F4F-4 vs Zero 21

[GRUNHERZ]

"The Zero was supiour to the F4F-4 in speed and climb at all altitudes above 1,000 ft"


The AH Zero 21 is in no way faster than the AH F4F4 at all alts over 1000ft... In fact is is much slower for most of the low alt area - while that test clearly states it was faster at over 1000ft or at least equal in speed at sea level.

[Angus]

IMHO the F4F is perhaps a wee bit overmodelled, and in such a way it does not compare to the Zeke in the same way as it did in Real Life. FM-2 should be nimbler and faster than the F4F by a significant bit, but is it?
BTW, the Zero is also overmodelled regarding diving speed and high-speed roll rates.
The Hurricane is good vs the Zero, not a lot of difference in turning there

[F4UDOA]

I should have posted this damn report at the beggining of this thread.

The A6M2 Speeds in AH are perfect as well as the climb speed are DOB.

The F4F-4 may be a bit overmodled as far as speed but it is certainly in the ballpark.

Here is the full report. Thank me later.

A6M2 test December 1942

Notice this.

1. The A6M2 outclimbs the P-38F up to 18,200FT.

2. Look at the climb of the early F4U-1 (No water injection) and tell me if it is modeled correctly in AH. At Mil power it should out climb the A6M2 up to 5,000FT almost equal to 19,000ft and superior above. I don't think so.

[brady]

TY for posting that link so that all might be able to see it, the meat of that report is listed in full in the above mentioned book, and the pasage on the Wildact vs the Zero is the same verbatium as the one i listed above.


  "The AH Zero 21 is in no way faster than the AH F4F4 at all alts over 1000ft"

 "IMHO the F4F is perhaps a wee bit overmodelled, and in such a way it does not compare to the Zeke in the same way as it did in Real Life"

 Ok, Grunherz, Karnak, and Angus: How do we prove this to such a degree that we can effect change>?

        Clearly as F4UDOA has stated the wildcat is a :

"The F4F-4 may be a bit overmodled as far as speed but it is certainly in the ballpark. "

  Now what are we missing, is their a wingloading issue hear that is effecting the F4F-4's turning abaility some numbers we can toss out their to prove our oppenion, are the spead/preformance numbers off enough to have fixed?

[HoHun]

Hi Karnak,

>Only the very early A6M2s suffered from the negative G cut out. The vast majority were fuel injected from what I've read.

Considering how important this point was tactically, I'm surprised so little information can be found on it for most aircraft (including the Zero). Do you have any further information, or the book containing the information? I was wondering about the A6M's later versions, too.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

[Shuckins]

The faster the Zero flew, the more it yielded its ability to turn on a dime, as well as its ability to roll around a point.  The higher diving speeds attainable by the later model Zeros was virtually useless against U.S. aircraft because at speeds above 350mph the Zeros rudder and ailerons felt as if they were set in concrete.  Any attempt to dive away from a Hellcat or Corsair was tantamount to suicide.

Against the F4F-4, the Zero managed to attain a matching diving speed, but a Wildcat pilot could lose it straight-away by doing a high-speed aileron roll while in the dive.

Shuckins

[Puke]

My biggest gripe is my perception of the structural integrity of the A6M2.  Just about every account I have read about the aircraft was that it really only took a few rounds in her to start her burning.  She seems much more durable in AH...maybe a gameplay concession.  I'm curious about the A6M2's roll rates too and will have to look into that in the linked document when I get the chance because the A6M2 and A6M5 should have a very noticeable difference in their roll rates.

Most Wildcat pilots that transitioned from the F4F-3 to the F4F-4 weren't very happy.  The F4F-4 was the first model with the folding wings and had extra armor added and two additional guns which increased the weight w/out any increase in HP and thus was actually less maneuverable.  But the F4F-4 began replacing units by the time of the Battle Of Midway and is probably the right choice in variant, though I prefer the Coral Sea's F4F-3s.

[Karnak]

A6Ms underlying stucture was strong and sound.  There simply wasn't any armor or self sealing fuel tanks.  That's why it was vulnerable.

[Innominate]

Originally posted by Puke
My biggest gripe is my perception of the structural integrity of the A6M2.  Just about every account I have read about the aircraft was that it really only took a few rounds in her to start her burning.

Well, I can say with certainty that the a6m2 is one of the most durable fighters we have.  (I've tested the amount of damage various fighters can take)

The a6m2 took more damage before breaking than the p47d30, typhoon, n1k2, f6f(and many others).  The only catch is that it DOES burn extremly easily, and for quite a long time.

[brady]

My experance is that it burns more than any other fighter.Long is kinda subjective, i rarely have time to get it down, in fact I think I may ditched it like once ever,the A6M2 that is, I have managed to get the A6M5 down a few time's but I have a lot if time in that plane.

   That damage assement kinda made me raise a couple eybrows to, in fact I think one is stuck....

 Realy most of this is all just kinda BS, a lot of "impreshiuons", "openions". Hard data would be nice to see, I know that these are whear we all start though, to get curious enough to actualy get the data to effect change.

 One pet peave of mine which is just presently "oppinion" is the hitting power of the Type 99MK I, which seams much less than that of the Type 99 MK II, these guns fired the same prodjectile, the ammo chains were 4/5th's HEI, the 5th round being APT, since most of the effect from these weapons is from the chemical component of the point impact rounds I am woundering if these is indead the case, I nead to get with a Squadie and test this out. Of course the hitting potential is substantialy less with the Type 99 MK I compared to the MK II, so this may realy be whats going on.

[Mitsu]

Originally posted by thrila
Sorta like the spit I and hurri I?

Didn't know the zero had problems like that.

Nope, actually ZEKEs didn't have that problem.
I heard this thing was also discussed in WB2xx (ZEKEs had engine cut issue), and it has been fixed.

[joeblogs]

This was the first fighter to have an engine with a two stage supercharger, which gave an under-powered plane tolerable performance at altitude.  Without this feature, we would look upon this plane as we do the early models of the P-40.

-Blogs

Originally posted by Puke
My biggest gripe is my perception of the structural integrity of the A6M2.  Just about every account I have read about the aircraft was that it really only took a few rounds in her to start her burning.  She seems much more durable in AH...maybe a gameplay concession.  I'm curious about the A6M2's roll rates too and will have to look into that in the linked document when I get the chance because the A6M2 and A6M5 should have a very noticeable difference in their roll rates.

Most Wildcat pilots that transitioned from the F4F-3 to the F4F-4 weren't very happy.  The F4F-4 was the first model with the folding wings and had extra armor added and two additional guns which increased the weight w/out any increase in HP and thus was actually less maneuverable.  But the F4F-4 began replacing units by the time of the Battle Of Midway and is probably the right choice in variant, though I prefer the Coral Sea's F4F-3s.

[Puke]

My interests lay with the Pacific War much more than the European war and though you'll never find any graph showing the susceptibility to fire for the Zeke, the many readings I've completed all make great point about this.  In fact, I just finished "The First Hellcat Ace" last night and he always makes point about how the Zekes he shoots catch fire and explode very easily (with very little rounds, he becomes known as "One-shot McWhorter".)  When he's back in the fray over Japan in 1945, he's then surpised that they take a few more bullets and states he learns they now have the self-sealing fuel tanks.  I too think the Wildcat and Zeke are maybe too similar in terms of manueverability in AH (with the edge going to the Zeke still), but I also think they are too similar in durability.   I think it's Joe Foss who states it isn't if you'll be hit in the Wildcat, but only a matter of when...and this is the one factor the Wildcat should markedly have over the Zeke which is not apparent to me in this game.  

Heck, the pilots didn't even want the extra two guns on the F4F-4 and were happy with the four-gun arrangement on the F4F-3, that's all that was needed, just a few bullets to make them early Zekes pop.

[brady]

If have a lot of time in Zero's and my experance with wildcats is more of from the prespective of having them in my sights than the other way round. But I will say this about the wildcat.

 It is very tough, it asorbs Type 99MK I cannon ammo like a freaking spunge, if you dont focuse your fire it is capable of taking the whole ammo load from an A6M2. Granted if you can focuse your fire on a weak spot like the tail or cockpit it takes only 10 to 20% of your ammo(20mm) to effect enough damage to make that part fail, now this is for a round that is suposed to be 99% as destructive as the Hispano 20mm, that is a lot of damage asorbation.

[HoHun]

Hi Mitsu,

>Nope, actually ZEKEs didn't have that problem.

Do you have any source for that? The A6M2 (serial number 4593) flown by Tadayoshi Koga, recovered and test-flown by the Americans after its crash on Akutan, seems to have displayed negative G cut-outs, and though some minor changes were necessary to make the A6M airworthy again, it looks like the carburettor still was original.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)