With the caveat that I am no expert in aero design there has always been one facet of AH's La7 model that I did not come to grips with.
This is the balance of total thrust v total drag.
AH seems to hit all the right numbers re climb, accel, top speed etc
But I keep going back in my mind to a trial undertaken in Oct 44 comparing the La7 with a captured 109G4.
The La7 beat the G4 in every department (as we would expect) except one.
Dive performance.
It says this (after translation)
The La7 accelerates into the dive faster than the Me-109 and therefore can reduce the distance to an escaping target. However in continuous dive the Me-109 increases its speed faster after initial acceleration and departs fropm the La7
To me there came a point where the La7's higher thrust could no longer bring benefit (over a 109G4)due to the higher total drag at high dive speeds.
Whilst the 109G4's lesser thrust could then bring more benefit due to lesser total drag.
Now try this in AH with a G6...........
The La7 will catch the G6 every time in a dive............ the G6 will not pull away in the later phase.
Why?
1)well the G6 could be porked but there is much more data available for this ac than the La7
2) looking at the La7 I often wonder if AH should give both more drag and more thrust to hit the same numbers as it does now.
This would IMO bring about two effects a) alot more stuff could evade/catch the la7 in a long dive b) the La7 would scrub e more quickly when chopping throttle.
http://www.tilt.clara.net/data/PAGE01.GIFhttp://www.tilt.clara.net/data/page01gif.rtfEdit word "induced" removed due to a confusion with the proper use of the term. (Thanks Virage)
