Balistics

[gospel]

Perhaps someone can help poor ol' gospel with this one:
Perhaps it is just my perception, but..
It seems that the cannons and mg's have the same hitting power at all distances, or at least if you get hit,no matter at what distance it is fired you suffer the same amount of damage.

Now I know that gravity and air resistance slows down the velocity of the shells, and changes the trajectory path, but should'nt this also mean the the round has less hitting or penetration power?

Maybe today's computers are not powerful to model this?

Any comments apperciated.

gos

[Lephturn]

Aces High does model proper ballistics.  You will find that with cannon shells, if you get a hit at long distance, you will still get damage.  This is because the much of the destructive force is provided by the explosive in the cannon shells.  However, try a long distance hit with .50 caliber or other MG rounds, and the long distance hits will normally just bounce off.

I fly the P-47D most of the time, and although I can sometimes get hits out to long ranges, I don't do anything like the kidn of damage I can do in close.  At 800 yards, if I can hit a Buff, I won't do serious damage.  However, if I close to 200 yards and hit that same buff, I can utterly destroy it with a short sustained burst.  At closer ranges, the kinetic energy of each round is much greater, so there is much more destructive power.

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Lephturn - Chief Trainer
A member of The Flying Pigs  http://www.flyingpigs.com
 
"A pig is a jolly companion, Boar, sow, barrow, or gilt --
A pig is a pal, who'll boost your morale, Though mountains may topple and tilt.
When they've blackballed, bamboozled, and burned you, When they've turned on you, Tory and Whig,
Though you may be thrown over by Tabby and Rover, You'll never go wrong with a pig, a pig,
You'll never go wrong with a pig!" -- Thomas Pynchon, "Gravity's Rainbow"

[gospel]

Well, only HTC knows for sure  

Maybe I am wrong, don't know a lot about it, but, wouldn't part of the destructive power from a cannon shell come from how far it penetrates into the target?

So should'nt cannon shells be less effective at longer range due to the fact they have less energy to penetrate into the target?

I use the 50 cals, and yes, they are less effective at range.  But part of that would be the dispersion that is modeled in the game.  The farther the range, the more the dispersion, and the less rounds that hit the target.

Mind you, I am not complaining, just trying to understand   .

Somtimes we forget just how amazing and advanced online flight simulations have become.  I was explaining to a non-flying friend about my "hobby".  He could not believe that we could do so much in a computer game.  

gos

[Ghosth]

Remember gospel, most Aircraft skins are light aluminum sheet over aluminum ribs.

I could penetrate one with a well thrown rock 50% of the time.  

Once the cannon shell is inside the skin, and explodes you get a variety of effects depending on exactly where it hits and exactly which cannon shell.

However, a combination of blast (overpressure), impact, and fragmentation is going to shred soft aluminum pretty effectively. Not to mention control cables, fluid lines, and wireing.

[BBGunn]

Hello gospel: Your basically correct-once a round leaves the muzzle it drops and slows down etc..  However, the mass of the 20mm round should be taken into consideration.  It does not have to be going as fast as the lighter 50cal round to penetrate into an AC.  I think for the most part sim builders figure that 20mm ammo is explosive or incendiary and the dont worry about penetration differences at different ranges which would propably be more apparent with armor piercing rounds.  There is some evidence to backup your hypothosis.  Japanese A6M2 pilots using the type 99-1 which had a muzzle velocity of about 1720 fps, closed to 100 yards or closer before firing the 20mm'ers.  They noted in some cases that chunks flew out of the enemy AC's skin.  Some F6F pilots when using the four Hispano 20's with a muzzle velocity of 2500fps noted that fire/damage erupted from the interior of the enemy AC-so it looked like the faster rounds may have gotten farther into the airframe before they exploded.  Of course the projectiles contruction may have been different also.

[Lephturn]

I am pretty sure that HTC models explosive and kinetic energy damage separately.  That is likely as far as it goes though.  I'm saying that as the range increases, the kinetic energy damage decreases.  I believe HTC has modelled that part.  I don't think they get into modeling the penetration of every single round.  That would be a pretty damn exacting damage model, and I don't think there is anything out there (yet) that models ballistics to that level.

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Lephturn - Chief Trainer
A member of The Flying Pigs  http://www.flyingpigs.com
 
"A pig is a jolly companion, Boar, sow, barrow, or gilt --
A pig is a pal, who'll boost your morale, Though mountains may topple and tilt.
When they've blackballed, bamboozled, and burned you, When they've turned on you, Tory and Whig,
Though you may be thrown over by Tabby and Rover, You'll never go wrong with a pig, a pig,
You'll never go wrong with a pig!" -- Thomas Pynchon, "Gravity's Rainbow"