I know that I may bore...but...

[BigJim]

Just a historical note, the "nose guns" of a B-17 were manned by the Navigator and Bombadier (not the best at gunnery for sure) and so the B-17 should be vunerable from HO attacks (if the poor gunnery of the gunners is modeled in the sim)????

[Vermillion]

Ummmm.... Funked your picture proved my point  

 

Maybe and just maybe, the A8's specifically designed for ramming Bombers might have had a specially reinforced wing, but I would be really suprised.

Isn't the Sturmbock the special bomber ramming model??

And the standard A8 (which is what we have isn't it??) doesn't have any armor in the wings.

And the armor in the Sturmbock isn't there to protect the wing, its there to protect the 30mm HE shells, at least according to the caption. So how would that armor plate protect you from losing a wing?



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Vermillion
**MOL**, Men of Leisure
Carpe Jugulum
"Real Men fly Radials, Nancy Boys fly Spitfires"

[Wanker]

 

Just a historical note, the "nose guns" of a B-17 were manned by the Navigator and Bombadier...

Not according to my 82 yr old grandfather, a chin and waist gunner on a B-17G of the 549th Bomb Squadron, 385th Bombardment group(H), Eighth AF. He was his plane's armorer, responsible for making sure all of the guns were properly working. He said he rotated between the waist position and the chin position during his tour. Maybe each group did things differently, though. So we could both be right.  



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banana
308 (Polish) Squadron RAF "City of Cracow"
"On the whole, it is better to deserve honors and not have them than to have them and not deserve them"

[Pongo]

Finally a picture that shows that the normal 190 A8 was not heavily armoured. That is no more armour than a spit or 51.  So without the outer wing guns what is the advantage of an A5 again? Those 2 13mm dont weigh that much more than 2 7.92s.....

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Pongo
The Wrecking Crew

[fats]

--- Vermillion: ---
Isn't the Sturmbock the special bomber ramming model??
--- end ---

There was no such thing as a Fw 190A specifically designed for ramming purposes. AFAIK there was only one mission flown with its purpose to bring bombers down by ramming which was flown on April 7, 1945 by Sonderkommando Elbe. But yes the lower of Funked's pictures is of a Fw 190A-8 meant for attacking bomber formations.

Now for the best part, the Sturm planes oft made staffel strong formation approach from the _rear_. Which is more or less suicidal with the AH gunner settings. In the same book as funked took the pictures from, Walther Hagenah sais that the staffel might lose 1 or 2 aircraft doing such approach. 2 planes out of 16! In AH it would be much more like 2 out of 16 might survive attacking so strong bomber formation.


//fats

[Pavel]

I've HO'd several B17s.  I originally tried it because escorts virtually prohibited any other pass- and it worked. After several subsequent successes, I now view the B17 HO as a potentially viable attack plan- one which I intend certainly to investigate further. I don't have any problems with the alleged God's death ray unless I send my firing pass in on God's telegraph.   Those that have trouble with bombers ought to fly them more so as to see from the inside what gives a gunner trouble.  

 

[funked]

Verm:

"So how would that armor plate protect you from losing a wing?"

The diagram doesn't show it, but the main spar is less than a foot behind that 20mm plate.

Sure it's a very small region of coverage, but it is SOME coverage.  

[funked]

I concur with Fats - There was not a ramming model of the Fw 190.  The armored variants were employed by Sturmstaffel pilots who took a vow to ram if they couldn't kill the bomber with guns.  But the plane was not designed for ramming.

The image I provided shows an Fw 190A-8/R8 aircraft which combined extra armor and MK 108 installation in the outer wings.  R2 aircraft had the MK 108 mods without armor, and R7 aircraft had the fuselage armor but no MK 108.

[Skorpyon]

A couple of nights ago, I got 3 HO kills on 17's in a 190.  The best way I found to do this is in the afore mentioned HO dive.  All 3 times, I came in weaving a bit, from between 1 and 3 o'clock high, though not high enough to risk tearing a wing on my next move, making gunner try to track me.  I actually dropped slightly below the 17's alt and pulled up hard at very close distance.  With all cannons and mg (20's and 13, no 30) I blew apart the right side wing root (can never remember port and starboard   ), and did so while almost totally blacked out.  It took a reasonably short burst, and I sustained NO damage.  Needless to say, the adrenaline rush was intense.  Will this work every time?  Absolutely not, but the 190 driver must use angle, speed, and impact point choice to his advantage.  If the buff gunner is having to keep up with you, he will have to be quite good to hit you with these movements/angles.  I have NEVER downed a 17 in one pass like this reliably any other way, usually relying on the dive, park, hose, dive tactic that works about 50 percent of the time.  Remember too... a 17 is a large target.  Shooting to center of mass means there are two vital areas (pilot and wing root), but they are surrounded with basically non-essential material such as cockpit shell, nose gunner's station, non-specific wing area, and even engines.  Face it, taking out an engine or two on a buff is no victory if he shreds you in the process and can still fly away.  Vital target choice is important regardless of whether using HO or 6 attack on buff.  Take the tail, take a wing, whatever, but make him a pile of pieces as quickly and safely as possible.  Too much time spent almost always works to his advantage.
   

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Skorpyon
I/JG2 ~Richthofen~
"Feel the Sting......"

[This message has been edited by Skorpyon (edited 03-30-2000).]

[Vermillion]

No more dancing around the issue Funked  

Do you agree or disagree with my "My Aircraft is not a Panzer rant"?  

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Vermillion
**MOL**, Men of Leisure
Carpe Jugulum
"Real Men fly Radials, Nancy Boys fly Spitfires"

[LLv34_Camouflage]

RAM - you sent me the film right after the incident and I watched it.  Like I told you then, I think you had bad luck.  You came into the HO, got the B17's wing, but at the same time the B17 got a good burst into your left side from close range.  You lost your wing and exploded.

You came almost directly headon, slighty on the left of the B17. The B17 had the top turret and left nose gun pointed at you. I believe you gave quite a stable target. You were fast, but not an impossible shot for the gunner.  I believe he got a good 1 sec burst from 3 .50's into your left wing root just as you shot his wing off.  I would estimate a 1/5 chance on that shot - 2 attacks out of ten you would be shot down too.  This was one of them.

With a little more lateral separation you can make the gunner's job a lot more difficult.  Come from the high 10 or 2, maybe even do like Skorpyon did - dive under it and zoom back up and shoot at the buffs belly.

Like I told you, based on that one film I can't see what the fuss is about.  Try these tricks - if you still get shot down more than you get kills, we can start looking for gameplay bugs together  

Cya in the virtual skies!

Camo


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Camouflage
XO, Lentolaivue 34
 www.muodos.fi/LLv34

"The really good pilots use their superior judgement to keep them out of situations
where they might be required to demonstrate their superior skill."

[sourkraut]

From BigJim >
Just a historical note, the "nose guns" of a B-17 were manned by the Navigator and Bombadier (not the best at gunnery
                       for sure) and so the B-17 should be vunerable from HO attacks (if the poor gunnery of the gunners is modeled in the
                       sim)????

<

So does this mean that the nose guns should not fire when the pilot is in the bombsight?
Does anyone know if the nose gun fires when the pilot is in the bombsight and a gunner
is in a turret firing at con in view of the nose guns?

sour

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Sourkraut
JG-2 Richthofen

"Hey - someone has to be the target...."

 

[This message has been edited by sourkraut (edited 03-31-2000).]

[Karnak]

Pongo, I'm familar with the armour on the Spitfire MkXIV and I assure you that the Fw-190 in the pictures has more armour than the Spit.  I don't know about the P-51, but as I fly Spits in all sims, almost exclusively, I have made quite an effort to know as much about them as I can.
If I can get some scans of the Spits armour, is there anybody who would be interested in posting it?

Sisu

[funked]

Vermillion I would say that some of the airplane is a panzer.  

[funked]

RAM:  The root of this problem is net lag.

Let's say that both you and the bomber are perfect shots.  All shells land on target from 1500 yds closing to zero yds.

Now in real life, one of the aircraft would die first and stop firing, before the two aircraft passed eachother.

But due to net lag in our game, both aircraft are firing all the way up to the pass.

Even if one of them has taken a fatal hit, this information will not be transmitted until a split second after the pass.  And during this time the "dead" aircraft has a chance to deliver a fatal blow to the "winner" of the joust.

The result is that both aircraft die more often than would be the case in real life.