Warbird Information Exchange

It would be neat to read. I've read the many comparisons of the P-38 to other fighters, but never anything on the F7F.

John

In the book FIRE BOMBER INTO HE**, by Linc Alexander, there is a chapter on him flying one as an airtanker pilot. It is quite interesting and the closest thing I have seen for what I think you may be looking for.

I have certainly never flown one, but I looked up the stats.
It is really heavily armed, maybe overkill on that. It claims to be as fast or faster than mosy all other piston planes of the Korean era., and has good range.
It's climb is up there near the best, it is a little below in service ceiling.
It"s hard to believe that it was supposed to operate off carriers, it failed it's acceptance trial for that, then when a revised version came out, it failed the trial again.
They flew in Korea, don't know if they had any kills at all.
Lookswise. when you see them up close, they are very tall, don't look much like a fighter or much like anything else. They are narrow from the front, sort of slab sided, not so round like many other planes. The fuselage seems small, the wing bigger, and the tail very tall, as if the parts were from 3 different type planes and just put together. I'd guess the tall tail was to offset some handling problems, like some other twins.
It is called a fighter, but It really has almost twice the guns needed to destroy any plane. I'd guess it was more for ground attack, maybe against ships. All those guns and ammo would be very heavy, probably noisy too!

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Bill Greenwood
Spitfire N308WK

My father has a photo of one he took on Guam in August 1945. What a cool looking aircraft!

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S.

Try Wings of the Weird and Wonderful by Captain Eric 'Winkle' Brown, CBE DSC AFC RN. The latest edition of the book was recently publsihed by Hikoki, distributed by Crecy Publishing...

http://www.crecy.co.uk/product_info.php ... cts_id=502

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David Legg
Editor, The Catalina News
The Catalina Society
Author: Consolidated PBY Catalina - The Peacetime Record

His F7F pilot report is also in the first edition of the book which you might be able to find used....Wings of the Weird and Wonderful, 1983 published by Airlife. ISBN 0906393 30 2.

The new edition seems to combine the first book with the later Wings of the Weird and Wonderful, Volume 2 from 1985.

Not to give away too much, here's a brief quote...
On the hole the Tigercar was a delightful high performance aircraft to fly, with the exception of the heavy aileron control at high speeds.

Brown has flown more aircraft types than most of us have seen...
aside from Frank Tallman, I 'd be hard pressed to think of someone with more experience in a variety of types.

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Remember the vets, the wonderful planes they flew and their sacrifices for a future many of them did not live to see.
Note political free signature.
I figure if you wanted my opinion on items unrelated to this forum, you'd ask for it.

Get the book "Grumman F7F Tigercat" by Corkey Meyer & Steve Ginter. # 74 in the red cover "Naval Fighters" book series.
He test flew(Corkey) the first one and did most of the test flying for the type and in it he describes many "adventures" in the process .
ISBN # is: 0-942612-75-2
It is heavily illustrated and the end has some on the civilian and fire bombers, plus a modeling section. I highly recommend it