Best P51 Performance?

[nickle]

The CFS3 P-51D is a dog.  Av History a much better dog than the MS dog but still a dog.

The CFS2 P-51D 1 percent is a very nice flying fighter.  No stall problems, handles well, and accelerates very well in dogfights vs the 1 percent Zeke.  Only downer is that the guns don't shoot into the pipper center at 1 G.

I used the Jerry Beckworth Aim It to harmonize the guns at 700 ft and 10 ft elevation.  Better, but not as it should be.

Ok, so you SH types prefer 200 ft harmonization. So be it.

[Iroquois]

On the topic of US WW2 fighters in CFS3, I find the heavy fighters like the P-47 and F4F Wildcat are far superior to the Stang.
In real life, what made the Mustang superior was it's long range. Which is why people keep saying to loose extra fule. If you set it to 50% you should keep flying for a while while gaining increased preformance.

[nickle]

The P-47 CFS3 is a super dog.

Haven't tried it in CFS2.  Zeke would eat it alive 1 v 1.

Wildcat is not a "heavy" fighter, reality or sim.

F4F4 my fav in CFS2 for dogfighting Zekes.  Major deficiency is lack of power.  

Real world not a match to the Zeke.

What if: F4F4 w/2 20mm Colts plus 200 rounds each.  A killer combination.

CFS3 P-51Dog flys good at zero fuel I'd wager.

[Jaffa]

[quote]
The CFS2 P-51D 1 percent is a very nice flying fighter.

[pliabos]

nickle i mean, try to imagine what enemy will do and use geometry in the air to gain advantage on him. most pilots r just follwing the target cone instead. i am flying in real life and i think u can learn emergencies, systems, prosedures etc. but FEELING it , is different . (sorry about my english )

[nickle]

P-51D stall problems:

Any sim aircraft can be made to stall by pulling.  Not good form to do that as the energy penalty is very high.

Now that you mention it, the sims are like arcade games.

On G:

CFS3 has a poor visual G reference. G plus lots of garbage.
CFS2 is much better giving FR and G.

Most simmers, but not all, are sitting at 1 G when in flight sims.  G is part of the energy manuverability problem.  Pulling high G results in instantaneous manuvering at the expense of speed and manuvering ability at the next event.  
The reference G for WWII fighters is 4 G.  Cannot be felt in a sim as in the real deal.  I use that as a reference for how much energy is being expended vs what the next event will be and how much speed I would like to have.

How did the pilots know G in WWII? From flight training GUIB telling the student what was right for aerobatics, from gunnery training, from operational experience with the fighter.  Since they wore no G suits, sustained 6 G was known.  Popped rivets gave them indications of very high G.  Accelerated stalls told WWII pilots the limits of the manuvering envelope.

[snake]

And, if you properly apply the kinetic energy in the P-47D, amazingly enough it becomes very deadly.  Ask me how I know, I have the screen shots to prove it.  

I think that a drastic increase in pilot skill is needed for the majority of combat flight simmers, who have never flown a combat aircraft, or any aircraft for that matter.

[nickle]

Snake

Tell of your fighter experience pls.

[Whiskey_Zulu]

Yeah, please tell us.  Are you a graduate of the U.S. Air Force Fighter Weapons School or something?

The P-47 in CFS3 is the worst of the Allied fighters.  It is just too slow and unmaneuvareable.  When flying a German plane, I always view the P-47 as just target practice.

KE doesn't mean anything.  It's power to weight that makes a fighter good.  P-47 has good power, but also very high weight.  You could have all the KE in the world, but if the airplanes you are dogfighting can out-climb you (and pretty much all the fighters in the game can, as they have better power-to-weight), you can never get near enough to use your guns, so KE doesn't mean anything.  All the P-47 can do it run away by diving.

[nickle]

In defense of the 47.  Corky Meyers, the legendary Grumman test pilot WWII and beyond, recently rated the P-47 as the No 1 European fighter.  Thirty eight percent more 47's than 51's flew 217 percent more sorties.  It was highly effective both ground and air.  Not a dogfighter in the same league as the Spit, 190 or 51 but very effective.  It's salvation in a dogfight would to break off the engagement when disadvantaged and use superior speed to escape from a 190.
The 190 would have taken no 1 but for the lack of N production capability.  It was a highly effective fighter as well as an attack aircraft.  It was the prototype for the F8F.
On KE or energy manuverability theory:  Every air force in the world now uses it.

[Whiskey_Zulu]

KE is just the energy of movement, not position.  I believe "energy management theory" also includes the energy of position, or potential energy.  KE by itself is meaningless, since speed is the only thing that matters (mass isn't going to make much of a difference.).  So saying using KE properly just means using speed properly is rather simple--faster=better, or don't go slow--wow, amazing insight.  But the P-47 is the slowest fighter.  It can only go fast if it dives--but that is taking advantage of PE, not KE, or rather, converting PE into KE.

The P-47 may have been good in real life, but only because it could dive and run away easily.  This severly limits when it is useful.  Escorting strategic bombers was the most important use of U.S. fighters in World War II.  So if all your escorts can do is run away, they are worthless.  The Allies didn't dominate the air when only the P-47 and P-38 were available.  It took the Mustang to do that.  The Grumman test pilot is probably just speaking in terms of strictly dogfighting, not the strategic necessity of certain fighters being able to fight it out and not run away.

Anyway, in the game, diving and running way is almost worhtless because AI/you is basically omniscient.  They will almost always catch up to you eventually--you can't hide, and you can't run for long.  Since you can select/target enemy airplanes, they can't hide from you either.

[nickle]

"Ke is just the energy of movement not position."

It is the energy of movement to gain a favorable tactical position.

Slow has little to do with the issue.  Just don't get slow at the wrong place and time.

"Escorting bombers was the most important use of US fighters in WWII."

It was their main mission until sufficient 47/51 became available late 1943.  In fact an AAF general was replaced over the issue of fighter tactics.  Welded to the bombers or allow fighters to roam seeking targets of opportunity?  47 was very good at the opportunity mission. Roam was the answer and the bomber guy went home.

Grumman test pilot and dogfighting.

He evaluated on total mission capability, not just dogfighting.  47 was multimission, 51 not.  His choice surprised me but I understand his reasoning.

The 47 was not a slug.  It had speed.  Better to bug out and live to fight another day than to die proving that the 190 was a better dogfighter than a 47.

You can't run for long.  Yes you can.  Boring as hell but possible.

[Whitey]

I don't see what all the fuss is about.  I have the defualt FDs installed and I recently made myself up a mission as an escort to Germany and back.  I ended up in a dogfight with about 80% fuel.  I still managed to drive off a formation of 109s and even destroy one.

It's all about what you can do with the plane and your wingmen.  Never forget that WW2 pilots never flew alone in a dogfight!  There wingman was always with them.  Also, dogfights as such were best avoided.  The idea was to get more altitude and speed than the enemy and dive out of the sun, picking off a couple of planes before you were even seen, then bug out.  Remember this won't be possible in Quick Combat because it's an actual dogfight.

All this physics nonsense... ...really, pilots in WW2 were usually young boys, barely into there 20s.  They couldn't care less about lectures and stuff like that.  If they got killed it meant they were bad fighter pilots, but there's no such as a bad fighter pilot, therefore if they got killed, they weren't really a fighter pilot at all...get my drift?

What I mean is that if you can't shoot down a 109/190 before they get you and then you go blaming it on the plane, you must suck at the game.

Why do you think you always get told to use your wingmen wisely before each mission?  And why do two always peel off when you give the order to attack?  Understand now?

[snake]

Here is victim number 1, A bfg-109-10.  Notice I am forcing him to "play" where I have the greatest advantage, at lower altitudes.

[snake]

And who says I cant climb with the 109-10's :-/