Best Naval Aviation movies

[Notanaviator]

Maverick's first foray in The Show was in a failed venture, aptly named Goose Airlines.

During the economic downturn of 2008, Goose Airlines was involved in a credit default swap scandal and CEO Maverick was indicted for

wait for it...

... writing checks his body couldn't cash.

I actually remember this scandal playing out - his efforts to spin the whole thing in a positive light fell flat.

 

[nittany03]

I actually remember this scandal playing out - his efforts to spin the whole thing in a positive light fell flat.

 

[Randy Daytona]

Debuting in the Bicentennial year of 1976 - "Black Sheep Squadron". (available on DVD). A great example of "beware the old man in a young man's game..."

Unfortunately, in Season 2 the show got moved from Tuesday night to Wednesday night - the same night as "Charlie's Angels" with Cheryl Ladd - and this was before VCR's. Make a call, F4U Corsairs or the Angels.

It had pilots and planes...

As well as maintenance support...

Black Sheep Squadron just happened to come on so I thought I would take a look at the Corsairs used in the show - found this:

POOR LITTLE LAMBS – The Corsairs of Baa Baa Blacksheep

POOR LITTLE LAMBS – The Corsairs of Baa Baa Blacksheep

UPDATE The Baa Baa Black Sheep book is currently in the works, the expected release date is September 21, 2024. If you would like to be notified and get your c

warbirdsnews.com

A total of eight Corsairs, of varied backgrounds, participated in the filming: four FG-1Ds, two F4U-7s, one F4U-1A, and one F4U-4. Five were combat veterans, two have turned hot laps at Reno, and two later became Oshkosh Grand Champions.

VOUGHT F4U-7 CORSAIR Bu.No. 133693

Bu.133693 (as 693) during her Aeronavale days on the deck of a French aircraft carrier. (photo via Stephen Chapis)

Black Sheep four-ship. (photo by Dan Friedkin)

 

[wink]

After seeing that shot/video a million times, I just noticed that -4 has an extended tail wheel. Was that one of the differences between models, or was that deferred maintenance.

Tailwheel retract may be inoperative as long as the tailwheel hydraulic system is inspected for integrity and isolated, the tailwheel is confirmed in the fully extended position and locked in place by a gear pin.

 

[Max the Mad Russian]

Black Sheep four-ship.

Is this nearest one with four cannons -1C or -7/AU-1?

 

[Pags]

Is this nearest one with four cannons -1C or -7/AU-1?

One or the other. From cowling shape (not chin scoops...oops) and the fact that there would be more of them around my guess would be AU-1.

 

[Pags]

One or the other. From cowling shape (not chin scoops...oops) and the fact that there would be more of them around my guess would be AU-1.

Also 4 bladed prop, unframed canopy, and antenna shape.

 

[Max the Mad Russian]

Have read those 20 mm were quite unpopular by Corsair people due to jamming habit, while USAAF P-38 crowd was quite happy with this weapon. Just like with P-39 as such: poor stepchild in USAAF and beloved bird in Soviet AF: one of two top aces here, Alex Pokryshkin, had 59 confirmed kills, 48 of them for his Cobra armed with 37-mm. He wrote the most funny thing was the low hunt for Ju-87s pulling of diving: as it turned out, P-39's 37mm could fire single rounds, and Aircobra was extremely stable at the treetop height so it was a competition to hit Junkers by single shot, clearly visible against a dark-green forest: it was always enough just one slug if it hit. Strangely enough but this cannon, as well as Cobra as such, worked perfectly over Soviet-Nazi front...

 

[OscarMyers]

Have read those 20 mm were quite unpopular by Corsair people due to jamming habit, while USAAF P-38 crowd was quite happy with this weapon. Just like with P-39 as such: poor stepchild in USAAF and beloved bird in Soviet AF: one of two top aces here, Alex Pokryshkin, had 59 confirmed kills, 48 of them for his Cobra armed with 37-mm. He wrote the most funny thing was the low hunt for Ju-87s pulling of diving: as it turned out, P-39's 37mm could fire single rounds, and Aircobra was extremely stable at the treetop height so it was a competition to hit Junkers by single shot, clearly visible against a dark-green forest: it was always enough just one slug if it hit. Strangely enough but this cannon, as well as Cobra as such, worked perfectly over Soviet-Nazi front...

Its funny you should mention the 37mm. This just popped up on my feed.

https://www.reddit.com/r/wwiipics/comments/j6188l

 

[Griz882]

Its funny you should mention the 37mm. This just popped up on my feed.

https://www.reddit.com/r/wwiipics/comments/j6188l

 

[Pags]

Have read those 20 mm were quite unpopular by Corsair people due to jamming habit, while USAAF P-38 crowd was quite happy with this weapon. Just like with P-39 as such: poor stepchild in USAAF and beloved bird in Soviet AF: one of two top aces here, Alex Pokryshkin, had 59 confirmed kills, 48 of them for his Cobra armed with 37-mm. He wrote the most funny thing was the low hunt for Ju-87s pulling of diving: as it turned out, P-39's 37mm could fire single rounds, and Aircobra was extremely stable at the treetop height so it was a competition to hit Junkers by single shot, clearly visible against a dark-green forest: it was always enough just one slug if it hit. Strangely enough but this cannon, as well as Cobra as such, worked perfectly over Soviet-Nazi front...

They built very few 1Cs so I'd guess not many folks were exposed to them. From what I've read pilots preferred that the .50s gave them more ammo and therefore longer firing times. I'd also imagine that many of them had habit patterns that were based off of using .50s from F4Fs and F6Fs. Also .50s were more than sufficient to down lightly built Japanese aircraft.

P-39s were used successfully by USAAF in the Pacific but they were fairly quickly replaced by more modern aircraft like the P-38. The P-39 was limited by it's lack of a turbocharger which resulted in poor high altitude performance. Air combat in the Pacific and over the ostfront was conducted at lower altitudes so that the P-39 could still be succesful in those theaters.

 

[Griz882]

They built very few 1Cs so I'd guess not many folks were exposed to them. From what I've read pilots preferred that the .50s gave them more ammo and therefore longer firing times. I'd also imagine that many of them had habit patterns that were based off of using .50s from F4Fs and F6Fs. Also .50s were more than sufficient to down lightly built Japanese aircraft.

P-39s were used successfully by USAAF in the Pacific but they were fairly quickly replaced by more modern aircraft like the P-38. The P-39 was limited by it's lack of a turbocharger which resulted in poor high altitude performance. Air combat in the Pacific and over the ostfront was conducted at lower altitudes so that the P-39 could still be succesful in those theaters.

The models used in the Pacific were Lend Lease buy-backs from the U.K. given the name P-400. The standing joke it the PTO was that a P-400 was a P-40 with a Zero on its tail. The aircraft was a great ship buster in the Solomons and a solid ground attack aircraft, but only one American pilot became an ace in the aircraft.

 

[Max the Mad Russian]

From what I've read pilots preferred that the .50s gave them more ammo and therefore longer firing times

Later during Korean war it turned out that Corsair with .50s was serviceable in hangar of small CVEs, like USS Sicily, since it was possible to make all maintenance on .50s while wings were folded. 20 mm in turn claimed spreaded wings, which was possible on a flight deck only, during winter snowstorms, so eventually CVEs over there hosted Corsairs armed with .50s only.

popped up on my feed.

Finns then had another airplane with quite controversial history in USN service, Brewster Buffalo, but with reassembled motors (all the original bearings were substituted with German ones) and rearmed with four Sweden Bofors .50s, and some of them, say WO Ilmary Yuutilainen or Capt Hans Wind, had 30+ kills piloting Buffalo. Even armored IL-2s were often the easy prey for Finn Buffalo over Baltic Sea - when hit in oil cooler underbelly, IL-2 became a bonfire in a seconds, but for this result the Buffalo should fire from the sea level literally. It seems that general success both Aircobra and Buffalo achieved over European fronts is mostly linked to very moderate heights of majority of dogfights where both were good enough, and the good radio which allowed seasoned pilots (both Soviets and Finns) to fuck the book tactics off and create their own from what they had in hand.

 

[SlickAg]

The Right Stuff starts streaming tomorrow on Disney+. I just saw a Facebook ad for it but haven’t seen much about it otherwise.

8 episodes, based on the book and the movie. Leonardo DiCaprio is one of the EPs.

Looking forward to “surprising” my wife with it since we just finished Indian Matchmaking and Emily in Paris. In other words, it’s my turn.

 

[SlickAg]

Later during Korean war it turned out that Corsair with .50s was serviceable in hangar of small CVEs, like USS Sicily, since it was possible to make all maintenance on .50s while wings were folded. 20 mm in turn claimed spreaded wings, which was possible on a flight deck only, during winter snowstorms, so eventually CVEs over there hosted Corsairs armed with .50s only.

Finns then had another airplane with quite controversial history in USN service, Brewster Buffalo, but with reassembled motors (all the original bearings were substituted with German ones) and rearmed with four Sweden Bofors .50s, and some of them, say WO Ilmary Yuutilainen or Capt Hans Wind, had 30+ kills piloting Buffalo. Even armored IL-2s were often the easy prey for Finn Buffalo over Baltic Sea - when hit in oil cooler underbelly, IL-2 became a bonfire in a seconds, but for this result the Buffalo should fire from the sea level literally. It seems that general success both Aircobra and Buffalo achieved over European fronts is mostly linked to very moderate heights of majority of dogfights where both were good enough, and the good radio which allowed seasoned pilots (both Soviets and Finns) to fuck the book tactics off and create their own from what they had in hand.

There’s a really good book by the naval aviator who tested those Buffaloes for the Finns called Aces Wild, by Robert A. Winston. He wrote some other great books too about navy flight training in the 1930s and being a VF CO during the 1944 Pacific air war, Dive Bomber and Fighting Squadron. All three are available on kindle for cheap.