How do you fight zeros?

[Saxman]

Also keep in mind that Zeroes really AREN'T great climbers from Midwar and later. Sure, they're amazing against the underpowered and heavy pre-war American iron like the F4F and P-40, but their advantage is gone, if not outright reversed, once you get into the 1943 birds.

With WEP the F4U-1 will out-climb the A6M2. It's a small margin, but it IS a margin, and enough that it's been my experience that the Corsair's E retention and horsepower only increases the advantage.

The A6M5 improves on this, but this is technically a 1944 bird. Compare it to our own 1944 Corsair instead, which is a late-block F4U-1A. The advantage shrinks to within a couple hundred fpm, and only up through 15,000ft where the F4U takes over (one key strategy against Japanese birds in the Corsair, and American Iron in general, is to take the fight UP. None of our Japanese aircraft are spectacular at high altitudes, and their performance falls off rapidly over 15,000ft). Not only that, but we're not talking a smooth curve, as there's several points as altitude increases where the Corsair's rate of climb closes the gap significantly. Once again, the Corsair's E retention can count for a lot. You also have the advantage of speed where the Zero might be able to out-climb you in a sustained climb, but what good does it do him when you can zip away in a shallow high-speed climb (this works great against Spitfires, who in some marks have a climb rate advantage bordering on the ridiculous)?

[uptown]

no turns. bnz. I answered the question in just 3 words Saxman 

[Noah17]

Excellant answers!

Thanks Mntman. After watching your films and reading your posts a second time I went for a sortie. As luck would have it in my F4U-1A I came across an A6M2 while taking off. He was higher and faster than me. I broke in towards him and extended. I was able to put to use all the fundamentals but my execution was a little sloppy. He chased me down to my level and I made the slow/focused climb to set up the rope. I was able to fake my dive down on him and force him to turn/dive away several times. Unfortunately my "hamfisted" stick and rudder work again put me in a nose low spin. I quickly recovered with the Zeke ~ 1.5 away chasing me while I extended to set the rope up again. We flew over the airfield and the Zeke was killed by ack....Hey I got the kill.....NOT AT ALL THE WAY I WANTED LOL....But I learned some important lessons and survived the fight.

While watching your films I just now realized after several months on AH that I've always paid more attention to the range between aircraft and did not realize that this does not always translate in to the difference in altitude(maybe because the range on the icon doesn't change as rapidly as the altitude when you watch the films). This is a basic and critical point.....Stupid of me(I'm not the brightest crayon in the box but I'm not an idiot either). I'm sure that many others don't understand as well. In other words the difference between 800 and 1.0 of distance isn't as important if one aircraft is 30-50MPH slower and directly trailing in the same path a plane that is leading it in to a "rope." Just make sure that you can maintain that 800-1.0 distance so as not to get shot and the faster plane going up can dictate the fight. I guess if you're going straight up the lower wingloading of an aircraft(Zeke) has nothing to do with climb.... the plane that has more speed is still going to climb the fastest/farthest......
Wow..... Maybe I was stupid....

Also, thanks to Sax, Agent 360, and others that offered their 2 cents.

[boomerlu]

A few things I want to mention:
Practice climbing all the way vertical from lower and lower speeds. It's possible at around 200 mph or less in some fighters, and these aren't specialized turn fighters either. At least from direct experience, 109G14 can do it, and I think 190A5 can do it. All it takes is some flap and throttle work.

This isn't necessarily a good thing to always do, but it's certainly possible. As mtnman said, being smooth on the stick is important. Stalling has primarily to do with too much elevator input - airspeed is secondary. There's some good stuff Agent also posted on the 109 Torque rolls thread in this forum on some exercise to practice the vertical reversal.

Diving to equalize speeds is something I also do in a fast aircraft. I know that if we're at matched speeds, the TnB fighter will lose E as time goes by because it is flying faster than its top speed (and drag will thus burn E).

Climb rate is overrated in a zoom. The most important factor in a steep vertical climb is probably your respective airspeeds. Climb rate is good for building an advantage over the course of a minute or more. If you are banking on climb rate, best make your vertical maneuver shallow at first.

Mmm... the fake rope lives! It's a good move. to you Agent, I've put it to good use after our duels.

[SAJ73]

I remember one fight me in a F4U vs a A6M5, it started to turn into a hard turning stallfight and I saw my doom about to come as we tumbled and looped down towards the deck. I was pretty new in the game as well and had just barely started to get some good credits for doing some decent fights in my hog..
But I was far from any expert, I still am not, far from it!

But the reason I remember this fight in particular was how I managed to get on that zero's 6 by a miracle..

We were going in a right hand turn just above the deck, the flaps was fully down, as were my gear also. So I was barely flying, stall buffet screaming and plane wobbling around and I saw the zero in the opposite side of our circle gaining inches on me for every turn..
I knew I was dead, I had to work something out, fast.

I realized he would get me after a few more turns anyway so I had to change tactics, I started to ease my turn slightly, letting my flap up one notch or two (don't remember exactly, its a long time ago) and applying rudder so I started to spiralclimb on the border of stall. At this point the zero gained on me fast, but he was still doing circles on the deck as I gained some alt on him so I slowly started to look down at him.
Then, just as I figured I had just enough alt above the deck I flattened my climb for a sec gained just enough speed to manage a backflip with flaps back on full again. So I did a backwards loop and ended up just above the deck again and right on the zero's 6, and that was the end of the fight.

Have tried to copy that move ever since, but never managed to pull it off again. So I guess it was one of those moves that you get once in a lifetime just by pure luck and all the given circumstances being just right there and then.

Have been flying the hog now for almost 2 years, and slowly starting to understand the plane better and better. Reading your tactics on how you fight the zero MtnMan I must say I learned alot just by reading this and watching your film. And I hope to get a training session with you some day so I may learn some more tricks and tactics in my hog. I have been kinda stuck lately, feeling I have ran out of tricks in my bag..