What am I doing wrong with the spitfire ?

[Orpheus]

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

[Raven Morpheus]

Originally Posted by Viper2000

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]

Originally Posted by Raven Morpheus

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]

Originally Posted by RE77ACTION

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.

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.

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]

Originally Posted by 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.

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.

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.

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.

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...