But sir, one of them is a P-51 and I just shot it up pretty good'. Silence.

Well, I located the P-51 again, and by this time he knew we were 47s, so I pulled up alongside to take a look. I didn't know it was Glenn Eagleston, but he looked like he was hurting. There was nothing I could do, so I left him and joined our formation.

I got part of the story later that day and the rest of it 3 months later. It went all the way up to the 8th Fighter Command Hqs......A p-47 had shot up a P-51. Col Mason had to go up there and explain it to the brass. But our story held up. The P-51 was 150 miles off copurse, and his camera film showed him shooting at a P-47.

The trouble was that an FW190 and a P-47 have the same silhouette. You have to see the planview to see the elliptical wings.

Three months later I crash landed near a 9th AF base, and was taken to their hospital with a banged up nose and forehead. Eagleton was stationed there and they knew my name from the flap at Hqs, so he looked me up and we drank beer at the club and flew the mission all over again.

Eagleton swore he was shooting at a FW190, and even my camera film looked like I was shooting at a 109 to our Intelligence Officer. Glenn said the only thing that saved him was the armor shield behind the cockpit.. The bullets came in over his shoulder, hit the instrument panel, knocking most of them out.. When he got to his base it was weathered in and he was forced to bail out. His instruments were too shot up to try it.

And that's how Don Whinnem shot down Glenn Eagleston - something no German pilot was able to do. Glenn ended up with 20 1/2 confirmed victories, tops in the 9th AF. Whinnem was no slouch either. He didn't get credit for that P-51, but he got enough 109s and 190s to make him an Ace.

[Shiva]

Originally posted by joeblogs
I have a book somewhwere that claims a test pilot put an F86 prototye into + Mach 1 dive at the sam time Yeager was tooling around in the X1.

Don't know if I beleieve it.

The first pilot to exceed Mach 1 is likely to be Hans Guido Mutke, who, on on 9 April 1945 entered a 40°-50° dive under full power from 36,000 feet in an Me-262 over Innsbruck. His claim is supported by the fact that the controls of the aircraft became totally ineffective shortly before reaching the sound barrier and then full control was regained a few moments later. At the same time both engines flamed-out and the aircraft suffered severe damage. lt is as a result of a pure coincidence that he came to realise that he must have exceeded Mach 1 on this flight on 9 April 1945 with the Me262 "Weisse 9" from III EJG-2. This occurred during a discussion with a group of test pilots during the international meeting "50 Years of Jet Powered Flight" held in Munich in 1989.

Interestingly, Me 262 A-1 Pilot's Handbook, ref: F-SU-111-ND dated 10 January 1946, issued by Headquarters AIR Material Command, Wright Field, Dayton, Ohio (Classification cancelled; 3 June 1955), has the following text on page 13:

Speeds of 960 km/hr (590mph) are reported to have been obtained in a shallow dive 20° to 30° from the horizontal. No vertical dives were made. At speeds of 950 to 1000 km/hr (590 to 620 mph) the air flow around the aircraft reaches the speed of sound, and it is reported that the control surfaces no longer affect the direction of flight. The results vary with different airplanes; some wing over and dive while others dive gradually. It is also reported that once the speed of sound is exceeded, this condition disappears and normal control is restored.

Note the underlined text. Information about the performance of the 262 included material from the British test pilots who flew the plane. How would they be able to describe the plane's supersonic performance if the plane couldn't exceed Mach 1?

It's also reported that an XP-86 pilot named Welch exceeded Mach 1 in a dive shortly before Yeager's flight, and that Chalmers Goodlin had flown the X-1 supersonic on 5 May 1947, but after 26 flights in the aircraft was taken off the project and the aircraft handed over to the military.

[Wilbus]

It's believed that the 262 was the first plane to brake the sound barrier in high altitude dives (not on purpose of course). There is a good story by a pilot on the web but I can't seem to find it again.

"It is believed that the Messerschmitt Me 262, the first operational jet powered aircraft, was able to break the sound barrier during dives. There are numerous reports of pilots of sudden, strange aerodynamic behavior during dives that are consistent with the effects while breaking the sound barrier, plus a number of unexplained crashes during high speed dives. Pilots described it as the plane being hit with a large hammer, often resulting in damage to the plane."

Search the web, you can find some nice stories about it. AFAIK there was one pilot who survived such a dive (his 262 never flew again after he landed). Can't find the page on the web tho.

[hogenbor]

I never heard about 262's breaking the sound barrier, ever. Wishful thinking? Also the story that an F-86 might have manged it is new to me, but that seems remotely plausible.

Is there someone here with a background in aerodynamics that has in informed opinion about whether or nor a 262 would be able to go supersonic without breaking up?

And, as we all know, some 262's are being built in Texas, one of them is flying as we speak. Could we persuade the chief test pilot to try a vertical dive and see oi the story is true?

[FBYeoman]

There's a lot of stuff of written about the P47D being the best plane for diving, but when I dive in the P51D I can exceed the speed of the P47D's dive.  Not sure what's going on.

[Steve]

Blammo, if you get a chance to repeat that scenario, you'd probably get a good laugh at making the pony overshoot  then wathcing it frantically trying to get out of your 8 .50's way.  Makes me chuckle just thinkin about it.

[Roscoroo]

Originally posted by hogenbor
I never heard about 262's breaking the sound barrier, ever. Wishful thinking? Also the story that an F-86 might have manged it is new to me, but that seems remotely plausible.

Is there someone here with a background in aerodynamics that has in informed opinion about whether or nor a 262 would be able to go supersonic without breaking up?

And, as we all know, some 262's are being built in Texas, one of them is flying as we speak. Could we persuade the chief test pilot to try a vertical dive and see oi the story is true?

Heres the guys to ask http://www.stormbirds.com/ They probly have accumalated the most info on the me 262 ...  (BTW they moved to Everett Wa.)

[HoHun]

Hi Blammo,

>Question is:  How?  A pony can outdive a P-47?  

Certainly. The P-47 in real life had a great acceleration in a steep dive but had a far lower Mach limit than the P-51 so in long dives, it would lose out.

By the way, I believe it's impossible that the Me 262 ever broke the sonic barrier in a dive. Control was lost even before Mach 0.9 was reached, and the aircraft would either have come out of the dive on its own without reaching Mach 1.0 or - and that actually happened more than once - continued the dive out of control, self-destructing itself - without reaching Mach 1.0, again.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

[Guppy35]

Originally posted by Angus
Eugene Walsh, flying a prototype(?) jetfighter (Sabre I belive) in a dive actually.
Yeager was the first to break through in a level flight. Walsh died while trying that, and so did Geoffrey De Havilland. I do not know if it is belived whether those made it through the barrier.

Just to clarify.  His name was George Welch, and he was one of the pilots that got airborne at Pearl Harbor.  He did the test flying on the XP86 and there is some belief he broke the sound barrier in a dive in the 86 prior to Yeager doing it in level flight.  Certainly the 86 was capable of this and it was done often by service pilots flying the F86

Dan/Slack

[Overlag]

Originally posted by Staga
That's possible IF Me-262 was at level flight but if both were in dive... I don't think so or P-51 was capable to pass sound barrier.

well it is here, i was doing close to 600 (probably 560-580ish) once in my 262 and a P51 with 2k alt advantage gunned me down and overtook me.............

i knew the P51D was fast, but not that fast.

so i upped one to see how fast i could get it and i couldnt get it going as fast as my 262 was even in a 90degree dive(remember i forgot how fast i was flying since it was along while ago)