Holtz. I don't know exactly if your saying Airspeed should be limited by compressibility, or if your saying at which Compressibility actually becomes noticeable to causing a runaway dive / increasing speed / decreasing control.
Or are you meaning loss in engine performance? Cause your right, its going to decrease performance, but in a dive, your still going to increasing speed from the simple physics of gravity, only acceleration would be affected. But it won't act like a "Dive Break," that's how I see you trying to explain it.
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Originally Posted by 6S.Manu
Anyway I don't think the elevator authority issue was about TAS or IAS: it was modelled like a loss of control surface effectiveness instead of a simple stick heavyness...
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Thats pretty much correct. TAS / IAS really isn't the issue. From my understanding (8 years real pilot, however no real experience in this area other than study, and never will because I'm not a test pilot and testing this can be suicide) TAS / IAS compressibility affects don't slow down the aircraft / reducing speed of dive capabilities.
The real key to compressibility stall is the atmospheric conditions via what altitude your at. Higher alt= less dense air. I say this from the fact that most stories I've read about WW2 compressibility stalls, they always start out with the pilots typically above 25,000 ft. They get into a dive, and as they go faster the laminar flow of the high alt / less dense air around the wings and control areas is so reduced to the point that the pilot looses control / has a runaway dive. At which point the only thing they can do is chop power, but your speed is still going to increase because your diving.
Your only able to regain control of the aircraft when it decreases down to denser air density returning laminar flow to the aerodynamics of the aircraft. However by this time your either A) Going so fast and theres no return of laminar flow that controlability doesnt return. B) The aircraft begins or already has broken up from structure failure of approaching the speed of sound.
There is one story I remember reading about Robin Olds, in a P-38. Started a dive at bomber escort alt (think 30,000 range) Got into a compressibility stall and literally didn't pull out of it till a few 100 ft above the ground. The P-38 is one of the most notorious WW2 aircraft with this aerodynamic design problem.
But seeing as most aircraft in CLOD at the moment are not modeled correctly above 18,000, I see it as only being a miniscule problem till this is fixed, then worry about compressibility FM problems.