I Love the Hellcat!

[quintisv]

I love F6Fs in front of me too - like hapless whales waiting to get harpooned

[BaldEagl]

Originally posted by Rich46yo
Im starting to extend the airplane more after I drop ords. Because theres no sense in engaging with ords still on right? Anyway when you dive bomb from 12,000' you end up with tons of "E" and it makes no sense slowing down to get into a turn fight with ords on, when you dont have a clear advantage in the first place.

                        Enter the conga line from the CV. A great place to extend thru. Get clear, get altitude, apply again.

I've found the ideal drop alt is 10K over your target.  Once you let ord go and have the nose pointed up again, put it on full auto climb with WEP on to zoom back to near initial alt.  Before you lose too much speed, loop it over the top and take another run, or, level and drop a wing to line up your next target.

Never engage w/ord.  If you have to engage a con before you've had a chance to reach target, drop it the ord.

[Rich46yo]

Originally posted by BaldEagl
I've found the ideal drop alt is 10K over your target.  Once you let ord go and have the nose pointed up again, put it on full auto climb with WEP on to zoom back to near initial alt.  Before you lose too much speed, loop it over the top and take another run, or, level and drop a wing to line up your next target.

Never engage w/ord.  If you have to engage a con before you've had a chance to reach target, drop it the ord.

                       Yeah the Hellcat seems to be just a natural when flown exactly as you say. Drop some ord, climb and loop, and repeat. For some reason Ive never flown a Jabo that does that as good as the Hellcat.

[Redd]

Originally posted by CAP1
ya know.......i'd like to get outta the spit/hurri/zeke mode....and i'm almost ready....but u mentioned the spit16....i absolutley love this airplane.....but i find it a bad choice to fly in furballs.......it seems to me that if i enter a furball with..uumm...say.........15 bogies...........14 of em wil drop in on my six.....the other one is in front or evading another friendly....if i fly any other spit, they don't give me any more attention than any other plane in the fight......and for the most part, i am an easy target regardles of what i fly.......feels like my crew chief discovered a way to magneticaly attract lead:rofl

<>

The 16 and the 9 are at their best E-Fighting, if I was taking a Spit to a furball , I'd probably fly the V or the seafire or the 8.

I've always felt that Hellcats get targetted quickly in furballs too - seen as being fat, slow and an easy kill.

[Redd]

Originally posted by Wadke
I love Hellcats too!

Gonna come back flying with me Wadke ?   we need to do 50 hours in the DA to shake off the cobwebs

[Redd]

Originally posted by BaldEagl
One of my three normal primary rides (F6F-5, FW190A-8 and Spit XVI).

A few notes for you:

1.  Use it's incredible zoom-climb to your advantage.
2.  Use wing-over reversals.  The F6F is very good at this.
3.  Use flaps in a turn fight but only enough to keep you inside or to get over the top.  Take care though... it has a nasty instability in very low speed high aoa turns.
4.  Don't be afraid to extend convergence.  The .50's have very good ballistics.
5.  Use 2 notches of flaps and WEP lifting with full ord/fuel from a CV.
6.  Take care pulling out of a high speed dive (especially if you have any type of ord left on-board) or you'll snap one or both wings in half (it will still be flyable though and you can get it home safely).

Other than that have fun.  It's among the best dive-bombing platforms in the game and it's a great fighter once the ord's gone.

One other thing to add , the Hellcat is very responsive to rudder, flying it to the limit will see you using rudders to perform all sorts of tricks. Get a good set of pedals.

[CAP1]

Originally posted by Redd
The 16 and the 9 are at their best E-Fighting, if I was taking a Spit to a furball , I'd probably fly the V or the seafire or the 8.

I've always felt that Hellcats get targetted quickly in furballs too - seen as being fat, slow and an easy kill.

hhmm....that'd explain why i have a bit of trouble in furballs with the 9.......that's the one i normally take rather than the 16......i seem to get out turned by the 8's and sometimes the 5's..and almost always by the hurri's if there's any.

funny hting you say about the hellcats in furballs......i've never viewed them as easy kills(i'm not good enough for ANYTHING to be easy kill....yet)...but i was flying an A6M5B last week, about 8 or 10k alt....came across one of the SK guys in a hellcat(i didn't know it was one of them till i got the kill).......in this instance, my thoughts were...if he doesn't run, i should be inside him in 1 or 2 turns.......well....we turned for 2 or 3 minutes, neither one of us gaining or losing anything......i did notice he was keeping slightly nose down....but i was still very surprised to see the cat  turning THAT well....in the end, i think the only reason i got the kill was due to a countryman flying through our fight....this distracted him just for a second....and that was enough to let me get his 6........but it was fun either way.......

[BaldEagl]

Originally posted by CAP1
....but i was still very surprised to see the cat  turning THAT well....

I got into a great fight one night in MW with SlapShot.  I was in a Spit V (flaps up) and he was in a F6F (flaps down).  We duked it out for a very long time.  He had to extend twice to re-set.  In the end I augered and lost.

I also had a great fight in MW once against Bearkats.  He was in a Spit (IX I think) and I was in an F6F.  Again we went at it for several minutes until I finally got inside him and got the kill.

In the right hands the Hellcat will turn with the best of them.

[Gixer]

Originally posted by BaldEagl
In the right hands the Hellcat will turn with the best of them.

Not sustained it won't, start knocking out flaps and you've already lost. Hence earlier comment regarding the dweebfires.


...-Gixer

[Bubbajj]

If you have alt to work with an F6 is wicked. Keep up speed and work the vert. Don't get to slow. I've had some success in the F6, very able bird if you keep in mind it's weaknesses. As mentioned earlier, they have a mean wingover. You don't want to be under one cause they can drop a wing and swing the tail around on a dime. Don't get sucked into a tight turn fight. You can outrun zekes and hurcs and BnZ them to death.

[Wadke]

If it can't outrun it...it can out turn it. If it can't out turn it it can out run it...
 I've surprised way too many guys flying a hellcat. I hardly ever fly any other plane. It's truly an angles plane. I will furball with anything in a F6F whether i die or not. It straight PWNS!.

(I dunno Redd. It's very tempting to come play again. Just been really busy with RL.)

[SlapShot]

Originally posted by Rich46yo
No I aint that good in one but I just love the way this airplane flys and fights. I love the ords it carries and how a flight of them can reduce a base to ashes. I love dive bombing it and how well it recovers and grabs alt again. I love taking off from CVs with it, and hunting CVs with it. I love the guns. I love the way it handles turns. I think it climbs decent for such a large aircraft.

                This is a great airplane.

Shhhhhh ... keep it down will ya ... we're trying to keep this a secret ...  

Originally posted by Gixer
Hellcat is very good ride, can't remember name now but years ago use to be a very good Hellcat stick and was fun watching him E fighting in the thing.

You maybe thinking about ... "MathMan" ... but the ulitmate in the F6F was ... "Drex"

Originally posted by Wadke
I love Hellcats too!

Too bad u suk in them tho.

[SlapShot]

Originally posted by CAP1
hhmm....that'd explain why i have a bit of trouble in furballs with the 9.......that's the one i normally take rather than the 16......i seem to get out turned by the 8's and sometimes the 5's..and almost always by the hurri's if there's any.

funny hting you say about the hellcats in furballs......i've never viewed them as easy kills(i'm not good enough for ANYTHING to be easy kill....yet)...but i was flying an A6M5B last week, about 8 or 10k alt....came across one of the SK guys in a hellcat(i didn't know it was one of them till i got the kill).......in this instance, my thoughts were...if he doesn't run, i should be inside him in 1 or 2 turns.......well....we turned for 2 or 3 minutes, neither one of us gaining or losing anything......i did notice he was keeping slightly nose down....but i was still very surprised to see the cat  turning THAT well....in the end, i think the only reason i got the kill was due to a countryman flying through our fight....this distracted him just for a second....and that was enough to let me get his 6........but it was fun either way.......

Not trying to poke you in the eye or nothing, but a Zeke vs F6F in a sustained turn fight ... well ... it shouldn't be sustained. The Zeke should clean it's clock if the HellCat decides to actually turn fight the Zeke.

Do you fly with "stall limiter" on ? ... I only ask, cause the Zeke should dispatch the F6F very quickly in a true turn fight.

As BaldEagl said, he and I mixed it up in a Spit V vs F6F. After short knife fights, I did have to extend ... 1-1.5K to reset ... because if I stuck around and continued the knife fight, the Spit V would have dominated ... same as with a Zeke.

[SlapShot]

Originally posted by Gixer
Not sustained it won't, start knocking out flaps and you've already lost. Hence earlier comment regarding the dweebfires.


...-Gixer

It all depends on what you are fighting that will determine if you can survive in the "sustained" mode.

The usage of flaps ... both dropping and pulling them back in, and when to do that ... is the key to sustained turn fighting in the HellCat.

[BaldEagl]

OK.  Stop this thread now!  All I've seen in the arenas the past few days are Hellcats.