

Had equipped the Corsair with a shotgun starter in lieu of This touchy enterprise had to stop short of flooding and thusĭrowning the spark plugs and evade the obvious fire hazard whileĬylinders to get the engine to cough to life. Next, the engine had to be primed with raw Lower cylinders of oil so the start-up could be accomplished in safety. Took two strong men pulling on a prop blade to slowlyĪccomplish the minimum revolutions needed to clear the The 2,800-cubic-inch engine was a monster to fire upĪfter it had sat in subfreezing weather overnight.

Typical day's ops, only about half of our fullĬomplement was safe to fly. To rate it with the Mustang as the best fighter plane of World War Two.īlackburn (CO of the Jolly Rogers) on the F4U Corsair: The Corsair appeared to be a superb fighting machine,īut it was overengineered and thus hard to maintain.

But its speed, firepower, maneuverability, and
