Well, without wishing to appear argumentative, I'm not so sure I would agree with some of Zapatista's comments. Firstly, the reference to the success of the Polish squadron seems to presuppose that the members of other squadrons set their convergence at much greater ranges. Is there actually any evidence to support this?
Secondly, the statement "a convergence setting is obviously not needed for nose canons, but i believe you could set elevation for some of these nose cannons on certain aircraft" worries me, in fact, I don't follow it at all. Most 109s , for example, had either 2 or 3 centrally mounted forward-firing weapons. These were comprised of a cannon of 15-30 mm (if installed) and two machine guns of either 8 or 13 mm. Because the trajectories of those weapons differ, to be effective, they will have to be harmonised to converge at a predetermined range. Even if you dispensed with the machine guns, you would still have to make a decision about what range you wished to sight your cannon for. Cannons, like MGs, have a trajectory, so the cannon must be adjusted to ensure it's projectiles fall through your line of sight at the desired range - rather than below it or above it.
fFnally, the advice concerning a selected aiming point: "aim at some specific vulnerable parts of the aircraft to be effective" worries me also. There's no doubt that from time to time a WW 2 combat pilot would have the luxury of aiming at the pilot or an engine or even the fabled 'petrol tank behind the pilot's seat' but in general, such precision shooting is completely unattainable under combat conditions - especially in twisting turning fighter on fighter engagements where high deflection angles are often involved. In these circumstances, just hitting the aircraft can be a small miracle let alone killing the pilot or shooting the tops off the spark plug leads.
On a related point, I am still at a loss to understand the separate convergence values that can be inserted in the loadout section of the sim for each weapon. If I select 200m for the horizontal value, how is it possible to insert say 500m for the vertical convergence value. If someone is able to explain how such a setting would be physically possible, I'd really like to know.
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10-06-2012, 10:29 AM
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