Likely America’s best combat fighter, the Vought Corsair was the first fighter to exceed 400 mph and served on both land and sea as a fighter and a fighter bomber.
it had a (claimed) kill:loss ratio of 11:1
It had a 4000 lb payload of bombs and rockets, same as the long load for a B-17
With its 13′ 4″ wide bladder prop and water injection for cooling of the 2,400 Pratt & Whitney air-cooled radial R -2800 engine, the F4U-4 could hit 440 mph in WWII and 452 in Korea, faster than a P-51D Mustang.
Strangely, she was shoddily made from Vought through most of her production run and for at least half of it didn’t even have a cockpit floor. You read right. Pilots were livid. Some of the F4U’s made by Brewster were so bad they were never accepted and lead to Brewster’s failing.
The flaps could be set precisely in 10 degree increments allowing tremendous maneuverability.
The air intakes at the base of the wings actually put the air being driven into the supercharger under additional pressure, upping the speed.
The US Navy actually evaluated both the F4U Corsair and Hellcat vs the Fw 190 and the Bf 109 vs the P-51B Mustang, and the Navy F4U came out on top in all contests, and in terms of sheer combat.
Carrier aircraft. esp. in the PTO, were designed and trained to fight in low-medium altitudes to protect the carrier, exactly how the F4U Corsair fought the Japanese aircraft in the Pacific although she could still reach 42,000 comfortably.
Because the Corsair was too difficult to land and take off it was restricted away from any US Carrier duty and on to Royal Navy and US Marine duty for two full years and earned it the unfortunate nickname The Ensign Eliminator.
an F4U Corsair was $75,000, very expensive to build at the time, with its gull wings, compound curve sections and large use of flush riveting, all added to its performance but at a high cost.