High Altitude Fights

[Minotaur]

I was wondering if some knowledgable people could answer a couple of questions for me.

I have noticed that manuvering at altitudes above 25k are extremely difficult.  I have given up trying to attack B17's at 30k (Yep, the whine comes out   ).  

You just can't manuver for a decent firing (except a slow 6   ) position, even if you can manage to catch the B17.  The slightest turn and you lose altitude.  

Was this a real occurance during WW2 era planes?  I really can see the need for planes like the 109K etc... if it is correct.  You really have to have a significant altitude / speed advantage to mount a successful attack.

I believe the "Norden Bombsight" is simulated in AH.  What was the effective altitude for accurate bombing?  Seems the AH B17's can drop very accurately from 30k+.

Thanks in advance!  

Mino

[Rojo]

Fighter attacks and ack forced the allied bombers to climb ever higher as the war progressed. Manuevering at such high altitudes was indeed difficult for the fighters, though it may be a bit exagerated in AH. In the book "JG26: Top Guns of the Luftwaffe," accounts often had the Bf-109s  assigned as fighter cover for the FW-190s, who in turn were charged with actually hitting the buffs (this is not to imply that 109s weren't also used as buff killers). The 109's better hi-alt performance made them better suited to mix it up with escorts, while the 190's legendary firepower made them natural buff killers -- remember the bombers flew straight and level, so manuevering against them was somewhat simpler than in AH. The 109-K variant was an attempt to get a 109 with better buff-killing armament (30mm cannon) and still better hi-alt speed and climb-rate (but ultimately lost much of it's manueverability in the process).

The other thing that the LW had that we don't in AH is a GCI center. The LW pilots were vectored into attack position by their ground controllers in many cases, who would try to place the interceptors in the path of the bomber streams. For what it's worth, on the large buff raids the Buccaneers have done in AH, the enemy fighters still made a darned nuisense of themselves, even at 30K.

Sabre (a.k.a. Rojo)

[MiG Eater]

Mino,

Guess we are reliving history concerning high altitude flying and specifically attacks on high flying bombers.  German pilots in their FW-190's had many hard lessons attacking bombers at cruise altitude.  Since air density is so much lower at 30k than on the ground, there is less air for the prop to "bite" into.  The very low air density also robs the engine of the oxygen it needs to produce full power and airplanes without 2-stage superchargers were especially disadvantaged.  Slow acceleration and the inability to sustain even moderate G turns without dropping the nose to maintain alt was usually the result.  Induced drag is much more difficult to overcome at high alt than sea level since your propeller thrust to airplane weight ratio is so low.  German airplanes made use of Nitrous Oxide injection for a brief bursts of oxygen rich air to enter the engine but the supply of nitrous was very limited in a fighter.

The Luftwaffe discovered that the best way of attacking bomber streams was to climb out ahead (often to one side out of guns range) of the bombers and reverse for a head on attack.  This allowed them to turn into the bombers and lose some alt to keep airspeed up in the turn in. This tactic presented the smallest possible profile for the gunners to hit and yet still gave enough time to line up for a (brief) shot.  Unfortunately, it presented escorting fighters with a good opportunity to find the gathering points and attack the slow climbing Luftwaffe planes en-masse.

In AH, employing a similar tactic would required you to fly where you think the bomber will be rather than where he is.  Climb above, build up speed and fly an interception course, turning in shallow turns only as needed.  Repeated slashing attacks work better than a predictable flight path straight to the bomber's six and his tail gun.

MiG

[Fishu]

What I have read, raids were usually done around 15,0000-25,0000ft, not at 32,000ft like many tends to do here (..not to mention about more accurate pinpoint bombing from that altitude than laser guided bombs do)

[Udie]

 I have noticed over the last few years of flying that speed is the key for manuvering up high.  It just takes ALOT longer to build up that speed.  Get in a p51 and climb to 35000, then level out to about 200-250 mph.  At this speed do a 0 G dive to about 30,000 ft,  Now you will be at around 300mph at 30k and you WILL notice the difference in manuvering.  Just don't manuver much because you'll find yourself all mushy real quick  

udie

[iculus]

Hopefully, the Norden bombsight won't be accurate to 50k feet in the future, which should drop bombers down 10,000 feet, or so.  I bet that possible cloud cover...and maybe wind   ...in future releases will also set a lower ceiling for buffs.  

As it is right now, you can't even catch a B-17 at altitude with a 190...

From my experience in WarBirds, even the me-262 has trouble at high alt.

IC

[This message has been edited by iculus (edited 12-07-1999).]

[Luckie]

actually, i was meaning to post a question about the ceilings for different planes in AH.
last night i was trying to climb to a b17. the buff was up around 38k. i was in a p51 and could get to 37k, but at that alt my max climb was about 100fpm (with WEP a burnin the entire time) assuming i didn't rock the wings to keep buff in sight.
so afterward i took a 51 up online with a full tank, kicked in the unlimited WEP and went to see how high i could get it.flying straight and easy with the auto on, i was able to eventually get to 40k. of course that took me all the way across the map ( and a VERY long time) to get that high.
A squad mate looked it up in one of his books and said that operational cieling for the p51 was 41k, so i guess that works out about right, in another 30min i could have probably inched it up another thousand feet. but keep in mind that i was down to a quarter tank by then, with a full tank i might not have been able to even maintain the 40k.
but, the same book claimed that a b17 had an operational ceiling of 35k. maybe that 35k was for a different model, but the b17's in AH seem to be capable of going well above that. and that buff was considerably more manueverable at 37k than my mustang was.
so i think the high alt performance could do with a little scrutiny from HTC. In the meantime i've learned my lesson and wont bother trying to climb to intercept a light b17 anymore ( until this is fixed anyway).
-luckie

[humble]

A great book on bombers in WW2 is "wings of morning", the story of the last B-24 shot down over Germany. Although it deals with B-24's the tactics are the same. Normal bomber altitude was 22,000 ft or so. The real limiting factor was the cold. It wasn't uncommon for bombers to lose an occasional crew member to hypothermia. Cold also affected the working parts..remember the bombers weren't sealed like fighter canopy's..the wind was blowing thru the whole flight.

[Mike]

Hi
The other's have talked about the mushy effects of controls' in thin air at
height. There's a whole range of effects  - the engine is struggling for air
too. I just asked my father about his experiences with high altitude flight -
(he flew a range of Spits mainly Mk VII) in 124 squadron. When they took
delivery of a VII they had to take it up to 40,000 to certify it operational.
(His squadron did a lot of high cover, though later in the war they did lots of
bombs, and strafing all through northern europe, mainly Holland. I'll post a Spit divebombing thread:-)).

He said that you could easily lose thousand's of feet if you stalled before  
you recovered, and that you were *very* nose high, 2-stage (?) blower going, and
there was a fine line between being nose high gaining alt and nose high losing
it. Any sloppy flying got penalised with height loss real quick which took a long time to make up. He said the max he ever got was 41,700 when the engine finally cut out -
beyond the capabilities of the blower to supply sufficent air for combustion.

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Skeet

[juzz]

Great stuff Mike!

Note - "and that you were *very* nose high" - I believe this was something that was somewhat particular to the Spitfire? Apparently it had to hold a more nose-up attitude at high altitudes than other fighters did.

[MRIDGELL]

pretty good poop ( except about induced drag at alt --perhaps a definition misunderstanding. induced drag is dependent on lift - up hi less lift-less drag ) the air is so "thin" at high alt that banking off even a small portion of your lift from the vertical ( to use that lift to turn) might result in, to little lift left in the vertical vector, thereby causing the plane to sink accordingly, or even stall if the bank was aggressive. while oxegen allowed the forts to climb to as high as 35000 it was for breif stints only. with out pressurazation and heat, crew indurance was limited and even minutes above 24000 are painfully intorlerable.  in aces where we chase the buffs from below, get coalt and attack immediatly. in ww2 190s useing gci would set up intercept points usually above the forts and attack in a circular pattern,hopeing for a side attack from slightly above or below. reason target aspect from the side is much larger then from headon and from rear. rear was to dangerous. and the 190s could set up a crossing pattern not allowing the waste gunner to fix on them in one spot.they also used the buff,s own wings to hide from waste gunners. and they attacked with supirior numbers. when the fighter saw the stream of tracers coming at him he would pull off the attack and leave that pass for some1 else. remember that in real flying the primary concern for all pilots was to get back home alive. suicide runs ( japanese excluded) are peculiar to flight sims. the anomoly of the buffs being as fast as the fighters at high alt is i think a result of the climb and attack imediatly pattern. a fighter co alt woth a fort at great alttiude enjoyed the same speed advantage there that he would at any other alttiude. and since his wing loading was only a fraction of the bombers hes manuvour problems were ( how ever bad) were much worse in the heavies.

[Mike]

Thanks Juzz
I forgot - he said the VII had a pressurised cabin too, and the 'blower' was a supercharger not a turbo. I'm pretty sure he may still have a small booklet on the Merlin all about how to operate the boost - that would be interesting to be modelled by HTC. (both the controls and the effect) - it was used at different heights not just hit 'P' from the ground up :-)

Anyhow, I'll stick my notes on Spit divebombing here:  

I asked my father (80 next year) how they did dive bombing in Spits and he
instantly replied, "Well first you identified your target' ...  "

(I thought, here's the training coming out nearly 60 years later - you can
hear the briefing officer bashing it into them can't you : Identify your
target!! Too many neutrals and friendlies got hit I suppose).

" ... then you'd cross the target slightly to one side, say to the right, watch
it disappear under the leading edge of the port wing and wait for it to
re-appear behind the trailing edge. Then you'd just do a lazy turn to the left,
and let the nose drop until it felt you were vertical. "

(What height would you be at?)

"Oh, you'd be at about 11,000 feet then you'd pull at out between about 5-6000
feet though the lowest might be between 3-4000. You'd be trimmed so that at
first you had to hold it in the dive but later the controls would be locked
solid. People used to tell tall stories in the mess about how hard they had to
pull back on the controls to get out of the dive - putting both feet up on the
instrument panel that sort of thing. When you pulled up you'd go vertical and
at some point just tip a wing over a bit to look back to see what damage you'd
done. Of course, you have to remember a Spit was never intended to be used as a
dive bomber - no dive brakes. From memory, the max speed they were rated for
was 490 mph. "

(In a VII?)

"No, I think it was pretty much the same as that in all the Mk's that I flew.

(You told me once about your CO being teased after hurting his neck - and
his dignity - after pulling too many g's. He was sitting in the mess head
crooked on one side, in pain when the squadron wit came in: "Hello sir, been
sitting in a draft?")
(Hardly ROTFL, but in context, it was 'smart' remark when commanding officer's
were next to God).

"Yes, our CO pulled too many g's in a dive, and the wings were actually pulled
up a little. If you ran your fingers along the wing near the root you could
actually feel little ripples in the skin. The aircraft was U/S of course.
Hehheh - he had ripples in his neck too."



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Skeet