What am I doing wrong with the spitfire ?

[M_B]

In the campaign when you first get a spitfire and take her up for an initial practice, I notice that shortly after take off on full throttle the RPM falls sharply.

I do not have CEM selected. Also if I switch the auto pilot on, the rpm increases back immediately and then when I take over it immediately falls back.

Is there something I am doing wrong ?

[Ze-Jamz]

Thats a bug mate..i have it too

[reflected]

That's not a bug: the AI (managing your engine) sets the prop pitch to coarse. Early Spits had a 2 position propeller, fine pitch for takeoff, landing and combat, and coarse for cruising. I guess you should enable CEM and do it yourself in order to be more efficient ;)

[M_B]

That doesnt explain why the AI then switches it back when the autopilot is selected. Essentially it means you can't fly the spitfire with CEM left to the AI.

...unless there is a key to change propeller position that I haven't found yet.Or perhaps the AI changes it when enemy planes are spotted.

[kashwashwa]

That doesnt explain why the AI then switches it back when the autopilot is selected. Essentially it means you can't fly the spitfire with CEM left to the AI.

...unless there is a key to change propeller position that I haven't found yet.Or perhaps the AI changes it when enemy planes are spotted.

I came here to find out why my RPMs were dropping too... this seems like bad AI. It definitely didn't change the prop pitch when enemy planes were spotted when I've tried.

[41Sqn_Banks]

It is not allowed to change pitch to fine during combat. The only situations where fine pitch is allowed is takeoff and landing with throttle back (to be able to go around).

[DC338]

It is not allowed to change pitch to fine during combat. The only situations where fine pitch is allowed is takeoff and landing with throttle back (to be able to go around).

Rubbish

[plucka99]

I came here to find out why my RPMs were dropping too... this seems like bad AI. It definitely didn't change the prop pitch when enemy planes were spotted when I've tried.

So this plane is basically unplayable unless you use CEM, great.

[41Sqn_Banks]

Rubbish

AP 1590B Merlin II and III Aero-Engines:

Variable pitch (two-position) airscrew
352. The variable pitch airscrew control must be in the coarse pitch position for all flight conditions other than for take-off and when gliding in to land with the engine throttled; in these cases, the control should be in fine pitch in order to permit an emergency take-off if necessary. On no account should running up on the ground be done with the airscrew in the coarse pitch position.

[Viper2000]

There should be no problem provided that the rpm limits aren't exceeded; the engine doesn't know anything about the propeller; it only cares about boost, rpm and temperatures.

The chances are that for general flying, considering the 2600 rpm continuous limit, it would be difficult to operate in fine pitch other than at extremely low speed.

However, when using the combat concessions there should be no obstacle to using fine pitch provided that the combat limit of 3000 rpm is not exceeded. AP2095 is quite clear that in general limits are for the guidance, and may be disregarded in combat; it even starts going into some detail as to how far one might expect to push beyond them before really bad things happen.

It is also worth observing that the 3600 rpm dive concession was obviously provided for a reason.

I think that one of the biggest problems faced by a sim like this is that IRL the reason that you don't flog an engine beyond its book limits isn't for fear that it will fail on this sortie, but rather for fear that it will fail on the next one, or the one after that. A new engine with perhaps 100 hours of life assuming 50 sorties of 2 hours each with 5 minutes at combat power would have a safe life at combat power of at least 250 minutes, which is over 4 hours.

You'd probably run the tanks dry in less than an hour at combat power in most aeroplanes, so that means perhaps 4 sorties of rampant hooliganism, followed by substantial risk of failure from perhaps sortie 5 onwards.

Actually of course, early engines especially have takeoff power equal to or greater than combat power, so you probably get an extra minute per sortie built into the calculations, which would take you up to 5 hours of high power running.

Naturally exceeding the temperature limits could easily bring failure more rapidly, but the historical data suggests that cooling was probably less of a problem than our experience in the sim suggests, since the radiators of RAF aircraft at least were generally sized for the tropical climb case.

This means that if we combine realistic engine performance and reliability with the standard practice of giving people a brand new aeroplane each time they hit "refly", they really "should" be able to disregard the limits with reckless abandon.

For this reason, I think that it would be wonderful if an option to force people to fly a single aeroplane until it was either overhauled or shot down was provided, especially for online use (since I suppose it's probably already implemented offline in campaigns).

Otherwise the only way to make people treat their airframes and engines sensibly is to artificially reduce their tolerance of exceedances, which has the unfortunate side effect of making CEM much harder for novices than it would otherwise need to be.

[Orpheus]

Whatever happened to this? I don't want to use CEM, and I'm now in a spitfire in the campaign - I'm barely getting 120 out of the damn thing? Will this be fixed, cause it essentially breaks the campaign?

[Babi]

For this reason, I think that it would be wonderful if an option to force people to fly a single aeroplane until it was either overhauled or shot down was provided, especially for online use (since I suppose it's probably already implemented offline in campaigns).


Completely agree. not for the fast arcade servers, but with a difficulty option for those 128 players persistent online wars that were advertised with the game. Let the players have a complete repair of their aircraft every (insert number) hours of online flight. In this way respecting engine and structural limit would make sense.

[jimbop]

So this plane is basically unplayable unless you use CEM, great.

If you guys have enough buttons on your stick then map the pitch and radiator to some. I find pitch most important to be able to access quickly. It's really not that tricky to learn CEM despite what people like to say. I guarantee you'll get more out of the game if you do.

Having said that I hope the non-CEM settings are fixed since not being able to fly like an ace on these settings kind of defeats the purpose of them.

[Orpheus]

If you guys have enough buttons on your stick then map the pitch and radiator to some. I find pitch most important to be able to access quickly. It's really not that tricky to learn CEM despite what people like to say. I guarantee you'll get more out of the game if you do.

Having said that I hope the non-CEM settings are fixed since not being able to fly like an ace on these settings kind of defeats the purpose of them.

It's not so much whether we have the buttons or not, if they're anything like me they just prefer not to use the CEM. It's a whole other level of difficulty that some of us don't fancy yet, or at all. We shouldn't have to use it to get a flyable performance out of the Spitfire.

This has pretty much killed the GB campaign, as on my last attempt at a mission in a Spit, I couldn't catch up with the bombers! With the simple engine on (which worked fine with the Hurricane), it struggles to hit 200, sometimes as low as 120 with maxed throttle and level flight. That can't be right, surely?

[jimbop]

It's not so much whether we have the buttons or not, if they're anything like me they just prefer not to use the CEM. It's a whole other level of difficulty that some of us don't fancy yet, or at all. We shouldn't have to use it to get a flyable performance out of the Spitfire.

Yeah, I understand. That's exactly how I started playing IL-2. I really hope the non-CEM model is fixed soon. I think it will be - what's the point of driving new people away with this?

I soon realised that I'd have to bite the bullet (which I was doing far too often I'm afraid!) and just learn CEM. It's really not that difficult and it is a completely different game when you get the hang of it. Anyone who is planning on learning CEM at some stage shouldn't leave it too late. Bad habits can be hard to break...

Order of business IMHO: 1) ensure radiator is open to allow cooling; 2) learn how to trim the aircraft, especially rudder and elevator trim since most early fighters don't have aileron (a loose spring joystick helps here, cable ties are just great to reduce spring tension!); 3) keep an eye on the ball & slip indicator and trim with rudder to get true forward flight; 4) focus on prop pitch interactions with throttle to keep the boost pressure under control or risk the dreaded perforated water radiator.

[skouras]

Rubbish

actually hes right
the rolls royce suggest that back in 1940

[hockeywarrior]

This problem really needs to be fixed ASAP. Learning the ins and outs of complex engine management takes time -- something that I don't have a lot of. This bug essentially makes it impossible to fly a Spitfire in any useful way, which is a game-breaking bug if you're talking about the majority of players who aren't using CEM yet.

I totally plan to figure it out in the future, but in the mean time I expect this bug to be fixed so that the game is actually playable ...

[Orpheus]

This problem really needs to be fixed ASAP. Learning the ins and outs of complex engine management takes time -- something that I don't have a lot of. This bug essentially makes it impossible to fly a Spitfire in any useful way, which is a game-breaking bug if you're talking about the majority of players who aren't using CEM yet.

I totally plan to figure it out in the future, but in the mean time I expect this bug to be fixed so that the game is actually playable ...

Really hope so... I was enjoying the GB Campaign and was looking forward to getting in a Spit for the first time. Sucks to find out I can't continue playing until/if it's fixed - makes me wonder what everyone else is doing, why there aren't more reports of this as it literally breaks the campaign!?

[hockeywarrior]

Really hope so... I was enjoying the GB Campaign and was looking forward to getting in a Spit for the first time. Sucks to find out I can't continue playing until/if it's fixed - makes me wonder what everyone else is doing, why there aren't more reports of this as it literally breaks the campaign!?People are either unknowingly dealing with a severely underpowered Spitfire and aren't shooting anything down or are playing with complex engine management on and have spent the needed time to figure out how to do so without blowing up your engine every 5 seconds.

[SdS49r]

This is a Bug that needs to be addressed RIGHT AWAY. The hurricane flys great in the GB campaign but the spitfire is a dog. If the hurricane flys great without CEM then the spitfire should also. That seems pretty simple to me.
Why all this talk about CEM, prop pitch, rpms and engine management?? Seems like quite a few comments above just don't get it! It's broken and needs to be fixed. If not then the majority of us cannot complete the GB campaign. Am I right?

[Viper2000]

If you're stuck in coarse pitch you just need to fly faster to get decent rpm.

Once you get to operational altitude (>15000') then you'll find that it's no problem to get full revs in coarse pitch because the air density is lower, the engine is putting out more power anyway (closer to FTH ~ 16000') and your TAS is higher.

So really this only matters if you want to get into slow turning fights on the deck. In which case you're going to get yourself killed pretty rapidly anyway ;) . Actually it's probably quite a good learning tool because staying fast (say >200 mph IAS in 1940) is a very useful life skill.

Since there obviously won't be a fix until the next patch, and we don't yet know when that will be, don't forget that CEM isn't really that hard in a single seat fighter if you turn off overheating, especially if you don't have to fly for range; you just leave the mixture in rich, control rpm with the prop control and boost with the throttle. Trying, crashing, burning and learning is probably preferable to being grounded until the fix.

When you want more power, first increase rpm/go to fine pitch and then open the throttle.

If you've got a 2 position prop then remember your rpm limit, and don't change up if you're less than say 300 rpm below it (i.e. don't go into fine pitch in a Spitfire if you're getting more than about 2700 rpm in coarse pitch).

When you want less power, close the throttle first and then reduce rpm/go to coarse pitch.

[Actually it's not even that hard with overheating on because if in doubt you just open the radiator and accept the (relatively small) drag penalty.]

[Orpheus]

This is a Bug that needs to be addressed RIGHT AWAY. The hurricane flys great in the GB campaign but the spitfire is a dog. If the hurricane flys great without CEM then the spitfire should also. That seems pretty simple to me.
Why all this talk about CEM, prop pitch, rpms and engine management?? Seems like quite a few comments above just don't get it! It's broken and needs to be fixed. If not then the majority of us cannot complete the GB campaign. Am I right?

Yes, quite right.

@ Viper - thanks for the info. Until this is patched we seem to have no choice but to use CEM if we want to continue playing the GB campaign, as the Spit is virtually unusable in its current state. Really hope someone from the dev team notices this.

As for me, I'm giving up, for now at least. There have simply been too many problems with this game since release. The last patch made the game playable (after however many weeks of waiting, ffs), and to fire up the campaign (which I've been really looking forward to) and discover yet another game breaking bug in something so obvious as the main campaign is just too much. Until this is fixed, there's no point carrying on.

[mattag08]

I don't see what the problem is. While Coarse pitch is supposed to be for cruising, I just run fine pitch all the time with the radiator opened about 50% and no issues whatsoever. If anything needs correcting its the mixture control, it's completely broken. Auto-mix doesn't work above 10k ft and auto-weak just causes the engine to cut regardless of flight parameters.

[Orpheus]

I don't see what the problem is. While Coarse pitch is supposed to be for cruising, I just run fine pitch all the time with the radiator opened about 50% and no issues whatsoever. If anything needs correcting its the mixture control, it's completely broken. Auto-mix doesn't work above 10k ft and auto-weak just causes the engine to cut regardless of flight parameters.

We're not talking about the engine cutting out. We're talking about the fact that the Spitfire given to the player in the campaign cannot catch up with large bombers, or in fact anything moving faster than a milk-float. I've literally had a level flight, full throttle top speed of 120kph on some occasions, with no damage whatsoever. After take off, the CEM does something to the airspeed, reducing it dramatically - you can even hear the engine wind down once you're in the air.

The problem - since this seems to need restating - is that without using CEM, which not all players are comfortable with, the SP campaign becomes unplayable once you move to a Spitfire. While I appreciate the response/advice, the simple fact is that I do not WANT to use CEM, and I shouldn't have to in order to get usable performance out of the Spitfire. This problem breaks the campaign (and use of the Spitfire in general) for non CEM users and needs to be addressed in the next patch.

Maybe this needs a new thread entirely, one focused on the broken campaign issue, rather than Spitfire flight mechanics. It might get the issue noticed and prevent the offering of 'solutions' that involve using CEM.

[Viper2000]

The problem - since this seems to need restating - is that without using CEM, which not all players are comfortable with, the SP campaign becomes unplayable once you move to a Spitfire. While I appreciate the response/advice, the simple fact is that I do not WANT to use CEM, and I shouldn't have to in order to get usable performance out of the Spitfire. This problem breaks the campaign (and use of the Spitfire in general) for non CEM users and needs to be addressed in the next patch.

Maybe this needs a new thread entirely, one focused on the broken campaign issue, rather than Spitfire flight mechanics. It might get the issue noticed and prevent the offering of 'solutions' that involve using CEM.

I just tested this with CEM and overheating off in a Spitfire I. There is no bug.

You takeoff in fine pitch. After a short delay, Santa's little helper then puts the prop into coarse, and leaves it there for the rest of the sortie.

(In fact, if you land, the second you have weight on the wheels your little helper will even put the prop back into fine pitch for you so that you can takeoff again.)

The only difference between what I do with CEM on and what the helper does with CEM off is that if I end up getting slow then I might put the prop into fine pitch in flight. This is most helpful at low level due to the high air density; at operating altitudes above about 15000' you get quite a lot of revs in coarse anyway so the benefits are less and the risk of overspeeding is greater. I'd also put it into fine to help me slow down for landing, and to facilitate going around should it become necessary to reject the approach.

But I also might break my engine, so you pays your money and you takes your choice. You can't really have your cake and eat it with this stuff.

As far as performance goes, the aeroplane does what you'd expect it to do.

I was easily able to get to 260 mph IAS on the deck with full throttle but without the boost cutout. It takes a while, but that's the nature of the beast.

Climbing at 180 mph IAS I get about 2000 fpm.

Flat out at 17000' I get 270 mph IAS ~ 350 mph TAS.

At the end of the day, it's a Spitfire, not an F-22.

It's very pretty, but it isn't magic. If you don't fly it properly then it won't perform, irrespective of CEM. If I fly at the correct airspeeds then it performs well; If I don't then it doesn't.

Just be thankful that you can fly at 17000' without constant backfiring caused by a real bug. ;)

BTW, in other news Spitfire IIa is a lot faster with CEM off because you're getting 3000 rpm the whole time; I can get about 295 mph IAS flat out at 17000', which is getting on for 380 mph TAS; rather faster than I would expect.

[Orpheus]

Viper - saw your post and went off to test it. You're right about it changing the propellor pitch - I see the RPM drop from 2900 on takeoff to around 2400 at about 1200 feet and stay there, and after that the Spitfire accelerates/climbs like an absolute pig. I'm getting climb rates of around 110 mph, not 170, though that is low level after takeoff.

It's the difference between the two that's most startling. I tested the same in a Hurricane at 2000 ft and was getting a climb speed of around 170, rpm again in the 2900 region. Is this really just a quirk of the aircraft, or am I just flying it like a pillock? I had no trouble at all in the Hurricane, I assume because it doesn't have the variable prop?

Thanks for taking the time to check for me anyway. :) I realise I've repeated the same circular argument that the op began with, although I guess I now have a clearer understanding of the way the engines operate.

[Viper2000]

Viper - saw your post and went off to test it. You're right about it changing the propellor pitch - I see the RPM drop from 2900 on takeoff to around 2400 at about 1200 feet and stay there, and after that the Spitfire accelerates/climbs like an absolute pig. I'm getting climb rates of around 110 mph, not 170, though that is low level after takeoff.


Set full power.

Takeoff.

Clean up.

Then just stay in level flight until you're flying at 180-190 mph.

Now trim the aeroplane for constant IAS.

You should see a rate of climb just under 2000 fpm, which will improve as you get higher and the engine rpm increases.

If you're flying at 110 mph then you're doing it wrong; you've got loads of induced drag and performance will be terrible. Indeed, at full power if you pitch to 80 mph you'll find that it can't either climb or accelerate, because all the power is going into making turbulence.

The only time you should ever fly a Spitfire slower than about 170 mph IAS is for takeoff and landing.

[Orpheus]

Set full power.

Takeoff.

Clean up.

Then just stay in level flight until you're flying at 180-190 mph.

Now trim the aeroplane for constant IAS.

You should see a rate of climb just under 2000 fpm, which will improve as you get higher and the engine rpm increases.

If you're flying at 110 mph then you're doing it wrong; you've got loads of induced drag and performance will be terrible. Indeed, at full power if you pitch to 80 mph you'll find that it can't either climb or accelerate, because all the power is going into making turbulence.

The only time you should ever fly a Spitfire slower than about 170 mph IAS is for takeoff and landing.

Heh, yeah - you're right. Was up surprisingly late last night flying the spit in the GB campaign. I'm very new to these games but I do see it now. Not sure what IAS stands for, I assume something AirSpeed (but then I have trouble trimming to level flight in any single engine it seems, I can keep the nose down with the elevator trim but never overcome the pull to the right with rudder trim). At higher altitudes it's a different beast entirely, much faster acceleration overall.

Appreciate you taking the time to talk me through it. I knew when I bought this game it was going to have a deep flight model... just didn't expect the two planes to be so different! :) Only thing that's confusing me now is that said campaign spitfire doesn't seem to have tracers... or indeed any visible indication of bullet strike on enemy aircraft (or water, for that matter) at even the closest range - though I still get the 'player damage 98%' at the end of the mission, so I am hitting! Free flight spits have the tracers and bullet strike is obvious even at long ranges, so maybe it's just a bug?

[jimbop]

Indicated Air Speed. There's a good explanation of IAS vs True Air Speed in the manual.

[robtek]

No, imho it is just a different ammo-loadout with no tracers as the experts used.
No need to advise your enemy that you are sitting in his six and did miss him with the first burst.

[Orpheus]

I see it now, had my sight range way out of whack. Thanks again guys :)

[Raven Morpheus]

Set full power.

Takeoff.

Clean up.

Then just stay in level flight until you're flying at 180-190 mph.

Now trim the aeroplane for constant IAS.

You should see a rate of climb just under 2000 fpm, which will improve as you get higher and the engine rpm increases.

If you're flying at 110 mph then you're doing it wrong; you've got loads of induced drag and performance will be terrible. Indeed, at full power if you pitch to 80 mph you'll find that it can't either climb or accelerate, because all the power is going into making turbulence.

The only time you should ever fly a Spitfire slower than about 170 mph IAS is for takeoff and landing.


Apologies for bringing up an a month old thread but I am having this problem also.

In my case I take off as follows -

1. Start the engine.
2. Raise the throttle level whilst holding the brakes on.
3. I let go of the brakes to begin travelling down the runway.
4. I wait and let the tail come up then I pull back on the stick to get off the ground.

As others have said a short time after that when I am trying to climb the RPM drops and the Spit then refuses to climb and barely holds level, in fact if I let go of the joystick which I have to pull right back to maintain level flight, the plane pitches forward into a dive.

As noted it would seem the simple engine management does this as a change in the prop pitch. This I understand. But like others I don't wish to learn CEM as it's a whole other level of difficulty - and I am a complete novice and don't have the full realism on at all.

But I am slightly confused as to what to do about it if indeed this issue can be solved without resorting to using CEM.

Please could you explain in simple laymans terms how one does what you have described above in the game, as I said I am a complete noob and have no understanding of how to fly a plane, particularly what you mean by "Clean up" and how one trims the plane for a constant airspeed?

Also whilst on this subject does the game have a set ceiling for certain planes? I flew the Hurricane in some missions in the campaign against BF-109s and they were able to climb to a higher level than I could, the Hurricane would get to a certain height and then simply refuse to climb any further - is this a similar problem to the one experienced in the Spitfire?

Thank you.

[RE77ACTION]

Please could you explain in simple laymans terms how one does what you have described above in the game, as I said I am a complete noob and have no understanding of how to fly a plane, particularly what you mean by "Clean up" and how one trims the plane for a constant airspeed?



With "clean up" I think he meant pulling up landing gear and landing flaps when used at the start. These two will induce great drag.

Personally I would advice everybody to use and learn CEM after you are able to start, fly and land a plane. It's not that difficult to get the basics and it ads enormous to the overall experience and your/the planes performance. Pitch control is almost as essential as throttle control. This counts even more for the bombers and heavy fighters (think of modern road trucks with 16 gears).

[Raven Morpheus]

With "clean up" I think he meant pulling up landing gear and landing flaps when used at the start. These two will induce great drag.


Ah right, yes I see that, I don't actually have landing flaps down when taking off, and obviously I raise the undercarriage. Should I be using landing flaps on takeoff, I thought as the name suggests that they are for landing?

Mind you I have seen combat flaps mentioned in this and many of the threads here discussing "trim" and yet I can find no key binding for them and no mention of them in any of the options menus. :confused:

I have just tried some of Viper2000s advice (the bits I understand), maintaining a level flight until the IAS is over 180, and it does work, to a certain extent, but it makes climbing in the 2nd Spit mission to meet the bombers painfully slow and by the time I'm at any decent altitude (highest I've got the Spit to go so far is 6000ft) I'm well out of range of any enemy aircraft and the bombers have flown past a long while before.

As for using CEM, all I want is an accessible, but slightly more realistic than the likes of games like Blazing Angels, WWII flight game that I can pick up and play for a few hours here and there, adding CEM into the mix seems like it will over complicate things, and just looking through the key bindings it seems I need a couple of extra arms and a couple of keyboards to map and use all the controls required.

It's just too complicated for someone who wants to pick up a game and fly and take down bogies for a while.

And I don't recall having similar issues in IL-2 1946, although I will now go back and double check that.

Forgive me for discussing this though as I suspect it's all been said before, but I'm new to the forums and this Spitfire problem is rather frustrating, up until the switch to Manston the campaign had been rather enjoyable for me.

[RE77ACTION]

Making your aircraft fly straight at a certain speed with your hands off the joystick is called trimming. Most people do it once they are up to speed. But remember that every speed on every altitude needs its own trim to be perfect. Trimming the ailerons is not possible with a spitfire. This is why it wants to roll to the right most of the time. With the right combination of RPM and pitch this pull can be minimized but gives other drawbacks the same time.

Flaps can be used during take-off to limit the space needed to take-off. This can be useful on short runways and/or with heavy load. Some planes have special flap settings for combat, but most don't. You can use your landing flaps to make an extra tight turn. But the disadvantage is that your IAS (Indicated Air Speed) shouldn't be too high to prevent damage and that you come even slower out of a turn. However it can be useful in some situations. Using flaps in combat situations is typically for the more advanced players.

[Raven Morpheus]

Ah right OK. Thanks for the advice.

I believe I noticed some suggestions for trim settings in the previous pages of this thread, I will see if I can master setting those.

But basically it seems from what you have said I will spend all of my time trimming the aircraft more than anything else.

I was quite reasonable imo (probably not when compared to anyone else) in the campaign in IL-2 1946 and I flew a Spit in single missions a few times as I recall. Don't recall ever learning to trim a plane or needing to to get the planes to fly reasonably.

Mind you I always wondered why I always have to have my hands on the stick. I just assumed that is the way it was. :rolleyes:

I haven't noticed any "trim preset" key bindings, it's a shame that such a feature hasn't been included if it takes constant trim changes to fly in CoD on a pick up and play once in a while basis.

For the novices such as myself they would be very helpful. One for a features suggestion thread methinks (if there is one around here) along with the IAS and Altimeter on the HUD being put back.

[609_Huetz]

Just to clarify the flap thing a bit, on the Spitfire, the flaps do not serve the purpose of creating extra lift, they are there to create a high amount of drag and slow down the aircraft on the landing approach.

While in the original IL2, these flaps could be deployed in combat by tapping the button to lower/raise them, I strongly advise not to do that in CloD, since the lowering speed is correctly modled. That means they will come down to their highest position almost instantly, producing a lot of drag and burning precious energy. The only practical use for them in combat thus is using them to avoid an overshoot in a slow-speed scissoring fight.

It is however a totally different story on the Hurricane. When operating the lever on the bottom right side of the cockpit to down, you can actually select the angle of the flaps by simply moving the lever back to neutral at the desired setting, thus giving extra lift if used correctly. Use the indicator that is next to the lever to see where they are.

[RE77ACTION]

One more thing about the trim of your aircraft. If you don't like to trim your aircraft constantly, you don't have to. The only thing you have to accept then it that it doesn't fly completely neutral all the time. I myself like to trim my aircraft when flying the first straight after take-off. After that I make only minor adjustments during the mission.

If you fly this game with a joystick (which is recommendable), I suggest you change the key bindings when it comes to trimming. I personally use the up and down arrow for elevator, left and right for ailerons and delete and page down for rudder. This make trimming a lot easier compared to the default key bindings.

[Raven Morpheus]

One more thing about the trim of your aircraft. If you don't like to trim your aircraft constantly, you don't have to. The only thing you have to accept then it that it doesn't fly completely neutral all the time. I myself like to trim my aircraft when flying the first straight after take-off. After that I make only minor adjustments during the mission.

If you fly this game with a joystick (which is recommendable), I suggest you change the key bindings when it comes to trimming. I personally use the up and down arrow for elevator, left and right for ailerons and delete and page down for rudder. This make trimming a lot easier compared to the default key bindings.


Thanks.

I have the trim keys mapped to my keyboard as single keys. + and - for the elevator.

I tried trimming the Spit last night, and as you said it rolls right due to the aileron problem. So taking my hand of the stick is not possible. I tried it whilst looking at the map and moving it around, I ended up rolling right and going way off course...

But when I tried trimming the plane I noticed that there only seems to be 3 steps between -0.1 trim and -0.2 trim and -0.1 trim is not enough to achieve a level flight but -0.2 is too much, and none of the settings in between seem to work all that well either.

I spent more time correcting the dive or climb induced by trimming the nose down or up than I did anything else. I tend to "porpoise" anyway, if I'm interpreting that term correctly, if you looked at my flight from a side on view as a graph the line would by going up and down quite a lot.

Whilst I have to have my hands on the stick to correct the roll to the right characteristic (even the BF110 does that?!) I might as well use it to keep the plane in level flight on the other axis.

Last night after trying a few times to get the 2nd Spit mission done I decided to turn on CEM.

It actually doesn't seem all that difficult, in fact I didn't really do anything - I left the prop at 100%, the mixture at 100% and simply adjusted my throttle as and when I needed to. The RPM does seem to drop dramatically when I go to dive but then picks up again just fine. The Spit was also a bit faster, after a while, I got up to 270mph at around 7000 ft, Viper2000 talks about 15000 ft but the missions don't require that as the enemy planes aren't much higher than 6000 ft from what I can tell, especially the bombers.

The bombers in the 2nd Spit mission out of Manston still seem to outpace the Spit though, I thought bombers were slow and heavy but the He 111 seems like it's at least as quick as the Spit I'm flying if not quicker. But when you get up close to them they all of a sudden don't seem to be as quick. It is rather confusing. I can't catch them if they get away off into the distance but if I get close they're sitting ducks. :confused:

I ended up chasing them all over the London area and around North Weald and then out into the Channel whilst they carried out their flight path, took a few stragglers down but 7 got away. By the time I decided to break off and head for home the rest of the squadron had been landed for quite some time and would've been having dinner if it were real. :lol:

I am getting there. It's a shame the simple engine management works in the way it does though.

I still can't land a plane most of the time though, had the same issues in IL-2 1946, I tend to dig the nose into the ground, but that's probably best left to practice and another thread - I did manage to land the Spit on the 2nd campaign mission though, but the next one I buried the BF110 into the ground. :rolleyes:

Oh the joys of being a novice...

Many thanks for your advice.

[RE77ACTION]

Nice to see that you tried to use CEM. The basics aren't that difficult and your plane will (most of the times) fly better than without CEM, even if your settings are a bit off. It takes a bit of practice and reading to get the best out of CEM. But even for a novice it can be really worthwhile and fun. Once you get the hang of it, you will never go back.

Don't worry too much about your trim. Try trimming your plane once you're up to speed. And remember it will never be completely perfect. Besides, every change in speed, altitude, RPM, pitch and radiator will have influence. Sometimes it's good to make some corrections to your trim. But don't overdo it. With a plane like the spitfire, you have to accept you need to correct with your joystick almost constantly.

You also mentioned the BF110. This is one of my favorite planes in CloD and it's pretty easy to get an almost perfect trim. Trimming is not a real substitute for autopilot. However, I'm able to get it straight enough to pay a quick visit to the toilet or get a drink and find it still more or less on course when I come back.

Bombers can sometimes be really hard to get. Especially when they are flying with full throttle and higher than you are. Thereby, the Spitfire 1a isn't the fastest plane in a straight line. But luckily this isn't an arcade game where the enemy can fly unrealistic speeds. If you can't get an enemy, it's because the enemy has a faster plane, your settings aren't optimal or maybe a bug in the game.

Good luck and lots of fun! I think you are getting there... ;)