Yiannis Mitzas

F4U-1 WM (Wasp Major) Corsair

Aircraft. Naval. The Vought-Sikorsky ‘Corsair’ fighter
(F4U-1) of the Navy, is one of the fastest fighter jets in existence. It is powered by a 2,000 horsepower Pratt and Whitney engine and has a cruising speed in excess of 425 miles per hour. Its top speed is a military secret. Designed to protect the Navy’s large bombers, the Corsair can be based on an aircraft carrier.

It is usually written that the F2G was created to counter the Kamikaze tactic introduced by the Japanese in the Pacific, which was first recognized in October 1944. If so, someone was prescient, since the decision to install an R-4360 on the Corsair was made long before that. Pratt & Whitney used two F4U-1s for the R-4360 for engine testing. The first was land-only, which began in May 1943. The second first flew on 12 September 1943.

Goodyear signed a contract in March 1944 for 418 F2G-1s and 10 F2G-2s. -2 had to be fully carrier compatible. Don Armstrong flew the first R-4360-modified FG on August 26, 1944. So, strictly speaking, the F2G’s raison d’être was not to counter Kamikaze tactics, at least not initially. (My explanation is that someone at BuAer wondered how fast a Corsair would go when powered by the massive R-4360.) The F2G was apparently really intended to supply Marine squadrons ashore, as almost all of the order was for the -1 which did not it had a tail hook or powered folding wings.

An F4U-1, with BuNo 02460, produced by Vought Corporation was transferred to Pratt & Whitney This plane had a lager cowling to serve for the Pratt & Whitney R-4360 Wasp Major.

The R-4360 was a 28-cylinder four row air cooled radial engine setup. Each row of seven air-cooled cylinders possesses a slight angular offset from the previous one, forming a semi-helical arrangement to facilitate effective airflow cooling of the cylinder rows behind them.

The Pratt & Whitney R-4360 Wasp Major was a radial piston aircraft engine designed and built during World War II, and the largest displacement aviation piston engine to be mass produced in the United States. It was the last of the Pratt & Whitney Wasp family, and the culmination of its maker’s piston engine technology, but World War II was over before it could power airplanes into combat.

This R-4360-4 – 2650 HP (1976 kW) Wasp Major engine was installed on 23 may 1943 and flown on 12 september 1943 as the F4U-1WM, WM stands for Wasp Major.

Pratt & Whitney tested the airplane at its Harford, Connecticut plant.

The US Navy saw certain advantages in the F4U-1WM configuration.

Achieving with this plane the highest speed on a carrier deck, would allow this fighter to intercept enemy planes.

It was finally Goodyear, that took the F4U-WM design a step further in evolution.

The XF2G-1 Super Corsair used a sub-rudder on takeoff and in landings to counteract the torque of the 2650 HP engine,