What made the F4U Corsair so much harder to fly than the Hellcat? I keep reading and hearing it practically wanted to kill its pilots.

Question

In flight sims, the Corsair does not feel like it handles that much worse than the hellcat other than the whole supercharger at low altitude wrecking the engine.

What about it makes it harder to fly in real life?

In: Physics

Answer 1

The Corsair wasn’t harder to fly. However, it was more difficult to land — on aircraft carriers — due to aerodynamic issues at very low speeds. The issues were fixed by fitting “spoilers” on the leading edge of the right wing.

[https://www.smithsonianmag.com/air-space-magazine/spoiler-alert-1-180977803/](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/air-space-magazine/spoiler-alert-1-180977803/)