In need of some tips

[Laurie]

I have flown typhoons and spit 8's for a while now and im looking for a novelty plane this month, i have chosen the  109. I have tried flying it a few times and found my gunnery wayyyy out. Is there a large difference between hispanos and the german cannons?

and some tips on flying the 109 would be nice
cheers,

[titanic3]

tips on flying the 109:

it's a BnZ aircraft, only turn when you have A LOT of speed (300mph-400mph).
i fire my 13mm to get a lead and 30mm to blow it up.

[Xasthur]

....The 109 is an excellent turner.

Even the K4 turns well in the right hands.

The 109 is extremely stable at low speeds and has a good range of flaps.

As for gunnery with the Mg 151/20mm cannons, aim a little bit higher than you usually would with Hispanos, their ballistics are not quite as good.

I wrote this a while ago in another thread here, though it seems to have disappeared.

The following is a decent helping-hand into the late-war 109s

109 K4


The MK 108
The MK 108 cannon in the K4 is devastating, just 1 or two rounds is enough to break your average fighter in half. It is a 'fat' and 'slow' round though, so spraying it from 1000 yards like it's .50 cal will get you nowhere.


Convergence:
I set my 108 convergence to 200 yards. Obviously, you must hold your fire until you are within this range. This 200 yrd setting takes into account 'bullet drop' as the round comes out of the barrel going up and arcs back down to hit its target.

Because this round is big and slow, you will need to 'lead' with it more.... ie: shoot where your target is going to be, not where it is.

This often means that you need to fire when the target is below the canopy line, so your Situational Awareness needs to be good. The 109's canopy will soon force this upon you, with its limited view.

I set the MG convergence to 300 or 400. Seeing as they are cowl mounted their convergence is not much of an issue. Important: Keep in mind that the MG rounds and the 30mm rounds will behave very, very differently so some people say that it is better to just fire your cannon so that you know if the big rounds are hitting or not. I use the MG rounds to hit targets at 400 - 800 yards in order to keep them manuevering and thus allowing me to run them down and get within range for a 30mm attack.

This method is very useful for taking down buffs and with practice (do note that it does take practice) you'll be able to take out a flight of 24s with 15 rounds with relative ease.

Flying and Fighting:

The 109K4 will out-climb almost everything and it is the fastest 'non-perk' climber. Thus, try to do as much of your fighting as you can 'nose-up', you will out-perform most aircraft this way.

Compression is an issue for novices in the 109 but I have found that it will often work in the favour of the 109 pilot. Lots of people will try to sucker you into a stupid, lazy dive thinking that you will just compress and plough into the ground. Throttle, rudder and elevator trim manipulation is very important. Your elevator trim is set to the ‘k’ as a default and if you hold this ‘k’ key down it will manually crank your elevator up (this was the solution for real 109 pilots also). This will allow you pull out of a suicide dive even if you black-out, as your elevators stay up. Beware, you will need to re-set your trim to normal either with the ‘i’ key (the reverse of the ‘k’ key) or by re-enabling Combat Trim by pressing Ctrl + X. Most of the time people having pulled this dive move on you will simply go back into a lazy climb to try and retain their ‘E’. This is where your superior climb comes in, simply go back to full throttle, re-set trim and engage WEP and you will catch them promptly.

The 109K4 is also a good turner, you will be able to hang with almost any plane in a turn fight provided it is not flown by an exceptional pilot. N1ks and A6Ms are best avoided in regard to turn-fights… as are early model Spitfires, just use your climb and speed in this case. It is possible to turn with the likes of a Spit VIII given proper use of flaps (flaps are important in turn fighting in the 109). Be careful of getting into this situation with Spits though, generally a pilot of equal or greater skill will beat you. If you’re good you can get away with it, but for now just be wary and keep an escape route open.

The 109 also slows down very well. This is great for warding off La7s and planes with E advantages. Use hard rudder, flaps if possible and a few tight rolls to force the over-shoot. If you enemy is stupid enough to try and slow down with you, let them blow past, WEP on and run them down.

If you find a 190 or a P-51D you will find yourself at large advantage because you can out-turn and out-run these aircraft at some altitudes (check Soda’s site for these details).

[Sketch]

Originally posted by Laurie
I have flown typhoons and spit 8's for a while now and im looking for a novelty plane this month, i have chosen the  109. I have tried flying it a few times and found my gunnery wayyyy out. Is there a large difference between hispanos and the german cannons?

and some tips on flying the 109 would be nice
cheers,

Set your convergence 50 yards further than what you usually shoot.  That is what I have been told... and it seems to work for me.

[Platano]

Which 109 we talking about here?

[BaldEagl]

The early model 109's are turn fighters at their best.  The F4 will turn with anything in the game and even the G2 will go turn for turn with a Spit XVI.  
the later models become more B'n'Z types but they still turn better than most B'n'Zers.  I'm actually amazed at the different flight charachteristics of the 109's from one end of the spectrum to the other.

I still haven't flown the 109's a lot, nor with the success I'd like but I do fly 190's a lot and you have to aim high with the German cannons, even at your converged distance.  You also need to lead more than you're used to.  The difference between Hispanos and German cannon is like that between a hardball and a softball relative to flight dynamics.

[Laurie]

Originally posted by Platano
Which 109 we talking about here?

g-14 and poss. g6

Thanks for all the input guys, i'll be trying to put it to good use,
<>

[Knegel]

Hi,

very important while turning with a 109 is to reduce power.

With WEP the 109´s dont decelerate enough to turn well, specialy while a downward fight.

Only use WEP as long as you have a real advantage to keep it, or while flying strait(climbing). But if you evade, dissable it and also try to reduce power, then the 109G will turn very well, but dont overstress this.

Greetings,

Knegel

[Xasthur]

^ Indeed, a lot of the time in a fight I am at almost zero throttle.

[EsX_Raptor]

I agree with you two, I've found out that when doing split-s and hard turns I reduce all of my throttle (when diving too) the 109s accelerate very good and are real fast, so chopping throttle to turn with an nme will not hurt that bad ever since you can catch up with them real quick.
I love taters, I've never taken the 20mm in my beloved G-14 and it's true, just shoot when you think you're going to hit, and I've gotten 400 yard kills with my taters this way

EDIT: Practice the art of tatering, you'll like it, trust me

[Furball]

Originally posted by Laurie
and some tips on flying the 109 would be nice
cheers,

If the model name has a 'G' in it, make sure it has a '2' at the end