F4u-4 and F8F

[IceFire]

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

Perhaps it's related to gunnery accuracy, but many times I've been shot down (PK or engine fire) flying against planes equipped with single 0.30/5.62 mm flexible gun positions. Sometimes I've been stupid and have been making almost dead astern attacks without manuevering, but a few times I've gotten zapped while doing things properly and making head-on or high-side high deflection shots.

Also, it seems like light caliber guns are a bit too effective at getting control surface critical hits.

Of course, on the other hand, flying planes like the Ki-43 or Hurricane Mk I is a challenge due to their light armament. But, that's sort of realistic since it reflects a conscious armament decision by the planes' builders which didn't work out so well in reality.



Hmm. I thought that each bullet is modeled as an "arrow" which penetrates through the plane model, like in "arcade mode". If it intersects with a vital system, there's a chance for a "critical hit." If it hits armor, it gets slowed or blocked. That's about as realistic as you can get without modeling things like explosive shell/bullet bursts, bullet fragmentation, or deflection/ricochet effects.



Isn't this a problem with individual planes (especially the older ones) rather than a systemic problem? Since I haven't looked at the DM for the various planes I don't know.

The problem with the Japanese guns is twofold:



Strange. You'd think that the US military would have collected this sort of information. They did pretty extensive testing of just about every weapon they captured.



Strange, since it's at least possible to get ballistic data for Japanese weapons.

So you're probably talking more about turret gunners which used to badly suffer from and still have some slight issues with being oddly accurate. These days TD has made them much less accurate to the point where its much more realistic... they still make the odd shot that you can either count as lucky or impossible. But this is a different story than normal gunnery as the bullet is hitting some of the vulnerable sections of the plane... the engine, the cockpit, etc. The heavy machine guns in particularly would be devastating and control damage is just the sort of thing that you might expect from bomber firing at you as you hover near their six.

I use the 109 as an example but yes this problem is pervasive with all planes. Some systems are modelled. Others are simply not. Every single bullet fired is calculated and tracked and when they hit an aircraft it is possible for them to hit a subsystem... absolutely. The DM system for IL-2 was, in its day, very good. The problem is that some systems don't exist in the model... the radiator systems for example. So even when you put a .50cal through that sub section you aren't doing all that much damage as there's nothing to hit.

The machine guns do structural damage too but not like the explosive rounds on the cannons. So IL-2's damage model is largely biased towards heavy cannons in my experience... this is something I'd consider general knowledge amongst the veterans in particular. It has gotten better... if you only started playing 2-3 years ago then you haven't seen what we used to have to deal with

If the US did collect information on Japanese weaponry its not easily recovered. I haven't been able to find it on any web resources anyways. The best I've found is a site with some of the individual shell details but not enough to reconstruct the guns accurately.

[horseback]

Originally Posted by pandacat

WD is whistlingDeath. Not sure if you know him. My PP control is +/- 5% increment. What about you? Btw, do you fly F4F? Does wildcat have similar powerbands?

Know of him in a vague way; the name sounds familiar, possibly from the old Ubi forums.

I use a CH Throttle Quad for prop pitch, radiator, mixture and flaps (it does not increment in small enough bits to be useful for trims in my opinion). I still have a couple of buttons assigned to 'increase PP' and 'decrease PP', but I rarely use them, except to top off my full prop pitch when the axis doesn't go all the way up to 100% (it sometimes will stop at 98% with the lever all the way forward). I doubt that 5% increments would be as effective, but give it a try and see for yourself young padawan...

All aircraft engines have a powerband and the F4F's is similar to the rpm range in the Corsair and Hellcat's, but the Wildcat in-game is sluggish and overweight (not unlike the real thing), and in it, your best protection from the Emperor's Sea Eagles is to keep your altitude advantage as selfishly as possible, develop a good wingman relationship with somebody, learn to use the Thach (not 'thatch'--it's named after a great fighter leader & tactician, not a basket) weave, maintain good comms with your wingman and work to become a good shot. Those were the actual advantages the US Navy and Marine Wildcat pilots used to nullify the Zero, and by the time the Corsair had replaced the F4F in the Solomons the Wildcat owned about a 1.2 to one kill advantage over the Zeke in fighter to fighter combat.

Oh, and don't bother with the FM-2 in-game; it's not remotely the fighter that the real life 'wilder Wildcat' was. It seems even worse to me than the F4F-4, if that is possible. On the plus side, it moves back to the 4-guns arrangement with longer firing time.

cheers

horseback

[IceFire]

Originally Posted by horseback

In my experience, any gun is going to be underpowered if I'm the one firing it...and if it is being fired at me, then it is undoubtedly overpowered.

I recently was re-reading Fire In the Sky, by Eric Bergerud. In it, he mentions that the Zero's cannon were originally license built MG-FFs. If they were slower firing than the German models, he doesn't say, but the LW moved exclusively to MG151/20s pretty quickly when it became possible. I seem to recall from possibly other sources that later 20mm cannon models the Japanese used were literally scaled up Browning designs, identical to the US M2, just bigger. I recall that the display at the National Air & Space Museum in Washington DC certainly reflected this.

In any event, the Japanese had issues with their cannon having very different ballistics and trajectory from their light machine guns, and found that the cannon were less effective in their favored close-in maneuvering combat; it seems that the cannon rounds often went somewhere different from the MG rounds if you fired during high-G turns (they were slower firing and <probably> started firing a fraction of a second later than the MGs).

cheers

horseback

So you're actually talking about two weapons there

The Type 99 used by the Japanese Navy is derived from the Oerlikon FF of which the MG-FF is also derived. So they share a similar parentage but with some unique attributes of their own. The biggest difference here is that the Germans used the Mine shell ammunition whereas I don't think the Japanese did... using AP and HE rounds in some sort of combination.

The Browning .50cal scaled up into a cannon is the Japanese Army Ho-5 20mm cannon which was probably the best of the Japanese cannons used in the war. This cannon is actually modelled in IL-2. How well I'm not sure... but it is present in the game files. You'll find it on the Ki-84 and Ki-100.

The Japanese Army and Navy were highly independent structures sharing very little in the way of aircraft and aircraft armaments so there is a huge long list of machine guns and cannons... of which very few are represented in any capacity in IL-2 1946. There is even a variety of different guns used in IL-2 1946 that were chosen to represent the missing guns... the same gun is represented by the MG17 in the nose of the Zero and the Vickers K in the nose of the D3A Val and the Browning .30 in the nose of the Ki-27 and Ki-43. It's a mess!

[Laurwin]

Ouch just had a bad game vs those late war Japanese monster planes (including infamous heavy cannon 30mm ki84).

What could i have done differently in corsair-d?

Well we were using " kinda " bnz tactics. More like vertical aand horizontal turnfighting to be honest.

I got couple kills and couple share-kills.

Then i died making a pass at a betty bomber g4m. I should have dropped to his low six to avoid rear gunner I think, it doesnt have a botton gunner rite?

But even those kills against japanese monster ac could still be made with bnz, and keeping energy high. Also perhaps, corsair might have advatage at higher alt? (we were low-med alt)

Gunnery is more difficult.imo, with CONGESTED NAVY GUNSIGHT. I mean you can hardly see thru it, where the.bandit actually is flying to. I always liked p-47-d-27 gunsite more.

So mainly enemy acs were ki84 30mm, and j2m raiden. I could have taken p38 L but ive heard that its quite bad vs those ki84s (i remember bigsilverhotdog made video he said p38 is outclassed - defensive choices video)

[IceFire]

Originally Posted by Laurwin

Ouch just had a bad game vs those late war Japanese monster planes (including infamous heavy cannon 30mm ki84).

What could i have done differently in corsair-d?

Well we were using " kinda " bnz tactics. More like vertical aand horizontal turnfighting to be honest.

I got couple kills and couple share-kills.

Then i died making a pass at a betty bomber g4m. I should have dropped to his low six to avoid rear gunner I think, it doesnt have a botton gunner rite?

But even those kills against japanese monster ac could still be made with bnz, and keeping energy high. Also perhaps, corsair might have advatage at higher alt? (we were low-med alt)

Gunnery is more difficult.imo, with CONGESTED NAVY GUNSIGHT. I mean you can hardly see thru it, where the.bandit actually is flying to. I always liked p-47-d-27 gunsite more.

So mainly enemy acs were ki84 30mm, and j2m raiden. I could have taken p38 L but ive heard that its quite bad vs those ki84s (i remember bigsilverhotdog made video he said p38 is outclassed - defensive choices video)

The Ki-84, particularly given the modelling that it has in IL-2, holds all of the cards against the Corsair except for durability and by the amount of firepower it can carry around. The Ki-84 as modelled assumes best operating condition and so it has a higher top speed, better climb rate, better turn rate, similar roll rate, etc. The J2M3 is the same and basically holds all of the same advantages.

The Corsair can soak up a lot more damage than both of these and it can carry a hell of a lot more weaponry for ground attack but as far as fighter vs fighter it is outclassed. If the Ki-84 had an additional version modelled assuming frontline conditions the performance difference would be much less... but the Ki-84 is an exceptional fighter.

Note the Ki-84-Ic with 30mm cannons may have never even seen combat so this isn't a purely historical match either. With the 30mm cannons he goes from owning the battle to domination in a 1 v 1 situation.

Your best bet is to take additional time to climb to a position of advantage and use sweeping attacks in a coordinated fashion. With energy advantage you can force him to evade and with team tactics you can ensure that no matter what way he breaks there will always be a Corsair in firing position. One or two glancing hits near the wing roots and his fuel tanks will light on fire. The J2M3 is a smaller target and a little bit tougher but no less vulnerable so exploit their weakness in toughness and make sure you can get some rounds on target.

Also the F4U-1C is probably your best option Corsair wise against these top level Japanese fighters. The four 20mm cannons will explode them rapidly.

Also the P-38L Late with the extra boost on the engines is actually a decent option. It'll be faster than both at most or all altitudes... it suffers by being a big target and somewhat less agile but if you're very good with the P-38 then you can manage your energy well and out perform them. The P-51 would be a more solid match here as well.

[Pursuivant]

Belting info for the Atukan Zero:

http://www.lonesentry.com/articles/t...o-fighter.html

[horseback]

CONGESTED NAVY GUNSIGHT

You may now lower the brightness of the gunsight displays by assigning a key or button to increase or decrease the brightness. The USN sight does take a little getting used to, because the center dot isn't larger or more pronounced in any way, BUT it stands higher in your forward windshield above the cowl line, and once you get used to it, all those little lines and dots permit you to estimate angles and lead much more easily than that single dot hanging in the center of the circle. You can make higher deflection shots with your target still in your field of vision, which was what US Naval fighter gunnery doctrine was all about.

I find that the ai are quite good at changing direction the microsecond they disappear behind your aircraft's nose, even the stinkin' bombers; they can't do that nearly as easily against you in a Corsair or Hellcat, and it is even harder for a human pilot flying 'full real' to anticipate an opponent's firing solution that way in any case.

The only thing I have to say about the late-war IJN and IJA fighters' FMs is that they are BULLS**T, two parts imaginary and one part assuming that the 'factory figures' of the actual aircraft could ever have matched the basic production quality we assume for Allied aircraft, or had the fuels and competent maintenance available to the Allies at any point during the war. It's about 'gameplay' and symbolically sticking a thumb in the eye of that certain US defense company Who Shall Not Be Named instead of historical accuracy.

cheers

horseback

[pandacat]

Horseback, going back to PP and CEM questions. I tested it on F4F-3, going 95%to90% does get a higher speed, especially with a little nose down attitude. However, it only works on a certain altitude. I remember hearing someone say different altitude has different PP settings. The learning curve is pretty steep in the field of CEM. Wanna set up a new thread to discuss PP and throttle settings in more details?

[Laurwin]

Originally Posted by horseback

You may now lower the brightness of the gunsight displays by assigning a key or button to increase or decrease the brightness. The USN sight does take a little getting used to, because the center dot isn't larger or more pronounced in any way, BUT it stands higher in your forward windshield above the cowl line, and once you get used to it, all those little lines and dots permit you to estimate angles and lead much more easily than that single dot hanging in the center of the circle. You can make higher deflection shots with your target still in your field of vision, which was what US Naval fighter gunnery doctrine was all about.

I find that the ai are quite good at changing direction the microsecond they disappear behind your aircraft's nose, even the stinkin' bombers; they can't do that nearly as easily against you in a Corsair or Hellcat, and it is even harder for a human pilot flying 'full real' to anticipate an opponent's firing solution that way in any case.

The only thing I have to say about the late-war IJN and IJA fighters' FMs is that they are BULLS**T, two parts imaginary and one part assuming that the 'factory figures' of the actual aircraft could ever have matched the basic production quality we assume for Allied aircraft, or had the fuels and competent maintenance available to the Allies at any point during the war. It's about 'gameplay' and symbolically sticking a thumb in the eye of that certain US defense company Who Shall Not Be Named instead of historical accuracy.

cheers

horseback

What convergence would you use with corsair/hellcat?

I've done ok at 300m with P-47 and mustang, but the gunsight is just... shall we say hard to adjust with the navy planes LOL.


I guess really close, you would blast zeke easily (and slightly tougher KI84 N1K2 etc...), with a closer convergence - like 150-200m.

[horseback]

Originally Posted by pandacat

Horseback, going back to PP and CEM questions. I tested it on F4F-3, going 95%to90% does get a higher speed, especially with a little nose down attitude. However, it only works on a certain altitude. I remember hearing someone say different altitude has different PP settings. The learning curve is pretty steep in the field of CEM. Wanna set up a new thread to discuss PP and throttle settings in more details?

Try taking it all the way down to 80%; the F4F is generally sluggish unless you're getting salt spray on your windscreen (at which point 120%/Full Rich Mixture will help keep your engine cooler), but many aircraft benefit from starting in low gear and gradually shifting to a higher gear for sustained speed and run still keep temps below overheat.

I had a thread that centered on acceleration tests the last three or four months; a lot of useful information can be found there, and if you can find the Pilot's Notes for the Martlet or F4F somewhere, there will be some Good Stuff there too. Simply put, though, the Wildcat was a classic case of the underpowered fighter. It's too heavy for the horsepower it has (and the FM-2, which was over 500 lbs lighter and had an extra 200 horses below 20K ft PLUS being that little bit aerodynamically cleaner simply doesn't have an FM that reflects that). According to America's Hundred Thousand, the Wildcat was pretty low drag but that little R-1830 wasn't enough for serious performance (and an R-2800 was almost two years off).

The Bearcat, which was the ultimate expression of the R-2800 powered fighter, looks a lot more like an FM-2 with a cut down rear fuselage and a bubbletop than it does like a refined Hellcat to me.

cheers

horseback