Don't let patches lure you into complacency, he's a pretty good stick. While I don't consider myself a great sitck, I have my moments. Here are some tips if you decide to not take the easiest path in the game and fly the F4U's:
Weakness: poor acceleration for the -1, -1C, and -1D is a fact. The -1 C&D climb better than the -1 but compared to a spit, yak, hurricane, or most fighters of that era have a lower climb rate. The F4U-4 does not suffer from such poor acceleration or climb rate. However, from my experience I would not call the F4U-4 uber. Also, the F4U's aren't good head on (HO) planes with the exception of the -1C with the four hispando's.
For some pointers:
Keep a miniumum amount of energy (alt or speed) in reserve while flying the -1's. Diving is the only way to accelerate quickly, and not surprisingly the -1's accelerate well in a dive. What you can't out run you can out turn and sometimes both! Oh yea, I forgot, don't fly with combat trim.
Some strengths are speed, good high speed manueverability, good instantaneous turn rates with flap use, good ammo load out, dive brakes (landing gear) useable to 400 ias, good high and low altitude characteristics.
I fly the F4U-1 a lot because I like the plane. The F4U-1 in AH matches my 1943 pilots manual (other than fuel burn rates) and I like that. Throttling back and reducing prop pitch helps with decreasing fuel comsumption. Also the F4U's fuel consumption *drops* (yes, that's right drops) with WEP.
While not the easiest plane in AH to fly, once you learn to fly using flap adjustments, throttle settings, and air brakes other planes are 'not so dangerous' to fly against. Soda's web page has a good assessment of the planes in AH with their relative strengths and weaknesses.
All you have to worry about next is gunnery...
Regards,
Malta
