Die wahnsinnige Ingenieurskunst der Vought F4U Corsair

Video from the channel Ingenieurwesen Dokumentation about Vought F4U Corsair, linked on its Above Ten Thousand entry. Duration: 42:06. Language: German. Video type: Documentary.

A German-language documentary about the engineering of the Vought F4U Corsair, the US Navy's carrier-based fighter. It goes chapter by chapter through the design requirements, the inverted gull wing, the engine, the materials and construction, the aerodynamics, the landing gear, the armament and the performance improvements of the successive variants.

In February 1938 the US Navy's Bureau of Aeronautics set very demanding requirements for a new fighter: the highest possible top speed, a stall speed under 70 mph for safe carrier landings, at least 1,000 miles of range, four guns (or three with more ammunition) and the capacity to carry anti-aircraft bombs. To meet them, the most powerful engine of the time was chosen, the Pratt & Whitney R-2800 Double Wasp, an 18-cylinder twin-row radial producing 1,850 hp at takeoff. The Chance Vought team, led by chief engineer Rex B. Beisel, worked to one clear principle: speed comes first. The first tests revealed serious problems: oil from the cowl flaps' hydraulic system on the windshield, gear bounce on touchdown, and loss of lift on slow approaches.

The enormous 13-foot-4-inch, three-blade Hamilton Standard Hydromatic propeller forced the adoption of the inverted gull wing: this allowed the landing gear to be shorter and lighter, let the wing join the fuselage at a right angle, reducing drag, and housed the oil coolers in the dihedral. The Corsair was the first Navy aircraft with fully enclosed landing gear: the legs rotated 90° as they retracted backward. The airframe used spot welding instead of rivets, although the outer wings aft of the spar and the control surfaces were still fabric-covered. It carried 150 pounds of armor and a 1.5-inch armored windshield. The two-stage, two-speed supercharger and water injection on the F4U-1A and F4U-1D raised power to 2,250 hp. The F4U-4 fitted the 2,100 hp R-2800-18W, and the F4U-5 the R-2800-32W, rated at 2,450 hp or 2,850 with water-methanol injection. In a dive it reached 550 mph, and a small 6-inch stall strip on the right wing fixed its handling. Squadron VF-17 improved carrier landings by raising the shock absorber pressure and adding anti-bounce cylinders. The F4U-1 carried six .50 caliber Browning M2 machine guns, and the F4U-1C four 20 mm cannons. In the Pacific it is credited with 2,140 enemy aircraft shot down against 189 losses, an 11-to-1 ratio.