Best fighter of WW2

The P-51 didn't just have a liquid-cooled engine - it had the liquid-cooled engine !

What would we have done without the Rolls-Royce Merlin to power the P-51, Spitfire, Hurricane, Mosquito and Lancaster ?

( OK, it went into some dogs too, Battle, Defiant, etc. - but it just has to be one of the greatest engines ever. )

 

Good point Martin. The Merlin engine was probably one of the best piston engines..... EVER !!! It allows better performance throughout the altitude ranges than most other engines. Be it liquid cooled or air cooled. It also allowed a pretty high service ceiling. It sounds nice anyway.

Didn't the Spitfire switch to a Griffon engine after Mk.XIV???

 

Yes, it did.

The Griffon was basically an enlarged Merlin incorporating many detail improvements. It was certainly more powerful but also longer, heavier, and didn't sound so nice !

 

Good point there Martin. The Merlin engine sound really, really, really, really cool.

 

These are my thoughts:

Best British fighter plane: The Spitfire. Very fast, very maneuverable, and very pretty. Carried a fair amount of armnament and was an Me.109 killing machine. Didn't do so good against the Fw. 190 however......

Best American fighter plane: The P-51 Mustang. This is my favorite overall fighter plane. This plane could take care of most, if not all, German fighter planes until very late 1944, early 1945 (Ta.152/Me.262). As I said earlier it accounted for 48.9% of all damge inflicted on the enemy by fighter planes in Europe. The war probably could not have been won without the P-51.

Best German fighter plane: The Fw.190. Ta. 152 and Me.262 came too late in the war. It was pretty tough to handle, but could hold it's own, at least for a little while, against most allied fighter planes.

Best Russian fighter plane: The Yak 9??? Don't know much about Russian planes. The reason Russian planes do exceptionally well is because they were built in such large numbers.

Best Japanese fighter plane: The Zero. I was going to say the Purple Lightning, but this plane also came a little late. The Zero was un stopable until the arrival of the Hellcat.

Other fighter planes.....

Best American Carrier based fighter plane: The F6F Hellcat. Stopped the unstoppable Zero. Was probably the reason the Japs did not go farther.

Best German Nighttime fighter/Bomber destroyer: The Me.410/Me.110. Very heavy armnament. Could take out most bombers if not spotted by a P-51 first.

Best American Landbased fighter in the Pacific: The P-38. Almost unstoppable in the Pacific. Top Two American aces flew P-38's in the Pacific. For every 11 planes shot down by a P-38 1 was shot down.

Best Russian Ground Attack Fighter: Il-2 Sturmevick. Most heavily armoured plane in WWII. Tank Destroyer.

Best American Ground Attack Fighter: The P-47. All I can say is *Duh*.

The Mosquito was a pretty good British nighttime fighter. The Lavochkin was right up there with the Yak. French, Australian, etc. fighter planes just weren't in this class.

Best Fighter Plane....The Mustang. Quite simply, it's the reason the goodguys won.

I hope this brings some more discussion to a dying topic.

 

sure, the P-51D was a great machine but if we check the aces planes (great WWII aces=Luftwaffe aces) of this war, a bog number of them were flying the Messerschmitt Bf-109....and please just check the Bf-109G series. Unfortunately the Focke-Wulf Ta-152C arrived too late....

 

The context of time makes this a difficult one to call, but fun to debate...

Like the Spitfire, the Me/Bf 109 Series was 'in it from the beginning' right up to the wars' end. I think perhaps the Spitfire design lent itself to 'upgrading' slightly better than the 109 but both aircraft were probably becoming a little outclassed by the latter stages of the war.

Every type has it's partisans ( especially on these Forums ) but there's no doubt whatsoever that the the 109 is one of the truly classic fighter designs ever.

 

Agreed Martin!

Anyway, wasn´t it the Bf 109 that during take off always tried to steer to the left and caused many kaput planes? If you did not know or were not familiar with it, then it was a problem. Probably you remember better?

 

The real problem with the 109 was the very narrow and awkwardly-angled undercarriage. Coupled with the torque-induced 'swing' of the big DB engine takeoffs could be very difficult, but landings could be very hazardous and many pilots, especially the inexperienced, were injured or killed in accidents.

To a lesser degree, the Spitfire had the same problem. Aircraft of later design ( see for instance the Fw190 ) had wide-stance undercarriages which are much safer and more predictable.

 

my two-cents on this highly volitile subject....


both 109 and Fw 190 had terrible line of sight problems on take off and the 109 was a big problem on landing due to just those problems that Martin mentioned. You all have probably seen the 1943-1944 pics of both units taking off side by side, a real plus when trying to get a whole staffel airborne. A hardpack grass or dirt surface was much more ideal than the airsptrips of the nowadays.....

E

 

I vote for the Spitfire. It was at the start of the war and it was used long after the war is over.

For a carrier fighter I am not sure if the Hellcat or the Zero would be the better fighter. I guess it would depend on the pilot. Again the Zero was in the war start to finish.

For a night fighter I like the Black Widow.

 

I think I would have to go for the Yak-9 in a pure fighter vs fighter situation. A Spitfire on steroids with outstanding maneuverability, turn rate, and acceleration, plus it climbed like a bat out of hell.

 

I reckon the Arado Ar196 (one of the only seaplanes used outside the Pacific theatre) was probably one of the best fighters. It was primarily used by the Luftwaffe for reconnaissance. However it had a much higher preformance rating against such allied types as the Curtiss Seagull and the Fairey Seafox and was given more formidable armaments. Even though outclassed by other fighters the Arado Ar196 had a high preformance record and was used mainly in the Mediterranean.
Along with the Arado Ar196 I believe the Spitfire was good as well

Jet

 

After four years of air to air wars where most of the time the advantage went to their opponents, the Germans really had to know how to fly.

 

best fighter....

 

best fighter....

hmmmm thats tough because the most successful fighter i feel was the p-47, and many aces preferred it over the p-51 for its ruggedness and dependability.

109-ks were also a pretty divine piece of German engineering for its time. If we throw out the Doras and some of the later models of the p-51, and focus on the bulk of the war; I'd say the best of the war was between, the 109 k-4 and p-47-d.

Lets not forget about the Yak-9 either, but in all honesty i don't think it faired to well with the 109s at higher altitudes.


Bill

 

WOW! This thread has been dead for 6 years and mp38 hasn't been here for 6 years either. There are much more recent threads on this subject.

 

I will go with the La-7 and the p-51 mustang.

 

P-51, FW-190, P-47

 

P-51 Mustang or BF-109k