Darn, I was hoping I would be the first to mention it. Amazing plane, with graceful lines.
Heavy Bomber: B-29 Superfortress
Medium Bomber: A-26 Invader
Night Fighter: P-61 Black Widow #1 Overall Favorite
Fighter: F4U Corsair
Ground Attack: P-39 Cobra
Dive Bomber: SBD Dauntless
Ooooohhh…good call on that.
Ground Attack: P-39 Cobra
?!?! Dude, the Cobra belongs in no “best of” or “favorite” list. Ground attack goes to the Thunderbolt or B25 FTW. The B25 with the quad guns in the nose, how awesome was that?
Goddamn Americans.
Lancaster and Spitfire with honourable mention of the Hurricane and Mosquito (but like any redblooded boy I have a soft spot for many WWII planes).
When I worked in the UK, I used to know an old Spitfire pilot and met a Lancaster gunner who flew with the Dambusters.
We can’t help it if our awesome technology saved the free world =)
No, that would be Russias oldfashioned but solid technology ;-)
I would never cite a Nazi plane as a favorite, but I have to say the Me-163 amused me when I read about it in some WW II novel about jet fighters. Was it “Angel, Archangel” ?
Anyhow, apparently this rocket fighter used potassium permanganate and peroxide as one of the two fuel components. Sadly for the Nazis, they didn’t have any aluminum by the time they brought this plane into its extremely limited production, so they had to use steel fuel tanks. Unfortunately T-stoff fuel rapidly corrodes steel, so it was just a question of “how long” before the fuel tank ruptured. And where did they put the fuel tank? Between the pilot’s legs. Needless to say, the oxidizer will also rapidly corrode flesh…
So they had this prototype fighter that flew so fast that they actually had problems keeping it on target when intercepting bombers – top speed 700 mph. According to the book, it was almost overwhelming versus both bombers and escorts. But every flight was a crap shoot for the pilot… Anyhow, according to wikipedia, eventually the allies figured out that the fuel supply was extremely limited, so they would wait for it to run out and pounce on it when it was gliding back home.
I’m another Hellcat fan, probably because it’s so overshadowed by the Corsair. For similar reasons I’m a fan of the S.E.5a over the Sopwith Camel.
Of course, I also like early-mark Spitfires and the P-51D (and the D-VII from WW1) so I’m not immune to the charms of the glory planes.
Ha, but it wasn’t until the super-sabre much later on that we came out with a jet fighter that actually worked. Kind of. As I understand it the sabre and earlier experimental planes were more deadly to our pilots than to enemies. But I guess the P-51 could be said to be the ultimate conventional fighter, so some props for that. As it were.
Don’t forget that it wasn’t long before they figured out how to shove a 75mm cannon in there too. The breech ended up right next to the Navigator, so he got the job of loading it, since he wasn’t really doing anything anyway while they were over the target areas.
The Soviets would beg to disagree…
It was one of the planes used by some of the highest scoring aces in the war. Just not Western aces.
Fighter: Mosquito
Bomber: Mosquito
I’ve always been partial to late model 109s, G-10 or K-4: crazily overpowered engines for an aging airframe, great climb rates allowing them to dictate straight dogfights even against late war allied fighters. Good punch with the nose-mounted 30mm cannon. And I like the aggresive looks and big variety of paint jobs.
The 190 for all it’s fame was a tamer fighter, maybe easier to fly and more versatile, but unexciting (except the Dora).
You guys listing the B17 are nuts. Don’t you recall that those things were chock full of zombies? On the other hand, admittedly they did have the cool feature that the turret gunner could simply sketch new landing gear if the conventional set got shot up.
I always felt that feature was never really modelled in any of the sims i’ve played.
Oh, and for the record, the Wildcat ended up with a net positive K/D ratio in the war, Zekes included.
It took a few weeks for American pilots to figure out tactics that worked, but with its superior dive, slim speed advantage, better roll rate and much higher durability, it did have key advantages to use against the Zeroes and Kis it encountered early in the war.
I’m not sure what you’re basing this opinion on, but all accounts I’ve read suggest that the F-86 Sabre performed very competently and reliably in Korea.
Honestly I have no sources at present, don’t remember, but I’ve read that pilots hated them and that many were killed in random non-combat accidents. That is admittedly a separate consideration from actual combat performance.
The previous owner of my house, incidentally, was a sabre and super-sabre pilot, but sadly I’ve lost track of him, so I can’t ask what he thought.
the second is an Amazing Stories reference isnt it? even as a kid I thought that was really lame.
My favorite fighter is probably the Focke Wulf line. The 190 is just a great aircraft - quick, nimble, smaller than its counterparts yet better armed with usually 4 autocannons and a couple rcmgs for lining up your shots. Radial engines so the kite dosent have the glass jaw of the spits, 109s and mustangs. The late war models, especially stuff like the Ta-152H are awesome.
The corsair is a great plane too.
Bomber I like the Il-2 Shturmovik (even though it wasnt known for carrying bombs - but im sure it did on thousands and thousands of sorties). Heavy 6-8mm armor on the vitals, brutal firepower with 20mm (early) then 23mm and finally 37mms in the wings without all the added drag of underwing or fuselage pods. And the unarmored gunner position is a classic Soviet touch. The casualty rate on the gunners was like 7x higher than that of the pilots - im guessing a lot of ground crews had to scoop those guys out of there with a soup ladle after a 109 or 190 pasted him with a hail of 20mm minengeschoss.
I vote for the Mustang. It’s just so recognizable that I associate it with WW2 more than any other plane, except maybe the B-17. Those are the images we are fed.
As for the rifle, I’ll go with the Enfield. Nice weapon, that one.
For pistols, I would think the Luger (spelling?) is more accurate than the .45.