Here are my thoughts
Firstly, I understand that this sim is far from flawless.
Secondly, this post is coming from a professional aviator with 20+ years of experience.
If things were modeled and coded as they should be I can tell you that this is the way the sim should operate.
For startup:
Fuel cock on (obviously)
Magnetos ned to be both on, 1+2, the magnetos give the engine the fire it needs to combust the gas and air, these old planes did not have spark plugs. The magnetos keep the engine burning the combustible properly.
Mixture should be full rich, at sea level or close to there anyway, since we are not taking off from a field elevation of 5000ft there is no reason to lean the mixture until we climb to altitude, again I dont think this is modeled correctly in game; I have treid leaning the mixture at 3000m to try and get better performance, but it doesnt seem to do s@$% until u lean it off to the cut-out point.
The prop should be full forward or full fine, it doesnt really matter since the engine is just at idle power anyway. It really wont change prop RPM until you add mucho power (i.e. when u dive in a 109 or 110 u notice you have to pull the props back to avoid over-revving).
Radiators for start should be full open since you are not flying through the air generating any ram air flow to cool them. It doesnt matter too much until the oil warms up to take off temperature anyway.
Crack the throttle and hit the starter.
Climb:
For a real world climb you should climb at max prop for maximum thrust and best climb rate. Watch your oil and water temps and level out for a few minutes to cool them down if you have to. Leveling out SHOULD cool them down as you have more airflow going over the cooling fins.
Manifold/Boost pressure, climb at max until cruise or until you are limited by coolant temperatures.
Cruise:
pull the props back a bit to stay out of the red zone on the RPM gauges, you will hear the prop chage speeds especially in the 110's.
pull the Manifold/boost gauges back to saty out of the red zones.
Just watch your temperatures, close or open the radiators to keep a mid range temp.
Combat:
Full props and full throttle, radiators wide open. The only difference is the 109's and 110's. These props are fully manual and you will burn out the engines in less than a minute if you dont constantly change the prop pitch in dives and you will get crappy climb performance if you dont climb at full fine prop pitch. There is a relationship between aircraft speed and prop speed. You will notice that you cant develop maximum PROPELLER rpm until the airplane is flying fast enough to allow it ( as at roation from the runway), You will also notice that if you are flying too fast for your selected prop setting that you will over rev the prop ( as in a dive).
Basically you can run the props at full fine the entire flight as long as you dont go too fast, this is why we have a controllable propeller.
Also note this, the Spits and Hurris have Carburetters and are not fuel injected as the german planes are, what this means is that if you perfrom ANY negative G maneuver you will get an engine that struggles to stay alive, this may be the white or black smoke that you see, depending on altitude; IF the game is modeled correctly.
Another thing that is pretty cool in this game that I have seen is when you are in a Spit or a Hurri and you make a rapid throttle change you will see a puff of black smoke from the stacks; the carburettors have to deal with the rapid fuel input or rapid fuel starvation and you get mass burnoff of fuel or mass burnoff of air, pretty cool. The rest of the engine modeling could use some work.
The game is really good and have every confidence that it will get better with time just like the first days of IL2 2001.
Hope this helps
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