Originally posted by Jigster:
Kinda off topic...but
RAM, have you ever read the story on "How the flying Porcuipine got it's name" ?
I think if one single Short Sunderland can take down 4 or 5 Ju88C's, and damage two more beyond repair with ONLY .303 guns and preforming the only the "corkscrew" defensive manuver...
I'll dig for an online copy, otherwise I'll type it out...tis a very good account of lone buff vs multi-direction fighter attack 
I think the biggest problem with USAAF gun crews was lack of training...very little was given in how to lead the plane because of the plane's own speed, and the difficulty of hitting a plane as small as a 109 or Fw-190...like pilots, most of the people in AH have far more gunnery practice then their real-life counterparts.
Oh well.
- Jig
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"How could you miss? I met eye to eye with that Messerschmit pilot! Hell I think I even saw him grinning!." -- Kevin C. Bacon (who recently passed away
) 8th AF B-17 pilot.
"Well, I pointed, I fired, and my bullets just never connected. Only a few seconds to fire anyway." -- 'Mack' Jones, flight engineer and upper-turrent gunner.
You are telling me nothing about my topic. I ask WHY a bomber dives on a fighter to fight it when in a realistic environment it should RUN AWAY AS FAST AS HE COULD.
Answer? Lazer guns. Plain and simple. Those concentrated turbolasers make akstarring a SO easy thing that a in a 109G-B17 contest the cat is the B17 and the mouse is the 109G. The world upside down. Ridiculous. Stupid. And unbeliable.
About your comment on the Sunderland...that was an act of exceptional performance, incredible quality of the crew...
and enless tons of good luck. IF you reas the story (I first knew about it by a book by Ivan Southall) it tells how was the plane after the attack. It was simply incredible it was still in the air.
BUT...the Sunderland was in the defensive. If he had seen a low Ju88 I am sure he wont have dived on it to kill it but RUN LIKE HELL hoping the Ju didnt follow.
In AH the sunderland would have dived on the Ju.
And that says it all.
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Toad:
I wont mess in another Hispano discussion as I have had enough about it in previous threads. I will only tell you that I use 30mm on G10 last days and over 150 yards is plain and simple useless. ANd that the hispanos are one ping wonders...one ping of hispano and you are already looking the damage list.
I dont know if it is realistic (I'm pretty sure it isnt but OK)...my argument is that with that kind of weapons the F4UC can be used as a HO machine all day long, with few chances of dyin (as most people refuse a HO with a F4U and if you put a ping on the avoinding HO pilot, he's gone).
I dont call that kind of flying "pilot skills" I call it "dweeb incompetents".
Of course there are lots of impressive sticks riding F4UC...but my point is that there are also a LOT of dweebs on them.