P-51C vs FW-190?

I don't know how 'real' this stuff is, but anyway

Regards Ninetalis.

I'm pretty sure the 190 could out-turn the Mustang, but the Mustang could perform some nasty maneuvers of its own. I also wonder if perhaps the scorecard was taking altitude into consideration? A lot of those battles occurred at high altitude in and around the bomb groups, and the 190A suffered that high up (big reason for the 190D and later the Ta 152).

Or maybe they were talking about the uparmored Rammjagers?

It would depend on the altitude for the 190. Their role rate was superior("A" series, not long nose), as the German Pilots favorite defensive tactic was to split S and dive for the deck. The mustang could drop 10 degrees of flaps and out turn any German plane. Interesting comparison though...

While on the Mustang vs. 190D, still of interest:

http://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/aviation/fw-190-dora-9-vs-p-51d-mustang-3151-23.html

Thanks for the responses guys. According to the show they did the comparison at the point when the 190 and mustang had dived for the deck. The 190 then dragged the stang through the flak cover of the airfield being bombed. So the dogfight occurred at low altitude. They interviewed the mustang pilot and he said "He made a fatal mistake when he turned right, i think he was trying to lose me in the smoke, but i happened to be in just the right position, and down he went"

This is the episode (It was history channel, not Nat Geo, sorry)

I have a question about History Channel, do you guys in the US have to pay extra fee to be able to watch the channel? because down here in Europe we have to...

Regards.

Sorry, I'll take 4 x 20mm cannon any day over the 6 x .50 cals, just get close.

For us down in little ol NZ it comes as part of our basic sky package. which we have to pay for. ($49.95 a month for around 50 something channels)

Scorpiomikey

For us down in little ol NZ it comes as part of our basic sky package. which we have to pay for. ($49.95 a month for around 50 something channels)

My parents pay for the cable here :P but in the USA History Channel comes with it. Now if the Military channel would be too thatd be great! One thing I miss about my ex

I think the FW-190 would win, depends on the pilots though.

I am going to hazard a guess that no FW-190 every destroyed a P-51C on the ground, but I could be wrong. And that plenty of C's destroyed 190's on the ground, but I could be wrong about that. And that more 190 pilots died than did C pilots.

Oh and that the factories that built 190's didn't look as good as the one's that built C's, in say late 1945.

But that's just me.

So if Nowotny had to pick whether to fly a 190 or a 51, which would he choose?

Ninetalis

I have a question about History Channel, do you guys in the US have to pay extra fee to be able to watch the channel? because down here in Europe we have to...

Regards.

We have "dish"....those channels (military, history, etc) don't come with the "basic package". We pay about $70 a month for the upgrade with those channels. So, we have many hundreds of channels (3/400), but maybe....MAYBE 15 are worth having.

I would say between these two, it would come down to the pilot.

As proven with any aircraft, it's not the plane but the pilot.  The 51 only flew during roughly the last year and a half, and the quality of pilot training of U.S. pilots by that time was so much more comprehensive than the Germans.  The Germans had a lot of experience but most of the older pilots were pretty burned up having to fight for so many years.

Thanks for all the informative responses guys.

How many of you read the initial question?

I wasnt asking which was the better aircraft. I understand That american pilots at that point were better trained.

What i was asking is, in an out and out comparison test between these 2 aircraft. Which is more manoeuvrable?

I found an interesting book regarding this topic.

Which is more manoeuvrable?

The B/C Mustang... If you're talking typical "dog-fighting" turn-fights.. The Pony had the edge in turn-radius and wouldn't bleed airspeed in the vertical as fast as the FW....

 I would say between these two, it would come down to the pilot.

Yepper..

Chuck Yeager said it best.. "The pilot with the most experience is gonna whip your azz every time, no matter what he's flying.."...  (This was after Yeager whipped an RAF pilot flying an F-86 against him in a MiG-15, then they switched, and Yeager did it to him again..)

However, given we're that we're talking about the C (or B, they're the same thing. Only measurable difference was where they were built, ie: Dallas, TX or Inglewood, CA), the B/C Pony had a tighter turn radius than the D/K had...   There was also an issue with the early B/C Mustangs' guns in  high-g turns, but this was solved with powered feed-pawls..

First two things to remember is that "Speed is Life, and Altitude is Life Insurance"... "Zoom and Boom" attacks are always preferable..   But when it comes down to a turn-fight, the Fw190 is out-classed, the way I read it...  Like what was mentioned with dropping 10-deg of flaps in a fight, the Mustang could hang right on the edge of a stall ( and the pilot kicked in opposite rudder to keep the nose up), with little chance of departure, while the FW needed to widen the turn a bit to keep it from departing in a rather vicious snap-roll and little to no warning...  Going into the vertical, the Mustang had it over the FW as well..

Dad flew both the B and D, and he always told me of the two, he preferred the B...  Once he got a Malcolm Hood, that is... Rearward vis in Malcolm-equipped Mustang ws almost as good as the D's bubble canopy, and the addition of two more guns and their ammo brought the weight up by almost 350 lbs and decreased the performance at low-speed/low-altitudes... But the Ds were what they got instead of new B/Cs, and since the Bs were clapped-out by that time anyway, they liked them too...

Bottom line was that, all things being equal,  if a 190 got on your six, you had about half a heartbeat to make peace with your maker if you didn't shake him... Those cannons and guns on the Butcherbird would eat you alive...  Luckily, the Germans had way more in the way of Fw190s than they had in experienced pilots...

When an American pilot with 300-400 hours (The USAAF considered it tantemount to murder to send a pilot into combat with less than 250 hours) went up against a typical, late-war German Jagdflieger, who had about 10-15 hours, the result was pretty one-sided...

Nice run down Hans!

Hercmech

Nice run down Hans!

Thanks.. I'm no expert, not a fighter pilot, not even a pilot, but there were plenty of 'em hanging around my house back in the day...  I've been able to play a vicous game of Crud with the best of 'em ever since I was 9, lol.. 

I forgot to mention the CoG issues with the B/C's fuselage fuel-tank though...   That changed the flight-dynamics of the Mustang a LOT by moving the aircraft's CoG aft...  If a Mustang pilot were caught in a fight while that thing was anything over about 25 gallons, the aircraft was, according to two Mustang pilots I know a complete "dog" and subject to a snap-roll at low speed, high AoA manuvers, a tendency to "porpoise" at high speeds, and the fabric-covered elevators were removed and metal-covered ones installed...  Also, the fillet kit for the vertical stab was added, which the lack of caused several B/C crashes during ACM...

According to the pilot's handbook (The D-Model is the one I have, but the tank issues apply to the B/C as well), most combat manuvers are restricted, and both intentional slow-rolls and tight turns (at airspeeds of 150 knots or higher and angle of bank greater than 45 degrees) are forbidden, until the fuselage tank is below 25 gallons... 

Never really think about things such as weight of fuel (or where the tank is) on an A/C performance but this all makes perfect sense.

What most of these arguments usually never discuss is that probably over 90% of the time when a fighter a/c shot down another fighter a/c, he had the "drop" on him...that is to say, the guy that got shot down didn't know he was being shot at until his plane started taking hits...

These hypotheticals are only relevant if both planes start the fight with no advantage over the other (altitude, surprise, speed, etc...) and that almost never happened...

I read where the 190 had incredible roll characteristics, which is great for jinking and aggressively avoiding hits. However, when it came to that, the 190 is already at a disadvantage and very defensive. There is a great "dogfights" episode where a 51 went up against two FW's in the Alps, Up and down they went, until the 51 finally got the drop at a very low altitude. It looked like they were pretty evenly matched for quite some time. Albeit the 51 had his hands full fighting off two.

I remember where Yeager said they would take off and burn that aft center tank first, hoping they didn't have to engage too early on. Think P-39..

Though not in a FW, Erich Hartmann had some good tactics, such as waiting until just before he sensed the enemy was ready to fire, then pushing hard below the nose sight line of the pursuer, pulling back and coming right back in on the tail. He would also fly in constant slip, to make any enemy over lead. Things like that could win the day. Also, the matra of the time was to never ever fly straight and level for more than 20 seconds. A slight relaxation on this and, as Herr Manstein mentioned,  you are riding in your chute.

Great summation Hammer. Very interesting. Kudos to your dad for what he did...

Incredible rundown, thanks Hans.

Somewhere I read an account of a P-51 dogfighting over Paris with an FW-190 in 1944..

Result : the P-51 expended all it's ammo and the FW-190 got away- albeit smoking badly.

Moral of the story was that the FW-190 was a dangerous adversary when flown by a skilled pilot- even in late 1944.

I believe that account was published in either an Air Classics or Airpower magazine sometime in the early 1980s..

Really, read the accounts. Reliability is the first factor. Every squadron history I have read relates that no mission really ever goes more than about 80% as planned. Three or four a/c have to turn back.

Then they can't find the bombers, and when they do, they are scattered all over the place.

By then the fuel and temperature parameters are catching up on the day.

Visibility, those two dots down there suddenly zip by and that' s all you get because the gunsight is fogged up. 

P-51 is probably more manuverable ->

-> Somewhat depending on the model and loadout I would say the P-51 is more maneuverable. If you do some number crunching youll see that a p-51 has a higher sustained turnrate. Also the FW190 has a higher wingloading so instant turnrate is probably worse than the p-51. Only maneuver advantage is perhaps the rollrate, have not found any rollrates but all I have read indicates a higher rollrate for the FW190.

And I'm talking about all altitudes.

Also related to maneuverability, Rate of climb depends on the model, fw190A-8 with almost 2000hp climb pretty well. A-8 with 1670hp does not. P-51 is probably faster at all altitudes but I think a FW190A-8 with 2000hp can give a stang a run for its money down low.

I'v written a program that calculates performance of differnt aircrafts, pretty neat if I may say so myself. It runs under Windows and any interested can send me a PM.

You could also program your calculator to do the same task.

There's no magic, just weight, power and drag.,

panzerpilot

. There is a great "dogfights" episode where a 51 went up against two FW's in the Alps, Up and down they went, until the 51 finally got the drop at a very low altitude. It looked like they were pretty evenly matched for quite some time. Albeit the 51 had his hands full fighting off two.

is that the episode where the P-51 pilot would chase one vertical and the second would come straight down and they had the P-51 pilot fooled for a bit thinking it was one FW-190?

i've always thought of the FW-190 as the "P-47" of the Luftwaffe: not extremly agile, but it packs a big punch and its tough as nails. IMHO the FW-190 is also probably the best looking WWII fighter as well...the P-51 is a close second though.