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Old 03-16-2012, 06:47 AM
Luno13 Luno13 is offline
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My 2 cents:

If you pause at 0:47 you can see full aileron deflection, and at 0:39, the slip indicates full rudder.

It's important to remember that the A5M is extremely light with moderately large control surfaces. It's not 1 and 1/2 wings that it's flying on, but closer to 1 3/4 or even 1 4/5 (look at the break-point and realize that the eliptical shape of the wings means that a length of the tip has much less area than an equal length at another part of the wing.)

The upturned bit of metal at the leading edge probably contributed a great deal to its stability.

That's not to say that flying with this much damage isn't possible....It just takes a variety of specific circumstances to come together perfectly. Think of all the pilots who lost that much wing area and didn't make it back. Those are the ones that never appear in films.

Compare this to the Hurricane screenshot:

1) clean break of the wing. No protruding bits to influence roll.

2) Ailerons are small, and roll authority is sub-par to begin with, especially compared to the A5M

3) Considerably greater area of the wing is lost, including the entire right aileron (The A5M still had 1/2 of its left aileron).

4) Hurricane has no rudder or even fin left.

Conclusion: Hurricane should not be flying straight and level.