Aircraft durability

[F4UDOA]

Gents,

I believe that the recent news about perking the F4U-1C is a result of the overmodeling of the damage effects caused by cannons in AH. And I don't just mean Hispano cannons or any other specific ordinance. I am talking about the complete lack of time on target required to kill even the most durable of fighters of WW2.

Here are a couple of examples.

1. The Typhoon is one of the best air to air vehicles in AH. However IRL it was all but removed from the air to air role until it's successor, the Tempest was brought into service.

2. Almost all(Zeke, La5?) cannon armed A/C have a positive K/D and only one machine gun equipped fighter (P-51D) has surpassed that figure. This is so heavily skewed from actual WW2 combat results that these numbers alone are indicative of an error in damage modeling.

3. The F4U-1C is having to be perked because of it's total domination of the rest of the planeset. It is by no means an uber plane by any of it's single characteristics. It is by far an instance of the "The whole package out weighting the sum of the parts". Or as some put it "Out 190ing the FW190". Clearly what you have is F4U-1D with cannons. Meaning that you take a good FM and add cannons= uberbird.

Solution.

I do not think the cannons are overmodeled. I think the A/C durability is undermodeled. Say if all of the A/C in AH are using a durability scale of 1 to 10. 1 being the worst(A6M5) and 10 being the best(P-47D,F4U,F6F). What if you took that scale and made it 1 through 20? It would give you a greater variance between the most and least durable birds and force cannon flyers to use ACM instead of relying on snapshots. This would also make it possible to increase buff hardness without overmodeling the buff guns.  

And here is a historic addendum to this post. I mention this a while ago and I was told I had to be wrong so I verified my reading.

In 1945 the VMF 123 encountered what they thought to be either Tojo's or Jack's. What they were fighting were NIK2 from the 343 AG. A collection of Aces put together to fly the new planes led by Ace Minoru Genda. During the encounter the F4U-1D claimed 11 kills with the loss of 2 of there own. One of the returning F4U-1D's was holed 41 times by 20mill cannon fire but returned home safely. The A/C was in such bad shape it had to be thrown overboard. This action was recorded not only by American historian but has been confirmed by the Japanese as well, although the kill totals were not confirmed by either side.

Sources. "Corsairs and Flatops" as well as "Imperial Japanese Navy Aces 1937 to 1945"

[This message has been edited by F4UDOA (edited 01-15-2001).]

[Jimdandy]

I'll put a little twist on it. As a rule of thumb when your putting a hole in almost any peace of material if you stay at least two diameters away from the edge with your hole the material wont see any significant reduction in strength. (DON'T START DRILLING HOLES IN THINGS WITHOUT KNOWING WHAT YOUR DOING BEFORE HAND. THIS IS A RULE OF THUMB ONLY!  ) So  with that said if the rounds being fired are not HE, and for the sake of simplification, we will say they punch perfectly round holes in the plane. Lets also assume that the bullets don't hit any vital things as they pass through. The skin on the plane provides most of the structural integrity of the plane. So lets make another assumption that we are looking at a square sheet of aluminum with the surface area of the size of the profile of an F4U. Now start drilling 20mm holes in it. We will start from the center and work are way out. Drilling the holes so that the size of the original penetration gets bigger in diameter. It will take a lot of  20mm holes in that sheet of aluminum to total one large hole big enough to be less then two diameters from the outside edge of the plate. That's a lot of 20mm rounds. I have made a lot of assumptions I know but your example seems to bare out my assumption. If they use HE rounds that is a different story. You will start blowing major peaces off of it.

[CavemanJ]

Hell man they make the birds more durable and ya might as well remove the .50 armed kites.

[Jochen]

I have also thought this by myself. Why most players fly cannon planes and why those planes have best k/d ratio?

Are MG's too weak? Are cannons too powerful? Range? Snapshot potential? Fw 190A-8 has very powerful cannon armament, yet it is very rare plane compared to F4U-1C. Why? Is it too hard to fly?

I think there is bit tuning work to do with damage caused by kinetic energy. Unless AP round hits armour or engine caliber is not that important.

20 mm and 12.7 mm AP rounds will cleanly pass through thin sheet wings and other surfaces leaving only a small hole dumping almost same amount of energy to target's structure.

If the round hits engine or armour then energy matters, 20 mm round has more energy and will penetrate more armour causing more damage.

I think current damage model does not account where the round hit, empty wing or pilot armour. Because of this 20 mm AP round does more damage to target then it did historically compared to 12.7 mm AP round.

For example in AH 10 20 mm AP rounds could rip wing off based on damage done by kinetic energy. For same effect 30 12.7 mm rounds are needed.

In real life however both calibers are roughly equally effective against wing since they cause rather same sized holes and there is nothing "hard" inside the wing.

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jochen Gefechtsverband Kuhlmey I/SG 5

Sieg oder bolsevismus!

[MANDOBLE]

The following is just my opinion.
Durability could be an issue, agree, but the problem with HogC guns is related, not only to their lethality, but also to their possition. IMO, for medium distance shots, each time you hit the target, it seems that you hit with two guns at the exact same point. The separation between each pair of guns is extremely small. In RL you'll be making two separated holes in the wing of the opponent, but here it seems that you hit the same point twice, doubling the damage. The Typh has the same armament, but the separation is biger, and the effect of one ping = no wings is less common.

About the 41 holes in the F4U-1D, I suppose they were done by AP ammo, surviving 41 holes by HE ammo would be just a miracle. I saw a picture of a B17 tail that received a single HE round from a german fighter (not sure if 20mm or 30mm) and the effect is devastating (1/4 of the vertical plane was gone).

[MANDOBLE]

 

Originally posted by Jochen:
...Fw 190A-8 has very powerful cannon armament, yet it is very rare plane compared to F4U-1C. Why? Is it too hard to fly?

190A8 is anything but a one ping - wing out wonder. We have no mine ammo here, so 151/20 now is only a bit more powerfull than 50s. You need to lite hard your victim to kill it (except in the cases of one ping - engine off or one ping - pilot wounded). The main problem with 151/20 armed planes is that aiming that gun is extremely difficult. 250 yards is the common range for that gun for moving targets. The projectile trajectory with heavy arc and the low ratio of fire makes this plane an undesirable ride for most of the pilots. Anyway, rhis is my preferred bird.

NOTE: 190A5 armament is even worse.

[Tac]

Cave, watch gun film from WW2. Enemy planes would receive a HOSE of .50's before going down.


What people may not realize is that in WW2 pilots did NOT have billboard icons and nearly all kills were done at close range (d400 or less). Most pilots were shot down without ever realizing they had an enemy fighter in their tail (aka, no billboard icons).

The high ROF of the .50's would shred an enemy fighter to pieces at close range. At close range the power of the cannons on the LW planes would make lotsa big holes and whammo damage on the receiving end (fighter or bomber).

I agree with F4UDOA on the toughness issue. Planes like the a6m were reputed to be really easy to kill due to their lack of armor and self-sealing fuel tanks, yet in AH it is the a6m that takes a hell of a beating and still flies (even when the plane is completely on fire it still flies fine until the engine dies). P47's, reputed flying tanks, hit them with one snapshot at d700 with .50's and it goes down just as easy as a C-47!.

Increased toughness on planes may be the problem, but I still say that no matter what changes are done, as long as there are icons the game will still be a game, not a simulation.

I played with friendly icons only a few nights ago.. it was very interesting. Enemy planes would jink and I would lose sight of them, creating whole new ACM situations. I had to fly quite close to get a good view/shooting solution on a target. And since I had no idea of the range on the target, I would not take the usual d900 shots ('cause it could be at d900 or d1.4 and I wouldnt know).

Think about it. Increase(or fix, whatever) the toughness on the airplanes AND implement friendly icons only. We would get some REAL ww2 like engagements for once.

[This message has been edited by Tac (edited 01-15-2001).]

[flakbait]

I gotta say it, again. The problem isn't the F4U-1C really, although Pyro did say he's gonna add a few hundred pounds to it when he gets the chance. The problem is the Hispano, more accurately the combined ammo. Hispano cannons have been firing AP-HE rounds since waaaaaaay back when. Pyro said so more than once. This is something I've never been a fan of since is skews everything all to hell. You end up with a shell that has the velocity and penetration of an AP round, with the HE round's explosive content. Far from realistic. I was killed today by, guess what, an F4U-1C firing Hispano cannon shells.

Tank-killing 20mm cannons realistic? Not by a long shot. I'm not talking those cheap little Panzer I and II tanks either. Hell a single .50 cal AP round would punch through one. This is a Panzer VI, with around a half-inch of roof armor. Let's see an honest-to-Hades HE round punch through that. Never happen with any WW2 gun under 30mm in size. Yet here we've got just that; a 20mm miracle weapon firing FUBARed ammo. Stick the thing with HE ammo and leave it at that, or give the Mauser AP-Mine ammo to compensate and watch the whiners come out in droves.

So yeah, I'm bringing out the very-dead Hispano argument. Only with a new angle I haven't seen anyone cover really. This combo ammunition is something Pyro did (I think) to make up for the lack of ammo choice. HiTech, Pyro and even Hotseat over at WBs all came to the same conclusion. They will not give players the ability to load their own ammo belts. So in place of this we ended up with combined ammo. All the effects of AP-incendiary-HE-tracer in one single bullet. Some time saver; look at the hell it caused.

I say stick the guns with whatever they were loaded with most of the time. Save a lot of migrains on all sides.


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Flakbait
Delta 6's Flight School
"During the Battle of Britain the question 'fighter or fighter-bomber?'
had been decided once and for all: The fighter can only be used as a bomb carrier
with lasting effect when sufficient air superiority has been won." Adolph Galland
 

[brady]

F4UDOA said:

In 1945 the VMF 123 encountered what they thought to be either Tojo's or Jack's. What they were fighting were NIK2 from the 343 AG. A collection of Aces put together to fly the new planes led by Ace Minoru Genda. During the encounter the F4U-1D claimed 11 kills with the loss of 2 of there own. One of the returning F4U-1D's was holed 41 times by 20mill cannon fire but returned home safely. The A/C was in such bad shape it had to be thrown overboard. This action was recorded not only by American historian but has been confirmed by the Japanese as well, although the kill totals were not confirmed by either side.

Japanese aircraft guns were loaded with 1 AP round followed by several HEI rounds, so the holing of this plane by so many rounds and having it survive seams to be the exception rather than the rule.

 Also in the book Japanese Naval Aces and Fighter Units in World War 2 by Ikuhiko Hata and Yasuho Izawa, these quotes are taken from pages 198-202, the section on unit 343, equipped with N1K2's.

"by 0930 they were able to zero in repeatedly on F6F,F4U, and SB2C formations. As a result of fighting very effectively in the air,48 enemy fighter and 4 dive bombers were shot down...for the loss of 16 of our own aircraft."

this is the summery of the units operations over Okinawa.

"165 aircraft that went out on these sorties and the 106 enemy aircraft that were shot down, records indicate that our side suffered only 29 aircraft lost"

"during the 2 June air battle over Kagoshima Bay, 21 aircraft led by Keijiro Hayashi,were able to make a surprise attack from a superior position on a formation of 23 F4U's. The result was a onesided battle that ended with 18 enemy aircraft being shot down."

"According to Capt. Genda's records, the approximate half year total of battle results of Air Group 343 amounted to about 170 enemy aircraft shot down.74 pilots were lost on our side.

 Unfortunately their is no specific account in this section that pertains to the account F4UDOA has sighted,the above are all the accounts related, save 2, one about B29's and another where 16 more us planes are shot down.

 Also of note, In so much as I understand it the Hispano 20mm cannon is pretty much the only aircraft cannon that fires predominantly AP(or Ball) ammo all other countries ammo load out for their cannons for air to air consisted of primarily HE/HEI rounds and a few AP rounds in their load outs.


Brady

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[This message has been edited by brady (edited 01-15-2001).]

[Jimdandy]

 

Originally posted by flakbait:
The problem is the Hispano, more accurately the combined ammo. Hispano cannons have been firing AP-HE rounds since waaaaaaay back when. Pyro said so more than once.

Wow I hadn't heard this. It sounds like a weapons model/damage model problem. Why the heck perk the chog if they know this.
If I understand you right each individual bullet in the chog is given both HE and AP properties? Or is it that it is loaded with both types of ammo. HE AP alternating rounds? I gather that all of the planes with cannon aren't modeled this way. If this is the case why is the chog the only one they did it to? If you air weighting this game toward air to air combat all of the cannon that had HE round available to them should be loaded with HE. Was it passable to load two different ammo type in the same belt. Or even a different ammo type for the inner guns than the outer guns? Even if it is passable would they have done it in WWII?

[F4UDOA]

Brady,

Could you post the ISBN number of the book please. Sounds like good stuff.

The engagement in which I am speaking of sounds like the one were they encountered 23 F4U's and attacked from an advantage. The Numbers from the VMF-123 said they had 17 A/C in formation and took several hits on the NIK2 first surprise pass. However they only reported two losses for the dat as well as claiming 11.

In "Imperial Japanese Navy Aces 1937-45" on pages 92,93 Lieutenant Naoshi Kanno a 30 Kill ace from the 343 AG encountered F4U's from the VMF-123 North of Kure AFB and was downed by Ensign Roy Erickson and was shot down. Kanno survived the shoot down and went back to leading his flight with the 343 AG. This is the same dogfight I believe was recorded in "Corsairs and Flattops".
Also in June 1945 Ensign Kaneyoshi Muto from the 343 AG(another 30kill ace) was leading a flight of NIK2's and bounced a pair of F4U's shooting one down immediately. The other pilot Lt Robert Applegate was joined by two F6F Hellcats one of which was shot down. Applegate and the F6F pilot LT Malcom Cagle fought of the flight of NIK2's and claimed 3 kills each. Applegate ditched at the carrier Cagle was the only man to land his bird. However the entire flight of NIK2 was lost including Ace Muto who was Posthumously promoted to ensign.

BTW, Muto is the pilot who is renowned fro taking on 12 Hellcats at once and shooting down 4. According to this book the story is Myth and Propaganda.  

[Nath-BDP]

Japanese kill claims were not varified, so when you say a Japanese ace with 30 kills, its more likely a Japanese pilot with 5.

Japanese pilots would claim a smoking aircraft as a kill, assuming that it would not return to base.

Post-war historians have calculated some of the actual kills scored by overclaiming Japanese aces... Tetsuzo Iwamoto claimed 202 victories, yet its more like 80. No Japanese ace ever got more than 100 kills.

[Hooligan]

Brady:

Standard late war British belting for the Hispano was 50% AP/I and 50% HE/I.  I have also seen a German document stating that standard belting in the West was:

1 - M-shell, 1 - APHE, 1 AP/I

Hooligan

[brady]

F4UDOA, the ISBN # is O-87021-315-6 published by the Naval Institute Press.

Nath-BDP, LTJG Hiroyoshi Nishizawa is believed to be the highest scoring Japanese ace of the Pacific War with aprox. 86 planes down.On the subject of accountability or authenticity of information regarding kill clams the book I refer to above has done as good of a job, and actually better I feel, in researching the clams of these men and units as any I have sean before.

 On a slightly different subject would not it be cool if we could pick our own ammo load out for our planes? we want all HEI we load it we want 50/50 HEI/AP we load it, could it be done?

Brady

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[This message has been edited by brady (edited 01-15-2001).]

[brady]

Hooligan, I was aware of the German load out, I apologize if I insinuated otherwise.As far as the Hisspano load out I had read  where the normal load was predominantly Ball ammo for it was considered very effective on all target types,however your statement makes more sense as this would be a more multipurpose loadout and sense a lot of late war fighter paroles were against "targets of opportunity" this would be more logical.

 As far as what was a standard ammo mix is concerned their is a universal amount of conjecture on this subject.For the belts were made up in the field and were loaded based on the need of the mission,the whim of the pilot and the availability of the type at hand, for example in the above story of the F4U returning with 41 holes it is possible that they for some reason did not get their HEI shipment and had to load all AP, or the pilot had his head up his bellybutton and wanted that in his plane's guns, or the fickle finger of fate(often the middle one) simply pointed at the George pilot that day.

Brady

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[This message has been edited by brady (edited 01-15-2001).]