forgive me answering before MTN but i think the answer is that he is, at the moment of 46mph, not flying but moving through momentum. After years of practice you get a feel for how to throw the plane up and make it come down in a certain way.
Kind of like throwing a ball in the air and catching it. You have no influence after you release the throw, but you know exactly where it will come back down.
Thanks BatfinkV!
I'm working night shift this weekend, and have been all sorts of busy in between shifts too. I've had a chance to glance at the Forums, but not really to answer...
And yes, that's exactly what I would have posted myself, and that's a great analogy. The speed isn't "off" in the flim, I'm actually moving that slowly. But I don't have control at that point. I enter with enough speed, and just "coast" through the period where I'm waiting for my speed to come back up. So yes, Noah17, I was at 46mph for a moment, but
I entered that maneuver at 150mph...
In reality, I don't find anything less than about 120MPH very "useful" in the F4U (and 120 is even pretty useless). It stalls at just under 80, if I go nose up and try to "hang", I can get it down to just under 60, and I may occasionally "launch" myself on a trajectory that will allow me to coast through part of a maneuver very slowly (as you mentioned), but I'm not actually "under control" or making the airplane do anything while I'm that slow. As a matter of fact, if I try to control the plane at that point I very well may put it into something hairy and end up in the dirt (or shot). I've heard many claims about ultra-slow maneuvering by the hog, I even saw someone post something about being able to bring the nose up at 60mph for a shot, lol. In reality, I can't do it, and haven't even seen film of others doing it...
Here's an example of what happens when I get greedy, and try to make the plane do things I shouldn't when I'm slow. There's a big difference between "coasting" through a slow speed segment, and trying to aggressively maneuver through a slow speed segment.
http://www.mediafire.com/file/yqag4ygy2jz/Agent360 fun fight with stall_0001.ahf
I put the nose at a bad angle, and then tried to force the plane to maneuver for a shot (and then I tried to follow him as he passed under me, and that sealed the deal, in a bad way... A few seconds later, you can see I've learned from that mistake, and am much less aggressive in a situation that easily could have gone the same way. Patience is a virtue, right? Right around 1 minute in, I'm basically setting up for a BRD, but alter it as the situation dictates about 1/2 way through it, and I realize I have an opportunity to get less
defensive and more
offensive. I have no doubt that Agent would smack me silly if I made that mistake nowadays...
It's somewhat of a gamble to fly that way (getting slow), and I don't ever plan on that happening. I'll always keep my speed up in my fights if I can. On the other hand, all I ever fly is the hog, and I know the edges of it's envelope pretty well. One aspect to notice in the film is the "up and down" aspect of my flying. I'm NOT dropping flaps, leaving them out, and getting/staying slow. I'm also not going to be diving to the deck. But I want to time my "dodges" so that when I get slow and go nose-up, I'm doing it at an optimal time and angle to preserve my hide, but then I exit nose-down and get my speed back up quickly. Ideally, I'll be nose-up while he's nose-down, and come through my maneuver nose-down and on his six, so that I can accomplish two things at the same time (build speed and shoot, or build speed and pressure him, etc). I'm E-disadvantaged here, so if I'm going to lose E by maneuvering, I need the biggest return on my investment possible... Even if the fight gets to be on the deck, I'm still going to use every bit of "up/down" that I can. When that option is gone (if I'm still fighting), I'm in big trouble.
In this case I'm being pressured and need to do what's needed to mess up Ardy123's shot, survive his attack, and figure out a way to shoot him in the process. Those are the first priorities. In addition, I'm trying to get our fight headed further out into the water if I can, because that coastline was the border of a furball strip. It'll make my SA an easier task if I can separate us from the possibility of others joining in as well. Ardy lost here, but he's definitely a "handful" all by himself, and I don't want any other planes to join our fight.