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I will also agree with that comment.
For me and, I guess, for some other people, Corsair is second tier iconic 
First tier: Spitfire, Me109, P-51
Second tier: P-38, P-40, P-47, Hurricane, FW 190, Corsair, F4F. F6F
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Well thatâs a hot take. The Spitfire is indeed iconic, but far more to Brits than anyone else. The Corsair is far more iconic to Americans.
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If you guys look up the most iconic planes of ww2, the corsair shows up in every list. You canât say itâs not iconic. You can say itâs âlessâ iconic than the spitfire I guess (particularly if youâre european). But saying itâs not iconic is silly.
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Oh as for the actual question in the thread, theyâre both fantastic. Theyâre both difficult to learn to fly at first. Buy whichever one you find personally to be cooler.
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I personally went with the Spitfire and will grab the Corsair at a later date/reduced price.
No. P40 Warhawk is first tier! That shark mouth and the flying tigers. Come on!
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If by âIconicâ you mean more popular with the press and the movie industry with lots of modern day fans you may be right. However, during the Battle of Britain 7 out of 10 German aircraft were shot down by Hurricanes. In the ETO it did not have the range to fly with the bombers. In the PTO the Spitfire was outclassed by the A6M and eventually relegated to ground attack duty (something it was particularly unsuited for). The Spitfire is a bit like a modern âBoy Bandâ not dreadful by any means, but very over-rated.
The F4U on the other hand managed 2,140 air combat victories against 189 losses. Which is pretty respectable though the Hellcat and the bf109 both did better.
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A bit of info that you may be aware offâŠthe Americans had a real issue of landing the F4U on an Aircraft carrierâŠuntil the Poms showed them how to do itâŠthe challenge was the long noseâŠbut as you said it had a fantastic and successful historyâŠand from I have readâŠthe pilots loved it.
You should add that when the Battle started, the Hurricane:Spitfire ratio was 2:1.
Very over-rated? I donât think many people, if any, will agree.
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http://darwinspitfires.com/index.php?page=spitfire-vc-versus-the-zero
No. 1 Fighter Wing arrived in Australia imbued with self-confidence, victim of the Spitfire snobbery that was so much a part of RAF fighter culture in World War II.
RAF fighter pilots in the ETO derided the USAAFâs P-47 Thunderbolt, belittling the huge American fighter with the quip that when the pilot needed to perform evasive action under attack by enemy fighters, he just undid his straps and ran around inside the cockpit! This knee-jerk reaction negative impression ignored the P-47âs massively powerful Pratt and Whitney R-2800 engine and its associated turbocharger, which gave the big American machine superior performance in the tactically-critical altitude band above 25 000 feet.
When RAAF Spitfire pilots like Keith âBlueyâ Truscott were posted back to Australia for assignment to the RAAFâs newly-formed Kittyhawk squadrons, they similarly dismissed the heavy American fighter. Alongside the P-40âs trickier handling near the ground, Truscott admitted that it had good combat characteristics, but churlishly complained that you couldnât âmake it danceâ like a Spitfire. Although he came to accept the P-40 as a ânecessary evilâ in the SWPA,[1] in making this largely adverse judgment he ignored the American machineâs tactically advantageous features - like its powerful and reliable armament and its excellent rolling manoeuvrability at high speed (in this respect much better than the Spitfire). With all his experience, he should have realised that air combat would not be decided by close-in dogfighting with enemy fighters, whether against the Germans over Europe or against the Japanese over New Guinea. The ability to make an aircraft âdanceâ was thus quite secondary as a tactical characteristic.
To make matters worse, the Japanese had a fighter aircraft which could âdanceâ even better than the Spitfire, a fact which was very well known even at the time, and about which the newly-arriving Spitfire pilots were warned. This was established beyond any doubt during comparison trials in August 1943 between one of the RAAFâs Spitfire VCs and a Model 32 Zero that had been captured in New Guinea and rebuilt at Eagle Farm airfield in Brisbane.
The Model 32 Zero, with its squared-off wingtips, was regularly encountered both over Darwin and New Guinea in 1943. Known to the allies by the reporting name âHapâ to distinguish it from the round-wingtipped âZekeâ, the Model 32 was an improved model over the original Model 21 with which the Imperial Japanese Navy had fought its 1941-42 air offensives. The chief difference lay in its more powerful Mitsubishi Sakae 21 engine, which developed 1130 hp (as compared with 940 hp in the Model 21). The more powerful engine was heavier, requiring a reduction in fuel capacity from 518 litres to 470, and more thirsty; thus range was less than that of the earlier model. Both the newer and older types were encountered over Darwin.
Nonetheless, it was a Model 32 Zero that was captured and rebuilt, permitting the trials to occur in August 1943. The 1130hp of the Model 32âs Sakae 21 engine was quite comparable to the 1210 hp of the Spitfireâs Merlin 46, but the Model 32âs weight was much less â 5155 lb compared to the Spitfireâs 6883 lbs. As a result of this structural lightness, the Zero had both a superior power loading (4.5 lb/hp versus 5.6 lb/hp) and a lower wing loading (22 lb/ft2 versus 28 lb/ft2).
These differing technical characteristics determined the pattern of relative performance between the two machines, as shown by the tactical trials conducted by two experienced RAAF fighter pilots in flying trials conducted over three flying days[2].
Flight Lieutenant âBardieâ Wawn DFC and Squadron Leader Les Jackson DFC flew against one another in both aircraft, and what they found was not encouraging.
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There was a cool old TV series the Black Sheep Squadron, It had the Corsairs. It was filmed in Hawaii, between the Hawaii Five O original series, and Magnum PI. Has a lot of the same actors.
Not sure if its on TV anymore, you can get the DVD set on Ebay, its a cool show if you like flying, some good flight scenes.
The Corsair was designed to compete against the Japanese Zero, Greg Boyingtons Squadron did pretty well against them.
Not sure why they picked the version made by Goodyear as the model, wonder how many sales they miss out on, when people see it, and say, oh Ill wait for the F4U,
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The VG means it was manufactured by Goodyear under licence, rather than Vought. The Goodyear Corsairs equipped over 50 marine squadrons and carriers in the ETO.
It is going to be very very similar to a F4U-1D and built to the same specs. In fact pretty much identical except for small cosmetic/manufacturing differences that only scale model makers are likely to care about.
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Quickly browsing through this articale I didnât read anything about the Spitfire being very overrated or even overrated.
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The Corsair flies and behaves more closely to the P47 (same double wasp engine and size) I own in DCS than the Spit to the DCS counterpart. So Iâd say that the Corsair is better modelled.
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Prop driven aircraft and taildraggers are definitely not a strenght in DCS concering flight models.
I donât think that using them for comparison makes much sense.
Fair enough, this is going to turn into one of those arguments between the canonical mythological Spitfire and the historical real world one so I am not going to bother. The only argument that is more pointless is trying to convince a Merlin fan that DB actual made better engines.
Disagree sir. You cannot find better warbird replicas in the sim market.
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I watched this TV series and never missed one. In french it was âLes TĂȘtes BrulĂ©sâ (burned heads?) and âBlack Sheep Squadronsâ I think in English.
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The " A6M" were modified T6 Texans but the Corsairs were real.