Agent, I'm going to suggest that you try this offline, with E6B open the whole time. You will find that your air speed is much higher than 80 mph, probably in the range of 115 mph.
MA comparisons invariably are greatly effected by the inability of the vast majority of pilots to get the best turn performance out of their aircraft. If, for example, you are chasing a Spit8 which pulls into a constant left turn, but panics when the stall horn so much as hints at noise, you will out turn him every time.
However, if the Spit pilot is a good stick, he will reef the Spit around hard and turn on WEP. If you try to stay in that circle with a 109K-4, the Spit will fly around the circle and be on your six in less than 4 full turns.
I will also state that every other 109 will turn smaller circles than a K-4 and do it at lower speeds. Indeed, the 109G-2 doesn't need more than a notch or two of flaps to out-turn the K-4, even if the K-4 has full flaps out. That's in left-hand turns. In right-hand turns, the K-4 suffers worse from torque than the G-2 and it's even easier for the G-2 to gain on it.
Of course, seeing is believing, so stop by the TA any evening mid week (after 9 PM Eastern) and we can do a demonstration.
Where the 109s do well is in turn rate. An example is the 109F vs the F4U-1. The Corsair turns smaller circles, but the 109F has a faster turn rate and can hang onto the F4U like glue.
All of the above aside, whatever you are doing is obviously a great success, and nothing succeeds like success.
My regards,
Widewing
Sorry for the war and piece novel but I can't really further explain wihout a lot of words. Sorry.
Widewing,
You are right on with everything said here. As far as the airspeed goes your right to a certain point. But I have been in turns as slow as 50 mph like this. But only because the target is getting that slow. Some will cut throttle hoping for an overshoot in the flat turn and when this happens I do as well. A very controlled small yo-yo can keep me there at these speeds as the K4 can still climb when the spitty can't atleast not without giving me a kill shot.
I am only speaking about the 109k4 specifically.
I knew when I made my post that I would get some diagreement. HEHEHE.
How one enters this turn is important. Just diving in and attempting this kind of turn in a k4 won't work. One has to "get there" in other ways. Mainly after a 1v1 merge. The fight ensues. Angles are gained in the verticle. We turn close. A few gun passes happen. The spitty makes a mistake trying to make a gun solution in the vert and cant make it. I then turn this mistake into a "i got your six and you can't get away" situation. At this point we are very slow on the deck with me inside 200 perhaps even inside 100 but can not bring guns onto the turning spit. Usually it happens that I come out of the verticle roll after stalling at the top and chase the spit down into a hard breaking left hand turn. I am able to catch the spit coming down but he can not get away because I am faster at this point ( in the 200 mph range). I usually have to cut throttle some here because I am nose down. My goal is to get slow enough to drop all the flaps and keep wep on. By now I am closing fast on the spit and he is now breaking hard to left.
The situation is now primed for this kind of turn. It is important to note that I must be very very close. Inside 200 and pulling pure pursuit (gun sight on target) but can't pull enough lead for a hit. But I am very close. The spit has no options now. If he does anything besides keeping out of my guns its going to be a kill shot.
At the point where I am coming down and tracking for a shot I have alt over the spit by a few hundred feet. This allows me to keep faster but below 200 so I can get flaps out. This is allowing me to gain angles and get inside his turn by only a small amount. If I go for guns now and miss then the spit can easily reverse me so I don't do that. I stay behind him patiently waiting for the nose dip which will force him out of the hard turn and make him loosen it some.
If anything happens to cause me to loose this position like a wing stall or terrain then the spit will get angles immediatly and I will have to go vert.
The key thing is catching the spit slow and forcing a hard stalling turn to the left (keeping everything left for explanation but I can do it to the right as well). In fact its a little easier to the right because the torque doesn't keep pulling the nose down and I dont have to use rudder so much.
Although the spit does technically have a better turn radious that doesnt end the story. The K4 has the pure beastly power to still maneuver here.
Ok, now I have this little spitty all out of E stalling in the turn and struggling to keep the nose up to prevent hitting the ground. He is just pulling as hard as possible with me so close I could chop off his tail with my prop but can't get the lead for the shot.
I now have all flaps out with wep on and we are now in a totally flat turn. The spitty is just turning hard trying to stay out of my guns.
If I maintain perfect control of my plane without any wing dips I can stay with the spitty almost indefinitly. But after about the third rotation the spitty always has to roll out a few degrees to keep from hitting the ground. When this happens it gives me the angle to pull the lead and make the shot. During the tail chase I must keep my plane at least a full wing span ABOVE the spitty. I can not get totally even. This is to say I need to be about 15 degress angle off HIS tail to the top. Any dropping below his tail will put me into an overshoot situation and allow the spitty to reverse and get out of the guns solutions.
The KEY is the airspeed in which we enter the flat turn. IF the spitty is not totally out of E and can maintain speed I can only stay here for mabey one reveloution before he starts gaining my six.
It is the pure power of the K4 that allows me to fly with all flaps out and still keep up and stay with the spit. In contrast if you try this in a G2 you won't have the airspeed or power to do this. YOu will have a better turn with the G2 but that aint gonna cut it if its a spit 16. 109's have a lot of WEP. I would say that when I do get into the flat turns their wep is gone. If they have wep left and I am not close enough then it could go either way depending on my closure rate.
One final note with regards to airspeed in this scenario. I can and do fly like this at 60 to 80 mph. But this is because I am tapping the rudder and at times side slipping some while riding the nose high to keep the angle off tail I will need later for the shot. So I am flying the plane "dirty" on purpose to reduce the airspeed further but only in relation to my target. I will correct my flight path as needed depending on how tight the turn is getting.
Also any slight hills or trees that get in the spittys way will cause him to alter the flat turn and again this is when the kill shot comes.
In regards to "Ace sticks". At one point or another my squaddies have taken me up on the flat turn challenge and I have stayed behind them. This was more of a test of turning skills then a fight. But fighting really good sticks like this wont't work to well unless you just have there six with absolutly no enery. Most good stick just won't let you get them in this situation to start with.
Agent360
