Corsair... from a Royal Navy perspective.

[Trooper117]

Great videos on the F4U Corsair from the Royal Navy... really worth a watch to get first hand accounts from a British perspective.

 

 

[Chief_Mouser]

If Combat Pilot ever gets that far into the Pacific War, here's a couple of books to whet your appetite for the RN Corsair and things Fleet Air Arm. Cheers.

 

[Trooper117]

You missed this one... a brilliant well researched book on the young RN pilots who fought in the Pacific in 1945...

[Calos_01]

On 6/11/2023 at 3:29 PM, Trooper117 said:

Great videos on the F4U Corsair from the Royal Navy... really worth a watch to get first hand accounts from a British perspective.

Great videos and great channel as well. I'm afraid I'm going to spend a lot of time there. Thank you .....but another reason for sleep deprivation 🙂

[Boom]

Really good description in the second video (at the 12.00 minute mark) of how to carrier land a Corsair.

A really good (first person) book on flying RN Corsairs in the Pacific is Norman Hanson's 'Carrier Pilot'.

[Gambit21]

A subject I’ve not read a thing about - thanks for the thread Trooper. 

 

[Flyingscotsman]

Hats off to the RN Pilots, (I'm a Crab) They took the Corsiar into service, in smaller carriers than the USN, when the USN had put a hold as they had problem landing, as they found the landing gear too hard/stiff and caused it to bounce about. The brits solved it by teaching the pilots to use the view over the gull wing on landing, Don't do a straight in, you can't see a thing. Bring it in from the port sid at 45 deg keep the deck in view until the last moment as your are always turning left, and then dump it down. The Corsair went to the U.S. Marines and the USN took it back later.

[javelina]

yep, I remember reading up on this as well.  The Brit's solved the problem with the initial carrier operations for the Corsair.  Indeed, good on them!

[Boom]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I remember reading (somewhere)that there was no floor in the Corsair cockpit. If you dropped something, it fell into the well of the fuselage, and was likely to come flying back up and hit you when doing aerobatics. 

Kinda hard to picture how a pilot would settle into the cockpit initially. Did he have to step straight onto the rudder pedals whilst he sat himself?

[Gambit21]

Just now, Boom said:

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I remember reading (somewhere)that there was no floor in the Corsair cockpit.

Correct.

 

 

[Art-J]

@BoomWell, there was no "full" floor so to speak, but there were two trays running from beneath rudder pedals to the back, so there was something to stand on while getting in or out of the pit.

By the way, Spitfires also had gaping hole down there (because of ctrl stick pivot being located at the bottom of the fuselage), just not as big as Corsair's one.

[Calos_01]

6 hours ago, Art-J said:

@BoomWell, there was no "full" floor so to speak, but there were two trays running from beneath rudder pedals to the back, so there was something to stand on while getting in or out of the pit.

By the way, Spitfires also had gaping hole down there (because of ctrl stick pivot being located at the bottom of the fuselage), just not as big as Corsair's one.

Exactly, it can be seen here:

 

https://www.milsurps.com/showthread.php?t=54488

 

 

[Calos_01]

But some corsairs do have full floors 🙂 

[Art-J]

True :).

Although the floor in this one is probably more comparable to its flying namesake 😉

 

[Boom]

Thanks for the link to those photo' of the Corsair cockpit Carlos. Shows clearly the runners for the pilot to stand on.
But I can't see any gap in the 'floor'. Looks totally covered over.

[Calos_01]

10 hours ago, Boom said:

Thanks for the link to those photo' of the Corsair cockpit Carlos. Shows clearly the runners for the pilot to stand on.
But I can't see any gap in the 'floor'. Looks totally covered over.

It seems quite visible to me. Try to zoom the image, consider the perspective, and I think you can see that the gap is more than a foot deep.