Why people think the 51D is so uber?

[SAS_KID]

i meen im wondering why everyone thinks the 51D like won the war and stuff. Everyone i know says O a P51 could pwn and WW2 aircraft im thinking my prettythang but nobody gets it. Even WW2 history teachers think it was our savior in the air.  I meen just because it was very fast doesn't meen it is great. Could someone show me some statistics or accounts of why people think it is so great?




Bah someone evwen said a 51D could outturn an A6M2

[DiabloTX]

Im gotta go wit teh Sptfire cuz its all kewl n stuff wit teh canins go pow! pow! pOw! n teh wings sooo kewl n i no that it culd blaze a 109 all ur base r belong to meh!!11!1111!!

[Guppy35]

Originally posted by SAS_KID
i meen im wondering why everyone thinks the 51D like won the war and stuff. Everyone i know says O a P51 could pwn and WW2 aircraft im thinking my prettythang but nobody gets it. Even WW2 history teachers think it was our savior in the air.  I meen just because it was very fast doesn't meen it is great. Could someone show me some statistics or accounts of why people think it is so great?

Bah someone evwen said a 51D could outturn an A6M2

Kid, ya gotta do a bit of research  Who is everyone btw?  I've never heard everyone say what you claim they said.  I'm part of everyone and I'd never say that.

The 51 wasnt really the best at anything, but was very good at a lot of things and it could compete with the best the bad guys had to offer and do it over the bad guys turf. There really isn't an Axis fighter you can say that about. Combine it with the incredible range it had and it became the best plane for the job, whether it be escorting B17s and 24s to Berlin, or escorting B29s to Tokyo.

And it was a relatively easy bird to fly, less expensive to produce then say the P38 for example and easier to maintain.

[RTSigma]

The P-51 went up against Axis planes, not Spits or P47s or 38's or Yaks. They also faced against an airforce that had a expotential rise of loss of experienced pilots and fuel.

It has great visibility, a potent gun package, range up the wazoo, could carry some decent bombs, and it was a stable, all-around performer in various combat scenes.


In the MA, it has a tougher job for those that stay around to engage the enemy (rather than engage it's hyperdrive). I love flying the 51 and it's combat flaps and turn radius is acceptable against some of the larger planes those meant for Bnz's. The 51 can BnZ pretty well, but it can go too fast and any sudden adjustment can lead to the shearing of wings or blacking out quickly.


My tip? Get a wingman. A wingman will make any plane better than an opponent's.

[Saxman]

Easy to fly?! A lot of what I've seen about the 51 makes her MORE dangerous for her own pilots than even the F4U.

[bkbandit]

i lov 51, Its faster then majority of the planes in the game, its pretty rugged, solid guns with enuff ammo,It can carry 2 1000lbers with rockets, great views,dont even talk about range and those high speed turns are something else(i never riped my wings off in a dive, unlike those light wieght spits).  THe plane really is more of a complete package rather then one or two great attributes.  Its just a plane that takes time to learn how to use.  HIstorically the mustang went against a real tough bunch of germans, there top ace had like 200+ killes and the germans continued to have aces through out the war. The biggest thing it did was bring those bombers to berlin because with out the allies bringin the fight into there home court those 262 would have been all over. The biggest problem with the game is that all the newbies jump straight into it not noeing wat there doin(i did the same thing,had to learn and i out grew the spit  and got back in it and appreciated wat it could do).  Check out some ww2 pages and read up.

RTsimga the jug p38 and yak all fought against the axis.  Allot of people forget that the p47 was all over before the mustang came.  The jug fought on all fronts(run into a jug fan and say 51, he'll gladly tell you about it).  Also the p38 was big time in the pacific.  And the spits and hurris won the battle of britian.  The mustang kinda over shadows the rest of the allied planes but there was alot of other great planes in the air(f6f,f4u,etc).

[RTSigma]

Originally posted by bkbandit


RTSimga the jug p38 and yak all fought against the axis.  Allot of people forget that the p47 was all over before the mustang came.  The jug fought on all fronts(run into a jug fan and say 51, he'll gladly tell you about it).  Also the p38 was big time in the pacific.  And the spits and hurris won the battle of britian.  The mustang kinda over shadows the rest of the allied planes but there was alot of other great planes in the air(f6f,f4u,etc).

What I meant is that the 51 was great against the axis planes during WWII because of the situation and the abilities of the pilots and the plane, but never had to dogfight against Yaks, 38's, Spits, Tiffies, or any Allied plane.

[DiabloTX]

Originally posted by RTSigma
What I meant is that the 51 was great against the axis planes during WWII because of the situation and the abilities of the pilots and the plane, but never had to dogfight against Yaks, 38's, Spits, Tiffies, or any Allied plane.

Soccer war.

From the Wiki: "The war is often cited as the last occasion on which piston engined fighters fought each other - both sides deploying former World War II American types. P-51 Mustangs, F4U Corsairs, T-28 Trojans and even Douglas DC-3s converted into bombers saw action. The Salvadoran Air Force was so out of shape that they reverted to dropping bombs by hand from the windows of their planes."

[HoHun]

Hi Saskid,

>I meen just because it was very fast doesn't meen it is great.

It was fast in level flight, it was fast in a dive, it could go high, and it could range far.

Its direct contenders were the P-47 and the P-38.

The limiting Mach numbers, important for the dive speed, were something like Mach 0.75 for the P-47, 0.72 for the P-38, and around 0.80 for the P-51. Major advantage for the P-51 over the P-38 - it only tells up high, but up high is where the fight took place back then.

Then there is range. When the P-51 was introduced, it had a major range advantage over the P-47, making it the escort fighter of choice for the 8th Air Force. It could be the P-47 caught up later, but by that time, the 8th Air Force was (almost) an all-Mustang air force.

The P-51's opponents were the Me 109 and the Fw 190.

The P-51B/C was introduced into combat service in the European Theatre of Operation in December 1943. At that time, it held a major speed advantage over the then-current Me 109s and Fw 190s, and since the P-51 had a two-stage supercharger where the German aircraft had only a single-stage one, they didn't quite catch up with regard to high altitude speed even when improved versions came out. The P-51 always remained superior in that aspect.

>Could someone show me some statistics or accounts of why people think it is so great?

The Mustang was the fighter that defeated the Luftwaffe. At least, that was the opinion of the Luftwaffe.

With regard to statistics, a forum search will bring up a monthly deployment overview showing that the P-51 was the dominant fighter in the 8th Air Force from early 1944 on.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

[Angus]

When Hermann Göring heard of a new single engine fighter roaming over the center of Germany (This was before D-Day) he said something like "Now we are doomed"

[bkbandit]

yea i heard a documentary say the something. They fly other him i think.

[Henrique Jitsu]

If I were able to outurn a a6m5 in a spit8, I dont doubt a good player can outturn a a6m2 in a p51D...

maybe the zero lost an elevator

[Schwein]

The P-51 was a mediocre fighter in all respects except speed and range. It was very successful over Europe because speed and range are the only two aspects of a fighter's performance you can't compensate for with superior numbers.

So the P-51 gave the Allies a fighter that could fly to Berlin and back. And to compensate for its mediocre performance they made sure they had every possible tactical advantage in numbers and altitude. Whenever the Axis got the upper hand the P-51 had the speed to disengage.

Simple really.

[SAS_KID]

Originally posted by Guppy35
Kid, ya gotta do a bit of research  Who is everyone btw?  I've never heard everyone say what you claim they said.  I'm part of everyone and I'd never say that.

Not in AH in RL around my area it seems like everyone is brain washed that the 51 actually won the war by itself...



Thanks for the info all.

[Pooface]

i still think the spitfire was the most influential plane of the war, simply because it did so much over such a long period of time. the mustang never had to deal with the might of the early luftwaffe. now of course, this is a biased british view

but i still think it's the one of the most beautiful and most influential killing machines in history