Corsair performance?

[SuluSea]

ORIGINAL: Ike99
The best I would think one could do in a Zero against a Corsair, smart human vs smart human is get a head to head attack. You know who will win that exchange 99% of the time minus a collision.

...And your reasoning is?

[Ike99]

...And your reasoning is?

Really hard to describe events with words for dogfights. That´s why you always see pilots, no matter where they´re from talking with their hands simulating the planes, but I´ll try.

The Corsair is faster, climbs better and dives better than the Zero.

Now as in a real fight the one person on top of another has an advantage over the other because of gravity. In air combat case...

A good Corsair pilot would, starting equal altitude, use his superior speed and climb rate to first climb to gain an altitude advantage over the Zero pilot. Then he would close to attack.

His extra altitude over the Zero would give him more energy to spend when he closes to start the actual dogfight.

He gets a good altitude advantage over the Zero, dives down to attack on the Zero, preferably from an angle making the Zero use up as much of his energy early as possible. The Zero must turn up, to meet the attack head on, or perform a defensive move to avoid the attack.

If the Zero pilot turns up into the diving Corsair, the Corsair has the huge advantage of plane durability. Even if both the Zero and Corsair hit each other with guns, the Zero will probably be a flaming wreck and the Corsair still flying.

If they miss each other with guns, after his dive the Corsair pilot keeps his speed up and goes into a climbing turn to repeat the same attack down onto the Zero.

¨Boom and Zoom¨

The Zero is forced to turn up and around to prepare for the Corsairs next attack but this pilot is losing more energy, getting slower and slower, easier and easier to kill because it is a less performance plane to start with and started the fight at altitude (energy) disadvantage. Less reserve energy.



Until finally, the Zero pilot is all out of energy and stalls, then gets killed or, chooses not to stall his plane but also not get the nose of his Zero around to meet the next attack and gets killed by diving deflection shot.

If the Zero chooses not to go head to head against the Corsair, to perform a defensive move and avoid the diving Corsairs guns the Corsair follows through on his dive and repeats the above mentioned attack again and again. The Zero will eventually run out of altitude, when he is out of altitude he will be out of the reserve energy needed to perform the defensive move to avoid the diving Corsairs guns.

So he stalls, crashes into ocean or land, or gets killed by diving deflection shot as mentioned above.

None of that probably made much sense but as mentioned before, it´s almost impossible to describe with words alone.

[SuluSea]

Thanks, given your basis of reasoning you just stated the Zero I highly doubt would win 50% much less than the 99%. You can bet all known tactics were used by Japanese Air and given the success rate of Corsair pilots very few were successful. Given the Zeros fragile airframe in comparison to Corsairs and other U.S. aircraft a head on attack would have more than likely ended with the same 11-1 ratio if not worse.

[Stele]

I think one factor not discussed is communication between the pilots. The Japanese doctrine required their fighters to attack, attack, attack. Fly the plane from point A (start), to point B (bandit). The Zeros did not have radio, except for maybe one or two designated planes, but they weren't used for communication between the pilots. At best, the Japanese pilots communicated through hand signals, but even then that was limited in combat.

The American pilots relied on radio communication extensively, and it was essential that it be used in combat to coordinate some strategies like the "sandwich." This was a huge asset in overwhelming even the best Japanese pilot's situational awareness. If you can't beat him with one on one tactics, then you use 2 on 1 or 10 on 1.

To look at just the plane alone in comparison against another isn't enough to say "that's why it won every time." Numerous factors come in to play. By the end of the war the Japanese had formidable fighters like the Ki-84 and J2M3, but it was almost pointless to launch them in the air when those particular planes required a lot of piloting experience and when the enemy is launching armadas of wings after you.

[Ike99]

To look at just the plane alone in comparison against another isn't enough to say "that's why it won every time." Numerous factors come in to play. By the end of the war the Japanese had formidable fighters like the Ki-84 and J2M3, but it was almost pointless to launch them in the air when those particular planes required a lot of piloting experience and when the enemy is launching armadas of wings after you.

Japanese had some very good late war fighters able to stand up to Corsair but they were too few, too late, to make much difference.

KI-84, great plane. [;)]

Thanks, given your basis of reasoning you just stated the Zero I highly doubt would win 50% much less than the 99%.

I either wrote that wrong or you misunderstood me. In a head to head pass the Corsair will win 99% of the time. Perhaps that´s an exagerration but the odds are extremely low.

Ike99-The best I would think one could do in a Zero against a Corsair, smart human vs smart human is get a head to head attack. You know who will win that exchange 99% of the time minus a collision...Even if both the Zero and Corsair hit each other with guns, the Zero will probably be a flaming wreck and the Corsair still flying.

[pasternakski]

ORIGINAL: Ike99
I either wrote that wrong or you misunderstood me. In a head to head pass the Corsair will win 99% of the time. Perhaps that´s an exagerration but the odds are extremely low.

I understood your point, Ike. Simple misunderstanding, I think.

[mdiehl]

I'll shock people and say something nice about the Zero. It had excellent stall properties. In the hands of an extremely experience pilot, with enough fuel, a Zero might survive an encounter with a bunch of corsairs. Something like that was documented, anecdotally, for a Ki-43 dueling with a bunch of P-38s over New Guinea in Bergerud's FitS. The Ki-43 hadn't a prayer of nailing one of the lightnings as they were doing all high energy attacks, but the Ki-43 spoiled multiple attack runs by multiple lightning drivers until the latter just shrugged and left the Japanese pilot alone.

The problem for post-1942 Zeke drivers was that survival wasn't their mission. Downing enemy a.c. was, and that demanded that they stay in the fight and try to win, rather than merely fly to survive. And unless most of them were as good as that Ki-43 driver, the performance differences between their planes and the F4U pretty much made their situation hopeless.

[SuluSea]

ORIGINAL: Ike99

Thanks, given your basis of reasoning you just stated the Zero I highly doubt would win 50% much less than the 99%.

I either wrote that wrong or you misunderstood me. In a head to head pass the Corsair will win 99% of the time. Perhaps that´s an exagerration but the odds are extremely low.

I'm sorry for the misunderstanding, Ike and the rest of the members of this forum. [:(]