Conserving E in a merge fight?

[Someguy63]

To the left of the trim indicator panel, lower right hand side.

Ah ok.

[Puma44]

At that G level Puma and FLS, are you not committing to a guns on or lose situation in that merge?

The G level is a variable dependent on speed, weight, and is tailored to what you are trying to accomplish with your next move.  Hopefully, it's not one of those "one size fits all" moves.  Individual aircraft performance charts will give you best corner velocity and g available values. So, it's hard to accurately say, pull this many Gs to accomplish this.  There are just too many variables.  One ride that I flew in an air to air unit had a max positive G limit of 7.33.  After landing, if the fights were always offensive/wins, the G meter would read 5 to 5 1/2 Gs, indicating pretty reasonable energy management.  If there was a defensive fight in the mix, the G meter would read 6 to 7 indicating a lot of hard pull to defeat guns/missle attacks.  The G meter was quickly glanced at in a hard pull so as to not over G but, it wasn't a primary reference during the fight.  "Feel" was.

Randy, my point being it's better use of your potential energy to, when necessary, pull to the tunnel vs the stall warning where energy is definitely being burned off along with airspeed.  The merge can go a lot of different ways.  Although, from observation, the vast majority of opponents will immediately pitch up and turn.  Another method is to do something that confuses the "pitch up and turn" opponent in such a way that he/she is wondering what you are up to and makes them abandon their canned merge maneuver and spend time and energy reacting to what you have presented them with.  The key idea here is to never be predictable.  The vast majority are very predictable.  

[FLS]

I will start to develop and eye for the G gauge ack-ack

 Is there a G reading you hold too in a E conservation maneuver in the P-38?

At that G level Puma and FLS, are you not committing to a guns on or lose situation in that merge?

If you want an easy turn a 3 g pull will usually do it but generally on the merge you will be watching the bandit not your gauges. You want to go into the fight with a plan but the bandit may fail to cooperate with it.

If the bandit makes an aggressive turn for position you either have to turn with him or give up your 6 and hope to drag him up to a stall. Whether you pull to tunnel vision on the initial merge or make an easier climbing turn depends on the situation.

Tunnel vision is simply your max sustainable turn when you're over your corner speed. You won't get tunnel vision and the stall horn together unless you are at your corner speed. If you are below corner speed then you can't pull enough g for tunnel vision so that's when you're using the stall horn to indicate near max turn rate.

Puma flew jets so he may assume a higher engagement speed where I'm assuming most maneuvering after the initial merge is below corner speed.

[Puma44]

Puma flew jets so he may assume a higher engagement speed where I'm assuming most maneuvering after the initial merge is below corner speed.

Good follow on to the previous discussion about being unpredictable.  Assuming a high engagement speed may or may not work because I strive to present the unexpected. 

There seems to be frequent discussion about stalls.  Obviously, a stall is not a BFM/ACM maneuver.  When a stall occurs in a fight, it's typically a lack of situational awareness leading to a loss of control event, a stall and/or spin.  In a fight, intentionally stalling transforms a fighter into a stationary target, akin to a hot air ballon. 

[FLS]

Good follow on to the previous discussion about being unpredictable.  Assuming a high engagement speed may or may not work because I strive to present the unexpected. 

There seems to be frequent discussion about stalls.  Obviously, a stall is not a BFM/ACM maneuver.  When a stall occurs in a fight, it's typically a lack of situational awareness leading to a loss of control event, a stall and/or spin.  In a fight, intentionally stalling transforms a fighter into a stationary target, akin to a hot air ballon. 

I wasn't suggesting that you were predictable, just that jets usually maintain higher speeds in a fight than Randy1 will typically see in Aces High. We tend to use WW2 aircraft to fight WW1 style dogfights.

[bozon]

Tunnel vision is simply your max sustainable turn when you're over your corner speed.

I think you meant "attainable" not "sustainable". Sustainable means that you can hold this turn without losing speed or alt, which is never the case for 6G turns in WWII planes.

In a knife fight, turn rate alone is not very decisive - it is the combination of turn rate and turn radius, and what is "best" is very difficult to define. Going fast enough to pull 6G (blackout) will give the best turn rate, but the turn radius will be large. One cannot get a gun solution on opponent, no matter how quickly he pulls around, if the opponent is inside his turning circle.

And here comes the "conserving E" part in the merger - many opponents who go for position on the merge will chop throttle to lose speed fast and pull a tighter (i.e. smaller radius) turn. With that they are giving up their energy in the hope of a quick victory, or that you do the same and you both end up in a slow stall fight. Against such an opponent, if you can keep your E and enter a low-G zoom, and with a good climbing plane, you can build a significant E advantage. This is a risky move because your opponent will get behind your 3/6 line initially and will attempt a difficult shot that just may connect. If you survived, they next moves are all yours.

In the P47M vs. P-38L the 38 can gamble on such a move. The P47 will pull a smaller initial turn when starting from blackout speed simply because it sheds its speed quicker - don't try to beat him in his best move. The 38 on the other hand is one of the best zooming planes and handles much better is a stall fight. A P-47 that will gamble everything on a first sharp turn and not make the shot will be in big trouble. Trying to follow a zooming/spiraling 38 down to speeds below 150mph will get it killed. but no one guarantees that this is what the 47 will do! If he predicts your move and thinks that you completely give up initial angles to save E, he can pull a much less sharp turn, keep WEP on and zoom after you, at least close enough to shred you with 8*0.5s - In that case, chopping your throttles and going all-out of angles would have won the fight for the 38... Being unpredictable is very important as said by the previous posters.

[Randy1]

Good stuff.  I have enjoyed reading each reply. 

Let me ask y'all this with E conservation in mind.  I am looking for just a rule of thumb level answer because of the wide variety of situations that have to be dealt with in an engagement. I am at 300mph+ in plane x.  It's best turn rate speed is 250mph.  Should one consider dumping E before the first merge to get to a better turn-rate or does E conservation as a rule of thumb trump turn-rate?

[FLS]

I actually did mean to say sustainable. Consider cruising at altitude at 400 MPH then diving and turning to a bandit. As long as you are above corner speed, above say 265 MPH, the best turn you can sustain is pulling to tunnel vision. Once you hit corner speed you have both your best turn rate and your smallest no flaps radius. You can decrease your radius with flaps but your smallest radius turn without flaps is at corner speed. Going faster at the same load factor will increase the radius, going slower will not allow the same load factor so your turn rate decreases.

If you pull power at speed you won't slow down quickly, it's the turn with no power that slows you down and a climbing turn without power slows you quickly.
If you want to lose speed for a merge go up with full power, you will still slow down while maintaining more energy then you would by reducing thrust.
There will be exceptions but there always are. In general keep your energy as high as you can.

[Puma44]

Good stuff.  I have enjoyed reading each reply. 

Let me ask y'all this with E conservation in mind.  I am looking for just a rule of thumb level answer because of the wide variety of situations that have to be dealt with in an engagement. I am at 300mph+ in plane x.  It's best turn rate speed is 250mph.  Should one consider dumping E before the first merge to get to a better turn-rate or does E conservation as a rule of thumb trump turn-rate?

Randy, that's another "it depends" situation.  Are you 1 v 1 or 1 v many?  Are you high or low?  What kind of opponent aircraft are you facing?  What are the environmental factors, i.e. sun in your face or in his, etc?  Are you feeling lucky today?  Energy conservation is like runway behind you, altitude above you, and gas in the fuel truck.  Once it's lost, hard to get it back and you are most likely going to lose the engagement.  You are well ahead of the average AH player if you are energy and corner velocity minded. 

[Delirium]

Many of these questions are (as Puma mentioned) very dependent on situational factors.

I'd be willing work with you in the TA anytime, just let me know. We can work on 1v1 similar and dissimilar aircraft versus the P38.

[Puma44]

Many of these questions are (as Puma mentioned) very dependent on situational factors.

I'd be willing work with you in the TA anytime, just let me know. We can work on 1v1 similar and dissimilar aircraft versus the P38.

Randy, this is where you'll learn energy management, practice, practice, practice!  Knowing the concepts is good but, application is the hard part. 

[Randy1]

Many of these questions are (as Puma mentioned) very dependent on situational factors.

I'd be willing work with you in the TA anytime, just let me know. We can work on 1v1 similar and dissimilar aircraft versus the P38.

I will take you up on the training offer in the near future for sure.

In the session I had with you we talked about merge entry speed for the P-38 to be around 300mph which I assumed was for a better turn performance. 

[duie]

Many of these questions are (as Puma mentioned) very dependent on situational factors.

I'd be willing work with you in the TA anytime, just let me know. We can work on 1v1 similar and dissimilar aircraft versus the P38.

 !!!!