The Parity of turning ability

[F4UDOA]

Gents,

I have to say that in the online simm market these day's the FM in AH seems to offer the most in ACM because their really is no Uber plane, no turn wonder or any one A/C that clearly does anyone thing better than the others all the time. My question is this.
Is this accurate?

I fly the F4U-1C or D exlusively and I have noticed that in an offensive situation that there is no A/C that can turn tight enough horizontally to prevent me from staying on their 6 and closing in a Co-E fight(haven't tried the Zero but I have the Spit). In other simms this is not the case. If I were to try to flat turn on the deck with a Spit9 in AW I would be dead in three turns. I have less experiance in WB but I believe the same to be true. I have also noticed the inverse to be true. If I try to evade a P-47 on the deck using flat turns I cannot excape. Nor can I escape a P-51 or FW190 (The P-47 and FW190 have very high wing loading). I have killed and been killed by the same A/C in the same flat turning situation. Is their some kind of design parity amoung the fighter A/C in AH that prevent one A/C from gaining an edge on the other. In combat evaluations of all of these A/C, one of the critical factors in all test was turning ability and minimal turn radius. It was very important in both offense an defense. As it was important for the pilots to be aware of just what A/C they were opposing.  This is does not seem to be a factor in AH either by design or not.

Pyro/HT

You mentioned that you were looking into some things in your physics model that may slow the turns down. Have you looked in this?
Did you find anything?

Thanks
F4UDOA

[This message has been edited by F4UDOA (edited 07-26-2000).]

[Pyro]

 

Originally posted by F4UDOA:
Gents,

Pyro/HT

You mentioned that you were looking into some things in your physics model that may slow the turns down. Have you looked in this?
Did you find anything?

Hasn't been done yet, but it's still on the to do list for 1.04.  



------------------
Doug "Pyro" Balmos
HiTech Creations

[F4UDOA]

Thanks Pyro

[Lephturn]

One thing to keep in mind.. always:

Fuel levels.

It is impossible to use anecdotal evidence IMHO because you never know the exact situation the other guys are in.

I fly a P47D.  Trust me... if I horizontal turn I can kiss my bellybutton goodbye in about a 30-60 seconds. <G>

------------------
Lephturn - Chief Trainer
A member of The Flying Pigs  http://www.flyingpigs.com


"My P-47 is a pretty good ship, she took a round coming 'cross the Channel last trip.
Just thinking 'bout my baby and lettin' her rip, always got me through so far."
 - Steve Earl

[F4UDOA]

Lephturn,

Your right, if you flat turn a Jug on the deck you should expect to die quickly. And if I were on your tail in a F4U-1D you would. However in the case of these two A/C I should also be able to escape from that same P-47D30 in a flat turn. You mention fuel loads affecting the outcome. Well here is a break down on that subject.

P-47D30loaded weight 100% internal fuel
14411LBS
Wing area=300Sq Ft
Weight of fuel 2220lbs
Wingloading
100%fuel=48.03
25% fuel= 41.48

F4U-1D loaded weight 100%fuel
11962LBS
Wing Area=314Sq ft
Weight of internal fuel 1422LBS
Wingloading
100%Fuel=38.09
25% Fuel=32.04

So even with the P-47 at 25%Fuel and the F4U at 100% Fuel the F4U is still better by a fair margain. With compairable fuel loads this is not even close. You may say the 2600HP help the P-47 through a turn but the weight and the high drag are worse than the F4U. It is not my intent in this thread to start ranting about the F4U again since I don't think that this is limited to the F4U.
I think that there is an across the board issue with turn rates. My issue with the F4U is that I believe either the drag or weight to be off affecting E-retention, turn rate and accelleration. But that is a topic for another thread.

Later
F4UDOA

[Zigrat]

the CLmax of the airfoil is important too F4U.

for example, if you were to compare a spitfire with a wingloading of 38 lb/ft^2 and a f4u with a wingloading of 38 lb/ft^2 thw spitfire would still outturn the hog since inch for inch the spitfire wing produces more lift because of its planform. Plus, like u said power loading comes into play.

And, it is always MUCH easier to turn when you are on offense rather than defense. On offense, you must break as hard as you can and waste e, while if on ffense you can yoyo a bit and wear the other guys e down.

[Karnak]

 

Zigrat posted:
And, it is always MUCH easier to turn when you are on offense rather than defense. On offense, you must break as hard as you can and waste e, while if on ffense you can yoyo a bit and wear the other guys e down.

I think he ment to say:

And, it is always MUCH easier to turn when you are on offense rather than defense. On defense, you must break as hard as you can and waste e, while if on offense you can yoyo a bit and wear the other guy's e down.

Sisu
-Karnak

[Yeager]

I have put much thought into this subject.

At first glance something does seem off kilter but I must acknowledge that the turn rate of ANY plane in AH is very dependant on speed.  Each plane has a comfort zone where turns are sharpest, problem is, when turning, speed is lost -therefore, the comfort zone is fleeting.

Fly smart!

Yeager

[F4UDOA]

F4UDOA,

Zigrat, your right about the max Cl of the wing making a difference in a turn. But I don't know if the result would help a P-47 pilot much. Most WW2 fighters had a no flaps Cl of between 1.4 and 1.5. the No flap Cl of a F4U is approx. 1.48 and it has a 1G stall of 100MPH clean. The Spitfire prob had a similer max Cl. The advantage of the Spit wing was the elliptical shape reducing Cdi or induced drag allowing it to move through turns more quickly with less loss of E. The F4U had maneuver flaps at low speed which increased drag but raised the lift coefficient to 1.88(It was 2.33 in early F4U's) allowing the F4U to turn at very low speed. The P-47 had a similer Cl to the F4U but had very high wing loading giving it a clean stall of 115MPH. If you multiply that times the 1.73(square of the G factor) it will give you the 3G stall 199.18mph. The F4U clean 3G stall is 173.2MPH. I will solve for the Cl of both the P-47 and F4U tommorrow but I guess my point is that there was no parity in turning ability of WW2 fighters. However in AH there seems to no advantage to having a superior turning radius. That's all.

<S>
F4UDOA

[mavric]

Great topic F4UDOA,

Quote: "However in AH there seems to no advantage to having a superior turning radius. That's all."

Exactly my problem also. There were huge turn differences in these aircraft. Not the case in AH. Here is a quote from Hitech:

""We are continuing to look into the matter and have some idea's and test we might run to see if a change to a few items wil enhance the sustained turn rate accuracy Write now I feel it could be off but realy havn't seen any real evidence that it is."

AH is a great sim with a great FM. But, one of the reasons I have not signed up for an account to play on-line is for that reason. Turn ability seems too similar across the board. I fly the P-47 alot in WB and AH off-line. They feel allmost identical. But why do the other AH aircraft not change in FEEL? I`m not talking about energy managment (which is very important and I do well), I`m talking turn rates between aircraft.

Here is a awesome topic on this subject. A very constructive and mature (mostly     ) disscussion. This is not a "flame war" thread, please do not turn it into one.

 http://agw.dogfighter.com/agw/Forum3/HTML/013132.html

The thread is 5 pages long. If you have the time to read ALL 161 POSTS then please feel free to add something constructive here. If not, then don`t reply.

It`s just that I see alot of AH players making uneducated FM claims without facts on this board. I can`t tell you how many times I see people preach AH realism and WB arcadism. Or that one is more difficult than the other, Pure BS. Get educated about both sims, learn the facts, then you can contribute something to your community.

Thanks, and look forward to flying AH in the future.

Great time to be a sim pilot isn`t it.    

PS: F4UDOA, alot of the information you may be looking for is on pages 3, 4, & 5.

------------------
Mavric ~ X.O.
WB 325th FG


[This message has been edited by mavric (edited 07-27-2000).]

[Fishu]

 

Originally posted by F4UDOA:
If I try to evade a P-47 on the deck using flat turns I cannot excape. Nor can I escape a P-51 or FW190 (The P-47 and FW190 have very high wing loading).

methinks you're underestimating Fw190  
(it is not dora..)

[Andy Bush]

On the subject of turn performance and comparisons...

This is not an easy subject to put into 25 words or less. There are many factors that enter into the subject...enough to make the whole thing hard to get a handle on.

Comparative turn performance is simply not a matter of comparing factors such as wing loading or lift coefficients (Cl). While these may be important, there is often more to the picture...a lightly loaded B-52 has a very low wing loading and a high Cl, but I wouldn't exactly call it a BFM monster!!

There is no easy answer. And going to the real world is sometimes risky since a sim's FM programming may or may not have any fidelity to the RL airplane. Just look at the A-10 in Janes USAF as a good example of a lousy sim FM...but it sure can turn!!

I'm including a graph known as an 'energy diagram' that a friend made for me. It is an example of the type of info that we would have to have on AH aircraft in order to make any comparisons.

Once we pick an aircraft type, we first stipulate the altitude, configuration, and gross weight. In comparing aircraft, these conditions must remain the same.

Then we can look at the diagram and derive some general info. The peak of the flight envelope represents the max instantaneous G that can be pulled at the lowest speed...this is Corner Velocity. The 'Ps=0' line gives us a look at energy conservation. The higher up a particular aircraft's Ps=0 line is on this chart, then the better performer it will generally be. Why? Because it will be able to sustain more G at a lower airspeed that others...this gives it a smaller sustained turn radius and higher sustained turn rate.

In RL fighters, we would take the energy diagrams of two aircraft and overlay them to see the differences. In doing so, we could get some general info...such as don't slow down with a MiG-21 unless you are in another MiG-21! But no one ever won a fight with an energy diagram. These are tools to help get a grasp of the big picture...nothing more.

For us to understand relative turn performance in AH aircraft, we would start with diagrams such as this.

Andy

   

[gatt]

 

"However in AH there seems to no advantage to having a superior turning radius"

Thats why I love AcesHigh, even tho I love early war plane sets. Thats why, IMHO, AH is less different from the Real Thing than other online sims. Better turning performance should not always give more chances to survive.

Faster and more armed fighters have always won. Its only a matter of patience ... maybe you need one or two more passes ... but in the end the T&Ber is dead meat.



[This message has been edited by gatt (edited 07-27-2000).]

[Toad]

Andy,

I really like the E-diagram!

What do we have to give the guy to run one up for each of the major combatants?

I'm assuming that is based on RL data and not just and example. Is the necessary data available for other planes?

Anyway, thx. That is a nice tool.

[gatt]

Toad,
these are AirWarrior diagrams.