Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Aircraft and Vehicles => Topic started by: GRUNHERZ on May 28, 2003, 09:33:32 AM
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From http://www.modelingmadness.com
Twenty years ago, doing an interview with BGEN Chuck Yeager, I asked about his experience at Wright-Patterson in 1945-47, and especially about flying captured Axis aircraft. "Which was best?" I wanted to know. He replied quickly: "That long-nose Focke-Wulf was maybe the best piston-engine fighter I ever flew. As long as you stayed below 25,000 feet."
:)
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Of course this is really just annecdotal propagnda done to change the performance of a video game 60 years later.
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Batz,
At least give me credit for my quotes ;) I just don't say that many quotable things you know.
Grunherz,
Wasn't it you that made fun of my After Action Report from the Korean War by Capt. Delong?
In fact didn't you use my quote as your signature and replace the word F4U with some German uber plane or another?
I think I'll try it.
Twenty years ago, doing an interview with BGEN Chuck Yeager, I asked about his experience at Wright-Patterson in 1945-47, and especially about flying captured Axis aircraft. "Which was best?" I wanted to know. He replied quickly: "That long-nose F4U was maybe the best piston-engine fighter I ever flew. As long as you stayed below 25,000 feet."
Hmm, that sounds about right. I think that's what Yeager wanted to say after all
:p
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Long-nose/Hose-nose... same thing. Yeager is talking about the Hog. Typical Army/Navy rivalry disparaging the hog by calling it a Kurt Tank product.
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I did use your quote but it wasnt to make fun of the F4U - IIRC it was to make some other unrelated humorous point.
Go ahead go change Yeager's words... I felt that such respect and admiration of the Dora by one of America's top fighter pilot godlike figures would ruffle some feathers and you fellas did not dissapoint.
Chuck Yeager thinks the FW109D is the best prop fighter he ever flew up to 25,000. :D Oh yea baby lat that salt sink deeper into your wounds. ;)
Thats one of the cool things about good Americans we have enough pride and self confidence to admire great performance even if it is not our own. :)
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well grun, yeager only flew the 51 in combat and as far as i know he never flew F4u or P38s or any other planes of ww2. He tested new USAF planes and axis planes, but did he ever fly other WW2 era combat-flying planes?
Give him a monster accel 190D9 and its easy to see why he was impressed. Its a p51 with uber acceleration.
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I was actually being tongue-in-cheek.
We all know the best fighter is the Hellcat...and that's because it was easy to produce and numbers are a quality all their own. :D
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Originally posted by Puke
Long-nose/Hose-nose... same thing. Yeager is talking about the Hog. Typical Army/Navy rivalry disparaging the hog by calling it a Kurt Tank product.
Nice try :cool:
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Some choice aircraft from a pilot who's flown a lot....
From Eric Brown's 'Wings of the Wierd and Wonderful":
"I have flown almost 500 type of aircraft, excluding variants of a type, and I have graded every one in a book with a terse two line assessment. There are six that receive top grading for handling qualities - the Spitfire XII, Lancaster I with power boosted controls, the de Havilland Hornet, Hawker P1040, North American Sabre, and McDonnell Phantom. These six are so different in size, role and time scale, that they are difficult to compare, but for sheer pilot enjoyment I remember the Hornet making the biggest impression. Certainly all six had good power/weight ratio, superb harmony of control, and excellent performance characteristics, but above all they inspired confidence in the pilot. The Hornet somehow had the edge on the others in my book.
Inevitiably the list above will give the impression that I am biased towards British and American aircraft, but let me say that just a shade below my first choice list are the Japanese Zero, the German Fw.190, Ju.88, and Me.262. However, for tops, it's still the Hornet."
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Originally posted by aircav
Some choice aircraft from a pilot who's flown a lot....
From Eric Brown's 'Wings of the Wierd and Wonderful":
[...]
Inevitiably the list above will give the impression that I am biased towards British and American aircraft, but let me say that just a shade below my first choice list are the Japanese Zero, the German Fw.190, Ju.88, and Me.262. However, for tops, it's still the Hornet."
Let's face it, Yeager's a dork.
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Originally posted by OIO
well grun, yeager only flew the 51 in combat and as far as i know he never flew F4u or P38s or any other planes of ww2. He tested new USAF planes and axis planes, but did he ever fly other WW2 era combat-flying planes?
Give him a monster accel 190D9 and its easy to see why he was impressed. Its a p51 with uber acceleration.
yeager flew jugs too didnt he?
Id be suprised if the US top ace hadnt flown every type at one stage or another.He was a test pilot for years too so god knows how many planes this guy has flown.I think you all should simply accept the dora was a lot better than the AH dora.I think the area where the 190d9 we have is deficient is in acceleration.
So many test pilots mention its superb acceleration yet this is never a thought that would strike you about the dora we have or WB for that matter.
I think the main problem is the fact that the MW50 or GM1 boost systems cannot be modeled correctly in AH. There is a 'generic' wep system for all planes in AH and this i think is where we lose out.It cant really be avoided so argueing for a better performing 190 is pretty pointless.
As far as i know the 190 matches closely to the various charts but its always just under the charts values, a touch less mph or few degrees of roll lost.If you look at some of the other aircraft in AH they also 'closely' match their chart numbers but generally they are a touch over the chart values, the f6f for example. The roll on the 190 is so superior to other aircraft of that time we should be unable to match the roll but the p51 and even the p47 seem to roll with the 190 easily. the differences in roll is so small that the 190 becomes pretty unremarkable which i feel completely contradicts the comments in various test reports. Unfortunately the so called experts in here forever disregard any coment made by COMBAT PILOTS from that era as if they know better and often they claim its nonsense.Test evaluations done DURING the war when they were looking for weaknesses to exploit and the information could mean life or death for some pilot and these test pilots lie and exagerate the performance? Ive never heard such utter crap in my life. /here we have a TOP allied ace clearly describing an aircraft for us to judge ours against and again people try to say he didnt know what he was talking about. Its fairly hilarious really. Show them a chart , its fake, show them ilots comments its anecdotal, show them your aircraft is 4 or 5 mph too slow they say close enough, acceleration according to RAF reports show it had excellent acceleration yet a spit 5 can out accelrate most of the 190s in AH. This is the area i suspect is wrong.Go try accelerate a 190 in level flight from 200 to its top speed using wep, it takes an absolute AGE. now try it with its contemperies , match the 190d9 to p51D, the 190a5 to spit 5 or 9.You'll see big differences.
However I have given up trying to get it looked into due to the fact i was accused of only asking for changes in order to have an easier time shooting things down.I can tell you I was very angered by this.I couldnt give two hoots what plane I fly AS LONG AS ITS ACCURATE to its WW2 type If i see problems or discrepencies why shouldnt you be able to question it?. If I ask about the p47 im enquiring, if i ask about the 190 im whining and seeking advantage.got too much for me in the end so i decided id just play and ignore it all.Problem is every now and again you read stuff like this report and it just pisses you off.
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Hazed,
I absolutely agree.
I do not like when head to head test data is completely disregarded or chalked up to propaganda. For what purpose?
I have AFDU data on the P-47D5 and P-38F that shows very similar maneuverablity at 20K as well as many other reports that would be scoffed at on these boards. But not one person who claims to know better has one shred of flight experiance with them or is qualified to make those assesments. But in here everyone is a genius.
BTW the roll of the 190 in AH is actually slightly superior to the NACA roll data at high speed and worse at lower speed. I have tested this and it is pretty close over all. The P-51 and P-47 are not so good as you think.
Acceleration of A/C is the largest discrepensy I have found in AH (The other being relative stall speeds). AH calculates climb to be equivelent to acceleration directly. The problem with that theory is that Air cooled engines used open cowl flaps to climb but not in level flight. This would make their acceleration better than the climb relaitvely because of reduced drag in level flight. The effect would be larger on some A/C than others.
I have at least one document that says just that.
This applies to allied and axis A/C btw.;)
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The problem with that theory is that Air cooled engines used open cowl flaps to climb but not in level flight.
Liquid-cooled aircraft would have to open radiator flaps in a sustained climb. Drag is drag.
ra
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RA,
Drag is drag huh?
How does cowl flap drag effect an A/C in level flight when the flaps are closed?
How does it effect them when they are open?
Is it more when they are open? yes.
So when they are closed there is less drag.
Show me the flaps on a liquid cooled engine and compare them to an F6F, F4U or P-47.
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weelllll, i just got done reading Dunn's autobiography, he flew spits, 47's, 51's and skyraiders i think...his pick for best? spit for pure fighting, 51 for overall fighter. Just adding another quoted ww2 pilot opinion to the mix.
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All american planes are inferior. They have lower model numbers' and is therefore lower on the development scale than german aircraft. :D
I'd like to add something serious too: According to Brown, they had no MW50 at Farnbourough for their Ta-152. I suspect that most LW aircraft flown after WWII was tested without this vital ingredient. Might as well fly spits and runstangs on kerosene.
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There are tests, there are stats, then there are the facts. The fact is the aircraft that is best is the one that helps win the war on the ground the best. One on one dogfights at 20k doesn't win a war.
The russians realized this more than anyone and their aircraft reflected their thinking. The russians had the best planes, imo. Although spitfires and mossies play a close second.
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"One on one dogfights at 20k doesn't win a war."
Tell that to the bomber escorts, in fact imagine how much use a low alt La7 would be in intercepting 360mph 30K B29s blasting ural factories with nukes being escorted by 35k 487mph P51H and 470mph P47N if the USA turned on the communist scum after finishing of the nazis and Japan in 1945. :)
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Germany lost the war at 20-30K feet. Her eastern-front armies would have had a good chance of winning if her indusries weren't turned into rubbel by the USAAF/RAF.
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Originally posted by GScholz
Germany lost the war at 20-30K feet. Her eastern-front armies would have had a good chance of winning if her indusries weren't turned into rubbel by the USAAF/RAF.
Fuel and transportation network destruction were bigger reasons. German production increased when Speer(?) was put in charge but that production could not get to where it was needed.
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Originally posted by MiloMorai
Fuel and transportation network destruction were bigger reasons. German production increased when Speer(?) was put in charge but that production could not get to where it was needed.
True. But we never could have paralyzed transportation, virtually eliminated the fuel, or even bombed the front-line troops, if we hadn't first won the dogfights at 20-30 thousand feet.
- oldman
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Originally posted by F4UDOA I have AFDU data on the P-47D5 and P-38F that shows very similar maneuverablity at 20K as well as many other reports that would be scoffed at on these boards.
It doesn't seem out of the question to me. Most P-38Fs didn't have the combat flap setting, and the two aircraft have fairly similar power and wing loading. (Move up to the P-38J, and the power loading numbers change a bit...)
To take a second viewpoint, the P-51B's tactical trial report included comparisons with the P-47D-10 and P-38J-5. The report concludes that the P-51B turns better than either of the others (no mention of whether flaps were used on the P-38J), but is much, much more emphatic about the P-51's superiority over the P-47.
Originally posted by F4UDOA The problem with that theory is that Air cooled engines used open cowl flaps to climb but not in level flight. This would make their acceleration better than the climb relaitvely because of reduced drag in level flight. The effect would be larger on some A/C than others.
This seems like a reasonable point to me, but with one important caveat: it applies only at low speeds. Erik Shilling (3rd Squadron AVG) flew both the P-40 and P-47, and stated that cowl flaps on both aircraft could be safely closed when climb speed was increased to 220-230 mph.
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Guppy,
Do you have the reports you mentioned?
If you do I would luv to trade with ya, please, please, please:D
BTW, are saying that the P-38F didn't have flowlers or didn't have a designated maneuver flap setting??
Anyway the comment about closing cowl flaps on the P-47 and P-40 would make sense since they would have reached a speed where air flow was suppicient for cooling at approx. 230MPH. But below that it would have been impossible. In fact the P-47 had a habit of overheating during climb and probably caused it to open the flaps even further and hurting climb even more.
If you point is that liquid cooled engines suffured as much because of this as air cooled I disagree. Just take a look at the size of the cowl flaps on aircooled engine a/c. On the F4U it increased buffeting severley if left open near stall.
I can't even tell you what the radiator flaps look like on most liquid cooled AC.
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Guppy,
I just reread your post. I think you were agreeing with me. Sorry about the rant.
BTW, and I agree about it applying more to low speeds.
However the climb charts that we all have for various A/C are all done at low speed only. We have no way of knowing what the high speed climb rates really were.
The high speed climbs we use in AH are really based off of the climb charts for low speed and then spread out over the speed range. Do you know what I mean??
So basically our high speed climb really isn't any more accurate because the corresponding climb data isn't avaible.
What I would like to see HTC do is just do a acceleration equation seperate from the climb charts.
I think this would give much more historically accurate results (or at least more inline with the AFDU data that I trust).
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Sorry, I don't have the actual tactical trial report; the excerpts were quoted in another document. :( I can pass you a PDF copy of that one if you like; it contains four paragraphs of interest, one each from the P-38G and P-47C tactical trials and two from the P-51B (plus a few other interesting quotes, such as a short commentary on the Allison Mustang vs. the 109 and 190).
As regards the combat flap setting, it was introduced only in the final P-38F variant, the P-38F-15.
Erik Shilling estimated that the P-40 would have needed about 150-200 hp more to fully compensate for the cowl flap drag. He thought the P-47 would need 300 extra hp to make up for its cowl flap drag. (I don't know how he arrived at those estimates.)
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Originally posted by Sixpence
...The russians realized this more than anyone and their aircraft reflected their thinking. The russians had the best planes, imo. Although spitfires and mossies play a close second.
The Russians developed a fine ground attack plane and two fighter variants (Yak 9 and La 7) that were fine planes. But except for the Il2, by the time they could be manufactured in numbers The U.S. and British had even better equipment.
By the time these marks appeared in numbers on the front, the Germans had already lost the air war, thanks primarily to the sacrifice of thousands of Russian pilots flying inferior equipment and with inadequate training.
-Blogs
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Guppy,
If you could send that it would be great!!
markw4@comcast.net
Anything you need or are looking for let me know.
Do you want the P-38F afdu??
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This is one aspect of this game that is grossly under-modeled, Systems management.
In AH you manage fuel and ammo, that's it.
However, it was considerably more complicated to operate a WWII era aircraft, much less fight effectively in it.
Setting and adjusting cowl flaps, radiator and oil-cooler flaps, mixture settings and a myriad of other factors are ignored. I understand why, but that doesn't mean I fully agree.
You couldn't go roaring around forever at full throttle in your La-7 without overheating the engine. After about 5 minutes you'd see your cylinder head temps up near the red zone, with oil temp chasing close behind. Within 15 minutes you would be flying an overweight glider. This is greatly exacerbated by flying at low altitude where you don't have the benefit of low ambient air temp.
When the P-38J arrived in the ETO, it was discovered that it was nearly impossible to keep the engines at optimum operating temperature above 25,000 feet. Radiator, intercooler, and oil cooler doors were closed and STILL the engines ran too cool. Eventually, sheet aluminum was used to blank off a portion of the cores to retain heat in the engines. That is the effect of -50 degree C temperatures. Lockheed had engineered the various coolers and radiators for sub-tropical operations with most operations conducted at low to medium altitudes (10 to 20k), as most P-38s were being deployed to the SWPA and over-heating problems were encountered with earlier models in that hot, damp environment. Under temp engines fail just about as easy as over temp'd engines do.
My experience with radial aircraft engines (over 2,300 hours behind R-2800s and R-1820s) tells me that the game is vastly over-simplified. Maybe we'll have a more realistic management model in AH2. If you guys think it's tough to fly and survive now, imagine the difficulty if you had an real world cockpit workload to deal with.
My regards,
Widewing