The Greatest Fighter?

[J.D.]

The BF109 was "over vaunted". The cockpit was too small and rearward visibility was poor. When in combat and the automatic leading edge slats would deploy or retract the aircraft would rock, frustrating the pilot in his attempts to aim the aircraft's weapons. At 400mph the BF109's elevator controls became extremely heavy and almost impossible to move. The BF109 also lacked a rudder trim which increased the workload and fatigue of the pilot.

The critical factor here was how it was used. Any fighter, within reason, will be effective if it is used effectively. The Bf109 was a "zoom and boom aircraft". In American terms, an energy fighter. The Gloster Gladiator and to a lesser extent the Zero, were manoeuvre ("angles") fighters. Virtually all the aircraft of WWII were energy fighters. Few were more so than the 109.

None of the types mentioned had more than two or three good turns in them.

Britain produced three truly great aircraft during the war - the Spitfire, Mosquito and Lancaster.

Interesting that he mentioned the Lanc... I never thought of it as being in the same league as the Mosquito. Just MHO.

On the subject of the Spitfire vs the P-51 Brown said the P-51 was easily the best American dogfighter, but it had no hope of turning with a Spitfire. Although the Mustang had a greater roll rate than the Spitifre the laminar wing also gave it rather nasty stall characteristics. He said in a dogfight he would rather be in a Spitfire, unless the dogfight was over Berlin, where only the Mustang would give him enough fuel to get home.

Neither of those aircraft could have been considered to have had a laminar flow wing. The Spitfire wing was never intended to be laminar flow - the Spiteful was - and although the Mustang was intended to be laminar, manufacturing standards of the day were not up to the task. Secondly, since 80% of kills are done by complete surprise, turning ability is only one aspect of combat. Better to have it than lack it but in that case you simply fight to your aircraft's own strengths and use speed and roll rate (which was generally superior in the Mustang). Don't get sucked into a turning fight if speed or climb is your best asset. The Mustang was also available in greater numbers than the Mk XIV. I have always thought the Spit XIV was the greatest evolution of the type and I'm interested to see Brown's opinion of it was so high, as here:

The two best propeller driven fighters of the war were the Spitfire XIV and FW190D.

but again, neither of those aircraft was available in sufficient numbers to have any effect on the outcome of the war.

Soviet fighters and their engines were not built to last. The workmanship was "rough and ready" and it did have an effect on the aircraft's performance.

Hardly surprising under the circumstances! The Mikulin AM-34RN featured a very advanced DOHC when it first ran in 1934. It was a very good engine but didn't have the development work done on it that the Merlin had. I don't think the Soviets ever had 100 octane fuel either. What the Soviet designers did instead was to build smaller airfames around the engine, hence the reason for the spectacular performance of the later Yaks.

The Soviets were tactically very naive, hence their huge aircraft losses during the war.

True and not true. The Eastern front was a "target rich environment". You put up that many aircraft, you can expect to lose a few along the way. The Soviets generally flew in a very ramshackle manner and not all their aircraft had radios. I can't see either of those factors contributing in a positive way to their efforts but the lack of apparent order made them hard to predict.

Brown regards Kurt Tank as the greatest fighter designer of the war

I'm not surprised. I agree with him.

[J.D.]

They had their own great designers like Clarence Kelly, Jack Northrop and John Atwood, who were all arguably as great as Tank.

I presume you mean Clarence Leonard Johnson, who everyone called "Kelly".

Probably the greatest designer of all, IMHO.

There was also Ed Heinemann and Leroy Grumman who would get a shoe in the door.

[Andrew Jones]

I'm totally amazed how many people on here seem to think they know more about fighter performance than someone like Eric Brown, who actually flew many of the aircraft being commented on. I would say you dismiss his opinion at your peril, if he doesn't know what fighter performance is, who does?

[J.D.]

I'm totally amazed how many people on here seem to think they know more about fighter performance than someone like Eric Brown, who actually flew many of the aircraft being commented on. I would say you dismiss his opinion at your peril, if he doesn't know what fighter performance is, who does?

Can you be more specific?

[-Neu-]

I presume you mean Clarence Leonard Johnson, who everyone called "Kelly".

Probably the greatest designer of all, IMHO.

There was also Ed Heinemann and Leroy Grumman who would get a shoe in the door.

Ugh, terrible typo on my part.... and not the first time I've done it for some reason.

In addition to being a brilliant designer, he was a great manager; up there with the likes of Hewlett and Packard.... listen to that video I linked above, it shows just how well he could run his company.

Edited January 17, 2011 by -Neu-

[J.D.]

I'm totally amazed how many people on here seem to think they know more about fighter performance than someone like Eric Brown, who actually flew many of the aircraft being commented on. I would say you dismiss his opinion at your peril, if he doesn't know what fighter performance is, who does?

If you're referring to my comments, I am in no way dismissive of Brown's opinion. Quite the reverse, in fact. My comments about the Spitfire XIV were along the lines of me being slightly surprised that someone of Brown's stature would agree with me. I thought I was on my own in a sea of Merlin supporters. I was also commenting not on fighter performance but on fighter tactics. Never fight on your enemy's terms. Exploit the best performance your aircraft has and exploit your opponent's weaknesses. Same applies to my comment about the 109. Luftwaffe pilots used zoom and boom tactics to avoid some of the less likeable characteristics of their aircraft. I found his comments on the 109 very interesting.

Remember Brown's comment about the Mustang's speed? Remember he said it wasn't as good in a turn as a Mk XIV? There are your tactics right there. Exploit speed avoid turning fights. Probably what they did.

I'm not disputing that the Mk XIV was a great machine, nor the Dora. What I said was that there simply weren't enough of them to affect the course of the war. In fact, in the case of the D9, the reverse was true: there were too many 109 Gustavs and not enough Doras. That's not a qualitative judgement.

I was a bit surprised to see a comment about the Spitfire having a laminar flow wing. I can't imagine Brown saying that. I'm not impugning the honesty of the person who posted it. It is well documented that the Spiteful was the first serious attempt to build one. The problem was that it turned out to be not as good as hoped while the elliptical wing turned out to be better than expected. Brown actually dived a Spit to M=.92 so he knew its performance very well. I don't know if he ever flew a Spiteful but I would imagine he flew a Seafang, which was very similar and shared the wing.

*EDIT*

Just checked: he flew both the Spiteful and the Seafang.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aircr...Winkle%22_Brown

Edited January 17, 2011 by J.D.

[davidelvy]

I was a bit surprised to see a comment about the Spitfire having a laminar flow wing. I can't imagine Brown saying that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aircr...Winkle%22_Brown

I don't think that is actually what Pielstick said. The way I read his post he is clearly saying the laminar flow wing did not give the P51 a great advantage. In fact post war experience showed that the Spitfire wing gave what was possibly the highest Mach number of any propeller driven aircraft - higher even than many of the early jets. Laminar flow wings were attempted on other aircraft such as the Tempest and Spitfires from Mk 21 onwards (at least they were referred to as laminar flow). Whether they worked as claimed is another matter.

As for disagreeing with Eric Brown, whilst not a mortal sin this is something which is probably quite difficult. Nobody flew more types of aircraft and few would have flown as both a combat veteran and a test pilot. His analysis is concise and based on the concept of analysing the fighting abilities of the aircraft he has flown. It may be possible to find combat veterans with contrary opinions, but they will not have had the experience on so may different aircraft - including the aircraft the combat veteran will have been flying against.

[-Neu-]

I'm totally amazed how many people on here seem to think they know more about fighter performance than someone like Eric Brown, who actually flew many of the aircraft being commented on. I would say you dismiss his opinion at your peril, if he doesn't know what fighter performance is, who does?

If you're referring to me, I'm only putting his comments into context. The only point I flat out disagreed with is the Vampire comment... but something tells me that this might be a misinterpretation. Other accounts state that it was a fairly good fighter, so I'm wondering why he would say that it was rather pedestrian. On the Tempest, he believed the Sea Fury as being one of the greatest prop planes he flew... so I suspect the Tempest was probably up there too.

The other issue is to claim that the greatest fighter pre-1943 was the Zero. The Zero had some pretty glaring deficiencies to achieve its performance; no-self sealing tanks or armor. Sure its easy to claim its the best fighter pre-1943 because it was manned by the most highly trained and experience cadre of pilots in the world. Had they been piloted by recruits, how good would the Zero have been?

This takes me to what I'm getting at; Brown only represents one part of the view for what I would weigh as "the greatest fighter." There are factors outside pure performance which are critical for assessing what is the "best" in my view. I think this corresponds with JD's view too. Durability is a technical factor not easily defined by flying performance and likely outside of Brown's assessment. For example the Hurricane was a critical aircraft in its time, but one of its best features was its durability. Sure the Spitfire had better flying performance, but it was more difficult to repair than the Hurricane... which means alot when its the Battle of Britain and how many planes a squadron can get into the air each day matters.

The same goes for the manufacturing issues, pilot quality and doctrine. I just think they are important factors if we make any consideration in this area, and the word of Brown is only one voice among these areas.

Edited January 17, 2011 by -Neu-

[J.D.]

I don't think that is actually what Pielstick said. The way I read his post he is clearly saying the laminar flow wing did not give the P51 a great advantage. In fact post war experience showed that the Spitfire wing gave what was possibly the highest Mach number of any propeller driven aircraft - higher even than many of the early jets. Laminar flow wings were attempted on other aircraft such as the Tempest and Spitfires from Mk 21 onwards (at least they were referred to as laminar flow). Whether they worked as claimed is another matter.

Yeah, good point. Again I must point out that I'm not in any way impugning Pielstick's good faith.

As for disagreeing with Eric Brown, whilst not a mortal sin this is something which is probably quite difficult. Nobody flew more types of aircraft and few would have flown as both a combat veteran and a test pilot. His analysis is concise and based on the concept of analysing the fighting abilities of the aircraft he has flown. It may be possible to find combat veterans with contrary opinions, but they will not have had the experience on so may different aircraft - including the aircraft the combat veteran will have been flying against.

I did not actually disagree with Brown. In some instances I was merely putting an interpretation on what he meant. I've read quite a bit of his stuff and there are some very insightful videos about. I'm probably more influenced by Brown's thinking than anyone else like, say, Chuck Yeager.

Sounds like part one of a two part issue. He may have referred to both these wings as laminar flow but he may also have known that in practice they were not.

Is that what you mean?

My point is that I would be surprised if Brown believed they were laminar flow in practice. He would know the significance of Reynolds numbers etc. and would have known that while the attempt was worthy the results probably didn't quite meet expectations due to manufacturing constraints.

Laminar flow did not really become a reality in Britain until advent of the Lightning.

[denstore]

The other issue is to claim that the greatest fighter pre-1943 was the Zero. The Zero had some pretty glaring deficiencies to achieve its performance; no-self sealing tanks or armor. Sure its easy to claim its the best fighter pre-1943 because it was manned by the most highly trained and experience cadre of pilots in the world. Had they been piloted by recruits, how good would the Zero have been?

I believe that the positive sides of the Zero outweighted the lack of self sealing fuel tanks and armour. And the high kill ratio of the Zero vs opposition in the early years should be a testament to it. Sure, the pilots where good, but in 41 and 42 it was an outstanding aircraft. Extremly good range, excellent handling at low altitude, and good guns. Compared to what carrier based aircraft was available in the US and UK at the time, I would say it was stunning.

Again, as I wrote earlier in this thread, people seem to forget that what makes a fighter great isn't just how it performs versus other fighters. Range, ability to down bombers, cost of manufacturing, ease of maintenance and so on makes for factors at least as important.

[J.D.]

Again, as I wrote earlier in this thread, people seem to forget that what makes a fighter great isn't just how it performs versus other fighters. Range, ability to down bombers, cost of manufacturing, ease of maintenance and so on makes for factors at least as important.

Or perhaps, the extent to which you force your enemy's planners to change their strategy or tactics relative to the numbers involved...?

[Pielstick]

Quick few points gents:

Brown never said the Spit had a laminar flow wing. He was pointing out that the laminar flow wing of the Mustang gave it nasty stall behaviour. Sorry if that was lost in translation.

He says the standard tactic used by Spitfire pilots when finding themselves in trouble was to throw the aircraft into a hard turn, knowing full well the BF109/FW190 couldn't keep up with them.

About the Zero, he does acknowledge its lack of armour and self sealing fuel tanks. He describes it as reflecting Japanese doctrine completely - you are in the fight until death. He says the Hellcat and Corsair broke the Zero's dominance by the use of superior tactics - the American fighters would enter combat from above the Zeros and dive down on them, building up speed and energy. The Zeros would perform a hard break and attempt to evade the American fighters. The energy built up by the Hellcat/Corsair would allow it to follow the Zero through perhaps 120 degrees - enough time for the pilot to aim and shoot at the Zero. The Zero's lack of protection meant they were very easily brought down by the Hellcat and Corsair's weapons. This is what someone earlier described as "Boom and Zoom" tactics. He also credits the Zero with a 12-1 kill ratio which he says is second only to the Hellcat.

He does talk about the Typhoon, but says it didn't live up to expectations as a fighter and its engine was far too unreliable. Not a surprising opionion really as I remember from Wings On My Sleeve a part where Brown describes demonstrating a fighter (I can't remember which) for Churchill at low level over a Loch when the engine failed, too low for Brown to bail out. I think this led Brown to place engine reliability as a very important factor.

Edited January 17, 2011 by Pielstick

[Giorgio N]

Eric Brown's insight is absolutely very important. However as I said before a pilot's opinion on a combat plane is always going to be influenced by the type of training he had. A pilot used to dogfighting will never rate a energy fighter too high, because he will find it lacking in the areas that he's used to exploit. Brown was a test pilot, and this puts his opinion miles above that of fighter pilots. However from many of his comments I have the feeling that he still considered dogfighting capabilities more important than others. Therefore I'm not surprised by his comments on the Zero, that as well known for its high manouverability. His comment on the Mc.205 is interesting too: while nobody denies that it was a very good machine, the same Mc.205 he praises was considered lacking in many areas by the same Castoldi who designed the fighter, so much that he had planned a different version (the 205N). Many pilots also considered it useless against the USAF bombers an their escort fighters because of its bad high altitude performances. However it was very manouverable.

There are then a number of factors that even the best pilot will not consider because they're not his business: durability has been mentioned, we can add ease of production. Looking at the Mc.205 again, it was very complicated to build because of its structural design (design that made it very tough), so much that i took 3 times as much time (and money) to build an Mc205 than a Bf.109 ! This was a problem of most italian fighters and contributed greatly to the low output of fighters from the italian manufacurers during the war. The spitfire was another complicated design (for other reasons) while the 109 and the mustang were very easy to manufacture in big numbers.

[denstore]

Or perhaps, the extent to which you force your enemy's planners to change their strategy or tactics relative to the numbers involved...?

Absolutly. Many factors that won't be apparant in flying the aircraft itself might be important.

And there is strenght in numbers, and that is why I believe that many modern projects are way too expensive. As an example, the F-22 may be a superb fighter, and second to none today, but at a $150 million each, I'm starting to feel it soon might not be worth it. Countries that don't mind losses in life will always having advantages from this. If you can field thousands of 2:nd rate aircraft, you will win over an enemy with a hundred 1:st rate fighters.

[-Neu-]

I believe that the positive sides of the Zero outweighted the lack of self sealing fuel tanks and armour. And the high kill ratio of the Zero vs opposition in the early years should be a testament to it. Sure, the pilots where good, but in 41 and 42 it was an outstanding aircraft. Extremly good range, excellent handling at low altitude, and good guns. Compared to what carrier based aircraft was available in the US and UK at the time, I would say it was stunning.

Again, as I wrote earlier in this thread, people seem to forget that what makes a fighter great isn't just how it performs versus other fighters. Range, ability to down bombers, cost of manufacturing, ease of maintenance and so on makes for factors at least as important.

Hey, I'm agreeing with you on that part.... But I think the zero is a special case. Japanese pilots were probably the best trained from 1939 to 1942. Remember most of their aviators had seen combat over China for several years with highly maneuverable aircraft along the lines of the Zero. American aviators did not have the same level of training, experience and a very different fighter design. The mismatch in aircraft and training was probably similar to the one faced by the Japanese over China.... which accounts for its impressive record early in the war.

The disaster at Midway and the slow attrition of the IJN's aircrews in 1942 and 1943 left the Japanese with lesser quality pilots, who couldn't properly exploit the Zero's advantages. Moreover US training and doctrine caught up to the Japanese, making the Zero's advantages less "pronounced."

He does talk about the Typhoon, but says it didn't live up to expectations as a fighter and its engine was far too unreliable. Not a surprising opionion really as I remember from Wings On My Sleeve a part where Brown describes demonstrating a fighter (I can't remember which) for Churchill at low level over a Loch when the engine failed, too low for Brown to bail out. I think this led Brown to place engine reliability as a very important factor.

See to me the typhoon probably had one of the most crucial impacts in the conduct of the war as a strike fighter. The Allied Tactical air forces basically forced the Wehrmacht to operate at night, as they caused significant damage during the day... severely restricting their strategic mobility. Movements that should have taken days, took weeks instead. Few aircraft could claim that sort of effect. The Typhoon and the Jug were at the forefront of this.

[Giorgio N]

Absolutly. Many factors that won't be apparant in flying the aircraft itself might be important.

And there is strenght in numbers, and that is why I believe that many modern projects are way too expensive. As an example, the F-22 may be a superb fighter, and second to none today, but at a $150 million each, I'm starting to feel it soon might not be worth it. Countries that don't mind losses in life will always having advantages from this. If you can field thousands of 2:nd rate aircraft, you will win over an enemy with a hundred 1:st rate fighters.

You make a very valid point, and history has shown many times how numbers can be more important than quality, with quantiy having been deliberatley chosen over quality in many occasions.

However for modern systems the matter is quite complicated: western countries prefer to go for ultraexpensive systems because these are in the longer terms cheaper than a higher number of lower quality systems. This because the cost of human resources is such that fielding big forces is not possible anymore. It's cheaper to have 200 superplanes at 150 milion a piece and 300 pilots than having 1000 planes at 20 milion each with 1200 pilots. This because the 1200 pilots and the maintenance crews and the bases to host them and the accomodation, the welfare system and so on end up costing much more than the planes. Of course a small force requires extremely advanced system, capable of compensating with their quality the lack of numbers. The effectiveness of these systems is then increased by introducing every possible force multiplier.

Other countries are in a different position, and the Soviet Union has always been a clear example of this: for them the human resources were very cheap and it made sense to build thousands of simple planes as it was easy to man them.

All of this makes sense in peacetime, while in wartime it's totally different. However nobody expects another WW2 to happen, while in limited wars the same economics as peacetime apply (more or less...)

[J.D.]

Quick few points gents:

Brown never said the Spit had a laminar flow wing. He was pointing out that the laminar flow wing of the Mustang gave it nasty stall behaviour. Sorry if that was lost in translation.

Nah, probably my fault. Thanks for clearing it up.

[denstore]

You make a very valid point, and history has shown many times how numbers can be more important than quality, with quantiy having been deliberatley chosen over quality in many occasions.

However for modern systems the matter is quite complicated: western countries prefer to go for ultraexpensive systems because these are in the longer terms cheaper than a higher number of lower quality systems. This because the cost of human resources is such that fielding big forces is not possible anymore. It's cheaper to have 200 superplanes at 150 milion a piece and 300 pilots than having 1000 planes at 20 milion each with 1200 pilots. This because the 1200 pilots and the maintenance crews and the bases to host them and the accomodation, the welfare system and so on end up costing much more than the planes. Of course a small force requires extremely advanced system, capable of compensating with their quality the lack of numbers. The effectiveness of these systems is then increased by introducing every possible force multiplier.

Other countries are in a different position, and the Soviet Union has always been a clear example of this: for them the human resources were very cheap and it made sense to build thousands of simple planes as it was easy to man them.

All of this makes sense in peacetime, while in wartime it's totally different. However nobody expects another WW2 to happen, while in limited wars the same economics as peacetime apply (more or less...)

That is correct, as long as the 200 superplanes can do the same job as the 1000. Problem is that I doubt that they will in the near future. And most western societies soon can't afford wasting money on any high end projects any more. On top of that, the superplanes are going to get more and more likely to get obscelent faster and faster, due to the accelerating pace of development in computers. I wouldn't be surpriced if we see new radar systems within 10 or 15 years, that will pick up all the now so hot stealth planes.

[SLoB]

Being a newbie here please be gentle with me.

I have been following this discussion with interest. I am not a pilot (my mother is though) and although I have met a few fighter pilots I cannot claim to have technical knowledge.

To my mind it does not matter how good a plane is on paper it can only really be considered if it has been in battle. I think this therefore rules out some (e.g. EE Lightning).

I know nothing about kill ratios, etc, etc but as a civilian with a vested interest in a war I would want to not only have confidence that the planes being sent up to fight the enemy are at least if not better than the opposition but I want something that might inspire me and 'keep me going' through the bad times.

From an English perspective I would have suggested that on the grounds given above I would suggest the following:

WWI - Sopwith Camel

WWII - Spitfire

Falklands - Harrier

Gulf - Tornado

My knowledge is too limited to comment on other eras/wars as such.

From an American perspective

WWII - Mustang

Korea - Sabre

Vietnam - Phantom

Gulf - Eagle

German perspective

WWI - Fokker DR III

WWII - Me 109

I suppose I could go on but won't - you will be glad to hear.

Personally, I know it's boring but my absolute favourite always has been the Spitfire.

One could argue that in 'peacetime' it is the threat of superiority that counts (therefore the EE Lightning for example) might be a significant factor, but it is only when the plane is ultimately tested in battle that it can really be tested.

SLoB

[davidelvy]

I did not actually disagree with Brown.

I did not actually say you did. The second paragraph of my post was a general comment, but on re-reading it I realise this was not clear.

[J.D.]

I did not actually say you did. The second paragraph of my post was a general comment, but on re-reading it I realise this was not clear.

Hey, that's fine. I'm just clearing it up.

My only criticism of Brown is that his descriptions can be very florid and verbose.

I'm definitely going to look for "Wings on My Sleeve".

Edited January 18, 2011 by J.D.