Corsair Question

[O.P.]

I see a F4U Corsair project for sale on the internet. It says it has an F4U fuselage with an FG1 center section. Can these be mated correctly. Were the Vought and the Goodyear birds identical? I personally am not sure, things never seem to be that easy.

[corsairboss]

just about everything on the Corsair was inter-changable, you run into some problems with cowlings, exhaust stacks, hell hole doors on the bottom, canopys glass, and front wind screens. The center sections where all the same, they did not exchange with Brewster stuff because of the rumor of poor craftsman ship. The wings where the same except for different gun barrels "50 cal. or 20MM", flaps where the same, I think you see the picture here.

[O.P.]

Thanks guys!

Thats pretty cool. Good thing to know too!

[Alan Brooks]

Hey Guys, Mint I'm going to disagree with you on one point about the Brewster built Corsair. In previous conversations with John Lane, John found (when researching for Kohs FG-1D) that Willy's (jeep co.) appears to have built up most of the center sections for Vought and Brewster. Yes, Vought built the c/s spars, then shipped those out. The c/s was then built up and shipped back to the final assy plant. So, in theory the center sections would mate up to most any other Corsair assy. We have all read about how the Brewster plane supposedly had lots of problems...... (fact/fiction?), but I believe that Lex's airplane has a combat history...... Alan Brooks

[RMAllnutt]

As far as I know Lex's bird stayed state-side for the duration, and its bureau number seems to indicate it was not in the batch allocated to the FAA. One of the USMC pilots who trained in it (forget his name, but Lex told me several years ago) had been a corsair combat pilot, and had been to see the plane at Lex's place.... perhaps that's where the confusion set in. Don't know.

I do know that no US Brewster-built corsairs saw combat... which isn't too surprising since there were only about 300 in US inventory. There was the rumor about poor construction, but I believe that in itself was just a rumor. I have had several conversations with one of the Brewster test pilots, Ralph Romaine, and he adamantly stated that the Brewster corsairs were as good, or better than those built by Vought or Goodyear. Could be professional pride talking, but I can't see why a pilot would sign off on a delivery if he wasn't certain of the aircrafts complete serviceability... just doesn't make sense. As far as I know I have never heard of any official complaints about the Brewster corsair either, although there was plenty of beef between the Navy and Brewster, but this was mainly over the low production-rate, and management problems... and costs of course.

With respect to FAA Brewster corsairs serving in combat, I find this highly unlikely. I have been through every British corsair record in the bible on WWII FAA aircraft, Ray Sturtivant's Air Britain book on FAA aircraft 1939-1945, and not one of them seems to have been posted to an operational squadron, nor lost on ops either. A few were allocated to training squadrons based in Ceylon, and Australia, but that's it. What are your sources Rob, as I am very interested to know if there is any proof of Brewster corsairs serving in combat?

Cheers,
Richard

I think one point on this project is being overlooked. It says its a F4U-4 and FG-1D. There are large differences between the two. Though I believe they can be bolted together.

[Steve T]

Don't know if it adds anything to the discussion really, but iirc the CWH (now Olympic) FG-1D was fitted with F4U-4 outer wing panels at some point before CWH acquired her. Also, at least one of the Cleland F2G racers (#74) swapped fin-and-rudder assemblies with Cleland's FG-1A in 1947. Seems to have been a good degree of parts interchangeability in the series.

S.

[RMAllnutt]

Interesting... didn't see something on the net which is a combo of F4U-4 and FG-1 parts. Can someone provide a link... I'm curious as to whose project it is.

With regards to parts interchangeability, yes, there are a lot of parts which basically fitted in the same manner, especially the center section. Some components, like the outer wings became all metal from -5 on, and the horizontals were made from metalite in later variants, rather than plain alclad, but the still attached in precisely the same manner. For instance, the outer wing panels on the former Paul Morgan FG-1D are from a late-variant cannon-armed corsair (-5 if I recall correctly). I hadn't realized that the Olympic Flight museum's corsair (former CWH) had -4 wing panels... that's pretty interesting. I remember Joe Tobul's -4 corsair had Brewster-made flaps, and -7 ailerons... I remember taking pictures of the data plates, because it was such an interesting detail. So there was a lot of interchangeability. The corsair was a very practical aircraft from this persective.

Cheers,
Richard

[O.P.]

Here's the link,

http://www.shermanaircraft.com/cgi-bin/aircraft.pl

I've looked around the internet and found the right wing, a propeller, and some other stuff. It looks like a good starting point. I gotta check my lottery ticket