Hi Schutt,
>3. Straiga says that there are 2 crit engines and hitec is wrong on this one... i dont get it... misunderstanding?
I think we all agree on the physical facts, the disagreement is actually just a question of nomenclature. Straiga of course is right that no engine is called "critical" when they are contra-rotating, and Hitech of course is right when the effect of the P-38's engines' sense of rotation is the same as being left with the critical engine on a twin with co-rotating engines.
>4. torque on twin engined...the overall torque on the plane is around the center of gravity or?
Ah, that question aims right at the core of the misunderstanding :-) Torque is not calculated around any certain point, it just adds up. You only have to consider an axis when you convert forces into moments.
>5. On top of this it is opposed by the stabilizing wings and tail, which makes the inflight behaviour eaven more complicated than just generating a torque around the CoG.
I'd say that while the entire system is complicated, the situation with regard to torque is very simple :-) The engines produce torque, something else generates an opposite moment. The side-effects of "something else" account for all the effects the pilots here describe (as I'm confident) absolutely correctly.
I'd suggest that the situation for the twin-engined aircraft is exactly the same as for the single-engined aircraft (on which we all seem to agree), except that due to higher rotational inertia, longer aileron moment arms etc. the rolling moment is much smaller than for the single so that it's submerged in the larger "side-effects" :-)
Regards,
Henning (HoHun)