Ta 152 question

[Ianseymour95]

No more so than an FW 190 or Me-109 was. It wasn't any better armed than either plane.

Fair enough, I just thought they might have done a specialist type with heavier armament of the plane for attacking bombers, but then again that would probably affect the aircraft's performance so I dunno :roll:

[Plain Old Dave]

Hi!

Would the Kriegsmarine have been if they had a carrier or two?

Well, an effective carrier battle group needs all sorts of support. Cruisers and destroyers as screens and long range radar pickets, a sub or two for scouting... All assets the KM did not have. Submarine Sailors had a term for an unprotected carrier at sea: Target.

Back to the original topic, though, piston-engine tactical aircraft were not a complete dead end in later 44-45; their lower speeds made them perfectly suited for the smaller decks of the WW2 aircraft carriers. An Essex-clas carrier is a small platform to bring an aircraft aboard and the slower an aircraft can get "in the groove" the better chance the aviator has of successfully and safely trapping. Another variable in the smaller WW2 carriers is the pitching and rolling deck. Where with a modern 100K ton carrier you'll never see or feel the ship move with less than 15-20 foot seas, there are tons of videos around of the older boats pitching and rolling. Question with the TA152 is, what was the stall speed? Where with jets, the landing is a 'controlled crash' where the aircraft is more or less slammed into the deck, on final approach to a carrier with piston engine aircraft, the pilot would get as close as possible to stall while maintaining controllability and cut power right over the arresting cable. More or less dropping out of the air onto the cable.

[T. A. Gardner]

I would say the big issue with the Ta 152 as a carrier plane would be it's horrible over the nose view. The pilot would have to guess his way to a landing as that long nose and low canopy would give no view of the flight deck on approach. This was one of the big objections the USN had to the F4U before modifications were made to improve the forward view.
Another would be how much "bounce" on landing the plane has. The P-51 was tested aboard the USS Shangri-La in early 1944 for suitability as a carrier fighter. It was found to have too much landing gear bounce due to the shock absorber arrangement, and poor over the nose visibility and rejected.