Real world: Fw-190 VS. BF-109

[Gaston]

He does say, right after "much better than the Me-109", that "you could curve it"... And he also adds that the "the only handicap" was the poor big nose visibility on take-offs and landing...

Rall says he could barely out-turn the 190A in the Me-109F (900 lbs lighter than G) when the first 190A models came out, and that most 109F pilots couldn't do it according to Rechlin: "They told us it out-turned the Me-109F"

A Russian large-scale combat evaluation summary has the FW-190A described as a "stereotyped" low-speed turn-fighter that will "inevitably offer turning combat at a minimum speed".

"The 190 does not like vertical maneuvers" they also add... "Keep speeds as high as possible against the FW-190"

The predominant opinion of 8th Air force pilots was that the FW-190A sustained turns better than the Me-109 (probably in a slightly wider radius than the Me-109 could do downthrottled very slow). This also was the opinion of British ace Johnny Johnson who describes in a post-war recollection being out-turned by a FW-190A in his Spit V, and adds that it was also known to turn better than the Me-109...

British tests have the 190 as superior turning to the 109, but US navy test follow what is the current consensus on the 190's character: No 190A combat experience for the US Navy, fortunately...

Also, a Sabre is an edged weapon shaped like a curve and creates large wounds when slicing in a curve... (Slicing being here an illustration of the firepower)

While a floret is light, straight, narrow, has no edge and can only be used in straight strokes to make a small, if deeper, hole: Pretty illustrative... It could very well refer to the 109's better high-speed handling when pulling out of dives after a diving attack, as the Russian evaluation has the FW-190A dropping 220 M (660 ft.) AFTER being nose-level during a 45° dive pull-out...

Trimmed tail-heavy, the Me-109G's 420-500 MPH dive pull-out was superior to a fabric-elevator P-51D...

Calculated conventional wisdom is simply in this case at 180° from the actual FW-190A reality. Note however the Me-109G could likely out-turn and out-perform the Anton above 7 or 8 KM, or at speeds above 250 MPH, which covers a lot of scenarios...

Formulas based on jet flight behaviour simply don't give good results with prop fighters...

Gaston