Flight speed
 

Awh,

TBH i've not yet recived my brand new Joystick i orderd but it's coming up next week, anyway when flying all kinda planes online others always seem to go faster than me, it's abit tricky controlling everything with keyboard anything i might missed of which affects speed quite a bit?

* Propswitch im using
* 110% on engine etc if necessary
* Using the right planes (fast ones)
* Flaps
* Gear up (etc all obvious stuff im no noob really)

Been awhile but just got back into IL2 world last week when i orderd 1946 again :D, so adjusting everything :P.

Appericate any answears
// happy hunting - virre89

Flying fast is really a much more complex subject than one might think, obviously the aircraft is important but other factors include trim, radiator flap settings, boost, Engine RPM, altitude, attitude, energy state and more.

"Tips" will seldom get you anywhere in this game, indepth knowledge of the aircraft and how they work and how they compare to each other will. That and practice..........

To that end I suggest looking up some of the excellent guides available online, Mission 4 Today has many of them available, the "Nuggets guide" can be found on UBI forums, and you can even study the actual aircraft and how they were flown during WWII.

Nothing, but nothing can replace experience though, getting together with and flying with more skilled pilots is the best way to learn (and live long enough to learn something).

P.S. The stick will help a lot.

If you compare yourself to other people flying online, well, that is always a bit tricky. Most experienced pilots use Boom and Zoom tactics, which means they gain altitude, then drop down on a target, of course increasing speed a lot, then fire and pull up, using the speed (also called "energy") to climb up fast again.

Naturally these are a LOT faster than you.

As BadAim mentioned, there are also a few things to experiment with.
Trim for example counters the momentum of the engine, which constantly turns and slips your aircraft in a way, that you have a much larger drag. Trim counteracts these effects. Especially rudder-trim is very useful here.

You should also note, that some planes have an extra-boost. They use different techniques, but the principle is the same: Inject a chemical into the engine to boost the power. You can press "W" to enable or disable this one, but not all aircraft have those.

Another large influence is the radiator. You can press "r" to open or close it on most planes. Of course the more open the radiator, the slower you are. If you close it or use a low setting (2 or 4), you can usually go a lot faster, but your engine will overheat quickly.

Proppitch is a bitch. It can help you on a lot of planes and it can totally ruin your performance on others, especially since you constantly have to adjust it to your maneuvers in a fight.

Thanks alot guys :),

I've been flying alot lately trying to learn from the good fellas, btw the ZOOM and BOOM guys as you call them are not the issue (aware of how aircrafts behave etc in real life and so depending on diving etc), but the guys when i go in a straight line always catch up with me :P.

But i'll try experimenting abit more with the things you just told me and i'll be picking up my stick tomorrow hopefully it will get me set in the right direction.

It's most likely lack of a stick, you can loose a lot of speed when you are having to make constant little adjustments to fly straight (as you must be with a keyboard). Even with a new player and a vet player with the same equipment the vet will fly faster in a straight line due to a steadier hand on the stick.

^^,

I've recived my stick now it's an Saitek Cyborg Evo.
Unfortunaly it didn't come with software but it worked just as well to download and install, it's calibrated and windows can see it, i can also use all buttons etc in the tests.

The problem is that IL2 Sturmovik dosn't find it at all, i get no reaction what so ever and attempting to set the controls i notice right away the game has no detection of the Joystick what so ever and i don't know why. :(

That is quite odd. Did you go into setup and make sure the joystick box is checked?

Thnx bad aim lol, i forgot that -_-.
Man flying with Jopstick adds another dimension but still im not going anywere close as fast as anyone else online (both noobs and pros rly) so it feels like im missing somthing important.

How much does stuff like -> Mixture , Propswitch , Superchargers etc play into airspeed?
I've commonly used Flaps as combat does it make a huge difference if going flaps raised?

Will keep playing around now :P thnx for any futher advices guys.

altitude=speed, turning hard takes away speed

You need the drivers.
Check the Download section at Saitek

They have the drivers, the SST profile manager and the manuals there. Best get everything and install the drivers and the SST. Unplug the stick before installing. The installer will tell you when to plug it in.
You need to assign the axis in -game in the "Controls"under the HOTAS section. You can assign the buttons there as well.
Also setup a profile for each axis under Hardware - Input in-game. (select all axis one by one and define the sensitivity with the sliders or with the number boxes below them.

Definitely flaps up for speed, you only really want to use flaps to increase lift at low speed (like dogfighting and takeoff) and to lower the stall speed and slow the plane (like landing) you will essentially never want to lower flaps over 300kph (more like 250)

The rest of the stuff is pretty aircraft specific (and pilot specific). You really need to experiment with the different planes for what works best for you.

That said, heres some general stuff to get you started:

Mixture; generally 100% will get you max power. Many planes benefit from 120% down low, usually below 1000 meters (some even lower) experiment if it's to much the engine will smoke, run rough and you'll lose manifold pressure (even if you don't get a boost in speed a richer mixture will help keep the engine cooler)(don't forget it uses more fuel too). As you increase altitude you may need to lean the mixture out on some planes, again look for rough running, smoking and low manifold pressure.

Supercharger: There are specific altitudes for specific settings on individual planes (these can be found in the various readme's and there are some charts out there), but as a rule of thumb if you start loosing power and manifold pressure, it's time to hit the next stage. You should be rewarded with a jump in pressure and more "breath".

Prop pitch: Again like with mixture, 100% will usually get you max speed and power, but some planes seem to like a bit slower engine speed in level flight. I've think, for instance many of the Japanese planes are a bit faster at 95%-97% (cutting back on RPM's definitely keeps the engine cooler). Check it out. Cutting back to 60%-70% will save fuel and keep the engine cooler for cruising. (BTW "prop pitch" ingame equals engine RPM for most planes, the only exception I know of is the bf 109)

Radiator: generally opening the radiator flaps cools the engine more, but slows the plane down. This is VERY individual the the specific craft though so experiment and ask people who fly a given plane what they use.

Trim: Keep your ball centered! side slip is an enourmous speed killer. If you are trying to keep up with planes ahead of you, keep your nose down! don't put your gunsite on a climbing plane and expect to catch it, you want to about split the difference between level flight and climbing straight at the lead plane. (really) Remember; nose up, plane goes slower, nose down plane goes faster.

If you are being chased by an enemy you really have to know the two planes relative strengths to be effective. If your in closely matched planes use careful plane and energy management to open the distance. If you have an advantage you can pit against a disadvantage in the other craft by all means use that. Say your plane climbs better than your opponent, then try to manouver out of gunrange (if you can get him to burn up some E, so much the better) then slam right into a hard climb. You might be able to sucker him into fight where you have a big hieght (and therefore Energy) advantage and he is nearly stalled.

I have to go to bed now :) Chew on that for a bit and I'll look in later. Happy hunting.

Thank you :),
I've gotten a better understanding of how i can catch up speed with different aircrafts now, it's also abit dependable on which one there is since their all very different.

Now just practicing circle dogfight ;):cool: