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Old 7th August 2007, 16:55
Franek Grabowski Franek Grabowski is offline
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Re: Placing the Bell P39 Aircobra.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Graham Boak View Post
I believe so, yes. This may depend upon a definition of "close", but as aircraft lacking airbrakes such as the Avenger were capable of "glide bombing" up to around 60 degrees, the use of airbrakes suggest the presence of something much steeper.
Graham, you are misled. A friendly Mustang pilot recalls that when dive bombing, the aircraft accelerated so uncomfortably, the tacho looked like a propeller. Dive brakes are as usual in perpendicular dive as they are in shallow dive.
That said, Soviets had no dive bomber in the sense of Ju 87. Americans had Dauntlesses and Japanese - D3As but that is all.
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