P-47 Actions 29 Mar 44 near Berlin

[Six Nifty .50s]

Originally Posted by Franek Grabowski

Actually, T-bolt had pretty poor dive performance, both Mustang and Spitfire outdiving it. This was a surprising result of supersonic dive tests performed in Britain.

Your comment is misleading. The Spitfire, except for the wing shape, was not a particularly clean aircraft and its dive acceleration was not very impressive. And, the British did not use a fighter version of the Spitfire for those high speed tests. It was an unarmed, Mk XI high-altitude photo plane that was dived from the thin air at about 40,000 feet. The Mustang Mk I was a low-altitude photo plane dived from 28,000 feet, with guns and radio removed. I'm not sure about modifications to the Thunderbolt, if any, but the pilot was not very experienced at diving this type. During the tests he lost control of the aircraft and had problems with the engine.

Under combat conditions most if not all Axis and Allied fighters could escape from a Spitfire by diving away from it. It was a standard disengagement tactic used by German pilots.