P43 vs Warhawks vs Aircobras

[Schatten]

The P38 works good in AE if you use them good.

Not as Escort but to Sweep Airbases.
I set them at high altitude (if possible higher as Zero´s and Oscar´s can fly) and so they start with dive attacks that very deadly and shoot down a big part of Jap. Planes bevore the Dogfight start´s.

As Escort for Bombers, that goes most times attacked by Cap, every fighter in AE looks bad.
Anyway this work must be done too.....

[xj900uk]

Hey, don't forget that dreadful POS known as the Boulton Paul "Defiant", a so-called "turret fighter" which had no forward-facing armament!? The British have a great sense of humor.

Hang on, at least the Defiant shot down quite a few EA's particularly over Dunkirk. Far moer than either the Wirraway, the Boomerang, the Roc or even the Skua. That rear-firing turret caught out many Me pilots who initially mistook them for Hurricane's. It was only when the German's realised that it couldn't fire forward and did head -on attacks that losses plummeted and the Defiant found itself on a bit of a sticky wicket.
It was an interesting if fatally flawed idea - having no forward firing guns and also the eyes of the aeroplane not being the eyes of the armament are two fatal drawbacks.

For the record, most Defiants were converted to night-fighter use during the winter of '40, a few were even fitted with AI sets and proved far better night-time AI's than the sluggish Blenheims

[Big B]

I'm amazed too...

ORIGINAL: castor troy
...


Fortunetely I haven´t compared Japanese BOMBERS with Allied figthers using tracker yet, but when reading this I´m quite puzzled. So far I´ve thought the most surprising air stat I´ve found was to see the Oscar being more or less twice as maneuverable than a P-51 or P-47 when flying at 38.000ft. With those stats you have to wonder how those planes could fight Luftwaffe fighters. [;)]

[Rob Brennan UK]

I seem to recall from many years ago that one of the biggest drawbacks of the Defiant was the weak engine and the weight of the quad mg turret behind the pilot. Lack of manauvering made it a simple target (esp when climbing) for any german pilot who was aware of the lack of forward firing guns.

Head on passes always have the risk of a mid air collision so iirc the germans attacked from below and behind as the defiant was unable to manauver out of the way of more nimble day fighters. As a night fighter it did rather well considering it was never designed for that role and the Belenhiem was far too slow to catch the 2E german medium bombers (esp the 88 which was pretty nible and fast for a bomber)

[xj900uk]

Yeah, I always think that the Defiant has been badly treated by history writers.  It wasn't that bad a plane, and it actually had the same Merlin-12 powerplant as the first Hurricane's & Spits.  However that rear turret weighed a lot and completely knackered both climb and speed.
It did surprisingly well in its mk 1a configuration as a night-fighter.  A Polish squadron also used them 40-41 for night ops and shot down a few night-raiders + two Blenheims that got in the way.  The Poles would,  usually without exception,  pop off at anything in the air...