WW1

[SCTusk]

The reason why you can't gain separation is because the machine gun dispersion for the WW1 fighters is tighter than any of the aerial tests you can find from WW1.  Every WW1 sim I have ever seen suffers from this lack of fidelity to the historical data.  I.e. compared to a Vickers mounted on a tripod, aerial tests found the Vickers to be 3% as effective at hitting a target the size of a man.  On a calm day, with an expert pilot, only 60-70% of bullets landed in a 100ft^2 box at 2-300 yards.

I think that's modelled on the F2b rear gun. At least that's the impression I get using it, attacking one from the rear tends to reduce your rtb time.

[Anaxogoras]

Dispersion patterns for the Lewis gun were different than the Vickers, both when mounted overwing, e.g. the SE5a, and when fired from a flexible mount.  In the first case, the dispersion pattern was less than half the size of fuselage mounted Vickers, but when fired from a flexible mount the Lewis' dispersion pattern was comparable to the Vickers.

I have toyed with these machine guns with the .target function offline, and I can tell you confidently that they are much tighter than these historical tests.

[Anaxogoras]

From Gunning for the Red Baron by Leon Bennett:



70-80% of the bullets were within the above circles.



The above aerial test was also with an expert shooter on a calm day.  When the author says that the pattern opens up to "Lewis gun size," he is referring to the test from a flexible mount.

It can be inferred that placing the machine gun on the fuselage where it was subject to the full strength of engine vibrations more than doubled the dispersion pattern.

[R 105]

The motor used in the DR-1 for the speed of 102mph is the 110hp Oberursel UR.11 rotary engine not a Swiss made power plant and the dive speed was 140+. The UR.11 was the motor in the specs for the DR-1 listed in 1917. The DR-7 had a 160hp Mercedes or the 185hp BMWIII motor at 120 mph with a dive speed of 170mph. The Camel had a 130hp Clerget motor at 113 mph with a dive speed of 150 mph+.

 The DR-7s clime rate was much better than ether of the other two aircraft. yet in AH they all are about the same speed. The DR-7 with its superior power speed and clime rate should be able to get a bit of separation. It is too bad WWI did not have better success. I do not see HTC investing any more resources in this arena. Maybe it is because it is just a furball arena with one dominate plane that rules the shy the DR-1 with no real objectives other than furballing.

[Anaxogoras]

The DR-7    It was called the Fokker D.VII.  There's a lot of confusion about its powerplants because the Germans called every Mercedes "160hp," even the ones that produced 180hp.  The D.VII used the 180hp Mercedes D.IIIa, the overcompressed D.IIIau, and the superb BMW that could produce up to 232hp at sea level with the altitude throttle opened up.  The D.VII in Aces High uses the weakest of these three engines, and only the very first D.VII deliveries retained it.

And as for the Dr.1:



Be careful of the quoted speeds you read for the Camel.  As Sid pointed out, the data we see is usually from tests with a French made Clerget, but the British made Clergets that were actually used in production models did not offer as much power.  This was only corrected with the Clerget 9bf, and Camel upgrades to this powerplant were completed somewhere around May 1918.

[R 105]

 You are correct about what you read. I have three books in front of me and I see different specs in all three. One listed the top speed of the DR.1 at just 86mph. I used Jane's fighting aircraft of WWI as it has middle of the road specs listed for each aircraft. It does not say who they got there information from.

 The D.VII we have in the game is what I was going for for information. The long and the short of it is our D.VII is an under performer in the game. Games like The Rise of Flight seems to have the modeling a bit closer. While that is just a Micro Soft type game and does not have the on line game play of AH. However Rise Of Flight does have some very good training films posted for WWI air combat tactics.

[Anaxogoras]

Rise of Flight has the same turd-like D.VII as AH, but it also has the BMW powered variant, which is a great fighter at low altitude, and a stone-cold killer above 6000ft.

The one D.VII I've never seen modeled is the most numerous type, the one powered by the overcompressed Mercedes D.IIIau, which would be something like a middle road between the turd and the BMW powered types.

[Tinribs]

Rise of Flight has the same turd-like D.VII as AH, but it also has the BMW powered variant, which is a great fighter at low altitude, and a stone-cold killer above 6000ft.

The one D.VII I've never seen modeled is the most numerous type, the one powered by the overcompressed Mercedes D.IIIau, which would be something like a middle road between the turd and the BMW powered types.

I can live with no power in the d7 what keeps killing me is the wings making a run for it every time I pull a little "G".

[USRanger]

Got some better trench textures to use now.  The T.E. has a trench object, but I like these better because they are bigger with more variety.  The object only comes in one shape.  Work has begun.

[CptTrips]

Got some better trench textures to use now.  The T.E. has a trench object, but I like these better because they are bigger with more variety.  The object only comes in one shape.  Work has begun.

Looks great!

,
Wab

[SCTusk]

Nice one USRanger 

Any chance of some better tree cover for hiding under when things get rough? I like to land nearby and have a smoke when the furball's going badly, but I keep getting shot at parked out in the open.

[Wmaker]

Rise of Flight has the same turd-like D.VII as AH, but it also has the BMW powered variant, which is a great fighter at low altitude, and a stone-cold killer above 6000ft.

The one D.VII I've never seen modeled is the most numerous type, the one powered by the overcompressed Mercedes D.IIIau, which would be something like a middle road between the turd and the BMW powered types.

The AH D.VII seems to match the performance (speed/climb times) of a captured O.A.W built D.IIIau powered D.VII tested by the French. Mercedes D.IIIa powered D.VIIs were overall very early production rarities when looking at the total production.

One thing that might limit the performance of the AH's D.VII is its weight which correctly matches the captured O.A.W -built machine but it also seems significantly higher than the weights of the D.VII's from other manufacturers/production batches. I don't know what made them heavier nor am I completely certain about the exact weight distribution (ie. where the extra weight comes from/how the weights figures are usually listed). I need to do more research on that.

[Wmaker]

The airspeed you're referring to was 102.5mph at 13100ft (~4km), and that was with a Swiss-made LeRhone engine.  The Oberusal copy was of inferior quality and did not yield the same performance.

The reason why you can't gain separation is because the machine gun dispersion for the WW1 fighters is tighter than any of the aerial tests you can find from WW1.  Every WW1 sim I have ever seen suffers from this lack of fidelity to the historical data.  I.e. compared to a Vickers mounted on a tripod, aerial tests found the Vickers to be 3% as effective at hitting a target the size of a man.  On a calm day, with an expert pilot, only 60-70% of bullets landed in a 100ft^2 box at 2-300 yards.

This is very interesting.

I've been wanting to see the dispersion ramped up significantly for the WWI planes but the data on the matter is of course very rare. I tried to do an in game flying test using level autopilot comparing the LMG's of the Bf109G-2 to the D.VII by firing a hundred round burst to a distance of 400 yards. Basically both planes scored a very similar dispersion patterns but the on autopilot the nose of the D.VII drifts to the right so it was hard to do a reliable test. Because of that reason the horisontal spread was larget for the Fokker due to the drifting of the nose but the vertical spread was very similar for both planes. Considering the more modern weapons of the 109G-2 and the more rigid mountings I'd say that there should be a significant difference which wasn't there in the game but I obviously lack conclusive hard data to prove it. I then did a ground tests which then showed very similar dispersion patters for both of these planes.

I've understood that HTC uses different dispersion for weapons depending on where they are mounted. My hypothesis is that they've left the dispersion of these WWI LMGs to similar values as the LMGs of the WWII planes and the same thing seems to apply the mountings even though the mountings of the WWI guns were far less rigid.

Hopefully HTC takes a look into the dispersion of these WWI guns.

[lyric1]

Nice research guys Keep it up.

[R 105]

Nice work WMaker thank you sir. <S>