Best Heavy Fighter

[Masherbrum]

R-2800s make perfectly adequate bomb truck, or transport mills - sure,
where a dedicated flight engineer can fart about fettling throttle/boost/mixture/cooling gills & etc..

All stuff a fighter jock don't need with a Messerschmitt  up his arse..

& stuff a `51 pilot [& even a radial powered 190 jockey] didn't have to do..

You are the one being 'absolutely ad-hominem'..
- how much `51H stick time do you have? L.O.L...

So you have 0.  Pretty much sums up your posts in this thread.

[J.A.W.]

Blah, blah, blah...

I have more primary source documents in my collection than you can possibly imagine. Almost all have been digitized, filling two 1 terabyte drives. I also have a vast collection on books and manuals.

The F8F's time to climb record was for Piston Engine aircraft. Be that as it may, A jet didn't beat it for about 8 years. Oh, and that "stiff headwind" is hysterical.

How about a recent comparison? At the 2011 Jacqueline Cochran Air Show, an F8F-2 and P-51D took off side by side. Okay, not really. The F8F was passing 2,000 feet before the Mustang had the gear coming up.

Watch the first 30 seconds...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5HfqMtksBI

I also like this brief video... The F8F pilot makes a couple of high speed passes at MIL power, which you will never see at an airshow....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kw6UWPaTUt0

My friend Chris Fahey is a pilot for the Planes of Fame Museum. Chris was a career F-16 pilot and currently flies for Delta. Chris has many hours in the F8F-2, P-51D, P-38J, F6F-5, F-86 and MiG-15 to name just a few. I asked him, what in his experienced opinion was the best air to air prop fighter ever made. Without hesitation, Chris stated, "the F8F Bearcat". He called it the closest thing with a propeller to an F-16.

(Image removed from quote.)

Left to right... Steve Hinton, John Hinton, Chris Fahey, Stewart Dawson, Kevin Eldridge and the mighty F7F-3N Tigercat.

"Blah, blah, blah" indeed - the `51D Grumman contemporary is the F6F..

How would that match-up go.. L.O.L.

 As the service test programs verified & published performance  data sets show,
[& which you studiously ignore Ww..]
the `51H would cream that tubby F8F - if both were in true mil-spec..

Yes Ww, that F8F airshow stunt stiff headwind was hysterical, equivalent to a CV
steaming on flying ops.. [& don't mention that the fix was in on the ADI boost control, too]..

Say, just how much stick time does C. Fahey have in a '51H on 90in boost?

As much as you? L.O.L...

& you finally post a link with some worthwhile info, which confirms the 3rd rank USAAF status of the P-38 in the ETO..

 Good effort Ww.. Keep it up..

[J.A.W.]

So you have 0.  Pretty much sums up your posts in this thread.

You do know what ad-hominem means don't you?

If I happened to be an ex-B.A. Concorde Captain with more Mach 2 hours than you have [zero is it?] - would that mean your ability to discuss the facts about supersonic flight is zero?

[SirNuke]

damn, that F8F takeoff is impressive. Never seen a prop plane take that kind of angle in an air show...this is jet territory

[SmokinLoon]

I like pie.   

[J.A.W.]

I like pie.  

Me too, with a light firm golden pastry holding  big chunky pieces of juicy beef steak in a rich tasty gravy..
...mmm..savoury..aarrrgghh.. as Homer J. would say..

[J.A.W.]

Ok, here are the USN/USAF Service documents showing performance characteristics of standard F8F & 51H aircraft..

http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.org/F8F/F8F-2_Standard_Aircraft_Characteristics.pdf

http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.org/mustang/F-51H_Mustang_SAC_-_22_March_1949.pdf

Note: neither of these US hot-ship recip's could match the
419 mph S.L. speed of the mil-spec Sabre powered Hawker Fury..
..Although to be fair, it did have 3,000+hp to spend doing it..

http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.org/Fury/Sea_Fury_Flight.pdf

[Brooke]

The P-51H seems like a performance monster on WEP (climb rate of 5500 fpm), but more like a typical Mustang without WEP:



You can find Bearcat performance without WEP here:  http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.org/F8F/F8F-2_Standard_Aircraft_Characteristics.pdf
The Bearcat without WEP is much a better climber than the P-51H without WEP, but what are they both with WEP?

For Bearcat climb rate with WEP, my best reference is this one (written by the test pilot's son, who has access to his dad's log book):

http://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/aviation/goodyear-f2g-vs-grumman-f8f-bearcat-33022-5.html#post911193

This gives the Bearcat's WEP climb rate as about 5900 fpm and explains how the F8F might have had time to climb record yet still not be in FAI records (as FAI wasn't keeping such records until 1951).

[Brooke]

Note: neither of these US hot-ship recip's could match the
419 mph S.L. speed of the mil-spec Sabre powered Hawker Fury..

The chart shows sea-level speed of the Centaurus-powered Sea Fury to be 402 mph.  Where are you getting the 419 mph number for a Sabre-powered version from?

This reference (Sea Fury FB Mk II) gives 380 mph as top sea-level speed (probably not WEP, I'm guessing):
http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.org/Fury/Sea_Fury_Hawker.pdf

Top sea-level speed of the P-51H on WEP was 424 mph.  For the Bearcat without WEP, it was 386 mph.

[J.A.W.]

Yes thanks for that link Brooke, since it confirms that the USN stunt F8F was
not true mil-spec & the conditions [ very stiff headwind] didn't meet FAI record requirements..

& of course the little V-1650-9 had to be wound up hard & be lightly loaded to beat those big R-2800 powered F8F figures..

http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.org/mustang/p-51h-booklet-pg15.jpg

[J.A.W.]

The chart shows sea-level speed of the Centaurus-powered Sea Fury to be 402 mph.  Where are you getting the 419 mph number for a Sabre-powered version from?

This reference (Sea Fury FB Mk II) gives 380 mph as top sea-level speed (probably not WEP, I'm guessing):
http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.org/Fury/Sea_Fury_Hawker.pdf

Top sea-level speed of the P-51H on WEP was 424 mph.  For the Bearcat without WEP, it was 386 mph.

Brooke, for Sabre-Fury specs see the link in post #282, this thread.

& the USAF figures give 358 knots/406 mph for max boost `51H  S.L. speed..

[J.A.W.]

This article has a graph - line marked 'Standard Tempest 6'
- which shows that the post-war Sabre-Tempest running 17.25lb boost
could do 'bout 418mph at S.L. too..

http://www.flightglobal.com/pdfarchive/view/1948/1948%20-%201660
 

[Widewing]

"Blah, blah, blah" indeed - the `51D Grumman contemporary is the F6F..

How would that match-up go.. L.O.L.

 As the service test programs verified & published performance  data sets show,
[& which you studiously ignore Ww..]
the `51H would cream that tubby F8F - if both were in true mil-spec..

Yes Ww, that F8F airshow stunt stiff headwind was hysterical, equivalent to a CV
steaming on flying ops.. [& don't mention that the fix was in on the ADI boost control, too]..

Say, just how much stick time does C. Fahey have in a '51H on 90in boost?

As much as you? L.O.L...

& you finally post a link with some worthwhile info, which confirms the 3rd rank USAAF status of the P-38 in the ETO..

 Good effort Ww.. Keep it up..

Aside from being remarkably ignorant on the topics (which you change every time your argument gets squashed), you don't understand the various circumstances that determine the outcome of air combat. Want to see how the P-51D stacks up against the F6F-5? Join Aces High and I'll show you. You won't like the result.

By the way, the climb rate shown in that public relations document you referenced for the F8F-2 is for MIL power, not combat power with water injection. See below for performance for both F8F types using combat power.

[Brooke]

Yes thanks for that link Brooke, since it confirms that the USN stunt F8F was
not true mil-spec & the conditions [ very stiff headwind] didn't meet FAI record requirements..

The relevant reference (http://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/aviation/goodyear-f2g-vs-grumman-f8f-bearcat-33022-5.html#post911193) confirms the opposite of that.  It explains that it wasn't a stunt (but part of testing that they did with lots of other aircraft as well), doesn't say that there was any headwind, gives time to climb for four different tests on four different days in three different aircraft, verifies that the planes were normal Bearcats loaded with ammo, armor, and 50% fuel, and says that the FAI wasn't officiating any time-to-climb records at that time (let alone having any associated record requirements).

[J.A.W.]

You are too funny Ww, & who changed the topic from `51H vs F4U-4 to F8F?