Is the Corsair hard to land or fly?

[FG1D Pilot]

Is the Corsair hard to land or fly?

Bill Greenwood asked me about flying the FG 1D on another post and I thought I would start a new one to answer.

To quote Mike Burke " The Average man couldn't do it". The way the gear is designed, it's hard to make a bad landing. I stalled out once a few feet in the air and dropped the left wing, hit hard, and was looking at a row of aircraft parked next to the very narrow runway. All of a sudden, I was rolling straight down the runway. I thought that was the hardest landing I had ever felt, (the P47 wreck was later). The crowd watching thought it was a great landing as I appeared to squeak it on. It didn’t feel that way in the cockpit. The gear just seem to absorb everything you give it.

My first flight was very eventful. It was a now or never chance. As Allen Henley was waiting to take it back to Lafayette. As I lifted off and reached for the gear, the engine started to cough. My mechanic side stepped in and I started playing with power settings and running the primer. As I came back around to land I found a sweet spot where it seemed to run great. I circled over the field and tried several things to trouble shoot and found that only high power caused the problem. It probably wasn't the best choice looking back, but I flew it for about 45 minutes over the field, playing and rolling before I landed and removed the carburator for Overhaul.
Flying it is fun. Very quiet, responsive, and a great view in flight. It’s impossible to see over the long nose, taking off and landing. With a little moisture in the air, a tight turn gives off great vapor trails that you can see, since you sit behind the wings. The best flight I had, was in Florida, weaving in and out and about the tall clouds, making vapor trails. Still gives me goose bumps.
Landing it can be a little fun in a cross wind as the dihedral of the wings seem to catch gusts and raise a wing quickly. The ailerons are very responsive and easily allows you to put the wing back down. Another problem landing, is that since the tail wheel locks, if you get the nose off a little, when the tail touches you go where it’s pointed. But again, the rudder is very effective, and easily gets you going in the right direction. The Corsair is by far my favorite aircraft I’ve flown, ( I haven’t had a chance to fly the Seafury and Stewart Dawson says that’ll end that for me), and nothing seems to draw a crowd more, ( except the girls taking pictures for the calendar).
Finally, the Corsair is really easy to fly, if you have other warbird experience. Sorry to let the cat out of the bag on you other Corsair pilots. I was told by another great fighter pilot that a certain part of your anatomy grows when you check out in a fighter. I don't know how true it is for others, but I did have to add room in the inseam of my new flight suit

[oscardeuce]

Do you think working out the problems in the gear got rid of the moniker "Ensign Elimanator" the Corsiar held for many years?

[Old Shep]

Finally, an almost honest fighter pilot! Take the extra step and announce that the lowly SNJ is the most difficult of the warbirds to fly well and I'll forgive your posts with the non-essential female crew members who inhabit your world.
Old Shep

[Jack Cook]

Few people probably realize that Lt Butch Davenport Corsair ace and the MO of VF-17 worked with Vought to come up with the solutions to the bounce caused by stiff struts and the wing drop. His knowledge and experience played a large role in making the F4U the great carrier fighter that it was

[Bill Greenwood]

Jack, I think I read that the Corsair was not operated off carriers when it first became a good fighter. When did they make the strut changes to lessen the bounce? How did they operate in Korea?

[pmahaffey]

A friend of mine who owns a T-6 and Flies a Corsair told me once; "After about 10 hours in the Corsair you are ready to start checking out in the T-6." His way of saying the Corsair is easier to fly than the T-6.

Patrick Mahaffey
B-17 "Chuckie" Pilot/Mechanic

[tom d. friedman]

from what i've heard...... the peripheral vision characteristics upon landing a corsair on a carrier deck, let alone taxiiing on the ground were murder...... the pilot practically needed curb feelers!!!

[Steve S]

Thanks for enlightening us ground bound folks who may never get a chance in single seater
So when is Stew going to check you out in the Sea Fury-

Steve S

[FG1D Pilot]

So when is Stew going to check you out in the Sea Fury

Believe it or not, I just haven't had the time to do it.

Take the extra step and announce that the lowly SNJ is the most difficult of the warbirds to fly well and I'll forgive your posts with the non-essential female crew members who inhabit your world.

Shep,
That I can't do, as that would put me in the same category as you and would drive away those "non-essential female crew members" before I had the chance to dazzle them with my " Fighter Pilot ways". As for which is easier. The T-6 has better visibility during takeoff and landing and has a steerable tail wheel. ( I know some lock) but, it does want to ground loop more. The torque alone in the Corsair requires a man with phenomenal strength and abilities. The "G"s and raw power are way over the top. As Mike said, " An average man couldn't do it"

I will admit that the T-6 was harder to fly when I first checked out in it. However that was my first experiance with with a "High Powered" warbird. There's no way one could just get in a Corsair and fly it with out going through the "baby steps" of the T-6. The T-6, like the Stearman, I fear a ground loop every time I fly them. In the Corsair the only thing I fear is what Stuart Milson, (undoubtably the finest Corsair pilot in the world ), once confided in me, trying to start it with a crowd watching. An almost impossible task.

[EDowning]

FG1D wrote:

I haven’t had a chance to fly the Seafury and Stewart Dawson says that’ll end that for me

Doug,

Have you flown the Skyraider? I have had a number of guys that have flown various fighters and told me it was their favorite. I haven't flown the Corsair, so I can't comment on the difference. I have flown with a number of other fighters and the Spad will get right with the program. It probably flys the least like it looks of all the warbirds.

[needle]

Yes Doug, starting with a crowd watching!


I remember Leeward ranch and the "dead" golf-carts.

Julian

[John Ceglarek]

A lot of the Corsair's "issues" were worked out by the time the -1a came out...higher tail wheel, bounce problem with the struts, left wing drop. But the problem with carrier landings still remained. As I understand it, it was the British who "taught" the US Navy how to do it...the Brits slipped the plane in towards the carrier, and therefore had visibility until the very last few seconds. The US Navy had been trying to land it straight on, and simply couldn't see over the nose.

[corsair166b]

Jerry Hayes, former owner of the P-51D 'Stump Jumper', said the best landing he ever made was in the CAF's Corsair at Breckenridge one year....he said he was coming down and holding it off and holding it off and SWEARS he never felt it touch down and could'nt figure out what was going on until he looked out the sides of the canopy and saw he was only doing about 20 miles an hour down the runway...after which he applied a little brake and taxiied off the active. He said it was the softest landing-no doubt helped by the oleo struts-he ever made in ANY plane.

Mark

[DougR]

We can't let Doug J have all the fun here, I'll throw a few cents worth in the discussion.

I have flown the -4, -5, & F-2G. The -4 and -5 are nearly identical, and the F-2G is a different animal.

The Super has a huge propellor with very little ground clearance and the prop low pitch stops are set very low. Because of the ground clearance, I land the Super in a very tail low attitude (read blind), and when the tail is low and throttle is closed with the flaps down, this combination blanks out the tail. There is a short period when you feel more like a passenger than a pilot. This would not be so bad were it not for the brakes. The brake chambers on the wheels are very large and it takes lots of pedal travel to snub up the brakes. When you are doing this in a hurry because the airplane is headed for the plowing, when the chamber fills up the brakes come on quickly. This can be the beginnings of a snake dance......

Bob O. lands the airplane on the wheels and then retracts the flaps to let some air over the tail and rush the tail down before the struts collapse, but I am not that brave. On the way to Reno 2 yrs ago the airplane tried to bite me at Elko NV. Gusty winds, one runway and some mechanical turbulence made for some fancy footwork.

T/O in the Super is a breeze. You have to put the flaps down to 30 deg get the Aux rudder deployed and with flaps 30, you pull the stick back, push the noise lever forward and before you could reach the edge of the runway, you're flying! Raise the gear and Flaps and pull the power back before you run out of fuel. I don't remember the T/O fuel flow, but it is a huge number. Bob O. does Wheel T/O too, but again, I'm a chicken $h1t.

The "normal" Corsairs have the same brakes and so they present the same challenge, but the rudder is much more effective through the landing in them. Wheel landings in the Corsairs are wonderful and uneventful. 3-points work fine too, but the visibility and the long struts that collapse like a whoopie cushion make nearly every wheel landing a greaser are so much more fun I seldom 3-point.

T/O in the normal Corsair is way different than in the Super and while most people don't use them, some flap make them easier. The flaps preselect on the Corsair (not sure about the FG-1D) only controls one flap and they are not mechanically interconnected. Selecting Flaps 10 can give you 10 deg on one side and anywhere from nothing to 50 on the other. This alarms wingman when you are waiting for T/O with a big split flap condition. As soon as the power comes up they balance hydraulically and you are good to go. Using Flaps brings the tail up quickly and shortens ground run dramatically. Directional control on T/O is no problem in the Corsair, unlike the Mustang where raising the tail early can mean a trip to the weeds. Without flaps you drive along ways with the tail down and no visibility. While I don't need to see on T/O, I like it.

I wrote an article a while back for Kitplanes that compared the Corsair to the RV-4. The similarities are remarkable. They both share a 23000 series airfoil. Great visibility in flight and marginal on the ground. Feather light flight controls. Very little stall warning with a clean break. Both airplanes will make you feel like a better pilot than you are.

In that article I also compared the Corsair to the -90 King Air. It too shares the 23000 series airfoil and has a similar weight and wing area, The Corsair has the stable and secure feel of the King Air, with twice as much horsepower and the RV's control forces and manuverability.

With the exception of landing the Super, and getting used to the brakes, I believe the Corsairs are pretty easy to fly. The rudder forces at high power are heavy but manageable. In any other regime, all controls are feather light.

Gerry Beck's -4 was the first fighter that I flew. When I landed, after everyone had congratulated me, I went inside and Beck asked what I thought about it. I told him it was really cool, but the flying was "no big deal."

He said, "If it was a big deal, you shouldn't be flying it."

Wise Words

Tailwinds,
Doug Rozendaal
from Balmy North Iowa, -18 deg F tonite Burrrrrr!

Last edited by DougR on Mon Feb 05, 2007 8:31 am, edited 1 time in total.

[bdk]

Interesting discussion on the various models of Corsair and the comparison to the P-51!

A little engineering comment. Props under power are destabilizing. Move the prop forward and the prop has a greater moment arm about the CG so things like P-factor are more pronounced. Of course the more power you have the worse it gets as well.

When the Maloney/Hinton Super Corsair was built, the R-4360 was mounted as far aft as possible (very close to the firewall). The model of 4360 used (don't know if the other models of 4360 were like this) had all the accessories mouted radially about the accessory section rather then aft of the accessory section like on the R-2800. The oil tank was placed behind the pilot to help in this respect too. Small fillets were added at the leading edges of the stabilizers, but these were more for streamlining than to add surface area. Don't know exactly where the prop ended up in relation to a stock Corsair, but it wasn't too far off.

The Sea Fury on the other hand didn't have so much room between the engine and firewall, so on Dreadnought the prop was considerably forward from the stock location. This is what necessitated the increased vertical stabilizer area. I understand that in certain flight regimes, a stock Sea Fury was lacking in vertical stabilizer area, and Dreadnought was worse until the area was added.

The swing spoken of in the Mustang when raising the tail I'm sure is problematic because of how far forward the prop is with the inline engine, but the T-6 suffers from this phenomenon also I am told, so it may just be a North American Aviation thing in the way they sized their vertical stabilizers. The Griffon powered Spitfires necessitated reduced power takeoffs to maintain controllability due to P-Factor. The extra power and extra blade area, which combine to create a higher polar moment of inertia, were enough to overcome the vertical stabilizer area which was quite sufficient for a Merlin powered Spitfire.

P.S. It was 90 degrees F in the Los Angeles area today... The stupid bowl party I went to today was outside. I wore shorts and a Hawaiian shirt. No jacket required!