P51 /F4U-4 Debate

A small interesting read on these two planes

http://www.flightglobal.com/airspace/blogs/dakota67/archive/2008/03/24/the-great-p-51d-f4u-4-debate-continues-64-years-on.aspx

My take

The P-51D’s strong side are long range escort and superior visability.
Acceleration are excellent and I don’t think there are any a/c in the game that accelerates that well.
Best of all, the P-51 are cheap and production time at the end of the war was less than 3000 man-hours.

Cons: Maneuverbilty are less than stellar under 18,000ft and if there are too much fuel in the rear tank it will fly like a brig. The P-51’s liquid cooled engine are like a glassjaw in the groundattack role.

In short; The P-51B/C/D are a highly specialised aircraft which should only be used as a high altitude fighter and escort aircraft.

The Corsair are an allround aircraft.

Pro’s: It is sturdy, fast and can haul a lot of load.

The cons; The visability are less than stellar, production cost was high. I think I saw a source that stated it was 1/3 more expensive than the Hellcat :eek: It use a lot of fuel.
The cost and production time would have prevented it from bieng used on such a large scale as the P-51B/C/D.

I love flying the Corsair becourse we fly it so seldom. Against the Japanese fighters the Corsair are superior. Only the Ki-84 and Ki-100 are better (in the game*).

In a 1 vs 1 agaist the Fw190A/D, my money are on the Fw190A.
The 190A have a superior visability and guns and required less manhours to produce.

  • Statistics and reportes quoted in the book: “Brute Force” reports a very different picture from the US after war evaluation of the Ki84.
    Many was lost during transferflights to enginefailures, hydralicfailures and airframefailures. The remaining examples, examined in Japan often lack armourplating and selfsealing fueltanks. It have been speculated that the example the US recived for flighttesting in the US, where in prestine condition.

Hi Starfire,

I have to agree with everything you have said, they were both ideal for the role they played.

I just came across this and its nice to read other peoples opinions

Stevie

I see guns and aircrafts as tools.
(I used to play a ropleplayinggame with lots of handweapons :cool:)
My choice depends on the job at hand :smiley:
Some tools are better for a job than others and some tools are cheaper